love and dancing

red is my favorite color. yes is my favorite answer. what was the question again?

click here to download love is the answer as one continuous mp3 (69:16)
click here to download love is the answer as a zipfile of eleven mp3 tracks

meet the new mix. same as the old mix - kinda, not really: it's an entirely re-recorded (except for the very opening bit, and also the intro bit tacked on before that) version of a mix i titled love is the dancer way back in april, now retitled simply love is the answer, with an extra 25% or so new material (including the whole last chunk), and with mostly snappier transitions using my new traktor>garageband method instead of my old actual live djing>garageband method.

not sure how much the fact that i made (remade) it entirely on february 13-15 affected my decision to make the "love" theme substantially more overt - it already had a kind of an uplifiting communal togetherness love vibe going on (i wanted to close with that ub40 all along so i'm glad i final got to include it) - but it's probably less than you'd think. though i suppose this one can be added to my lengthy history of valentine's day mixtapes (and that ain't all of them neither.)

(and it almost might have provided some excellent opportunities for cd packaging options: i was going to snag some post-v's day clearance-sale merchandise and make valentiny packages...however by the time i got to cvs they were already stocking the shelves with easter stuff, and the best i could've done was some generic red envelopes. so i decided to just make my own red envelopes, using a special new design i devised for cd packaging that takes the form of a heart. prototypes are go; i'll keep you posted on how mass-production turns out. (may go a little upscale. decent card-stock. letterpress tracklists?)

Title: Love is the Dancer (Soul Vs. Dancepop, Round 2)
Format: continuous DJ mix [79:15], currently available on CD-R (13 tracks) or mp3 (1 or 11)
Date: original 18 April 2007, revised 13-15 February 2008
Packaging (projected): red card-stock envelope/sleeve in heart-shaped fold-out design, with track titles letterpressed (?) or printed and pasted onto the back.

track list:
1. ross of love is the answer
2. ross of love your body
3. ross of love action (i believe in ross of love)
4. ross of love to love you baby
5. ross of love (stoned)
6. ross with love
7. (i'm gonna steal your) ross of love
8. too much ross of love
9. (loss of) ross of love will tear us apart
10. ross of love was made for two
11. ross of love the one you're with

[cd only bonus tracks:
12. sing our own song - ub40
13. i like love - r. kelly]

okay okay... here are the actual songs on the mix:

(collage of digital passion)
a joy - four tet
it's just begun - jimmy castor bunch
love is the answer - ram
the sound of violence - cassius
4 my people - missy elliott
jacques your body (make me sweat) - les rhythmes digitales
moist - schneider tm
rude - herbert
love action (i believe in love) - the human league
love to love you baby (junior jack mix) - viktor lazlo
fast and delirious - lindstrøm
everybody sings - supersystem
acceptable in the 80s - calvin harris
blackbelt - teddybears
moving truck - radioinactive & antimc
pucker up buttercup - jr. walker and the all-stars
lovestoned - justin timberlake
with love - hilary duff
dragonette - i get around (also a bit of the "midnight juggernaut" mix)
tiger tails - moonbotica
hijack - herbie mann
get physical - margaret berger
too much love - lcd soundsystem
sunshine of your love - spanky wilson
i want you - paris hilton
collarbone - fujiya & miyagi
chic cheer - chic
illegal gunshot - ragga twins
(lack of) love will tear us apart - the honeydrips
take control - amerie
i wanna be your lover - la bionda
i wanna be your lover - prince
love was made for two - data 80
100% pure love - crystal waters
remember love - nôze
love is the answer - cerrone
(love - simian mobile disco)
love the one you're with - the isley brothers

analysis:
there's no great concept at play here apart from the "love" meme, which mostly just relates to the song titles anyway - there's all kinds of love being represented here, which i like - it's just a dj/dance mix. hopefully not too clever for its own good - i really tried to make it, just, straightforwardly dance-friendly. but interesting. there ends up being a lot of genre-jumping, so the transitions aren't always the smoothest, but hopefully that's what keeps it exciting.

in fact, this might as well be considered soul vs. dancepop, round 2 (the long-awaited rematch!), though it's a little closer to funk vs. electro-pop. electronic wins of course, but that's not the point - what's actually going on, by process of deduction, is disco discovery. you get yr funky-disco (herbie mann, chic), yr discoey-funk (jimmy castor), yr digital disco (moonbotica, herbert i guess), yr "french touch" filter-disco (cassius, nôze), yr "cosmic"/"space"/"beardo"-disco (lindstrøm), yr disco-punk (supersystem), yr disco indie-pop (fujiya+miyagi), yr disco-covering italo-disco (viktor lazlo), yr disco-sampling contempo-disco (paris hilton), yr latter-day "not disco" actual-disco (crystal waters) and finally yr straight-up no-holds-barred honest-to-god disco (cerrone)... and i didn't even really mean to do like that! and that's not even counting the sometimes-so-called "queen of disco" (m. berger, whose inclusion here is closer to electro.) then there's also some stuff that's not really disco at all, which was apparently acceptable in the '80s. whatever.