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KHAN REMIX CONTEST! WHO IS THE BEST?

Khan Of Finland ?S/T? CD out now on I?m Single Records via KOMPAKT & Groove Attack

Hi guys,

celebrating this week’s Khan of Finland album- release, we are calling for a Khan remix contest:

http://www.tracksandfields.com/studio.php?viewSessionId=199

Khan is providing the samples of his song “i got to”. You can use our online sequencer or download the stems from our sample library. The best mix will be featured on his websites and considered for a release on his label “I’m Single”.

For those who are not familiar with Khan, he is an extremely prolific producer. Born Can Oral, raised in Frankfurt to Turkish-Finnish parents he’s a world resident (currently based in Berlin, after previously residing in New York, Mexico, Cologne and Finland) who has produced electronic music under at least 10 pseudonyms and collaborations (including Bizz OD, 4E, El Turco Loco, Captain Comatose, Kid & Khan).
Check out our video interview at blog.tracksandfields.com where he talks about the making of his collaborative album “no comprendo” on Matador records.

We are looking forward to your entries! Keep checking in, we will have a lot of new contests coming up soon!

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Tracksandfields.com – Make music online

Take a relatively obscure 80s pop track, re-work it by one of the UK?s most successful bands and release it on a highly-respected German label

by NEALE LYTOLLIS

- if you thought that recipe for success was a just little too ambitious to be true then think again because no less than Pet Shop Boys have just released their latest single – a cover of the classic I?m In Love With a German Film Star featuring vocals by Sam Taylor-Wood – on Cologne-based label Kompakt.

On the surface it may seem a curious concoction all round yet it?s perhaps the unlikeliness of it all that has ensured a striking finished product. Kompakt?s Michael Mayer explains how the single came about: ?There?s a longstanding mutual admiration and respect between Kompakt and PSB,? he said, ?We?ve loved their music ever since they started recording. Neil and Chris discovered our label many years ago. They are very up to date with electronic music and even came digging for records in our record store.

This collaboration with Sam Taylor-Wood is a very special side project that they didn?t want to run through their usual channels. It?s a labour of love and the song is about a German film star ? so Kompakt seemed to be a suitable harbour for it.? Neil Tenant says of the collaboration: ?I?m a big fan of Kompakt and it?s a thrill to release something with them; they?re a definitive electronic music label.?

When the song was originally released at the beginning of the 80s it was only a minor hit yet it?s made a lasting impression on Neil Tenant: ?I bought the original version by The Passions in 1981 and I?ve always thought it was a mesmerising track,? he explained, ?We thought the song would lend itself to an electronic interpretation. I hope we?ve emphasised the sexual longing.?

All the stops have been pulled out for this release which features a brace of sexy remixes, three of which come from Berlin?s own Mark Reeder. Michael Mayer is hooked: ?It was the boys? wish to include him in this project. Of course we were aware of his existence since he started the label MFS in 1990 but our paths had never crossed before. To be honest, I was a little unsure if he would be a matching choice given the fact that he was known for working mainly at the mainstream end of trance music but when I heard his mixes I was staggered. He?s totally captured the classic PSB sound of their early Bobby O. phase. That?s probably something a 25-year-old minimal techno hotshot couldn?t have accomplished. I think his Stuck in the 80s Mix rounds off the package in a very appropriate way.?

While Michael Mayer may lean towards Natassja Kinski as his favourite German movie goddess, the striking cover art can leave no doubts as to which German film star Neil Tenant is in love with: ?Marlene, because she?s so glamourous and has that wonderful husky voice!?

Sam Taylor-Wood produced by Pet Shop Boys ? I?m In Love With a German Film Star is out now as CD maxi, 12? and 7? on Kompakt Pop.

www.petshopboys.co.uk
www.kompakt-net.com

in case you haven’t seen this yet! Zan Lyons should do a full length film asap.

another question comes up when you see this: when was the last time someone in the UK thought about the future? seems a whole generation of UK teenagers is in chains – prisoners of the past.

Delia Derbyshire (1937-2001) is a name virtually unheard of in Germany yet in the UK she remains one of the true pioneers of electronic music.

Derbyshire was born in Coventry and studied mathematics and music at Cambridge. This curious combination no doubt influenced her work as an innovator in the field of bringing logical, scientific approaches to the field of electronic music to create something new and inspired.

Her developing interest in music led her to apply for a position as a sound engineer at Decca Records only to be turned down on the grounds that the company didn?t hire women in their studios. Derbyshire subsequently accepted a post to work for the UN in Geneva before returning to London to work at music publishers Boosey and Hawkes.

By 1960 Derbyshire was working at the then fledgling and massively influential BBC Radiophonic Workshop. The unit was established in the late 50s at the legendary Maida Vale studios under the guidance of Studio Head Desmond Briscoe to provide new sound effects and scores for radio and television. It was in this highly experimental environment that Derbyshire?s creativity was allowed to flourish, enabling her to create some of her best-remembered works.

Perhaps her best-known composition from her years at the Radiophonic Workshop was her interpretation of Ron Grainer?s theme for the then brand new children?s TV series Doctor Who, which first went on air in November 1963. Derbyshire created a swirling, hypnotic interpretation of Grainer?s music utilising reverse tape loops and electronic oscillators. The process took weeks; each note had to be individually treated, recorded onto one-inch magnetic tape, spliced and then edited back together again.

The composition is often credited as being the first every purely electronic theme tune used in a mainstream television broadcast and was a sensation at the time of its first airing. Grainer was so surprised with how Derbyshire had interpreted his sheet music that he asked her: ?Did I really write this?? to which Derbyshire neatly replied: ?Most of it.? Nevertheless, Grainer was so impressed with Derbyshire?s work he attempted to have her credited on-screen as co-composer, something which BBC bureaucracy at the time prevented.

She also collaborated with musical luminaries such as Paul McCartney and Yoko Ono and was a founder member of the short-lived Unit Delta Plus, a group of like-minded musicians whose intention was to promote electronic music to a wider audience. They presented some of their works at The Million Volt Light and Sound Rave and at the Royal College of Art before disbanding in 1967. Derbyshire remained at the BBC until 1973 and created sound effects and theme tunes for numerous television and radio productions.

After her BBC years, Derbyshire turned her back on music working at various times as a radio operator, in an art gallery and in a bookshop. Her passion for music was revived in the late 90s and she was busy at work on a new album of compositions when she died suddenly of renal failure whilst still recovering from breast cancer in 2001.

And there the story should end. BBC procedure at the time meant that the majority of Radiophonic Workshop staff were uncredited and therefore unappreciated for their work and Derbyshire may well have sunk into the depths of anonymity. However, her theme for Doctor Who ? which has subsequently become one of the world?s most recognisable theme tunes ? and her magnificently atmospheric Dreams project set her aside from her Workshop peers. Perhaps more interesting is the discovery of a box of 267 8? tapes which have remained unplayed for over 30 years.

They were stored in Derbyshire?s attic until her death when they were donated to Radiophonic Workshop Archivist Mark Ayres. Now they are in the hands of David Butler from Manchester University?s School of Arts, Histories and Cultures who is currently digitising the collection in its entirety with a view to making it accessible to the public. Perhaps the most outstanding find in the collection is a nameless, experimental dance track.

Derbyshire herself introduces the composition by saying, ?Forget about this, it?s for interest only.? What follows is a track which could easily have been recorded in the present day. Paul Hartnoll, former member of the group Orbital, heard the studio outtake and told the BBC, ?That could be coming out next week on Warp Records. It?s incredible when you think where it comes from.? Indeed, for a musical throwaway from the late 60s it?s an incredibly foresighted composition and ranks up there with the best of contemporary left-field dance.

The introduction of the synthesiser in the early 70s has been cited as the main reason Derbyshire quit the BBC; it made electronic music much easier to produce, too easy in fact. Part of Derbyshire?s enjoyment in her work was her ability and need to explore, to experiment. She was a sculptor, a creator ? not simply a programmer. Once an element of ease had been introduced to electronic music then the scope for experimentation narrowed and Derbyshire?s enthusiasm lessened.

In 2008 when electronic music across all genres is so popular, it?s especially important that we recognise the contribution Delia Derbyshire made to the development of its popularity, especially given the two sided problem of being a young, attractive woman working in a man?s world in the early 1960s and also having to create advanced, deeply atmospheric pieces from the most primitive of technology.

Delia we thank you.

For more information on Delia Derbyshire plus links to the BBC news site which features audio clips of the recently discovered attic archive, visit: www.delia-derbyshire.org
click here for weblink

NEALE LYTOLLIS

October 3rd – Hannover Alec Empire DJs at After Party /Film Premiere

October 11th – Alec Empire DJs Concorde Club /Potsdam
Lindenpark, Lindenpark, Stahnsdorfer Strasse 76-78, 14482 Potsdam

November 29th – Alec Empire rides out for final electronic solo show this year !
Dresden Scheune, Scheune, Alaunstr. 36, 01099 Dresden

Dezember 4th – Alec Empire Djs big Staubgold event at Maria Club, Berlin.

There are more dates coming in. Alec Empire has agreed to write the film score for Phantomanie,
feat. Natalia Avelon, Bruno S. (yes, his first role since that Werner Herzog movie!) and many others…
More news soon.

COLD METAL PERFECTION (2001) and WHITE HEAT (1998)

Both releases are out of print and the physical copies are sold out since two years.
This is Nic Endo’s gift to her fans before her new solo release is ready to launch:
The two albums have been completely re-mastered from the original analogue tapes with the latest 24bit technology at The Hellish Vortex Studios in Berlin.

Nic:” When I heard the new version it felt like listening to a different record. It sounds so much bigger and more powerful now.”

Comprising previously unreleased 9 min. masterpiece “Walking-Dancing-Falling”,
Nic Endo wrote for a modern dance performance, that was staged in London 2002.

The 2CD boxset includes a poster (DIN A2 long / 29.7cm x 84 cm), sticker, badges and new artwork.

This ultimate Collector’s Edition is a true must have for all die-hard Nic Endo fans!

Make sure you check out the big Alec Empire special in ‘Future Music’ this month.
It has an inside view on Alec’s studio in Berlin. He is also talking about his philosophy on sound and mixing.