motel de moka

The Undertones - Teenage kicks
The Undertones (1978)

A charmful ode to young lust and according to John Peel, the most perfect three minutes of music ever pressed into vinyl. While I beg to differ with him, truth is the man was right, nothing can be subtracted from this to make it any less perfect.

Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood - Some Velvet Morning
Nancy & Lee (1968)

A nightmarish, ambitious masterpiece about drug addiction. With its startling juxtaposition of Hazlewood’s wry, haunting delivery and Nancy’s dizzying chorus all drenched up in flowery, childlike experimentalism, ‘Some velvet morning’ distances itself far away from all the summer-of-love idealism and naiveté, coming up as one of the most strange and unnerving pop hits in the history of music.

Can - I’m so green
Ege Bamyasi (1972)

The contagious bounciness on this song underpinned by Jaki Liebezeit’s hypnotic, milimetrically precise drumming style and Damo Suzuki’s often unintelligible, playful vocalization catchs me off-guard all the time and sucks me deep into its spiral before I can even think of reaching for the skip button. Hard for me to choose for a favorite Can composition, but I’ll leave the high mark in between this one and ‘Bel Air’.

Captain Beefheart & the Magic Band - Her eyes are a blue million miles
Clear Spot (1972)

An oddly beautiful love song with a little jagged edge. The Magic Band stomp out a delightful rocker with a disjointed feel to it, while the Captain’s vocal tics are put in the service of a pleading emotionality, like a drunk just barely keeping it together but pouring out his heart nonetheless.

The Beatles - Lovely Rita
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)

What appeals me the most about Lovely Rita it its strong transitive sense of kinetic, physical action being expended. Set to a rhytmic backbone that keeps chugging its way through a brilliant piano solo and an awkward climax, the composition menaces with falling apart at any moment as the vocal parts get increasingly complex and sound effects come and go. I always feel the urge to turn the volume up when this comes up on my stereo.

Belle and Sebastian - Dog on wheels
Dog on Wheels Ep (Jeepster / 1997)

Musically emulating Love’s Forever Changes with it’s vaguely hispanic rhythm, dark chord voicings and a gorgeous trumpet break halfway through, Stuart Murdoch sings a soft-voiced ode, both intelligent and humorous to one of his childhood toys. One of the band’s finest moments.

Devendra Banhart - Mama Wolf
Cripple Crow (XL / 2005)

Mama Wolf echoes the sinister dichotomy that lies at the heart of Devendra’s music, an uneven mixture of jocular humour and fey mysticism that places Devendra’s lyrics somewhere in between childlike innocence and sinisterly demented storytelling. At any rate, Mama Wolf, presents us Devendra at one of his shinier moments, a deceptively simple and effusive lullaby delivered with such phatos and a couple of wolf’s howls that makes it almost impossible not to fall hard for it.

David Bowie - Letter to Hermione
Space Oddity (1969)

Bowie’s gifts for building atmosphere are easily discerned in ‘letter to Hermione’, using nothing but a simplistic acoustic guitar strums and ocassional electric arpeggios as an accompanient, Bowie creates an unsettling, melancholic bubble inherent to the heartbreaking nature of the lyrics.

Images: Siggeir M. Hafsteinsson.
Also See: Moka’s Favorites No. 1

snarl and howl in the wood wake all the birds
hound the harlots out of the ferns
this damfool twilight threshing in the brake
bleating to be bloodied
this crapulent hush
tear its heart out

- from ‘Echo’s Bones‘  by Samuel Beckett.

Scott Tuma - Tiktaalik
Not for Nobody (Digitalis /2008)
Lau Nau - Painovoimaa, valoa
Nukkuu (Locust / 2008)
Vashti Bunyan - Here Before
Lookaftering (fatcat / 2005)
Nico Muhly - The only Tune III. The only tune
Mothertongue (Bedroom Community / 2008)
Skuli Sverrisson - Sería
Sería (12 Tonar/ 2007)
Grouper - Heavy Water / I’d rather be sleeping
Dragging a dead dear up a hill (Type / 2008)
Moondog - Pastoral
Moondog 2 (1971)

One pint of blood can save up to three lives.

see also: My blood is clean Pt. 1, Pt. 2 and Pt. 3.

Photos: Jean-Baptiste Mondino, Emiliebjork, Monsieur Oiseau, Melaniepappas, Sirlovalot.

Well, it tells the story about women and men. That’s what music is all about. It’s about being human and love and hate. You hear the blues talk about “my woman have left me.” “I love you baby.” “Honey, don’t go.” “Come on back.” You talking about a woman, you talking about a man. They feel different things. Every song I write says something about a human being, just like a man write about a woman. I don’t write about no man! [Laughs.] I wrote about a woman for a song called “Dimples,” you know. [Sings "She got dimples in her jaw."] She says, “Well, I like that,” because it saying good things about her. “She got dimples in her jaw.” “I like the way she walk.” “She wiggle when she walks.” You know, they like stuff like that. You ain’t gonna write a song called “I Hate You-You’re No Good.” They wouldn’t like that! So you got to say good things about women-they love it then. - John Lee Hooker

“The Root List”

01. John Lee Hooker - Good Rocking Mama
The Big Soul Of John Lee Hooker (Collectables, 1962)
02. Son House - Death Letter
Father Of The Delta Blues (1965)
03. Bo Diddley - She’s Fine, She’s Mine
Bo Diddley (1955)
04. Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band - Sure ‘Nuff ‘N Yes I Do
Safe As Milk (Buddha, 1967)
05. R.L. Burnside - Walkin`Blues
A Ass Pocket of Whiskey (Fat Possum, 1996)
06. Minutemen - Polarity
What Makes a Man Start Fires? (Sst Records, 1982)
07. Shellac - Song against itself
1000 Hurts (Touch & Go Records, 2000)

note: Something root. When everything is blur, there is always blues to center on. That’s my general take when music turns confusing at least, when I want to create new center of mood. Amazingly it always work. Few tunes above are from my favorite artists, with delicate and precise picking. Dark, soulful, isolated, but fast. Never desperate. I particularly like how tempo pattern change to make the limited blues combinations interesting. They are timeless. Anyway, a short blues list. Root. Timeless.

see also: the blues (PBS), Mapping the Blues Genes: Early Blues Music: 1900-1930
image: puja

Photo: Ola

To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

~ William Blake / Auguries of Innocence ~

Growing up near the sea and spending many days wandering through the dunes, feeling the warm sand and the soft breeze of spring, has left me with a deep affection for its unique surroundings. A place that gives us the time and patience to recollect our thoughts while the endless sky holds an angelic purity of light reflected by the sea. This mix starts off with Bonnie Beecher sweetly humming her well known tune from the American television series The Twilight Zone (1964). A wonderfully enigmatic recording that continues to inspire and entrance people even today. From there on it continues with soft and hushed songs and with James Yorkston adding his poignant baritone voice and hopelessly romantic lyrics. A piece from François Ozon’s film Sous le Sable not only provides the mix’s title but also subtly takes us back to the adoring and dreamy undertone that was laid down by the opening tune. Please also notice the downloading functionality that I’ve added below the playlist if you quickly want it in its entirety and don’t want to download each file individually.

Inspired by and dedicated to Ola.

1. Jeff Alexander with Bonnie Beecher - Come Wander With Me
   The Brown Bunny (Tulip, 2004)
2. Joanne Robertson - Ola
   The Lighter (Textile, 2008)
3. Joyce - Meus Vinte Anos
   Nelson Angelo E Joyce (1970; reissue on Discos Mariposa, 2006)
4. Tribalistas - Lá de Longe
   Tribalistas (Blue Note, 2002)
5. Asa Irons & Swaan Miller - Abacus
   Asa Irons & Swaan Miller (Important, 2007)
6. Philippe Rombi - Sur le Sable
   Bandes originales des films de François Ozon (Wea, 2006)
7. James Yorkston - Surf Song
   Just Beyond the River (Domino, 2004)
8. Micah P. Hinson - When We Embraced
   Micah P. Hinson and the Red Empire Orchestra (Full Time Hobby, 2008)
9. Josephine Foster - Trees Lay By
   Hazel Eyes, I Will Lead You (Locust, 2005)

Stream playlist
Download playlist

Photo: Afremov

At this critical point in the story, it is necessary to take account of what seems to be the only coherent eyewitness description of the birth of the tango. This striking piece of evidence was brought to light by Josè Gobello, one of the wisest and most knowledgeable writers on the history of the tango and lunfardo and the moving spirit of the Academia Portena de Lunfardo (the main body that studies the traditional popular culture of Buenos Aires) since its creation in 1962. It is contained in an article printed on 22 september 1913 in Critica - Buenos Aires’ firts mass-circulation popular newspaper, itself founder only a few days earlier. The author signed himself Vieio Tanguero: he has never been definitely identified, but on the evidence of the piece he was an educated man who knew what he was talking about. Althrough the article was written thirty years after the events he describes, its testimony is impossible to ignore.
Viejo tanguero’s most serious claim is taht in the year 1877 the African Argentines of Mondongo (an area on the western side of the centrally located barrio of Monserrat) improvised a new dance, which they called a tango and which embodied something of the style and movements of the candombe. Couple danced it apart rather then in an embrace. Groups of , who apparently had the habit of visiting African Argentine dance venues and then parodying the gestures and movements they saw there, took this “tango” to Corrales Viejos - the slaughterhouse district - and introducet it to the various low-life enstablishments where dancing took place, incorporating its most conspicuous features into the milonga. From Corrales Viejos, according to Viejo Tanguero, , this new way of dancing the milonga spread rapidly to other districts. At this distance in time, we have no way of corroborating his claim, but an interesting confirmation that something like this was going on may be found in a book of Ventura Lynch published in 1883. According to Lynch, “the milonga is danced only by the compadritos of the city, who have created it as a mockery of the dances the blacks hold in their own places”. Moreover, Lynch further testifies to the popularity of the milonga at the time when it was undergoing this obviously important modification.

Nouzeilles & Montaldo - The Argentina Reader: History, Culture, Politics

01. Daniel Melingo - Pequeno Paria
(Maldido Tango / 2008)

02. Luis Bacalov - In bicicletta
(Il Postino [The Postman] / 2006)

03. Daniel Melingo - Montmartre De Hoy
(Maldido Tango / 2008)

04. Ruichi Sakamoto - Tango
(Smoochy / 2007)

05. Gotan Project - Vuelvo Al Sur
(La revancha del tango / 2003)

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Image: Riders-Online

The prevailing mood in Cuba, however was no longer passive. Since 1922, inflamed by the proclamations of Argentinian students at the university od Cordoba (1918), and influenced by “anti-yankee” feeling of most Latin American intellectuals (for example, José Vasconcelos in Mexico and Manuel Ugarte in Argentina) and the revolutionary events in Mexico, students at Havana University began demanding the forging of a “new Cuba”, free from corruption and yankee tutelage.

Leslie Bethell - Cuba: A Short History

01. Lenine - Rosebud
(Lenine / 2006)

02. Habib Koite - Cigarette Abana
(Baro / 2001)

03. Los Munequitos De Matanzas - Coros De Clave
(Live in New York / 1998)

04. Pink Martini - Lilly
(Hang on Little Tomato / 2004)

05. Orishas - A Lo Cubano
(A Lo Cubano / 2000)

Note: as I referenced an italian singer into a frech playlist, now I refence a brasilian artist into a playlist that focus on Cuba. I’m not a scientist, I’m not here to calibrate elements with the reference manual in hands, I just do the mix I like.This playlist is decicated to my beautiful brother Jo.

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I was already on pole, then by half a second and then one second and I just kept going. Suddenly I was nearly two seconds faster than anybody else, including my team mate with the same car… And so you touch this limit, something happens and you suddenly can go a little bit further. With your mind power, your determination, your instinct, and the experience as well, you can fly very high… I continuously go further and further learning about my own limitations, my body limitation, psychological limitations. It’s a way of life for me… It was like I was in a tunnel. Not only the tunnel under the hotel but the whole circuit was a tunnel. I was just going and going, more and more and more and more. I was way over the limit but still able to find even more.
My biggest error? Something that is to happen yet.

Ayrton Senna

01. Beth Carvalho - Dança Da Solidão
(Brasileiro / 1999)
02. Céu - Malemolencia
(Cèu / 2007)
03. Lura - Mari D’Asceson
(M’Bem Di Fora / 2007)
04. Tribalistas - Ja sei namorar
(Tribalistas / 2003)
05. Adriana Calcanhotto - Vambora
(Publico / 2000)

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Images: Ana Ventura.

My thumb is embarking on a great adventure. ‘Don’t go, please,’ say the fingers. They try to hold him down. Here comes a black limousine with a velied woman in the back seat, but noone at the wheel. When it stops, she takes a pair of gold scissors out of her purse and snips the thumb off. We are off to Chicago with her using the bloody stump of my thumb to paint her lips.

- Charles Simic, excerpt from ‘The world doesn’t end’.

Giacinto Scelsi - Ave Maria
(Natura Renovatur / 2006)
Carlos Paredes - Cancão Verdes Anos
(Guitarra Portuguesa / 1989)
Tape - Moth wings
(Luminarium / 2008)
Stella Chiweshe - Kasahwa
(Ambuya? / 1975)
Larkin Grimm - the last tree
(The last tree / 2006)
Arvo Part - Berliner Messe - Agnus Dei
(Te Deum / 1993)
Paavoharju - Tuoksu Tarttu Meihin
(Laulu Laakson Kukista / 2008)
A Silver Mt. Zion Memorial Orchestra - Built then Burn
(Born into trouble as the sparks fly upward / 2001)

note: Fuck your zen garden. Get your feet in the water. Get your feet in the mud. Let’s crash all our planes in the river. Let’s build strange and radiant machines at this jericho waiting to fall.

See also: My blood is clean Pt. 1 & Pt. 2.