FUNNEL OF LOVE

Jessica Hopper’s twitter just alerted me to the fact that I’ve been missing out on a couple years worth of monthly mixtapes from the Off-Chances crew (despite the fact that I’ve gone to Chances on-and-off for years, I haven’t made it to any of the Off-Chances parties at Danny’s or the Hideout because some project or other of mine is usually competing with the night). Chances is a dance party that serves the weird-er/alt-er/hipster-er elements of the Chicago LGBTQ party scene. I’m consistently impressed with some of the music at Chances and am more likely to use Shazam there than at any other party in the city.

So yeah…at all the Off-Chances parties they toss out mix cds and they’re all compiled online. Recent mixes include the “blueprint for a rock n’ roll stage adaption” of all seven Harry Potter books, a mix of songs about body parts and Last Night a Cyborg Saved My Life. Curated by resident John Twatters, this month’s is all about girl group’s of the 60’s. There’s a lot to be mined from this genre, as can be attested from compilations like the multiple volume Girls in the Garage and Girls Go Zonk series, and significant portions of the trashier strip club rock found in each edition of Las Vegas Grind. For this mix, John Twatters leaves out the rock, and sticks to doo wop and northern soul ballads, ranging from classics like the Marvellettes’ “Mister Postman” (and what a refreshing change of pace for me personally to hear the original and not the bmore remix for once) and the Dixie Cup’s take on “Iko Iko” to some of the more left-field stuff from the era, like the Chiffons’ “Nobody Knows What’s Goin On In My Mind But Me” and the Shangri-La’s “Sophisticated Boom Boom.”

Check out Off-Chances mixtapes at podbean.com
Check out pictures from parties we’ve done with Chances DJs at GlitterGuts

HOW THE MIDWEST WAS ONE

Only Children are a DJ, production, and design collective comprised of Bald E., Mister Wolf, Dinoscopy, and grayarea. As a group their relatively new, but this mix is already a million blogyears old, appearing all over the internet two weeks ago). If you haven’t heard it yet, you should. It’s disco as fuck- disco, the way Afrika Bambataa took it in the 80’s, disco the way DFA has been doing it since the 90s, and disco the way groups like Villains are taking it now. The mix showcases a lot of Only Children’s original productions, including remixes of Tigercity, Morgan Page, Prince, and Empire of the Sun, as well as tracks by Drop the Lime, Röyksopp, Louis La Roche, and Little Boots.

Check out How the Midwest Was One on UR Chicago (and download some of the individual tracks off Hot Biscuits)
We haven’t rocked any parties with Only Children yet, but check out some events we’ve done with Bald E here.

THE HOOD INTERNET VOLUME FOUR

I’m assuming that if you’re on this site, you’ve heard The Hood Internet before, you know them, you’ve been to their parties, you’ve got them on your ipod, you don’t need an introduction. The Hood Internet is a mash-up duo, and as mash-ups have fallen pretty far out of vogue since they first showed up six or seven years ago, you’ve got to expect that Hood Internet is really fucking good to still be in the game, rocking festivals like Lollapalooza and Bonnaroo and tastemaker parties alike. They are, and with each mixtape they’ve shown substantial growth. When they started out, their m.o. was pretty simple, mix one underground track with one hit. Almost always the hit was a hip hop radio single or a dance music club staple and the underground track came from the world of indie rock (Jay-Z vs. Xiu Xiu, Pimp C vs the New Pornagraphers, The Pussycat Dolls vs. Matthew Dear).

As time progressed, this repertoire came to include hip hop versus electro, buzz band vs. bloghouse, underground vs. underground, and hit vs. hit. As the entire music landscape changes, it’s hard to tell who’s the hit artist and who’s the novelty act, and if the old model is still even in place (like when Dead Prez faces off against Grizzly Bear, you’ve got a respected political hip hop duo that has met commercial success in no small part due to their song opening up the Dave Chapelle Show for three years, against a sincere, interesting rock band who’s so overhyped right now that they’re probably mentioned once a week in HipsterRunoff– which one of these groups will last into the next milennium, or even the next election cycle? Or is “lasting” an old concept, something ephemeral and unimportant in the digital age?)

I digress… Volume Four doesn’t have the cheeky fun of a track pairing Montell Jordon with Arcade Fire or Rick Ross with Wilco but it does allow for tracks where Weezer meets Glass Candy, Amanda Blank to meet Vega (which cmon, is only one Scion/Colt 45 event away from actually happening) , and Major Lazer to saddle up with the Dirty Projectors.

Check out The Hood Internet Volume Four at thehoodinternet.com
Check out some of the parties we’ve done with the Hood Internet here