Talk:Music Wiki/old

My plan is to make this blog like... discuss good albums, music news, current projects, site improvements, etc.

Notes from the Editor 8/18/05
This weekend I found a copy of Stevie Wonder's Innervisons on LP in wonderfully good condition. This was significant because it currently is residing at the top of my all-time favorite albums, which should be noted, changes in the same continuous fluctuation as the stock market. So listening to this album over and over again in the last week has caused a lot of agitation in my life. It should first be noted that this album is one of the finest funk/soul releases ever, and in my opinion, by far the best Stevie Wonder record. The combination of the two genres so seamlessly causes quite an internal struggle, which is one of the agitations I mentioned earlier. On Sunday, after flipping the LP for the umpteenth time, and starting "Too High" over once again, I fell into a 3-hour drooling coma. My soul had been continuously getting down and dirty for about a day and a half now, and there is only one way a white boy's soul can dance... awkwardly. In fact, as the 2nd chorus came bouncing in, my soul tripped over on of his two left feet and came crashing down my left leg abruptly stopped by my femur. Needless to say, he was knocked unconscious for three hours which I spent staring at the wall in a blank, drooling gaze.

What concerns me the most is that the soul-funk genre has really fallen off. It, without a doubt, peaked in the early 70s when Stevie, along with Otis Redding, Curtis Mayfield, Al Green and James Brown all being in their primes. While i was yet to even be in my sperm state at this time, I have seen enough documentaries and read enough books on the subject to know that it was a result of the controversial times and an evolution of soul into a more powerful presence. As the decade moved into the more conservative 80s and recording technology took leaps and bounds forward, the soul-funk genre began to fall off. The biggest problem in my ears was that the recordings became too polished and lost a lot of the raw edge that is pertinent in funk. There was a small and effeminate man named Prince who did everything in his powers to keep it alive, but as the 90s trickled in, it was all but lost to the kings of pop and rock & roll. Today, in the age of re-issues and rare-track compilations, thanks to labels like Now Again and Honest Jons are doing what they can to bring the unknown names to the recognition they initially deserved. But, you also have to pay homage to the names that though mainstream, were worth every drop of attention that came pouring in their direction.

This brings me to skinny, pasty-faced white kid who has been living in Berlin for the last couple of years. WARP's Jamie Lidell has recently released an irresistible funk-soul album called Multiply. The genius of it is how Lidell has managed to finally update the genre without losing it's essential qualities. He somehow manages to sound like Otis Redding when he gets excited but all the while hitting the higher pitches that patented by Curtis Mayfield and Al Green. He's backed by what could only be described as robotic humanoid replicas of Booker T. & the MG's complete with new modern accessories like the drum machine and glitch creating laptops. There are even keyboard licks that sound as if they were taken from right under Ike Turner's fingertips. Ridiculous. If you haven't picked this album up, it's time. Go out to the store, buy the first copy you see, get home as quickly as possible, find a comfortable, and safe, place to sit. Because the chances are, by the time the record is over your soul will be crumpled up, completely unconscious, lying peacefully against your calf for a good 6 hours.

Notes from the Editor 8/11/05
I am currently working on the Label section. I am just moving down the list alphabetically, except for jumping down to Stones Throw to take advantage of an impulse on inspiration. I am starting here for a number of reasons. Firstly, because it will make a good supporting backbone for the site. I believe it will encourage people to write about artists listed on their favorite label. Secondly, it will create more artist links. By displaying each label's roster, it is creating a great amount of link that would otherwise not be there (either because of my overlooking a band or ignorance). I'm not moving all of the names to the Artist list just yet; either because they are relatively unknown bands or moved to a much bigger familiarity and no longer in the ranks of independency (i.e. Hot Hot Heat). But with labels like Alternative Tentacles that have a very rich history of bands, it is adding a lot of necessary links (even if it is taking me forever to list them all). If any band gets written about and is not on the artists list, I will definitely put a link at that point.

If you haven't heard Sufjan Stevens's latest, Illinois, you really need to get off your ass and go get it. It's ridiculously good and saying that it is well written/played/recorded/produced is a vast understatement. And this is coming from a person who never gave into the immense hype-aura Sufjan excretes hourly. If you like indie-rock, chamber pop, singer-songwriter or really just good music, you'll jump on this faster than Fox News jumps on a story that demonizes Democrats. Personally, my ears perked during "Chicago," was addicted and fiending for more by "John Wayne Gacy, Jr." and seeking rehab by "They are Night Zombies." Genius record.

While I am raving about albums, you should also check out Prefuse 73 reads The Books. Scott Herron continues to expand the boundaries (actually, at this point, he has destroyed the boundary and currently ruling over an entirely new country) of instrumental hip-hop and music in general. The album is overflowing with creativity and every remix is an invigorating yet mellow collage of samples, beats and damn fine ideas.

My thanks for the week: Thank you Jamie Lidell for reinventing soul music along with keeping the sound of Otis Redding alive and strutting in our ears with Multiply on WARP. Thank you Langhorne Slim for making bluesy, rootsy folk music cool again with When the Sun's Gone Down on Narnak. Thank you Ibrahim Ferrar for enlightening our lives with your smooth Cuban voice and undeniable soul, R.I.P. Thank you http://betterpropaganda.com/ for some amazing playlists (especially C@, http://betterpropaganda.com/staff_picks.asp/).

New Toys
I uploaded 5 images- 00%-100% blocks. Type in ""(Image:00.png in two brackets) or 25%.png,50%.png,75%.png or 100%.png. These can be used on the main artist and label pages, to show how complete label pages are. That way we can gauge our work better. (Note: I took them from WikiBooks.) Paul Lynch 03:27, 13 Oct 2005 (UTC)



"Lover's Spit" by Broken Social Scene
If you have heard the version on You Forgot it in People and Bee Hives, which one do you like better? Paul Lynch 09:36, 5 Nov 2005 (UTC)

HALP! -- Featured Article Won't Change!
Ok -- perhaps someone else can help me out here -- I forgot to change it yesterday, so I changed it today, but for some reeason the Main Page refuses to update with the new featured article. I've gone through and put the "Featured" template on the Madlib page, removed it from Prefuse 73, but for some reason, the Main Page won't re-render with the correct "Featured Article". Anyone know what the deal is? What've I forgotten to do? I've tryied resaving the main page, hoping that'd do the trick, but so far, it hasn't. So, yeah... not sure what I'm doing wrong here. - Rev. Syung Myung Me 22:06, 28 Nov 2005 (UTC)

What you have to do is edit the contents of Template:Featured Article. I don't know if there is a way to automate this, at least I couldn't figure it out. It's not a lot of work though, just copy and paste the bio for the featured article and change the 'read more' link. It's set up funny because it is a bootleg system from another wiki. Feel free to restructure it if you feel so inclined. Mpardaiolo 23:32, 28 Nov 2005 (UTC)

Ah -- gotcha, thanks! I thought it was automated, but, well, that explains how it knows to take the right part of the page there, heh. Thanks! I'll see if I can figure anything else out about automating it, but now that I know, that's cool - Rev. Syung Myung Me 00:27, 29 Nov 2005 (UTC)

Hey, cool!
I just noticed! It looks like our wiki is no longer en.music.wikicities! We must have swallowed up the other flavor, since I don't think it had much of anything on there. So now we're just Music.Wikicities! neato! - Rev. Syung Myung Me 17:54, 14 Jan 2006 (UTC)