I Don’t Buy Records In Your Shop Now I Tape Them All | A Mixtape By Telafonica

April 14th, 2010 Stu

Telafonica are a Sydney band that operate more like an evolving, fluid collective rather that a rigid formation of players. Their original line-up has filtered into the diaspora, with core Australian members morphing into a four-piece that explore a long terrain, bordered by melodic pop on one side and experimental electronica on the other. Although the palate is broad, the influences are not always evident – hence, when Adrian from Telafonica suggested dropping a mixtape of tracks that acted as touch-points for the creation of their most recent album “Love On the Second Stair”, it was impossible to resist. Whilst many bands shroud themselves in unnecessary mystique, Telafonica take the opposite approach – here, by revealing their influences in such direct terms, and also at their web site, where work-in-progress conversations between members are carried out in the public domain. Stuart Buchanan

“In December of 2008, the Australian based members of Telafonica decided to specifically focus on the creation of a new album. They already had a handful of tracks in various stages of development that they had been playing in their live shows but were looking to see how to draw all these together, as well as create some new songs. One of the tactics used to give focus was the creation of half hour inspiration ‘mixtapes’ on CD to be shared around. In the end, only Blake and Adrian ended up compiling whole mixtapes, though Rebecca and Eliza contributed other tracks themselves as inspiration for specific Telafonica songs.

“The album was created and released in November of 2009 as ‘Love On The Second Stair’. This mixtape, developed especially for the Discontent blog, combines some of the tracks that were on the initial inspiration discs, along with other inspirations that came to the fore in the process of making the album, as well as some tracks from which samples were directly taken and used within the music that formed the finished album.

“There is obviously a wide range of things to be heard, from the most mainstream of mainstream to obscure side channels in the history of music. These reflect Telafonica’s bower bird approach to music construction, begging, borrowing and stealing from any and everywhere in order to compile their own postmodern, post-retro pop.

“In this mix, where a track appears in full, it has been either already made available by the original artists on the internet for free, or specific permission has been gained from the original artists to include their work. Obviously, a number of the tracks have not been made available for free and permission would be difficult (and costly) to secure. In those cases, the tracks have been used in a traditional sampling sense, with only very brief snippets occurring, and are generally processed in some manner.” Telafonica

DOWNLOAD: I Don’t Buy Records In Your Shop Now I Tape Them All | A Mixtape By Telafonica (69.7MB)

(nomo – all the stars)
(adam and the ants – kick)
(parts & labor – satellites)
(the martini bros – dance like it is o.k. (dj koze & the tease remix))
(the flying lizards – money (that’s what i want))
1. beem – RER
(the beatles – sgt pepper’s lonely hearts club band reprise)
2. balun – a surprise
3. whitewash – feather
(sigur ros – festival)
4. slareffenklang – you win
(bow wow wow – c30, c60, c90, go!)
(the jam – that’s entertainment)
5. ghoul – swimming pool
6. sufjan stevens – sister winter
7. hamilton yarns – newhaven to dieppe
8. go! team – junior kickstart
(the smashing pumpkins – tonight, tonight)
9. parades – exodus (telafonica treble remix)
10. underlapper – choking ibis

IMAGE: Cover Design by Telafonica

Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

Posted in Mixtapes. | 2 Comments »

Underlapper | Meanderthal (Cleptocleptics Remix)

February 8th, 2009 Stu

F3E1A78F-4EA7-4E98-A4E3-647E94D78725.jpg

When Underlapper first emerged, a collection of their own homespun CD-Rs went into circulation, track titles scrawled in green biro on TDK branded inlays. This demarkation clearly suggested that Underlapper were still in their embryonic phase, that they hadn’t quite decided that the world was ready for them. Yet the music itself, and their accompanying gigs, clearly showed a band who were more than ready to face the future. What they lacked in confidence, they more than made up for in their approach to experimentation and a willingness to imbibe influences from all corners, including those that might potentially discourage a swelling fan base.

Although experimental and post-rock influences were writ large, when Underlapper’s album ‘What Came Forth From The Sea’ finally dropped in 2004, they had taken an odd detour into Anticon country and had infused their sound with raw, Australian hip-hop vocals. Though unexpected, it did herald the fact that Underlapper were determined to diversify their sound and to eschew the notion to ‘play ball’ with expectations. To their eternal credit, there remains to this day no other example of Australian post-rock hip-hop. For this fact alone, even if that was end of their tale, Underlapper would have found themselves in 6pt black type in a tiny corner of the Australian Music history books.

Spool forward two years, and Underlapper drop kicked the hip-hop for their 2007 release ‘Red Spring’ – a release that should have come from a band twice their age, playing together for twice as long. Indeed, it could have come have come straight off the shipping container from Scandanavia, with sounds reminiscent of some of Iceland’s finest, minus the attendant histrionics. ‘Red Spring’ was a quiet melee of electronics and acoustics – pianos, flutes and bass all skirting around arpeggios and droplets of digitalism – somewhat disguising the inherent truth that Underlapper can write some simple and beautiful songs.

And so to ‘Red Spring Remixes’, released this month on Sydney’s Feral Media. Thirteen tracks recontextualise the original collection with a cast list that reads like a Who’s Who of Australia’s next wave of experimental artists – Broken Chip, Part Timer, Faux Pas, Karoshi, Aheadphonehome and, on the track below, Tom Smith aka Cleptoclectics, bursting out of his Prefuse-like skin to share a spiraling piece of sun-kissed beat science.

Underlapper – Meanderthal (Cleptocleptics Remix) | mp3

Join Feral Media’s mailing list for full details of the album release date and supporting stores.

img | matteo sasselli

Tags: , , ,

Posted in Old Blog Posts. | 2 Comments »