Downtempo | scissorkick

The Foreign Exchange

31. October 2008

It would be dishonest of me to say that I’m a huge Neo-Soul kinda guy, but I’ve always been a big fan of the production from Nicolay, one half of The Foreign Exchange (with NC rapper-now-singer Phonte, from Little Brother). Their first collaboration, Connected, was one of the best hip-hop/soul records of 2004, and the [...]

Midnight Lab Band

30. September 2008

2 Comments

I’ve always considered a certain level of anonymity an important quality among the musicians I tend to lionize. Not to say I expect a musician to release LP after LP under different pseudonyms, or drop mysterious white-label 12-inch vinyl as a career’s worth of output, but there’s a certain modesty and focus on the music [...]

Michna

11. August 2008

3 Comments

A while back, when I was DJing more frequently, I used to rely on a small stack of records to get me through particularly tough transitions within sets. One of those records was “The Underwater Adventure Hop Secret Treasure 12″from the Secret Frequency Crew, and I always felt like their full-length CD that followed on [...]

Koushik

30. July 2008

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Stone’s Throw often relishes in mixing the new with the old but few of the venerable label’s artists sum it up as well as Koushik, the eponymous moniker of Koushik Ghosh. Mixing hazy 60’s nostalgia with new school beats and production, the music occupies a very unique place within a larger nexus of downtempo, soul, [...]

Flying Lotus + Lil’ Wayne

8. July 2008

1 Comment

Here’s a quick little nugget just sent out by the Warp camp from LA’s Flying Lotus, who will be dropping a series of EPs throughout August featuring new non-album tracks, very special collaborations, and remixes from some of your favorites. Here’s one of the first, featuring none other than the self-professed “greatest rapper alive” Lil’ [...]

Blktop Project

28. June 2008

1 Comment

“How did I not know about this group?!” It’s one of the most satisfying questions music fans can ask themselves. You work hard to follow an artist, group, or label, constantly staying on top of releases yet still an entire project can exist under your astute radar. Such is the Blktop Project for SK, a [...]

Presto

16. June 2008

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It gives me great pleasure to be back posting after a hectic month of work. Expect much more regular content moving forward, starting with today’s post from Los Angeles DJ/Producer Presto. His early 12″ instrumentals were a staple of my older downtempo and hip-hop sets, so it’s fantastic to be able to bring you word [...]

Keston and Westdal

14. February 2008

5 Comments

Here’s a nerd fantasy for you: Tortoise covering Boards of Canada’s “Roygbiv” with Quincy Jones producing. Yeah, it’s totally unrealistic, perhaps even a slight bit musically incongruous, but I don’t give a fuck. I think that would be sick. It is just a dream after all. Now, I couldn’t in good conscience say that [...]

d_rradio

29. January 2008

2 Comments

The d_rradio guys (pronounced D-R-radio) are definitely from the SK oldschool and we are happy to announce their next full-length, self-titled opus will be on its way to your ears in March via UK imprint Distraction Records. We’ve been online friends for sometime (check this old post from 2005 ) and I’ve always respected the [...]

Jet Black Crayon

28. January 2008

3 Comments

Tommy Guerrero, Gadget and Monte Vallier are Jet Black Crayon. The story goes that Guerrero was asked to open for Isotope 217 way back when and instead of playing solo, he tapped his boys to play as Jet Black Crayon. And years later, the trio — with the occasional helping hand from a large group [...]