The first Fucked Up year was 2001, the same year when Wikipedia was launched. The beginning of the first decade of the new century was set to be that of discovery to a “fun little punk project”.
 
Damian Abraham, Jonah Falco, Mike Haliechuk, Ben Cook, Sandy Miranda and Josh Zucker are the usual suspects of a group that delivered a considerable number of epic punk rock tracks during the last few years.
 
“David Comes to Life”, the band’s latest album, released in 2011, is like a classic hardcore opera these days. The record climbed the charts like no other, and also made it on to almost every best of list of the year.
 
We talked with Mike Haliechuk, the crew’s lead guitarist, about Fucked Up’s path, the band’s new album and more.
 
Read below.
 
So, two years have passed since the release of “David Comes to Life” – what are Fucked Up doing these days?
 
We’re just finishing up recording our new record, and going on tour in Europe for the next few weeks.
 
Any clues about the new album – could the stakes be high due to the greatness of “David Comes to Life”…?
 
The stakes really aren’t high for us; we’d make the same record regardless. This time we’re focusing a lot more on the drums rather than the guitars…
 

When you first started with the band – what were your real expectations? Did you believe that you would still be playing 12 years later?
 
Definitely not. We started just as a fun little punk project, to put out a few singles as a tribute to old labels like Dangerhouse. When we first started we didn’t ever want to go on tour or release a full length. When a punk band like us becomes full time it kind of just happens by accident rather than design.

Mike Haliechuk | Fucked Up

 
What can you tell us about the process of collaboration? (Fucked Up collaborated with several artists over the years)
 
Well we like to add different textures to the sound and involve people from our community. We like to collaborate with a lot of people from Toronto, to make connections and to help shine light on people we think are great from our town. It’s also fun to take up random encounters, like when we had Jim Jarmusch sing on Year of the Tiger, because our engineer played in a band with him…
 
What about the band’s image (clothes, speech, you name it) – do you guys “manage” that so to speak? Do you believe that those issues are important to spread out the message?
 
Not really. We don’t ever talk about stuff like that; we’re not really on that level
 
Please share with us about three albums that everyone should listen during these more or less troubled days…
 
Austra – Olympia:
 

Disclosure – Settle:

No age – An Object

Alice Donut is a punk rock band, or at least it was during the dark days when they first formed in New York during the 80s.
 
The group officially formed in 1986, and not so officially disbanded ten years later (just to re-form again in 2001, but that’s another story).
 
They distinguished themselves because of their sharp ability to offer what could easily be called theatrical songs, depressive urban poems turned into musical pieces of music.
 
Their better known albums, namely “Bucketfulls of Sickness and Horror in an Otherwise Meaningless Life” (1989) and “Revenge fantasies of the impotent” (1991) are pretty much like a collective emotional exorcism. Songs like ‘Dorothy’, ‘Come Up with Your Hands Out’, or ‘Lisa’s Father’ are just too graphic to ignore.
 

Alice Donut

When the garage rock revival took over the world in the 2000s, they were one of the bands on the frontline. At present, and after releasing five albums, The Hives are a band known worldwide, with legions of followers.
 
Even if it is a fact that garage rock keeps on being the band’s favorite playground, the truth is that the Swedes nowadays are on a much bigger league, with songs featured on the soundtrack of video games, and an endless agenda with live shows for thousands of fans.
 
We talked with Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist, the band’s vocalist, about the secret of The Hives’ success, garage rock and style.
 
Read below.

A lot has passed since the establishment of the band – can you point out three key moments of The Hives’ history?

I suppose making Veni Vidi Vicious. We kind of hit our stride there and found the core of the Hives as we now know it.
Getting massively popular around 2001-2 was pretty cool and changed our lives in many ways.
Releasing and touring Lex Hives has been pretty special. Not many bands fill the same places or bigger 13 years into their career with virtually no radio play.

The Hives

«In this day and age, a man has to have choices, a man has to have a little bit of variety…»

Mickey Knox in “Natural Born Killers”

 
As Mickey Knox once and so wisely stated, in this day and age, and fortunately for us, there is variety. However, a band called Death was not that fortunate, and back in the early 70s, before Bad Brains, the Ramones or even the Sex Pistols, the world was not ready to rock, it was just about to disco.
 
Death was a band formed by three brothers, David, Bobby and Dannis Hackney, that began to play punk rock even before there was punk rock. Now, it is time for the world to know the truth.
 
“A Band Called Death” is a documentary about that rock venture that began one day in Detroit.
Check out the trailer below, and be sure to know about your rock history.

DJ Ride is one of the best explorers of electronic. Portuguese by birth, DJ Ride is also World Scratch Champion of the World DJ Association, and a true discoverer of new ways of dealing out music, like with the Pixel Trasher project, a video scratch live act that he is currently crafting.

Last year, Ride released his latest album, “Life in Loops”.  The record offers a truly exploratory set of tracks that ultimately forges new soundscapes, finds fresh ground for the definition of mashup, offers original interpretations to what really moves a DJ devoted to music.
 
DJ Ride shared with us some of his story, some of his feelings, some of his truth.
 
Read below.
 
Who or what was your most important influence?
 
In the beginning my main influence was D-Styles and Ricci Rucker on the Scratch, they are Turntablism Gods. Then I started to produce more, and I was always listening to releases from Warp and Ninja Tune, I love hip hop instrumental mixed with electronic and weird stuff. One of my biggest influences is my partner in crime, Stereossauro, that is one of my best friends, and he is like an older brother to me, I grew up with him… Almost all my friends and family influence my work, everyone is special and give me good energy to feed my work.
 
What is the ultimate feeling that drives you behind the turntables? Or is it just pure adrenalin?
 
Fun, adrenalin, love for the music, crowd energy, making people dance and react to what I’m scratching live. Stage is a hell of a drug!
 
Are there sound combinations that simply come from the gut?
 
Yes, sometimes it’s like free jazz, you improvise and let things go with the flow. But most of the times it’s a mix between what you do during the rehearsals at the studio, and what you feel in front of the audience, and some special moments that came from some errors in the stage.
 
Is there still some occasion that you feel that the equipment simply can’t cope with your own beat?
 
I felt that in the past, when i didn’t have the proper equipment! But right now I have the perfect tools for what I do, and most important, for what I want to do in the future.
 
Tell us more about the Pixel Trasher project – what led you into it?
 
Pixel Thrasher is my video scratch live act; I scratch and manipulate audio and video at the same time. It’s a kind of a ”one man show” because everything (both video and sound) come from my mixer and my laptop, but I had a crew of 6 people directed by my man from Rockit Video Gonçalo L. Santos producing and cutting all the videos with me. It’s a scratch video live act, where I have original stuff, our own productions, alongside with stuff sampled from YouTube, classic videos, some viral stuff that everyone knows and also a cameo with Bruno Aleixo. I came up with the ”PIXEL THRASHER” idea and concept because I wanted to have a stronger live act, something totally different from what I did in the past, and I wanted to combine video scratch in my gigs, with some comic moments, stuff that we produced from scratch, and my own music/mashups. Scratching live Video have a really strong effect and it’s still something fresh because there are really few people doing it properly.
 
Name one thing that you haven’t done yet, but that you feel you simply have to do during your lifetime.
 
I wanted to jump from a plane, but I already did that last year. Hum… maybe go to India, Japan and Mexico, yeah maybe doing a huge road trip for a year or something.
 
Is there such a thing as the perfect beat? If there is, name it please.
 
Sure! Just pick up a classic from Jay Dilla, (”Nothing like this”, or any track from ”Champion Sound” or Donuts). Or Digital Flora from Zomby, or some tracks from David Axelrod, the list goes on…
 

 
 
 
Image credits: Vera Marmelo

Nine Inch Nails are back.

Trent Reznor revealed in a statement at NIN.com that the band is preparing a worldwide tour that will include live dates during 2013 and 2014. According to Mr. Reznor, the band is going to reinvent itself completely.

The crew will also change, with the line-up now including bassist Eric Avery (Jane’s Addiction), guitarist Adrian Belew (King Crimson), keyboardist Alessandro Cortini (NIN), keyboardist Josh Eutis (Telefon Tel Aviv) and drummer Ilan Rubin (NIN, Lost Prophets).
Mr. Reznor stated: «The first shows will begin this summer, followed by a full-on arena tour of the U.S. this fall and lots of other dates worldwide to follow through 2014. »

The comeback (after an apocalyptic worldwide farewell tour in 2007-2008) came to be after Trent Reznor was working around with Adrian Belew. One thing led to another, and soon after Mr. Reznor was doing some phone calls and the NIN comeback become a reality.
Click here to check out Cult Edge’s Top 10 NIN Songs of all time.

Daft Punk will release a new album during the upcoming months. The French duo recently signed a contract with Columbia, a subsidiary of Sony Music.

The creators of enormous tracks such as ‘Around the World’ or ‘One More Time’, are working on the new album with music visionaries like Nile Rodgers (Chic), Giorgio Moroder, Panda Bear and Chilly Gonzalez.
 
Daft Punk released “Human After All”, their latest album in 2005. In 2010, the crew delivered the soundtrack for “Tron: Legacy”.

Check out ‘One More Time’ in the video below.
 

Daft Punk.com

Kompakt Records, the imprint that better delivers the work of artists such as Matias Aguayo, Coma, Field or Gui Boratto, is celebrating 20 years.

It was on March 1st, 1993, that Kompact first opened its doors, in Köln. Two decades later, and after 500 releases, Kompact is without a doubt considered as one of the world’s electronic music command centers.

To better celebrate the occasion, and adding to several celebration releases and merchandising deliveries, the label is taking it to the streets. Geneva, Paris, Amsterdam, London and Berlin are (so far) the European cities where Kompact’s commemoration extravaganza will take place.

To be among the first to get around all the festivities, be sure to be in Geneva, on March 28, at the Electron Festival. Tickets for the event go on sale on January 29. Know even more about it here: ElectronMusicFestival/Kompakt.

More Kompakt

SlimCutz is one of the best of the art better known as turntablism.

After winning several djing competitions in Portugal and abroad, and playing all around the local busy electronic music scene, the Portuguese DJ still finds the time to get around The Bigger Banger Theory, an experimental electronic combo that is all set to overcome any sound boundary there is.

Turntablism and the thrilling fascination of vinyl records has been SlimCutz’s better arena since a very young age. Now, at 22, and while preparing to release his first album, as well as The Bigger Banger Theory’s debut record, DJ SlimCutz is also ready to hit it big internationally.

Be sure to find him around the world dance music circuit pretty soon.

Before all the travelling, SlimCutz talked to the Cult Edge.

Read below.

Please introduce yourself:

I’m Deejay Slimcutz, the alter ego of Luís Azevedo. I’m 22 years old, but started mixing with 13 and never stopped after it. I’m passionate about scratch and my goal is to keep playing more and more.

How would you define your musical style?

I don’t have a specific musical style.  When I’m playing I usually go with the flow, tripping between different musicals styles like hip-hop, dubstep, drum n’ bass… I like to do musical journeys.

How did you start over doing your turntablism thing?

I was fascinated by the noise of the scratch, I’ve always been. I remember using my parents’ turntable but then I damaged it so it was a short step till I buy a pair for myself. That was the beginning of Slimcutz as you now know it.

What is your relationship with technology? Since that you do use a thing that has been around for so many years (vinyl and turntables).

I’m a big geek in music technology. I have a lot of gear in the studio to use for producing. But when I’m playing I just feel comfortable with the turntables. I feel I can do whatever I want with them. I also use an iPad for cues and effects but the turntables and the mixer are my main set up.

What can you tell us about your upcoming album, release dates, etc.?

At this moment I just can tell that we are working and its sounding good… But there’s the first Bigger Banger Theory release coming out soon and in March I’ll be playing in Ibiza and some other international circuits so it will be great to perform outside Portugal.

What is the Bigger Banger Theory?

The Bigger Banger Theory is the set of unexplainable rules according to which a “banger” is created. The minds of producers and deejays Sistema, SlimCutz and Taseh, hailing from the internationally unknown but locally vibrant music scene of Porto, have converged in order to try and lay on the line just how a “banger” is made, no matter what genre or category of electronic music. We knew all we really needed to do was to spend hours, weeks, years, trying weird combinations and mixing components with all our gear, like the mad scientists do. We must have been doing something right so far, as I am the Portuguese 2009 DMC Champion, Sistema is the DJ for one of the country’s biggest rap acts and Taseh has produced albums for some of the most defying and left field musicians in town. Now, gathered as a unit, we feel ready to unveil onto the world, I mean, galaxy, the first real results of their attempts at mastering the secret art of sonically crafting those so sought-after Bangers.

DJ SlimCutz

Benoit & Sergio are one of the strongest electronic acts around and they’re back.

‘Bridge So Far’ is the new two song EP of the Washington & Berlin based duo.  The title track ‘Bridge So Far’ and the additional ‘$100 Bill’ better expose Benoit & Sergio’s sound venture: to proclaim new territories to the dance and groove systems.

The beats and melodies are of a notable good taste, and the vocals perfectly fit the whole equation, almost like powerful mantras.

The ‘Bridge So Far EP’, released by Hot Natured, is now available for pre-order at DFA’s online store with shipping estimated to begin during the week of 20 January.

Enjoy samples of the two tracks below.

Know more about Benoit & Sergio