Purchase:

Mew – Frengers (LP) - Amazon, iTunes

Listen & Download:

Mew – Comforting Sounds (320kbps) - http://usershare.net/0jhr3hgh56jj

http://ftdstorage.com/jeremy/Mew/Frengers/Mew-Frengers-10-Comforting Sounds.mp3

2003 isn’t much of a ‘throwback’ time-wise, but this track from Pitch Black‘s Pitch Black Law album (released in 2004), sounds like it’s from the late 1990′s. Might be because it was produced by DJ Premier.

Listen & Download:

Pitch Black – It’s All Real (Prod. DJ Premier) - http://usershare.net/zkgcxwz42v7l

http://67.159.60.107:40000/d/3oebcnoyybptncgrwz2uvykz5rad7xvv7is5ozi2/audio.mp3

It’s been awhile since I’ve done a Throwback Thursday… but here’s DMP‘s “Ooh!!!” from their 2004 (or 2005, I don’t recall the exact year) mixtape, The Incredible DMP presented by Nottz.

VA all day, 757 stand up and all that.

Listen & Download:

DMP – Ooh!!! (Produced By Nottz) - http://usershare.net/n5m1bo0n1w36

http://thecluh.com/mp3/DMP – Ooh (Produced by Nottz) (thecluh.com).mp3

Legend has it that in the United States during the late 1980‘s and 1990‘s people actually had fun dancing in clubs– to acts such as C+C Music Factory, La Bouche, Snap!, 69 Boyz, Tag Team and pretty much every artist featured on ESPN‘s Jock Jams compilation series. I wasn’t mature enough during the 1990′s to experience the fun for myself, but by the looks of the accompanying music videos (that we’re actually played on television) the imagery of people having fun while dancing is evident.

The C+C Music Factory, consisted of producers Robert Clivillés and David Cole (R.I.P) with various supporting members, including Freedom Williams rapping and Deborah Cooper singing the main vocals as heard above in their 1990 hit, Gonna Make You Sweat. Clivillés and Cole also produced for Mariah Carey, Whitney Houston, Aretha Franklin, James Brown, Lisa Lisa and Cult Jam and many others.

Also, I do know it’s Friday.

Professor Hobart Frisbee proclaimed “Gentlemen, I am an Idiot, an absolute idiot… do you realize that since we’ve been cooped up here that music has changed, and changed considerably. I’ve been completely unaware of this situation. However, I tend to rectify it immediately… gentlemen, I’m going out… out into the world, out of this house, out to tap the major sources of this new music.” then the other men in the room, all white save one, spurt out, “boojie-woojie?” “toobie-dixie?” “jum?” “jive?” “swing?” “blues?” “rhe-bobbety-boobity-bip?” “rhebop?“

The 1948 film, A Song Is Born was produced by Samuel Goldwyn (the ‘G’ in MGM) and directed by influential director, Howard Hawks whom also directed the original Scarface produced by Hollywood legend Howard Hughes. The film starring Danny Kaye and Virginia Mayo is a musical and Technicolor remake of the 1941 film, Ball of Fire with Gary Cooper. The plot focuses on a professor writing an encyclopedia about music with fellow scholars and are introduced to jazz by two black window washers Buck and Bubbles played by the performance group of the same name with Ford L. Buck and John W. ‘Bubbles’ Sublett (whom talent at dancing was the inspiration for Michael Jackson‘s naming of his famed pet chimpanzee.)

The movie also starred musical legends Tommy Dorsey, Benny Goodman, Louis Armstrong, Lionel Hampton and Benny Carter in addition to other other musical acts of the era. I haven’t actually seen the film yet, but I stumbled across it today on YouTube while researching Louis Armstrong. Anyone seriously into music definitely should see it. It’s available for viewing on YouTube and it can be purchased on DVD for relatively cheap on Amazon.com.

Herb Alpert is the man. He started A&M Records with Jerry Moss in 1962 (naming it that after they had found out Carnival Records was taken by another company.) A&M stands for “Alpert & Moss.” The A&M logo also pays homage to Alpert’s instrument of choice, the trumpet.

The label houses/housed musical acts such as Herb Alpert’s Tijuana Brass, George Benson, The Brothers Johnson, Al Green, The Human League, Toby Keith, The Carpenters, Quincy Jones, Joe Cocker, Cheech & Chong, Snow Patrol, Maroon 5, Bill Withers, The Black Eyed Peas, Shanice, Nazareth, Pussycat Dolls, Iggy Pop, Payolas, Queen (to A&M Canada), Sound Garden, Styx, Sex Pistols (only for a week though, right after EMI dropped them), Ike & Tina Turner, Atlantic Starr, MxPx, Mya, The Police, Sun Ra and Janet Jackson. You know, just to drop a few names.

Herb’s and his band, The Tijuana Brass did the title music for the original Casino Royal and Alpert is also the only artist ever to have placed five albums on the Billboard Pop Album Chart at the one time.

According to his Wikipedia article, “(His) musical accomplishments include five number one hits, twenty-eight albums on the Billboard charts, eight Grammy Awards,  fourteen Platinum albums and fifteen Gold albums (and) as of 1996, (he) had sold 72 million albums worldwide.”

The song featured in the video above, Rise was from his 1979 album of the same name won a Grammy and was sampled in the Notorious B.I.G.’s 1997 song “Hypnotize.”

Read the Wikipedia article about Herb or visit his website, http://herbalplert.com appropriately titled [ Music. Art. Life. ] to  learn more about Herb, his contributions to music over the past 4 decades and what he’s been up to now-a-days. Alpert is truly a living legend.

Spike Jonze directed this video waaaay back in the mid 90′s. I was 7 or 8 when it came out but I still remember it from being played on MTV and The Box and recently (a few years ago), The Work of Director Spike Jonze DVD from Palm Pictures.

I also know of Mr. Jonze from his directing, filming and editing of the legendary skateboarding video masterpiece “Video Days” that came out in 1991 from Blind Skateboards feating the likes of Mark Gonzalez, Guy Mariano, Jason Lee and others. I first saw it as a 174px QuickTime video that circulated online during the early 2000′s and it was still damn good even when pixelated as fuck. He also is the co-founder of Girl Skateboards and does direction for their skateboard videos and also is an established Hollywood producer, actor and director with such movies as Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, Synecdoche, New York, and the upcoming Where the Wild Things Are due out in October.

Okay, this post wasn’t really about the video, but the video is still a classic and the behind the scenes/commentary on the Spike Jonze DVD is definitely worth the purchase.