Guest Post Vincent from Fufu Stew- C is for Cratedigger

Any reader of this little blog will be familiar with both Vincent and his blog fufu stew. Vincent has put together a two part Holiday weekend mix where one part is posted on cratedigger and the other is posted on his blog.

Here is a link to the part of the mix on Fufu Stew:

Warmed over leftovers

I am very honored to have the chance to share the fruits of Vincent's cratedigging efforts. I will let Vincent take over from here.

Stay cool with the soul and funky sounds of DJ SOUL Chef!!!

Hello, kiddies.

Here I am in in your backyard, armed with a massive stack of 45 rpm goodness. I've never been to Chicago, but if I do get the chance, I know where to go first. Thank you Rich for having me aboard. If you Cratedigger fans had a chance to pick up on what I put down over at Souled On Music, then you know where my head is right now. This is the second in a series of mixes where I will attempt to use all six keys of the scale on a standard keyboard. For reasons that should be rather apparent, this one focuses on the key of "C". It's a gentle blend of sweet Northern and Southern soul, plus plenty of funky heat. After having blasted it on my iPod for the past couple of days, I decided that it was done just right and ready to serve, so without further ado, here we go...

01 Here Comes The Judge-Shorty Long (Soul)
02 Hunk Of Funk-Gene Dozier & The Brotherhood (Minit)
03 (I Wanna) Testify-The Parliaments (Revilot)
04 Bingo-G.T.+4 (The Groovy Label)
05 Do It To It-Bird Rollins Featuring The New Jersey Burners (Calla)
06 Cool Broadway-The Fantastic Johnny C (Phil L.A. Of Soul)
07 Hogwash-Earnest Jackson (Stone)
08 Hot Butter N All-Lou Courtney (Hurdy Gurdy)
09 Damph F'aint-The Herb Johnson Settlement (Toxsan)
10 I Can't Get Next To You-Mongo Santamaria (Atlantic)
11 If I Had A Hammer-Ace Cannon (Hi)
12 I Likes To Do It-The Peoples Choice (Phil L.A. Of Soul)
13 Leroy Is In The Army-Jimmy Castor (Smash)
14 Nothing You Can Do-Wilson Pickett (Atlantic)
15 Saturday Night Fish Fry-The Coasters (Atco)
16 Tip Toe-Robert Parker (NOLA)
17 Everyting's Hunky Dory-Billy Harner (V-Tone)
18 You Ain't Too Cool-Cash McCall (Thomas)
19 Gettin' Away-Cliff Nobles & Co. (Phil L.A. Of Soul)
20 Here Comes The Meter Man-The Meters (Josie)
21 Serve 'Em-Madhouse (Today)
22 Get Down People-The Fabulous Counts (Moira)
23 Crazy Legs-Donald Austin (Eastbound)
24 Swim Pts. 1&2-Bobby Freeman (Autumn)
25 Wild Little Tiger-The Isley Brothers (Atlantic)
26 One Eye Open-Maskman & The Agents (Dynamo)
27 Alvin's Bag-Alvin Cash (Toddlin' Town)
28 Let's Go Get Stoned-James Brown (Smash)

I can't stress enough how much of a pleasure it is to be able to join in with all of these great blogs and share my love for the timely sport of crate digging. I have learned so much in such a short amount of time, not to mention the practice I've been getting in making these mixes with the mighty Cakewalk Pyro software. I'll be back at it again real soon. I hope you will all join me for the ride. Have a great weekend, have fun and as always, be safe.

Peace and blessings.

Please download and enjoy "C Is For Cratedigger", an .mp3 file, 69 MB.

Party in Pilsen 82507

My buddy Sloth, invited me to go to a party with him in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago. I have enjoyed what limited exposure that I have had with that neighborhood. so I agreed.

This was a house party with a professional PA, 1200s, the works. Also it was a late night, as the shindig was due to start at 11PM. There were a number of DJs scheduled to perform, including Alexander, Slow Children and Ed DMX from the UK was to headline.

The house had a killer pro PA system, it was loud as hell and very clear. There were also a couple of projectors illuminating the space with various video and images mixed on a macbook. Note the figure shadowed above, bathed in cool blue hues... Here is Ed DMX a banging away on his Roland and other contraptions.

In the background you can see the video/image mixer at the macbook projection deck...

All in all a cool evening. The music itself was pretty far from funky. I couldn't venture to say what sort of stuff they were spinning.

I did enjoy a gent named Chris who was very proficient on the decks, and used some old school rap to do fast cuts from whatever other music was spinning on the other platter.

I think that I would like to spin a set next time and get the kids moving to some music that is more my flavor.

Thanks for the good times.

Another Guest mix: DJ Blueprint from this is tomorrow

If you are down with the soul and funk blogosphere, then surely you are aware of this is tomorrow, which happens to be one of my faves.

DJ Blueprint, the proprietor of this is tomorrow put together a tight 30 minute funk work out set for cratedigger.

I am pleased to present:

30 min funk workout 4
tracklist:
1. incomparable seven - funky grand paw part 1 (top hit)
2. landlord & tennants - sagittarius part 1 (coach)
3. soul patrol - don't knock the cop (zuma)
4. communicators & black experience band - is it funky enough?
(duplex)
5. the marlboro men - (ride on) iron horse (nite beat)
6. sammy gordon & the hiphuggers - upstairs on boston road part 1
(archives)
7. house guests - my mind set me free part 1 (house guests)
8. tommy bass - (i can't help it baby) this is my thing (soulful)
9. city council ltd. - when you git through wit it put it back (gt
graytom)
10. mary davis - danger! (playboy at work) (conclave)
11. con-funk-shun - clique (fretone)

Please download 30 min workout 4.

Enjoy.

SOULMAN 2001 SPACED ODDITIES PT. 2

Phill over at thatrealschitt has posted the second half of his 2001 Spaced Oddities.

I dug the first half and my trip out of NYC yesterday was put to a most excellent groove to the recently posted second half.

Go check it out.

Link

RB is a guest selecter at this is tomorrow

this is tomorrow blog is celebrating its' first birthday by inviting guest selectors to post mixes.

I am in awe of the company that I share in this honor. Larry from funky16corners and Vincent from Fufu Stew have already posted their mixes. I visited the Colonel's well of dub treats for the final time for the mix I made for this is tomorrow. The final installment of the Colonel dub mixes is called, The Colonel's Dubquarters (edit.)

Dig & enjoy, and congrats on one year DJ Blueprint!

Biking in Gotham

I had the chance to take my first bike ride in Manhattan this morning. How awesome!

My hotel had a Puma folding bike, pictured above, that was available for riding purposes. The bike itself was pretty cool. It is a single speed, kind of a cross between a large bmx and a mountain bike. Despite the lack of a downtube, the frame felt pretty stiff under my girth. I have never ridden a bike that has been equipped with disc brakes. The brakes were perfect for the Union Square streets.

I set off from 17th St and Union Square at about 5:55 this morning and headed west towards the Hudson and the bike path that follows it. The ride along 17th was OK, I only tried to catch onto one vehicle.

Towards the end of this western jaunt, I hit a very old stretch of street that was actually cobbles, and here the wide tires were a blessing. Up off the saddle and the disc brakes killed it.

Heading south towards the Battery, I saw the site that used to have the Twin Towers on it. That was a trip. Even the path was a bit out of sorts at this point. Eieree site, never forget and all that.

Continuing on south, I hit the Battery and looked off to the south and got a good sight line on both Ellis Island and The Statue. The path sort of petered out there and I headed east along Broad Street for a few blocks. Around the bottom of the island, I caught up again with the path/ boardwalk. Heading north now, I was between the FDR and The East River. A bit further, I passed Pier 16, where I caught the Devotchka show a few weeks back at the SchniederTent Theatre, a venue that I recommend highly.

I continued in a northerly direction, passing the Houston bridge, 10th St bridge, etc. At 17th (?) and Ave C, I was able to go under the FDR. I ended up in a project looking group of brown high rises, that looked like a perfect backdrop for a breakin' throw down back in the day, but are seeing more yuppified times now.

After spinning through there a bit, I caught 12th St and headed west until I hit 1st Ave where I headed north. Once at 17th, I headed west back to my start at 17th and Union Square.

It was one of the best rides of the summer so far. 55 minutes of prime rolling in Gotham.

Rockit Scientist Records-NYC

I had a long day at the office in Gotham, and my dinner plans changed.
So what to do? I decided to take a little hike a bit south and a bit east over to the new Disney Land that is The East Village.

As I ventured a bit, I came upon St Mark’s Place. In the back of my mind, I remembered that there was a record store that has been advertising in Ugly Things for 12 years or so. I could picture the ad, but could not remember the store.

On the south side of the street, I saw Kim’s Video, which is the most absolute sickest video store that I have ever seen. It has at least 2 levels, and to be honest, since I can only focus on one collecting addiction at a time, I just bypassed looking at all the video and DVDs, and went up straight to the back of the second floor to the vinyl section. I found a couple of things, but when I looked at the condition, missing the paper insert, general wear, etc, I could not pull the trigger on a few $6.99 records.

As I left Kim’s, the name of the record store came to mind—Rockit Scientist.

I went about another half block or so, and I saw Rockit on the north side of the street. It is a couple of steps down off the sidewalk. When, I walked in, I was taken aback. This is a place of musical nirvana. On the right side of the store there are racks from floor to ceiling, filled with cds that range from soul to funk to 60s garage, psych and cool music of all stripes. Along the left side of the store is the traditional record store raised counter of yore, featuring various record related ephemera and an older Technics turntable. Moving towards the back, past the basement stairs, there is a rack of LPs on the left and LPs on the right. Going up the walls and continuing onto the ceiling there are other records- mainly mid value 45s. The record explorer needs to be careful to not stub your toes on the budget LP crates that sit in front of the other racks.

I found a box of LPs titled, James Brown. Bingo. I looked through the box a bit and came up with a sealed copy of Sho is Funky Down Here priced at $9.99. The record is marked as all instrumental. “James Brown plays and directs the James Brown Band.” Done.

Frankly, I was a bit overwhelmed at the depth and breadth of the music on offer in this tiny store. I struck up a conversation with Robert (?) the proprietor. We discussed all manner of music and musicology. This guy knows his stuff and knew many of the old garage folks from whom I have purchased records, reissues, reviewed their releases, or even interviewed- Crypt Records, Norton Records, Mop Top Mike, etc. over the years.

I remembered something that I was interested in getting a copy of and asked for a recommendation of some Gil Scott Heron. I picked up an LP compilation of Gil Scott Heron called The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. I can’t wait to hear this one either.

I will definitely be back to visit.