Soil and "Pimp" Sessions, Planet Pimp

To sense the full force of Soil & Pimp "Sessions" you in truth need to be at the foot of a stage, non plugged into an iPod. After all, the Japanese alt. nothingness collective have built their name around a repute for fast, frenetic live shows. While not a patch on the live experience, S&P "S"' fourth album captures much of this furious, feverish energy.

The six-piece, wHO burst onto the DJ-driven Tokyo club scene in 2001, have perfected their unique sound through unnumerable live performances. Having toured with the likes of Berlin based 'nu-jazz' collective Jazzanova and been championed by euphony guru Gilles Peterson (whose Brownswood label they ar now sign to), S&P "S" suffer secured their place as pioneers of experimental altitude. jazz.

If 2007's Pimpoint record album constituted inanimate, technically sharp compositions, album number four-spot takes the group's self styled harsh approach a step farther. The incongruously named Hollow is a dense aural onslaught. Like a crazed dog on acid, the track dips and dives through cacophonic guitar fragments and swaggering psychedelic tones before finally settling on a victorious trumpet leitmotif. Storm is equally unruly with dazzling brass and wriggling, hard ornamented phrasing, while Go Next! dozens top simon Marks for plain audaciousness.

Despite their kamikaze ad-hoc tendencies, S&P "S" never earmark serrated-edged riffs and boisterous rhythms to get in the way of a good tonal pattern. The World Is Filled By � as in a flash memorable as Pimpoint standout track A.I.E � ranks high on the catchiness scale. With knee-quiveringly upright harmonies it is for certain a contender for single release. The heady ruffle of entwined samba rhythms and slayer keyboard on Sea Of Tranquility is equally irresistible.

While constantly dynamic, Planet Pimp never runs away with itself. Most importantly, its creators steer clear of ostentation. Dizzyingly substantial, if at times physically exhausting to listen to, Planet Pimp offers ungoverned excitement at every turn. On moment thoughts, possibly the listening experience is as dear after all.

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Download Merlons

Artist: Merlons: mp3 download    Genre(s):  Trance     Discography:      Trance    Year: 1996    Tracks: 1 The Merlons of Nehemiah were formed in 1992 in Germany. They chop-chop made a name for themselves when swerving precipitously from the course taken by many groups natural out of that country's burgeoning early '90s take turns folk-rock setting. While "Deutsche" folk-rock groups like Paddy Goes to Holyhead, An Cat Dubh, Fiddler's Green and Tapsi Turtles borrowed nigh exclusively from their Irish and UK contemporaries the Merlons john Drew from more far-reaching sources. Utilizing instruments like recorders, lutes, bombarde, dudelsack and drehleyer in addition to diddle, guitar, bass and drums their expressive style could be described as "Alternative Medieval Mystic Folk Rock." Their sound remained constant throughout their number one triplet albums Cantoney, Eluoami and Romanoir when they were known by their

The Rolling Stones go Universal

The Rolling Stones and Universal Music Group have signed an exclusive, long-run, worldwide recording agreement.

The pact covers future albums by the Rolling Stones and the unmarried most iconic catalogue in rock & roll, including such landmark albums as �Sticky Fingers,� �Exile On Main St.� and �Black And Blue,� and such global anthems as �Brown Sugar,� �Angie,� �It�s Only Rock �N Roll� and �Start Me Up.�

New recordings by the Rolling Stones will be released by Universal Music Group�s Polydor label through UMG companies around the world.

The Stones commented, �Universal are

Batman Begins - 7/8/2008

1997: Batman is last seen in the guise of George Clooney, chasing down an all-blue Arnold Schwarzenegger, with two gutter punks (Robin and Batgirl) on his tail, and shepherded by the one director that all film critics love to hate: Joel Schumacher.



The franchise was left for dead, revived only by speculation of an absurd Batman vs. Superman movie in 2002. Most moviegoers seem to have bid good riddance to the series, which in its later years was notable only for generating more discussion about the nipples on the batsuit than anything else.



2005: Against all odds, Batman is back. With the fourth actor (in five films) to take on the role of Bruce Wayne, the film is a "reboot" of the series by imagining this as a prequel to the other Batman movies. (It's unclear whether Batman Begins is meant to live in the same universe as its forebears, and the film hints at an alternate Robin to come and ends with news of a familiar villain -- but one with a much different M.O.) Directed by Christopher Nolan (the auteur behind Memento), some fresh blood helps immensely in kick starting the series.



The epic Batman Begins starts with a young Bruce Wayne trying to make sense of his life in Gotham City. His parents are billionaires that try to "give back" to the community (while simultaneously managing a multinational corporation), but Bruce just wants to play with his pal Rachel on the Wayne Manor estate. Here we learn of Bruce's fascination with bats (he's attacked when he falls down a well) and his obsession with justice, when his parents are killed during a mugging in depression-stricken Gotham. Years later, a distressed Bruce (Christian Bale) skips town to live like a bum, stealing food and intentionally getting thrown into foreign prisons so he can fight with the inmates.



Wayne is eventually sprung by one Henri Ducard (Liam Neeson), an enigma who Bruce follows to a mountain compound, where he's trained by ninjas (ahem) in the arts of fighting, misdirection, and stealth. Finally, Wayne (presumed dead after a seven-year absence) returns to Gotham to clean up the town -- and at last the actual plot of the movie starts to take shape. (For those of you still hanging in there, it involves a maniacal plan to poison the city and turn everyone into a lunatic, courtesy of the movie's one "iconic" villain, The Scarecrow.)



At nearly 2 1/2 hours long, you better really want to know about Batman when you enter the theater for Batman Begins. No stone is left unturned in Bruce Wayne's backstory, and you may find yourself dozing off during the first hour of the film, which features too many fistfights, too much repetition of Wayne being yelled at and beaten up, and confusing choreography (when ninjas fight ninjas, no one wins). As Team America: World Police memorably points out, we could have used a montage in here to trim some running time.



Once the plot gets rolling, the pace picks up quite a bit, but still we have to contend with a half-dozen major bad guys, at least four different conspiracies against Gotham, and a variety of hangers on that range from memorable (Morgan Freeman, an unlikely tech guru) to clich�d (Gary Oldman's helpful cop) to useless (Katie Holmes's district attorney/wannabe love interest). Michael Caine, as sassy butler Alfred, actually commands every scene he's in. And the new Batmobile is pretty kick-ass.



Bale, as is frequently the case in his films, is a blank slate for Batman. He plays the dark prince with suitable bravado but doesn't quite emulate the snarl of Michael Keaton's Batman voice. Bale does have a solid screen presence and does well with the physical side of the part. He also benefits from very well-written dialogue and a script full of memorable lines. (Alas, few of them are very funny, and every good superhero movie needs a solid dose of comic relief. Alfred carries that burden in Batman Begins all by his lonesome.)



Batman Begins is a solid and frequently very good superhero flick, though it doesn't quite measure up to 2002's Spider-Man, a film which follows a surprisingly near-identical template. Both characters keep their secret identity from would-be girlfriends, try to avenge their dead relatives, create their own super-suits, and face down a villain who goes crazy thanks to his own ill-advised scientific experiments -- and that's just for starters. But pound for pound, Sam Raimi's Spider-Man has more thrills and is simply more fun for its running time. Batman Begins is dark to the point of suicide, such that my one-day-later memory of it has devolved into a swirl of black and shadows. After 2 1/2 hours of this stuff you'll be ready to kill yourself. Now we know why Tim Burton (the master of dark filmmaking) gave his villain a day-glo makeup job.



Bat-geeks are going to love the Batman Begins DVD, which features a full disc of extras that explore the making of the film in depth. But the highlight, for my money, is the included booklet which includes Bob Kane's original "The Bat-Man" comic (from Detective Comics #27) and two more recent vintages of Batman comic stories which inspired the events in the movie.







Black: The new black.

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Erik Seifert

   
Artist: Erik Seifert

   Genre(s): 
New Age
   

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Discography:


   
 Thrust Avis

   Year: 2004   
Tracks: 8

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Stonebridge - More Additions To Glastonbury Festival Lineup Confirmed

The lineup for the Stonebridge Bar at Glastonbury Festival 2008 has been announced.

While not home to the type of big name acts that feature on the main stages of the Somerset festival, the bar is one of the most popular venues on the festival site, due to its location in the relatively-new Park area of the event.

And while the festival itself does not start until Friday June 27th, organisers have confirmed the Stonebridge bar will play host to Sean Rowley's beloved Guilty Pleasures DJ set on the Thursday night, for festivalgoers who have arrived at the Worthy Farm site that day.

Other acts and DJs lined up to play the Stonebridge Bar include Man Like Me, Toddla T, XFM's John Hilcock, while London club night Hip-Hop Karaoke will also be transported to Somerset for the weekend.

The full lineup for the Stonebridge Bar is as follows:Thursday June 26th

The Heavenly Jukebox
Guilty Pleasures
Baggy Mondays
Breakin Bread

Friday June 27th

Robins Jukebox
Dad Rock
Hip-Hop Karaoke
Phil Harrison and Chris Parkin
Jon Hilcock (XFM)
Very Special Guest
Lou and Soph
Get Involved Club DJs
Richard Norris

Saturday June 28th

Jeff's Jukebox reggae set
Bassclef
Secousse DJs with Esau Mwamwaya
Hip-Hop Karaoke
Heatwave DJs
Man Like Me
Deviate DJs
Leaf Troup
Toddla T
Grecoroman

Sunday June 29th

Danny's Jukebox
Ben Swank
Ben UFO
Soulsavers
Huw Stephens and Sleeve Face DJs
Justin Speer
Drums of Death (DJ set)
Special Guest TBC




21/05/2008 08:16:23

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Kieron Tyler: From Messiaen to Michael, Quincy Jones has done it all

At age 75, Quincy Jones should be satisfied with his astonishing path through music and his extraordinary achievements in civil rights. His production of Michael Jackson's Thriller will always be a benchmark, as will the pioneering long-form video of the title track that he oversaw. His arrangement of Frank Sinatra's Fly Me To The Moon is timeless and evocative. His Italian Job soundtrack still thrills. He produced The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air. His Listen Up foundation has been behind the construction of homes in South Africa. Yet the Quincy Jones you know depends on when and where he cropped up.

As a gifted big band trumpeter and arranger, Jones could have been comfortable as a backroom figure. But he had a drive that must have come from his mother, a multilingual Boston University graduate who became a bank executive before succumbing to schizophrenia. In the late-40s, he met Count Basie and they remained friends until the bandleader's death. Lionel Hampton offered Jones a job before he'd left high school. In 1951, shortly after starting music school in Boston, another offer from Hampton was accepted. He was 18 and loose in New York. Bebop was jumping, but Jones began looking beyond jazz.

The mainstream pop world wasn't swimming with opportunities for black orchestrators, despite the lead of Duke Ellington's arranger Billy Strayhorn. So in 1957 Jones moved to France, where he worked with Michel Legrand and Charles Aznavour. In Paris, he studied with Olivier Messiaen and musical doyenne Nadia Boulanger. Jones wanted to learn how to arrange strings, which US record labels wouldn't let blacks do. He socialised with Picasso, Josephine Baker and author Françoise Sagan. There were no boundaries, no such thing as high or low art. In 2001, French president Jacques Chirac made Jones commander of the Légion d'honneur.

Back in New York in 1961, Jones became a staffer at Mercury Records and was soon the first black exec at a major label, working with Dinah Washington, Dizzy Gillespie and Count Basie. But his big-time crossover came with the whiter-than-white girl singer Lesley Gore. Jones' musical direction of It's My Party lent the song a drama that leapt out of radios, bringing him his first No 1 in June 1963. Jones' liner notes to Gore's first album describe her as "the five feet two, green-eyed princess of song."

Nineteen years later, Jones began working on Thriller with the future King Of Pop. The album redefined musical success by spending 36 weeks as the US No 1. It's doubtful whether they compared notes on Sagan, but the breadth of scope that Jones brought was crucial to Thriller's appeal.

It was classic polymathic Quincy Jones. Back in 1954 he'd told Down Beat magazine that, "A jazz musician can either be an artist and do progressive things or he can work on pleasing the people. I think a happy medium between the two can be reached." Musical cross-pollination might be de rigueur these days, but Quincy Jones set the template over 50 years ago.

· Quincy, Fri, 9pm, BBC4


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Jack and the Kung Fu Panda

FEEL-GOOD STORY. Top-shelf animation. An all-star production team.  And a struggle to get it made.

After four-plus years in production, the journey for Kung Fu Panda has ended with an uplifting family film that has a good shot of attaining the �classic� branding that will serve it well for years to come. So it�s a good thing that Jack Black finally gave his OK to accept the lead voiceover role of panda Po.  Otherwise producer Melissa Cobb would probably still be waiting to get the DreamWorks film completed. It opens in theatres today.

�He was the only person we could think of (for the Po role) but he said no a few times because he was busy or he wasn�t in a place (mindset) where he wanted to do it,� Cobb said at a press conference in Los Angeles. Joining Black in the voiceover cast are two-time Academy award winner Dustin Hoffman, Angelina Jolie, Lucy Liu and Jackie Chan. Might be some box-office appeal there.  After a full-out, last-ditch sales pitch by co-director John Stevenson, who showed Black an animation of the Po character speaking dialogue from his role in the School of Rock to bait Black, the chase for the star finally became the catch. Once committed, as Black explains it, there was little preparation or research to do because he says the role is essentially him in his real life: a little chubby, in awe of his heroes growing up and always dreaming of bigger things.

The story begins with Po wanting to leave his father�s noodle shop and somehow find a way to be a kung fu star, joining the ranks of his fighting heroes called the Furious Five. From that group must come the new Dragon Warrior who must have the goods to fend off  the most menacing warrior in the land, snow leopard Tai Lung. 

With determination, Po gets himself on track to be his own hero.  With the engaging tug of war with his mentor, Master Shifu (Hoffman), the student and master learn a few things about each other and themselves. Under the direction of Stevenson and co-director Mark Osborne, the production had the mandate of honoring the martial arts genre and the Chinese culture. 

There�s lots of humour, but parody got the boot. So did any pop culture references. �We did tons and tons of research,� said Osborne. �It was very important for us to honor the culture of kung fu.�

>> For Metro's review on Kung Fu Panda click here

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Former stripper allowed to stay on Idol

'American Idol' producers have decided to allow contestant David Hernandez to stay in the competition despite his past as a stripper.
A number of media reports recently unveiled Hernandez's former job as an adult entertainer at a strip club, where he appeared nude and performed lap dances.
Reacting to the reports, 'American Idol' executive producer Ken Warwick told TVGuide.com: "We've had strippers on the show before."
"We're never judgmental about people who do things like that," he said.
"If it were some sort of heavy porn, then maybe we'd have to take action. But certainly not on this."
The Fox network, which broadcasts 'American Idol' in the US, declined to comment on the matter.

James Bond to wed in Quantum Of Solace?

British actress Gemma Arterton has hinted that James Bond may tie the knot in the forthcoming 007 movie.
The 22-year-old star told a US TV reporter that she and Daniel Craig had been shooting scenes in a honeymoon suite for the film, which is titled 'Quantum of Solace'.
The surprised journalist asked: "Honeymoon suite?", prompting Arterton to reply: "I think I've said too much."
The actress, who can currently be seen in 'St Trinian's', plays an MI6 agent working at the British consulate in Bolivia in the new Bond film.
Bond has previously been married on screen. In the 1969 movie 'On Her Majesty's Service', George Lazenby's Bond married Tracy Draco (Diana Rigg). However, she was murdered in a drive-by shooting on their wedding day.
Visit our James Bond photocall gallery here.

Wang Sheng-di

   
Artist: Wang Sheng-di

   Genre(s): 
New Age
   

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Discography:


   
 Dancing Crystal

   Year: 2000   
Tracks: 6

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Sirus

Celebrity chef Keith Floyd collapses

Television chef Keith Floyd has reportedly been hospitalised after collapsing at his friend's pub.
According to reports, the chef became ill earlier this week while staying at The Chesters pub, run by his friend Glenn Geldard.
The cause of his collapse is not yet known but the chef's agent Stan Green told BBC Radio Stoke: "It's probably exhaustion. He was in hospital a year ago with a similar complaint."
"He recovered from that, so let's hope he recovers from this. We understand he's stable," he said.
Floyd's friend Geldard said: "He is not doing very well. I've just been down to the hospital now."
The chef recently returned from a trip to Thailand.

Weather Is Hot; So Is Sports

With mostly reruns as their only competition, sports dominated the weekend, with the first two games of the NBA championship series between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Boston Celtics winning Thursday and Sunday nights . The Belmont Stakes drew slightly bigger ratings on Saturday, as viewers tuned in to see whether Big Brown would be the first winner of the Triple Crown in 30 years. (In an upset of historic proportions, Da'Tara, a 38-1 longshot, won.)


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