[ urban gamelan ]

[ -" FIYAH!!! "(*cue killer bass*) ]
-I’ve been listening to nothing else but 23 Skidoo for a week now, headphones as alien transmittors, living the groove, feeling it, skilfully avoiding the bemused and somewhat puzzled looks of fellow tube passengers when the D.I.Y. scrapmetal punkfunk rhythms make me tap and drum my fingers on every surface available, tapping in and out of tune with the rumbling and chu-chugging of electric vehicles swooshing by, city noises intruding on the platform calm, outside through the giant metal doors we can hear police sirens screeching past, a tired-looking lady shouts her guts out to some ex-boyfriend on the phone, busy commuters watch their clocks and tries their best not to acknowledge the crowd of bored youths posing in the corner, kicking an ancient coke can into the walls with quiet laughs, bringing about a metallic sound which fits great into the gamelan groove. As our train arrives, the nearest kid winks at me and starts MC’ing over the beat. The crowd starts moving. I turn up the volume.

[ READ. ARTIST FILES: Jim Haynes @ Aquarius writes: ]
"This British trio developed one of the most unique sounds to evolve from the UK's Industrial Culture -- which was self-consciously aware of its actions as critiques of control and power within Thatcherite society. Unlike Psychic TV and Coil who offered an aesthetic of extroverted abjection and vile transgressions (often to amazing results, mind you), 23 Skidoo embraced something like a bunker mentality, by preparing themselves with both body and mind for the possibility of a future attack, but more likely in defense of their own personal agendas. The group -- Fritz Catlin, Alex Turnbull, and Johnny Turnbull -- studied various martial arts along with the then little heard sounds of Indonesian gamelan. Unable to get a hold of a true gamelan (except for a Kendang), 23 Skidoo built their own out of scrap metal, kitchen wares, and water jugs. Their personal discipline from their martial arts training made for an easy transition in terms of mastering the fluid, yet complex rhythms that made for an excellent junkyard replication of true Indonesian gamelan.
"Urban Gamelan" finds 23 Skidoo addressing two distinct aesthetics, the first being their post-apocalyptic funk (which had been previously mapped out on their first album "Seven Songs") and the second emphatically pronouncing their faux-gamelan sound. The album in fact begins with a remix / reworking of their hit single "Coup," which has had the infamy of getting ripped off by the Chemical Brothers. Driven by counterpoints of bass and distant bursts of haunted trumpets, the first half of the album recalls some of Pop Group's dub fuckery, with an inclination for a more natural funk. 23 Skidoo then drops all of the electric instruments for an exhibition of their complete gamelan repetoire. If you ever thought that Einsturzende Neubauten or Test Dept. needed to get their groove on, then you definitely need to check out 23 Skidoo."

[ LISTEN. SOUNDBITES: listen to tracks @ tigersushi radio ]
[ linktiy link link ]

[ READ. ARTIST FILES_2: Bill Brewster @ DJ History writes: ]
"In Sheffield, Cabaret Voltaire mapped out new directions for electronic music while, across the Pennines, A Certain Ratio made wildly dissonant funk records with Manchester’s Clyde Stubblefield, Donald Johnson, tethered to the drum stool. In the west country, the influential Pop Group kept that punk rock anger and filtered it through a percussive wall of sound, while the art scene had Throbbing Gristle and This Heat. In London there was 23 Skidoo, wilful, perverse and, at times, brilliant.
23 Skidoo were doing tribal while Junior Vasquez was still a fashion designer; scaring the fuck out of audiences when Aphex Twin was still being potty-trained and incorporating dance and hip hop elements into their music when Norman Cook was still playing bass in the Housemartins. In the early years they had so many band members changing, they might well have had a revolving door in their rehearsal studio. However, they have maintained the same line-up for the past 17 years – Fritz Catlin, Sketch and brothers Alex and Johnny Turnbull – and a consistently interesting and inquisitive approach to music; this restlessness often brought to life in their recordings.
When they first started, largely through a numerical anomaly, they somehow found themselves lumped in with funky pop acts like Haircut 100 and Heaven 17. Financed and produced by Mark Bedford of Madness, their debut single, ‘Ethics’, gave no hint of what was to come. By the recording of The Gospel Comes To New Guinea, produced by Cabaret Voltaire alongside Ken Thomas and 23 Skidoo, the sound had dramatically changed into something altogether more interesting. Out went orthodox song structure and in its place ethno-rhythms, tape loops and chants.
"I have very fond memories of working with Skidoo," remembers Cabaret Voltaire’s Stephen Mallinder, who later went to make house records for Warp. "We had the same interests: Burroughs, Gysin, funk, dub, Kenneth Anger and martial arts movies. Along with ACR they were perhaps one of the most influential, but underrated bands of that early 80s period – the original punks on funk. The gigs we all did around the time were groundbreaking in terms of the fusion of influences."
Live 23 Skidoo were something else. Tape loops whirred menacingly in the background, film projections drenched the stage in jarring visions of some awful present or future, as band members skipped from one instrument to another, the music never stopping, the audience barely given chance to catch its breath. If you can imagine Apocalypse Now as a stage show, it might well have looked and sounded like this."
[ read the whole article over here ]