THE COLLECTOR'S GUIDE - When Worlds Collide

FRANKIE TEARDROP, SUICIDE / SUICIDE (Ariola, 1977)
Being ahead of your time can be real painful; when Martin Rev’s ferocious electronics accompanied by Lou Vega’s psychotic Elvis-like crooning exploded on the early New York punk scene, the bottles thrown by an audience hungry for the customary guitar, bass and drums often drew blood. But it’s never too late to appreciate, and 30 years later that sound still counts as progressive and also as one of the most important influences on 21st century music.

WINDOW LICKER, APHEX TWIN (Warp Records, 1999)
Forgive the hyperbole, but isn’t Chris Cunningham’s work with Aphex Twin one of the most successful collaborations of all time? The perfect marriage of form and content, where each supports and gives extra meaning to the other. Perhaps best seen in hilariously surreal rap video parody Window Licker.

SMOKE ON THE WATER, SENOR COCONUT (Emperor Norton, 2003)
Certain music is sacred, so generally electronic remixes or sampling of classic rock tracks should be punishable by – say – removal of the ears with a blunt object or at least heavy fines (a recent cheap butchering of Jimi Hendrix’ Foxy Lady springs to mind), but this rework of Deep Purple’s classic track just works and there’s no point getting all fundamentalist about the whole thing.

I’VE SEEN IT ALL, BJÖRK / SELMASONGS (One Little Indian, 2000)
Aside from the fact that Björk is quite possibly from the future making anything she does a sort of collision of worlds or dimensions, her collaboration with equally genius Lars von Trier in the musical film drama ‘Dancer in the Dark’ is very well known for two reasons: they suffered such ‘creative differences’ that Björk famously vowed she would never work in film again, and at the same time the movie is a genuine rarity in its courageous and affecting nature, which awarded it the Palm d’Or and Best Actress for Björk at the Cannes film festival.

99 PROBLEMS, DANGER MOUSE / THE GREY ALBUM (Bootleg, 2004)
Brian Burton’s mash-up between the Beatles White Album and the a cappella version of Jay-Z’s Black Album undeniably appeals also to a naïve listener, but music geeks tend to get especially masturbatory about it. This is not sampling, but more a deconstructive art form where Burton has built the music around Jay Z’s vocal tracks using only the Beatles album and the software Acid Pro.

BIDI BIDI BOM BWAH, JAMIE LLOYD / TROUBLE WITHIN (Future Classic, 2006)
Sydney talent Jamie Lloyd finds sonic inspiration in the most unusually usual places; a mosquito flying past or the sound a cat makes trying to cough up a fur-ball can be the start of a new piece. His found sounds and own voice collide in surprising yet harmonious ways with conventionally sourced beats and bleeps with the sound of a tree branch breaking replacing a snare drum or the particular sweet acoustic of a public toilet door shutting taking the place of a bass drum.

THE ADVENTURES OF GHOSTHORSE & STILLBORN, COCO ROSIE / RAINBOW WARRIORS (Touch and Go Records, 2007)
Coco Rosie is this delicious dish you can make when you separate two sisters for ten years and marinate one in classic, operatic training at the Paris conservatory and infuse the other with linguistics, sociology and Brooklyn intelligentsia, then place together and steam intensively in a small bathroom in Montmartre.

THE SUNDAY SMILE, BEIRUT / THE FLYING CLUB CUP (Ba Da Bing! Records, 2007)
What would it sound like if the soul of Tom Waits and the voice of Rufus Wainwright were reincarnated in a 21-year old musician from New Mexico, who, on his teenage trip to Europe became completely infatuated with Balkan brass music? – Certainly something like this drunken, melancholic melody straight from the heart of wise-beyond-his-years Zach Condon.

MUSIC TO THE CREATIONS OF GILLES JOBIM, CRISTIAN VOGEL (Station 55 Records, 2007)
Vogel is a true challenge to preconceptions. Firstly, despite the name he’s not even close to German, but a Chilean living in Barcelona via years in England. Secondly, the experimental music he is known for truly stretches our sonic imagination. And finally, with his compositions for the contemporary dance and multi-media art world he dispels the stereotype of what an electronic act and producer should be.

MORE THAN PUSSY, THE REMIX EP, BRAZILIAN GIRLS (Verve Forecast 2007)
From the quintessential melting pot of New York come this quartet and their self-named ‘melting pop’ wherein a multitude of languages and genres are mingled. The remix EP just released in August is a yummy treat where their hybrid brand of music is reworked by Carl Craig (genius), MSTRKRFT and armsofghandi, and also includes the Brazilian Girls take on the Talking Heads’ classic Crosseyed and Painless recorded in English and Spanish.