Free Lab Radio

Tonight's Free Lab Radio: Bollywood Future Beats with the Synth-Father.

The shine of vinyl.

Recently all the trend-driven kids have been promoting Charanjit Singh as if they'd discovered America along with Columbus. But the Indian synth-father Singh has been around for years and anyone aficionados for the talent that went into tape multi-tracking, analogue synths or Bollywood and early disco/house will have been listening to him since his heyday. He was born in the '40s for goodness sake. Not that we should let that date him, or detract from his current tour of live performances. Which brings us to his London date in 2013...for which we have two tickets to give

Early Singh, in his turban

away!

To catch Charanjit Singh at 25th May's Field Day Festival London listen in tonight on 104.4FM or online how to get those two tickets valued at £55 each. And what a lovely aural image, Singh's live synth billowing out over the green of Victoria Park in a sound clash with other Field Day Festival headliners like Bat for Lashes, Animal Collective or Four Tet. Or even Koreless who's an act we've played out on Free Lab Radio several times before. We just wonder if Ceefax Acid Crew will be there to witness the synth line up...

So what's the deal with the synth-father? You pronounce his name Cha-ran-jeet by the way, we've just listened to the RinseFM Field Day Festival takeover mix, it opened with Squarepusher Red Hot Car original mix (another track we've been listening to around when it came out at the turn of the century) and moved onto Singh, but come on, you've got to get that pronunciation at least half right. Everyone knows somebody who knows somebody who you can ring to consult on correct-name chat matters.

But back to Singh. Our young producer and musician rubbed shoulders with other classic Bollywood producers like R.D Burman, and plays several instruments. Singh's now enjoying a resurgence since Sublime Frequencies (responsible for the likes of Omar Souleyman and Group Doueh on tour, who we caught at Corsica Studios a few years ago), re-released his band instrumentals on a compilation Bollywood Steel Guitar. Because he's not just electro keys, Singh plays the far-out-looking double steel guitar on the Sublime Frequencies rerelease like a real cowboy. Catch a sample and his whacky album cover for that HERE

Singh at the studio wearing a jumper that looks like it's been knitted by an astrophysicist

So what's so fab about Singh? Well we've been to Bollywood film studios and can testify that his music encapsulates that unlimited energy that surrounds much of Indian film score creativity, and we don't just mean they're on the caffeine. They literally have no limits, such is the thinking and funding for sound tracks in Bombay. And for most Indian musicians, music is a spiritual ride. They don't separate the man the music, the instrument and their ideas of all an pervading energy form which we originate. Most people pressing play on a Singh track won't know what a raga is, but rest assured his synth work is going to give you a lift. Minimal, at times comical, there is always a driving beat with ornamentations worthy of a Gang Gang Dance album. Oh and did we mention he's credited for creating techno, or sometimes for creating house before most of these genre of producers knew what they were capable of? Singh uses the Roland TB-303, an electronic bass sequencer to create the basslines and the Roland Jupiter-8 for the melody and ornament.

Synthesizing: Ten Ragas to a Disco Beat came out on Bombay Connection in 2010 and was recorded in 1982, over 30 years ago when it was released by the godfather of all labels His Master's Voice. At the time the album was a flop. Only a few hundred copies of this forward-thinking original LP were ever pressed, and now only a handful were circulating the internet for resale. Preceding that album in 1981 he released Charanjit Singh: Plays Hit Tunes on Synthesizer of Silsila, which takes from the movie soundtrack for Silsila, but is no way comparable to the high energy disco of Ten Ragas.

Playing ancient Indian classical Ragas with the modern synthesizer was a stroke of genius for which he'll always be a don.

COMPETITION
Over 18s only need apply.
(This won't go down well with the ResonanceFM show to follow ours at midnight, because Sick Notes are a bunch of broadcast savvy mid teens. Oh well...old enough to go to air, not enough get to the festival.)

Our Sat Night Fringe Dance Show on Resonance104.4FM. May's 'Free Lab Radio'

All shows are Saturday nights, 11-midnight in UK, repeated Wed 2.30am

May 4th,

Who Are the Keeper Group Mix - the mysterious Keepers of the Light bring this amazingly smooth and thoughtful mix to us with traces of dub, trash rhythm and sine wave.

May 11th
A Charanjit Singh Special
The 60s-80s legend, synth disco-electro star Charanjit Singh visits UK for a one night performance. Free Lab Radio are excited as we have two tickets to give away to see this pioneer of acid house music, live. They call him The Man WHO ACCIDENTALLY INVENTED ACID HOUSE

May 18th

A bespoke mix for Free Lab Radio from drummer and DJ Will Huckerby aka 'kWeRk'

May 25th
BITMARX in Iran - a one hour house and beats mix, the result of master-producer Bitmarx scouring the airwaves and cyberspace to bring us the best in unusual beats, currently being made in Iran

See the ResonanceFM schedule for more details

Tonight's Free Lab Radio: Krauts Have a Funky Soul

Tonight from 11-midnight a one hour mix of German funk from DJ Slingshot. A 7 inch enthusiast, DJ Slingshot has been producing mixes and podcasts for many years.
This one made in Germany, a new ambient mix veers from edgy to kitch, breaks to Italo electro with a dash of library thrown in amongst the Krautrock is called: Krauts Have a Funky Soul.

If you have tunes or mixes that you feel fit the bill, contact us here or on Facebook via the web and we'll have a listen ...

Tune in on 104.4FM, or www.resonancefm.com/listen

Fluid technocrunk and Scrambled Sonics

Who said no one listens to entire albums anymore? Tonight's Free Lab Radio is a double album Xpoloration of two albums, one by Miguel Baptista Benedict and one by Koloah. We move between clear-cut programmed bass-driven beats, and cut up experiments that show an irrelevance for such formalities. Yet there are threads that bring them together, you dear listeners, will likely discern.

Koloah (Dmitriy Avksentiev)is all of these: Kievbass, Hyperboloid, Cut, Soulection, RAW, Car Crash Set and Robox Neotech from Kiev, Ukraine. A constant producer he's now on tour with his synth, performing with Daedelus and the like. Labels he works with are Kievbass, Hyperboloid, Cut, Soulection, Raw.

Miguel Baptista Benedict on releases on Brainfeed, Aphonia and Ninjatune. Based in Los Angeles, United States Benedict is a noise artist, vocalist and composer. He's been grandiosely called "a continuation of the dadaist movement" but in truth he's just a brave, dedicated talent with an ear for musical dissonance, hauntology and home made recording. Of his latest album he said " It’s supposed to be pronounced “Superb Children” I was trying to go for multiplicity but also individuality.”

Koloah meanwhile describes himself as "Music producer, video director, editor, screenplay wrighter, alcohol drinker, robber, brawler, hidden duke." Sounds tiring. His downtempo tracks carry textures such as Pets Can Rock, that suggest the link between the two.

Tonight's Free Lab Radio: El Iqaa - نشر

Remains in the Medium of Time
[photo/installation, 2010 -ongoing]

Detroit-Beirut based artist and musician Joe Namy aka El Iqaa explores his Lebanese identity through sound, archive and the word. For this Saturday's Free Lab Radio Show we journey with him on a two album mix, involving some very short snippets of sound that are an audible connection between his magpie-style practice of picking up sounds around him, and his digital work as a music producer. Catch it on air from 11pm-midnight, details below. Namy's audio work is interesting to us because in his hands, the music plundered becomes a tool for a sonic exploration, ResonanceFM being the representative home of sonic exploration in the UK. WE met Namy at Art Dubai, and interviewed him for our radio project Eavesdropper/ Falgoosh, but tonight the words are only embedded within the sounds.

Part of Namy's Cazzette Coverz collection✧

#Najwa Karam #Ya Habayeb #1989 #label: relax

So how does Namy present these explorations? As El Iqaa, Joe Namy works with sampled sounds, documentary / music videos and photography to investigate aspects of identity, memory, power and currents encoded in music. He says his ideas 'often revolve around the space between two technics turntables' - between fading and amplifying. Namy has produced two albums under the moniker El Iqaa, 'Detroit Beirut' (2007) and 'Circulate'
نشر(2011. Namy explores these issues through quotes and cuts from specific definitive samples (ranging from Abdel Halim Hafez to Pierre Boulez, Amiri Baraka to Trisha Donnelly + much more). The splices in these albums are mixed with original recorded sounds to create a dialogue between the past and the future, in hopes of trying to make sense of the present, and grapple with issues around language and translation, memory, movement, electricity ( as an energy resource) and appropriation.

Namy also hosts a sporadically frequent radio program Electric Kahraba on artonair.org. You can check more of his sounds and other exploratory projects, often exploring the musical history of his roots, at www.olivetones.com
To listen tune into 104.4FM on your transistor dial if you're one of London's millions of inhabitants, or listen online www.resonancefm.com

Podcast- Cornershop Special

Free Lab Radio - Cornershop by Fari on Mixcloud

Find out more about Cornershop, even Tejinder's top ten films, here and their official site HERE

And check their latest video, our favourite lyrics: "Milking it. Jiggy, jiggy, jiggy is all I hear, no rhymes, no style, no original beats."