Van She - Strangers (Dir. Lorin Askill from Collider)
Aussie shoegazers, part-time remixers and Modular people, Van She have a return to form with ‘Strangers’, the latest track leaked from their forthcoming debut full-length, ‘V’, slated for an August release. This follows up the first single ‘Cat and the Eye’.
Van She is unique in that they are their own best canidate for a remix. Not many can pull off being rockstars who also produce jawdropping club remixes. That club membership card is held by, perhaps, by Van She and Ghent’s Soulwax alone. The evidence is below. Club dues are paid in full.
MP3: Van She - Strangers
Removed by label’s request.
MP3: Van She - Strangers (Van She Tech Remix)
Removed by label’s request.
Save the Feist ‘1234′ remix, which is so good it’s untouchable, this 2006 remix for London electro-poppers I Am Finn is probably my long standing favorite and doesn’t leave my queue.
Currently on tour, Chi-town’s Flosstradamus take some time out of their busy schedule tell us what they are up to:
What’s up Flosstradamus! First off, introduce yourselves.
Hello Bloggers and friends! We’re Flosstradamus! We’re two guys from Chicago who DJ a LOT and sometimes make a remix or two here and there.
How’d you guys come up with the name ‘Flosstradamus’?
Curt and I were djing in my room one night when he played a Lil’ Jon record on 45 and it got me so hyped that I took the record off the turntable and broke it over Curt’s head and knocked him out and when he woke up he told me of all these visions he had about us becoming a DJ MEGA GROUP and playing music for kids who love the party as much as us all over the world and together at the same time we looked into each others eyes and said… Flosstradamus.
When did you guys start DJing/producing music?
Curt started about 9 years ago and I started about 7 years ago.
How would you describe your style?
Fun. Honestly we started out throwing parties in Chicago because we wanted to give our friends a place to go and dance without having to worry about feeling weird, or judged, or looked at for the way they dressed… i.e. not a club. It’s always been about giving our people a
place to go have fun for cheap.
What are some of your influences musically?
Right now it’s our friends man… Chicago, Kid Sister, Cool Kids, A-Trak, Chromeo, Yuksek, Treasure Fingers… lots of people are killing it and they all seem to be really cool too so it works out. Cajmere [Green Velvet] has always been a huge influence personally, even though he’s super Christian now which is a bit weird, dude has HITS. Would love to work with him.
Curt, talk about your Flossy FX sampler. What’s it all about?
Flossy FX is a little “stand alone” application I designed to play sound fx, vocal drops, or any audio file along with Serato. I designed it when money was tight for us. I was going to purchase a sampler to use in our sets to play the “Flosstradamus” robot sample along with a few air horns and other things to heighten the night. Me being a cheapskate and a nerd I figured out a way to do the same thing with the program I designed. What it does is it stays on top of Serato when we DJ. It has a row of buttons on it that you can use to drag and drop any file to mp3, wav, aif. Once you drag and drop the file onto the button, you can either click the button or press the key on your keyboard that corresponds to that button. There are other features in the app that allow you to let the whole sample play from beginning to end, or as long as you keep the button pressed, or layer samples.
Once we finish version 2, I will have it up on our new website I’m designing. We will give it away for free with a donation. Eventually I would like to have Serato pick up on this feature. I also have a huge grocery list of features I would like to work with Serato on. I know that some how DJ AM was able to get his own version of Serato made. Maybe we could have our own version of Serato. You know, for the ‘hipster’ DJ crowd!? Maybe even our own release that has special colored vinyl? I would also like to be able to integrate MIDI so i could add cowbells drums etc into more of a live performance with Serato.
What does 2008 hold for Flosstradamus? Any future collabos we can look forward to?
Our album is going to drop this year. We’ve been talking about it forever, but it’s actually starting to look like it’s really going to happen which is exciting to say the least. The whole album is going to be based around some serious collaborations… it’s all teamwork man! We wouldn’t be where we are today if it wasn’t for the help of all our people, so we’re going to return the favor and put them all on our record.
Any last words?
The only two that matter right now… Chicago and Illinois.
The blogoshpere loves La Greve Generale and apparently Modular does too as the boys were on the bill for Modular’s party this past weekend at the Ditch Bar. We’re proud to say that we were the first blog to post La Greve Generale when they stepped on to the scene back in January.
But enough about us, congrats to the boys and check out the live set they threw down at Modular’s party in case you were unable to make it.
Tracklist
Johannes Heil - Warrior Of Light (Re-edit)
Snowden - Anti-Anti (Treasure Fingers Remix)
Lil Mama vs Blur – Lip gloss and TV (La Grève Générale blend)
Bobmo – To the Bobmobile
Nelly Furtado – Do it
Chromeo – Fancy footwork (Guns’n'Bombs remix)
Nil – Comme un printemps
Yo Majesty vs Federico Franchi - club Action cream (La Grève Générale blend)
Wing Wang Twins - Bmore Enur (Extended Sinusitis Mix)
This puts NYPC in some great company! Their debut album, ‘Fantastic Playroom’ (Buy it!) was a long time coming. Their break-through single ‘Ice Cream’ was featured in a major advertisement campaign for Intel, as well as countless mixtape, radio and club playlists all over the world.
Great songs become remix juggernauts. Interesting that ‘Ice Cream’ was originally released in 2004 on UK label Tirk Records before finding it’s next home on Aussie label, Modular. ‘Ice Cream’ is a great song and is absolutely a juggernaut. The is still getting it’s remix fix and just received some new remix jobs from, most recently by Tiga and, previously, Hervé, Van She and The Hooks, among others.
Pick up the singles and you’ll realize there are so many remixes of ‘Ice Cream’! Now seriously, Pick them up from Amazon and HMV. Strictly for the hardcore, NYPC has a merch site with shirts and mugs and junk. We gots one, we hardcore!
Australia’s Bumblebeez 81, newly re-branded as simply, The Bumblebeez were one of the first Modular acts that we really got into. Now they’re back with the fantastic new single and video for ‘Dr. Love’, directed by Tom Kuntz from the always amazing, MJZ Productions.
OK! Remember Bumblebeez 81 and the ‘Pony Ride’ single? Here’s a refresher and another favorite off their debut album, ‘Printz’ (where Pia gets down on the mic):
The ‘Dr. Love’ single was released in the US last Tuesday, and you can cop it from Amazon along with the rest of The Bumblebeez / Bumblebeez81 back catalog right here. The forthcoming album, ‘Prince Umberto & The Sister Of Ill’ will be released in the US on August 14th. Modular 4evr.
The tracks are like whoa. There’s a Presets remix called ‘Hung Down’ which features the ARP Odyssey riff from Madonna’s ‘Hung Up’ (Originally from Abba’s ‘Gimme Gimme Gimme’). I don’t think Modular is selling the promo so you’ll have to buy a t-shirt from them in order to get one. Or, know a super cool blogger, like me!
I think if you order anything from Modular Records they throw in this promo cd. So go buy stuff from them here. If you buy the Van She shirt, call me & tell me before you wear it, don’t wanna end up wearing the same thing to school! How Embarrassing!
