"Alcachofa" by Ricardo Villalobos

Ricardo's best known for his solo projects, singles only as far as I know (Perlon, Playhouse and a few other joints), but he's also half (alongside Dandy Jack, AKA Martin Schopf) of Ric y Martin, and I believe he's working up something with Luciano, and then he's collaborated with Dandy Jack and Atom Heart as a trio, plus of course his role in Narod Niki (Hawtin, Schopf, Villalobos, Luciano, Dan Bell, Cabanne, Dimbiman, and Akufen) at this year's MUTEK.

I love Luciano! His productions have always got this irresistible urgency, mischief, and bounce. He's bringing the fun to microhouse!

My favorite Luciano 12" (of the ones I've heard, at least) is the one on Bruchstuecke or Birchstick or Brushstroke or whatever you call that label.

Right now I'm fuming at my housemate; last night was my first gig in Barcelona and he ran off to Germany with my copy of Alcachofa. Can anyone suggest a fitting punishment upon his return?

(I could never keep Primus' songs straight.)

Sigh

I think they price things up down here more than they do up in SF. Everytime I go to the Height store there is a ton of stuff available and some of the guys actually know what I am looking for.

Damn Royal Mail.

Alex is right though, there seems to be little demand for Kompakt/Perlon/Playhouse in SF. Aquarius gets a few Kompakt bits but they have an admitted aversion to "dance music." I've never seen Playhouse or Perlon there. Amoeba gets a few Kompakt bits, the occasional Perlon, the occasional Playhouse, but only as new releases, I think. They never restock that. ('cept maybe for the Total series.) Tweekin' is yr best bet, though again it's mostly as new releases ('cept for Playhouse).

To bring this back to Villalobos, I'm a little disappointed w/ his mix for Luciano's "Alain Brito" on Peacefrog. Very deep and ripply but somehow missing the internal drive that his deep'n'ripply mixes of Heiko Laux, Auch, etc. have had. He seems to be going further and further from the dance floor. Perhaps that's not true - he's just shown he has no interest in peak moments, is much more interested in the long, drawn-out perpetual now. A very good thing, normally, but that track's not doing it for me.

Has anyone heard his Rob Hood remix on Logistic yet?

As far as the demand for microhouse in SF the same goes for LA if not worse. At amoeba they refused to order the stuff until the Mayer Fabric Mix came out, now they stock a few titles mostly Mayer related. Can we all be so far off the boat that no one in California is listening to this stuff?

I mean its even kinda poppy and fairly easy to digest, its not like its Merzbow. Which I can find plenty of at Amoeba.

With the passing of EFA, Muzik, ect. is dance music going back underground?

I suppose the "problem" with such a slot is that you've got to take a no-bullshit, let-it-all-hang-out approach. It's got to be a sequence of peaks, with no time to build up, cool down, and stretch out. In that way, I think he's better if he plays for four hours rather than an hour and a half. For instance, Villalobos and Dandy Jack played for a million hours on the last night of MUTEK 2002 and I was never bored.

RICARDO VILLALOBOS: thé au harem d'archimède

Details of a new mini album from RICARDO VILLALOBOS, due October 11th on Perlon.

RICARDO VILLALOBOS

Here are the details on the new Ricardo Villalobos mini LP on Perlon. Out October 11th, 2004 in Europe. Which is roundabout October 12th over here. When promos arrive I will let you know.

Ricardo Villalobos
thé au harem d'archimède
(Perlon)

3x12" / CD

perlon43/perlon43cd

tracklisting:3x12"

A1. hireklon
B1. serpentin
B2. forallseasons
C1. théorème d'archimède
C2. hello halo
D1. temenarc 1
D2. temenarc 2
E1. miami
E2. stereobox
F1. true to myself

tracklisting: CD

1. hireklon
2. serpentin
3. forallseasons
4. théorème d'archimède
5. hello halo
6. temenarc 2
7. temenarc 1
8. miami
9. true to myself

Archimedes' theorem defines the buoyant lift: Diving an object into a vessel full of water causes an increase of pressure inside the vessel. The displaced amount of water, i.e. the lifting force is equivalent to the object's body volume, i.e. its weight-force.

Transfering this theorem to the music of the overwhelming parallel universe of Ricardo Villalobos' new triple EP/album length CD, one will realize the following: Diving all of its notes into reality results in the displacement of the same to a high degree, since the music has an enormous volume by expanding airily. Which means nothing but the musical principle of psychedelics taking effect here. This time by using the method of reduction, Ricardo is closer to the tradition of the cultured jam sessions by the legendary German 70es musicians' collective Ash Ra Tempel around Manuel Goettsching (known from his Prototech solo production "E2-E4") than to the simply structured march through occasionally rather uninspired club metrics.

While experiencing this uniquely fascinating work the amazed listener is witnessing a musical terraforming, at the same time the colonization of the new planet: every single track creates a mystic space in which sound elements are able to spread out in all directions. Teeming, often melancholically coloured sound organisms awake on the field of free flows - among them Flamenco patterns ("Hireklon") or warming bass lines ("Miami"). Just as one is used to it concerning the tracks within Ricardo's DJ sets, which hardly can be marked by a simple definition of beginning and end any more. A confining grid is dissolved almost completely, physical laws are replaced by emotional ones - by the mathematics of intuition.

Ricardo's percussive talent is undisputed: the sophisticatedly elastic rhythm meanders of Latin American/Caribbean origin sound as if they have been introduced to the wild from the base of a cool, impeccably clean laboratory which is located somewhere in the Science Fiction vastness of the Chilean Atacama desert. The loss of sense of time appears in favour of the event of intensity. Frequently the tracks appear surprisingly volatile, despite the considerable playing times of several titles which are absolutely required for exhausting the free, rhythmic modulatons. One wishes them to last forever, like the whole production.

In the staggers of these animating blurrings of perception Archimedes' theorem transforms into the romantic image of "Tea in the harem of Archimedes". This synthetical mind expansion of bizarre beauty is highly addictive!

Source: Forced Exposure/FE Publicity e-mail

Do any of you have the vinyl version of Alcachofa? Is it just me or is it intentional for the 4 sides to switch rpm when you flip sides? It's very annoying.

It's also disorienting I swear dexter and easy lee sound slower than my mp3 versions but it might just be my ears.

Side A and C are definitely 33rpm and side B and D 45rpm but it doesn't have any info on why would they do this.

Yeah it is (annoying and intentional). The sides w one track're 45, those w two 33. Took me a few weeks to notice/look into this myself

Ok I've had it for a few years now and noticed immediatly but assumed it was intentional. No idea why. I guess he just thought it would be fun for trolling vinyl djs or something like that.

It's cos it means he gets 45 quality sound where he can, I guess

Oh yeah it's 3 vinyls. Didn't realize that the speed changed depending on the number of tracks per side... That's interesting. It might help me next time I play it but it is still annoying.

Frm memory that rule applies to everything of his, I got p anal abt checking all my Villalobos LPs/12s out after that (also once had sex to the incorrectly slow Easy Lee, which ws kinda creepy)

He also tends to have different tracks between cd and vinyl and it's somewhere between cool and annoying. In this particular album it annoys me because he left out YGH out of the vinyl version and it's nowhere else to be found in vinyl format. Also some of my favorite tracks were only released on the cd version (waiworinao, fools garden and what you say) and the exclusive tracks on vinyl aren't as good as those.

I would have loved to have waiworinao or what you say instead of "i try to live" which is the only track in the album which I don't care for at all.

Specially mad about the exclusion of waiworinao as it's one of the highlights in here besides dexter and easy lee.

Not to be a dick, but:

http://www.discogs.com/Villalobos-Alcachofa-Tools/release/194548

http://www.discogs.com/Villalobos-Halma/master/124107

Oh wait that's not what you meant, sorry. No sign of YGH as you obv know

Yeah I know they are in there I would just prefer to have the same album and the extra tracks on an ep.

YGH is not in there btw!

in my world of young dance music vinyl, having one side 45 with one track and one side 33 with two tracks is a pretty standard move and hardly some unique trolling exercise by mr villalobos

it's certainly not unusual and as mentioned upthread is to do with maximising volume on each side depending on the length. unless you have an incredibly high end turntable, it's not really that much hassle to change the speed as you change sides, is it?

Are the 45 sides the ones more likely to be played out? That'd also make sense.

My turntable cost about £150 15 years ago - ie it's entry-level - and to change speed you have to take the platter off and manually adjust the belt drive. So that is a hell of hassle for flipping speeds as you change sides, actually.

But I own Alcachofa on CD, so...

All mine it's only ever taken flicking a switch, only trolly move is never mentioning it on the sleeves bt he prob likes the idea of ppl listening to it at the "wrong" speed anyway

i have a lot of admiration for this record and villalobos overall, but i find it hard to love. sometimes i feel like he is the autechre of dance music

A+ zing

I thought autechre were the autechre of dance music

lo i don't know in what universe autechre makes dance music

less so these days

Damnit I thought that ws the joke

sometimes i feel like he is the autechre of dance music

You mean that he's very good at it?

Gotta agree with Marcos. I admire the guys skills at putting together groovrs, but his music is often kinda alienating and gray. Very much like Autechre, yeah.

plenty of autechre tracks could bang in a set.

haha like what?!

"eutow" maybe

idm always was a bit of a contradiction in terms

"montreal"?

not bang i guess, but work as an offset for a harder track or vocal. in a context where no one knows or cares that it's idm.

idk

yeah I can see early early autechre working in some sets, lots of incunabula i bet would work too

flutter! maybe.

i sort of take it back though, not a lot of banging autechre. i mean it's mostly chilltime for sure.

anyway lots of dahnce vinyl switches between 33 and 45. i thought it was about maximizing levels / sound quality esp. bass?

I've heard their work used well in a few mixes but it's usually a remix they did, or a short segment dropped in by Surgeon or other djs of his ilk

plenty of autechre tracks could bang in a set.

― mattresslessness, Thursday, July 31, 2014 11:26 AM (39 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha like what?!

― the late great, Thursday, July 31, 2014 11:27 AM (37 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

― mattresslessness, Thursday, July 31, 2014 11:26 AM (39 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

"oh yea, you know, like 'q3ztuuu,' '0102303-394,' 'XIDIDIII"' loads others!"

lol

"I admire the guys skills at putting together groovrs, but his music is often kinda alienating and gray"

You know how people say that when you're about to freeze to death you start feeling all warm? A lot of Villalobos tracks have that effect on me.

to be fair you can really fall into those grooves after the first eight hours of dancing

it doesn't bang necessarilly but

LOWRIDE

Dancing to Autechre is easy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiLK7S2fXqQ

Surgeon could probably pull off "second bad vibel" in a set

^would listen so hard

dance too, lol

yeah iirc he (surgeon) actually has used autechre in several online mixes

you could say autechre has been a "tool" of the "surgeon"

Surgeon could probably pull off "second bad vibel" in a set

― brimstead, Thursday, July 31, 2014 1:23 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Totally.

Clipper is a total banger, too.