Thank you but our Princess is in another castle

Ok so it’s high time you lot knew about 8 Bit Peoples.

The site is a web.2 community dedicated entirely to music made via the mediums of Commodore, Spectrum, Nes, Game Boy, Master System ect;

They give you gloriously OTT detail about the technology that will leave you moist;

“It’s a common misconception that ZX Spectrum 48K sound is generated solely by the Z80 chip, with the AY chip only being used by the more high-tech 128K models. This is not true. The first AY interfaces for 48K Speccys appeared around 1990. FREAKuencies was written entirely on the ZX Spectrum 48K (more specifically a Timex Computer 2048 – the American/Portuguese ZX48K clone) with AY interface. Sound-Tracker 1.1, a Polish music editor made especially for such configuration was used to create these chiptunes on a computer not much bigger than a calculator”

All you chip heads make sure you visit the site shop and contribute some cash to this very generous web service. That way we can all keep enjoying the lush cream of the 8-bit crop the people crew serve up every month.

Here are some of my fave tracks from over the last year;

Stu_AUCR

BitShifter_HexidecimalGenome

Sabrepulse_DarkLightning

(All tracks are included for sampling purposes only. Please support the artists by buying their work or going to a show. If you are the artist or their management and you object to the work appearing here please email us at iwcwcwc@gmail.com and we will follow your wishes and remove it).

Camden Crawl 08 (well…)

So last night I managed to swing a spare ticket and found myself headed Camden Town-wards to get sweaty with the kids in ‘intimate’ venues, hopefully hearing some hot new acts in the process.

I would have loved to at this point be able to say I’d seen Ipso Facto. It would have been amazing to have been held in thrall by Crystal Castles or even Reading’s freshest home boys Does It Offend You, Yeah? but sadly queues of an untold nature put paid to those designs.

We ended up trecking up to Bullet Bar in Kentish town for the Drowned in Sound stage. I caught the very end of Lovvers (balistic balls out punk that’ll have Gallows watching their backs,) and all of the not particularly striking Fanfario (who don’t appear to have a web page at the mo, if I track one down I’ll do an edit on this post).

M83 were my sole reason for picking that particular venue and surrendering all hopes of getting into the Earl of Camden or other proxies. However after a 45 minute delay a chunky brash sound tech addresses us to inform that a fairly crucial piece of equiptment has been left behind by the band. In France. When the band eventually took to the stage they played for 10 minutes before being hauled off due to curfew.

If it had been anyone else I would have been royally brassed off by this. However Mr Anthony Gonzales (who cites influences as Brian Eno, John Hugues and landscapes,) properly pulled a rabbit out of his ass and saved the day. The key piece of equiptment having transpired to be the sampler containing the basis of all the band’s work, Gonzales starting frantically twiddling knobs on his Yamaha and intermittently gurning and nodding his head – basically he was writing new material on the spot and composed an entirely improvised set in about 5 minutes. and MY GOD was it strong stuff; deep penetrating textured synths pulsing with restrained undulations.

M83 live is a very different beast from on record. Much punchier, much more heavy and rhythmic. Check out the track America below as a fairly good indicative guide. If you like it then crack open your piggy bank and shell out for the new record Saturdays=Youth which you can get from Amazon HERE.

M83_America.MP3.

(All tracks are included for sampling purposes only. If you like them you should support the artists by buying their work. If you are the artist (well done your stuff is blinding,) and you wish for your music not to appear here we will follow your wishes just email iwcwcwc [at sign] gmail.com and let us know.)

Ra Ra Riot – Ghost Under Rocks (Andrew Maury remix)

New York’s Ra Ra Riot have been one of those bands to be blogged about intensively, yet have received no real exposure in the “real world” of print and people. I was first introduced to them by The Little Ones (another lovely indie pop band that I have an unabashed liking for) and since then have been religiously checking their myspace for any sign of UK dates having instantly fallen in love with their heartfelt, energetic indie-pop tunes.

One day back in June when I was doing my routine check-up there was a blog posted by the band about the sudden tragic death of their 23 year-old drummer John Pike. Obviously horrific news and something that shocked the band to their core. A few months later the band, still with John very much on their mind, came back with possibly their best song to date ‘Ghost Under Rock’, a song that seems even more poignant given the year the band have had. Andrew Maury (indie remixer du jour) has given his own considered stamp on the song. Check it out here and see what you think:

Ra Ra Riot – Ghost Under Rocks (Andrew Maury remix)

Happier posts to come!!

Favourite Nude Remixes

Some of you will know that Radiohead have been running a remix competition lately at http://www.radioheadremix.com/. There are some great remixes in there, but two of them particularly caught my ear:

Nude (RAC Mix) – RAC have always been purveyors of fine remixes, but this retains the original’s slowie-ness. There’s a monster of an echoey snare, and some nice harmonies. Not too far from the original track.

Nude (Hipster Runoff Mix) – This is great too – created by the brilliant Hiperster Runoff who has a great MP3 blog at http://www.hipsterrunoff.com.

Got any favourites from the site yourself? Let us know in the comments.

Hello, world.

I was country when country wasn’t cool is an Interactive club night and music blog.

If you want to DJ at one of our club nights, then comment a track listing of stuff you like. or post it on the facebook group wall here:

If we like your style we’ll give you a set at the night. It’s that easy.

If you want to send us stuff please do; we like that

iwcwcwc@gmail.com

If you want to get in contact with us, sure thing we love that too

iwcwcwc@gmail.com

If your art features here and you rather it didn’t, then let us know and we’ll respect your wishes

iwcwcwc@gmail.com

If you want to write for us, then thats cool baby. Send a sample of your work to

iwcwcwc@gmail.com

If we like it we’ll sign you up to the crew. Initially at least, we will always try to give contructive feedback on anything we get sent.