Chromeo, oh

One of the purposes of this blog is to showcase some of the funky music that I listen to, and that I think you should listen to as well. So welcome to the first of my artist showcases, and who else could it be for the first one but Chromeo, probably my favourite act right now.

Chromeo are you one of those odd cases where I only got into them after seeing them live, but it was actually much later. I saw them at a rainy festival in 2008, and the only reason I was in the tent was to shelter from the rain. I didn't really pay them any attention, and so they didn't really make much of an impression on me at the time - in fact all I can remember is the keyboards with legs. It was probably another year or two before I stumbled across them on Spotify and as I recognised the name I gave them a go, and was hooked.

There's something about them that I just love. It's the kitsch 80s retro, the squidgy synths, the vocoders, but more than anything they just make great, catchy disco music. I also like that they don't seem to take themselves too seriously, it's fun music for fun times. The kind of 80s retro synth style that they specialise in is so dated and cheesy that its cool again, and they've nailed it. Here's a couple of their highlights...

After failing to pay attention to them when I saw them live the first time around, I've been itching to see them ever since I discovered them properly. I managed to miss them at Glastonbury a few years back (due to excessive mud I think), and watching them on Bestival highlights in a year I didn't go only strengthened my determination. But finally, late last year that day arrived. I don't go to many gigs these days, but I'm glad I went to this one, in a tiny club in East London on a week night. Non stop songs that I loved, and about 3 rows from the front. Here are some of the startlingly good photos that I took on the night...

New album on the way this year at some point - make sure you give it a listen. Here's a taster of what's to come:

 

Audacious Groove #3 (Disco)

Episode 3 of my Audacious Groove podcast is pure, unadulterated Funky Disco Music. A veritable explosion of groovy retro goodness!


TRACKLIST:

Sister Sledge - Lost In Music (Dimitri From Paris Remix)
Sergio Mendes - I'll Tell You
The Salsoul Orchestra - 212 N. 12th
Eastside Connection - You're So Right For Me
The Brothers Johnson - The Real Thing
Quincy Jones - Ai No Corrida
George Duke - Reach Out
George Benson - Never Give Up On A Good Thing
Slave - Just A Touch Of Love (Breixo Edit)
Norma Jean Wright - Sorcerer (Smart Edit)
Loleatta Holloway - Love Sensation
Rose Royce - Is It Love You're After
Scherrie Payne - I'm Not In Love / Girl, You're In Love (Mix-X-X-Tend Version)
Nightfall - Keep It Up (Dim's DJ friendly Edit)
Doug Willis - You Should Be Dancing
John Davis And The Monster Orchestra - Bourgie Bourgie
Brainstorm - We're On Our Way Home

Audacious Groove #2 (Soulful, Funky & Deep House)

Episode two is full of sexy House music of various types, with a few current-ish tunes and some funky classics. It's not 100% House (I even threw in a bit of Jacko towards the end), but based around a 4/4 beat. Enjoy!

TRACKLIST

St Germain - So Flute
Cassy Britton - A Plea For Me
deepanddisco - Stomp! (Deep&Disco Rework)
DJ Fopp - Tribute
Mr. Ho - What We Want
Rue Jay & Ic3 Cream Social - All Night
SolutionFeels So Right - Friend Within Remix
The Candy Dealers - Come Alive (Jay West Mix)
Miguel Puente - Small Proposition
Rudimental - Hell Could Freeze (Skream Remix)
Ce Ce Peniston - Finally (Acapella)
Bad 2 The Bone feat. Denise Gordon - Never Gonna Stop (Vocal Mix)
Jaimeson - Common Ground
Kings of Tomorrow - Fall For You (feat. April) [Sandy Rivera's Classic Mix]
Sylvester - Mighty Real (Sixth Avenue Remix)
Wattie Green - New Jazz
Alankara - Higher Love (Fender Edit)
Waifs & Strays - Body Shiver
Jonas Rathsman - Feeling You
Stardust - Music Sounds Better With You
Hot Natured - Benediction
Angel Manuel vs. Mr Fingers - Can You Feel It (Masi & Mello Remix)
Oliver Cheatham - Get Down Saturday Night
Michael Jackson - Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough
Just Kiddin - Feeling Better

Three steps to Funk...

As you can probably tell, this blog is all about Funky music, and the majority (but by no means the entirety) of what I listen to nowadays would fall within that bracket. I didn’t get into Funk overnight, it’s been bubbling along for several years - although it was a conscious decision to start listening to and collecting more, and to make all things funky the centre of my DJ sets.

 I like to think I’ve got a pretty wide ranging taste in music, and I thought it would be fun to have a look back at the various types of music I’ve been into over the years. Interesting to see that my interest in music can be roughly divided into three distinct stages based on age - teenage, twenties, and thirties (I’m ‘only’ 30, by the way!) I was always a bit of a rocker in my teenage years, but always had a bit of a soft spot for electronic music, secretly listening to Aphex Twin and Squarepusher in between Nirvana albums. My interest in electronica remained when my enthusiasm for Rock faded, and it soon broadened out to include more - first Hip Hop and Drum and Bass and then as I started to get more into DJing I found House, first as necessity to learn to beatmatch and then as a passion. House opened up a whole new world for me as it’s one of the most diverse and versatile forms of music out there, so for years I immersed myself in House, and I still love it today. I have become a lot more selective though, and I prefer the warmer side of it these days, rather than anything too mechanical.

I think this unscientific and hastily drawn diagram neatly (!?) sums up what I've been into over the years... Although it's worth mentioning that I don’t like to be restricted by genre... If I like it, I like it, regardless of what it's been pigeonholed into. And a lot of stuff I like I have no idea what genre it even is! I could keep on adding lines and genres to this diagram all day but it’s complicated enough as it is.

 So how did I end up addicted to funk? Well, a couple of years ago my interest in DJing was waning a bit, and a lot of the music I used to love just wasn’t doing it for me any more. Instead of trying to mix anything and everything I love (not impossible, and some people do it really well, but I don’t have the time or the money to dedicate to that!), I focused on what I loved about the music that still did do it for me, and the common theme that emerged was ‘funkiness’... whatever that is (more on that in a future blog post, perhaps?). I guess it’s just music with soul and feeling, which a lot of electronic music can often be lacking. Music with a good bassline and that intangible groove that makes you want to dance. So funk doesn’t represent the entirety of what I listen to and like, but rather the side of what I’m into that I want to share with the world.

Audacious Groove #1 (Funk)

I've finally got around to recording my first mix in absolutely ages, so I'm really pleased with myself. This mix is just straight up Funk in it's rawest form, the majority is made up from tracks from the 70s, although there's a bit of newer stuff in there too. Not much beatmatching as it's tricky to do with this style of music, and I find that trying to do anything too flashy with music like this actually takes away rather than adding anything, so I decided to let the music speak for itself for this one. A lot of the other music I play (Disco, 80s Synth Funk, House etc.) lends itself much more to beatmatching and blends.

As I said, this is my first mix that I've uploaded for ages, about 18 months in fact. The reason it's been so long is that I went through a tricky time with mixing whilst I pondered my future and what I wanted to play. Then once I got back into it it just took me ages to get back to the stage where I was happy enough with my core skills, music collection and track selection abilities to want to record anything. Then it took me a while to get around to it, and it took a few attempts to get right. But I got there in the end!

One thing that really frustrated me was that just after I uploaded this mix I got an email from Soundcloud saying that it had been removed again because of 'copyright infringement'. The track in question was the very first song - Soul Man by Sam and Dave. Now I'm all in favour of artists being paid for their work and I acquire all of my music legally, but this strikes me as pointless. I could understand it if I was making any money out of the mix, or I was offering up the song on its own for download, but as part of a mix I see it as more of a celebration of the songs, and if anything it's promoting the song on the label's behalf for free. Literally half of the music I buy is due to Soundcloud mixes - I listen to a mix, note down where in the mix there are songs that I want, Shazam them and then buy them. So I don't really see who gains from mixes being taken down like this - yes technically I do need their permission to use it, but I acquired it legally, they made money from me buying it, and what I'm doing doesn't cost them any money, and might even make them some. Seems to me like another case of record labels throwing the book at everyone in a vain attempt to protect their work, but in the end it does the opposite. Thanks Atlantic Records.

Luckily it was the first track, and the lack of mixing on my part made it easy to do a quick edit and reupload. But it's a shame because it's a great track, and I thought it was an appropriate start to my new mix series as well. Anyway, here's the rest of the mix, hope you enjoy!


TRACKLIST

Sam & Dave - Soul Man 
Otis Redding - Hard To Handle
Commodores - Slippery When Wet
The Haggis Horns - The Bump
Inez Foxx - Watch The Dog That Brings The Bone
The Isley Brothers - It's Your Thing
Black Ivory - Surrender
Gloria Jones - Windstorm
Pimp Rekker - Mission & 24th
Uptown Funk Empire - We Stand at the Back of the Bus
Parliament - Give Up The Funk
Leroy Hutson - Blackberry Jam
Ann Sexton - Sugar Daddy
Brass Construction - Get Up To Get Down
Sly And The Family Stone - Thank You
Ohio Players - Fire (DJ Prince Remix)
The Soul Snatchers - Scratch My Itch
James Brown - Give It Up Or Turnit A Loose
Elijah Collins & Tee-J - I Used to Feel Alright
Marva Whitney - Unwind Yourself
The Mighty Showstoppers - Shaft in Africa
Mass Production - People Get Up
The O'Jays - Love Train

This is the first of hopefully many in the Audacious Groove series, and I'll be trying to get them uploaded on a regular basis. Episode 2 is already done so will be up soon... Let's hope that one doesn't fall foul of copyright too! Please feel free to let me know what you think, both of the mix and of the copyright issue. Is it going too far or does intellectual property always need defending to this level, even when in my opinion there don't seem to be any clear winners in this case?

I'm FNKY

Hello! I'm Tom, And I play music that I like for my own amusement, and occasionally for the entertainment of others. Welcome to my blog, which will eventually become a random collection of my thoughts, musings and mixes.

As you can see, when deciding on a new DJ name I decided to eschew vowels and go for one composed entirely of consonants, so FNKY it is. It doesn't stand for anything, I just like it and was amazed that no other DJ on this planet had thought of using it before me. Moreover, it's four letters that pretty accurately sum up the sort of music I play - anything funky basically. That's actually a pretty wide remit, spanning a lot more than just Funk. As well as old and new Funk I also play Disco, Soul, Hip hop, Electro, and House music in its myriad forms... Soulful, funky, deep, old skool. And anything else too - as long as I can feel that groove I'm happy.

 I'm intending to regularly record mixes and upload them as a podcast. To compensate on the lack of vowels in my name this was originally going to be called the Facetious Groove Podcast (‘facetious’ having all five vowels, in order), but I eventually settled on Audacious Groove, which nicely sums up what I’m aiming to achieve from this series - music that’s groovy, but original and daring, not falling into a rut, and willing to take some risks. My plan is to have a theme for each episode, but the episodes themselves will be quite varied - I hope for it to be a showcase for the many facets of funky music! Please also check out my Soundcloud page to find the episodes.

Although I’ve been DJing for about 10 years now, it’s only relatively recently that I’ve started to focus on the funkier things in life. I used to be resolutely a house and electro DJ, but found that something was missing, and I wasn’t feeling the same connection with the music that I once had. I love a huge variety of music, but when I made the decision to just try and play whatever I wanted (my short lived Genreholics Anonymous project), I found it too difficult to focus and to build coherent sets. That’s why I decided to focus on funk, and make it my life’s work to collect, assemble and interpret the vast array of music out there that’s got that funky feeling.

This blog is intended to be a collection of my thoughts, feelings and general outlook on the subject of anything funky. It’ll also contain some of my general goings on as a DJ - I’m not in this game to make a living any more, but for the love of the music, and I hope that comes through in this blog.

Anyway, that’s enough from me for now. Thanks for reading, and I hope you come back here soon.