14/11/2004
MF Doom – Potholderz
Like a Funkmaster Flex mixtape – "MF Doom (Doom, Doom, Doom)! Big up (up, up, up)! New 'ish ('ish, 'ish, 'ish)!"

IMHO, the only real good album that MF Doom has released so far under his many solo guises is Operation: Doomsday. King Geedorah was good but patchy in places. Viktor Vaughn was entertaining, but you won't find yourself going back and listening to Vaudeville Villain over and over again like O:D.

So what's MM Food like then? Having heard the leaked retail version, all I can say is that it's more of the same. Which can be good or bad depending on your preference. The album starts off pretty promising until Doom starts indulging in his TV-snippets-over-beats thing midway through (which is what made King Geedorah patchy in the first place). Seriously, Doom's a great MC, so I don't see why he has to get all lazy and play trigger-the-sample on his MPC.

The beats are top-notch, no doubt. As usual, Doom manages to get away with his cut-ups of 70's-80's funk/disco tunes and making crunchy breaks out of them. Doom acolytes will recognise some of the backing tracks from the Special Herbs & Spices instrumental LPs but they really only come alive with Doom rhyming over them.

But don't judge an album by its metal faceplate; check the album out when it drops. "In stores November 16 (16, 16, 16)!"

9/11/2004
I was meant to post a bit of a diatribe on the US elections but I've forgotten most of what I wanted to say. Besides, I'm not that political of a person to begin with. So if you haven't read it already, read this. Sums up almost every thing that's on my mind.

Resfest in Singapore was pretty cool, but I was largely disappointed by the fact that half the stuff I managed to catch, I've already seen before in one form or another. The Shynola Rarities weren't that rare and the Jonathan Glazer Retrospective regurgitated a lot of what's already been shown on UK television many times over. In all fairness the Jonathan Glazer feature never promised anything new to begin with and was meant to be a compilation of his past work anyway.

Well at least the Shorts One segment made my trip down south a little more worth it. I was expecting the worst after watching the Australian short film that kickstarted the show – I wasn't prepared to sit through an hour and a half of abstract, meditative, post-modern, digital filmmaking. So I was quite relieved when the next short was a recreation of the tale of Oedipus featuring a cast of vegetables (a potato fornicating with a tomato – now that's art). Other memorable films include The Mood (USA), Butterfly of Love (Belgium), Pol Pot's Birthday (USA, hilarious!) and Ward 13 (Australia).

Unfortunately I had to miss Cinema Electronica and the feature film Sprout (featuring animation by Geoff McFetridge, which I didn't know anything about until the festival organizer mentioned it – darn!) cos they were only gonna be shown late in the evening on Sunday. Sigh.

Of course, in addition to Resfest there was the hanging out with Michelle who very graciously bowed to my every whim and fancy despite not having enough sleep. Thanks for the wine and grapes – next time serve them in gold chalices please. Can't expect me to tell you everything now, can you? And I concede, Cocco Latte does rock. Looking forward to visiting again.

Here're some pictures of Phuket, Thailand:



















Here're some of Singapore:









And here's some music:

Death From Above 1979 – Blood On Our Hands
As the saying goes, two's a crowd. It's always the double acts that make the most impact. The White Stripes, Simon and Garfunkel, Eric B and Rakim, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen. Now we have Death From Above 1979. Not unlike the White Stripes conceptually; one's on bass and the other's on drums, but no ambiguous inter-band member relationships or anything like that.

Fatlip – What's Up Fatlip?
This track has been around since 2000 but this unfortunately unsuccessful (see the Spike Jonze documentary) ex-MC from the Pharcyde is only now putting it together to release his debut solo album. A funny, self-depreciating rant ("Ain't got no homies that got my back/Yeah I'm a brotha, but some times I don't feel black/My girl is white, my game ain't tight/Niggas who ain't seen me in a while be like "Dude, you aight?"") backed by a sunny, carnival-like beat.