Solid Ground feat. Freddie Cruger @ Ruby Rabbit, Sydney (08/02/08)
Do you want to dance and be happy? It’s a good question, that one, and it’s also the vocal hook from Nickodemus’ Funky In The Middle, which greeted my ears courtesy of Somatik as I walked in to Ruby Rabbit. I pondered the question as I stood at the bar, and decided that yes, I did want to dance and be happy. Which was lucky, because the quality of music on offer tonight was such that no other conclusion would have been possible anyway.
Niche Productions had brought their caravan to Ruby Rabbit for the first time tonight, taking over the rather palm-treed and cane-chaired ground floor as well as the exposed-brick and bare-globe first floor. Somatik was doing his usual quality work on the ground floor, but it seemed that upstairs was the place to be, so up the stairs I went to hear the tail end of DJ Vee’s set and to see the first of the night’s live acts Mickey Morphingaz. He was launching his thoughtfully punctuated Me… U (the Business Card EP) with a live show that featured Morphingaz on turntables, laptop and xylophone and a keyboard player who also doubled on melodica. Having seen Morphingaz filling in for DJ Modest when Belleruche toured recently, I knew that his turntable skills were top notch. Would the tunes match up? In a word, yes.
Featuring more stuffed pythons than any other electronic act I’ve seen in the past few years, and opening with the EP’s track Mickey (which involves much scratching of the line “Oh Mickey, you’re so fine” from the Toni Basil ‘classic’), the Mickey Morphingaz live show takes itself not at all too seriously, but that doesn’t stop some seriously good music being produced. If you imagine Hermitude without an MPC (but with one more stuffed python) you can get an idea of the musical seam he mines. And xylophone playing from Mickey Morphingaz is something Australia needs more of (note: for pull quote purposes, it is acceptable to truncate the last sentence to “Mickey Morphingaz is something Australia needs more of”.) On the last track Boomerang he took to the mic, but with lyrics like “It’s a piece of wood shaped like a banana; if it doesn’t come back, it’s a bummer”, it is probably safe to say that as an MC, Morphingaz is an exceptionally good turntablist (acceptable truncation; “exceptionally good turntablist”). EP launched, and well worth keeping an eye out for.
Mark Walton’s Fretless were next, and there was a sense of anticipation building; any time you’ve got Mark Walton, Jimi Polar and Noel Boogie together on the one stage, you know you’ve got something special. But that trio was only the half of it, for there were three more Fretless folk on stage; trumpeter Alex Gooden Zonkt and the vocal front line of Agent 9 and Funk’n Irie. Dance and be happy? Oh yes, please. The Fretless live show is something you really need to get out and see. You need to buy the album as well, as I did the day after the gig, but you need to get out and see the live show. And here’s why. Firstly, the performers are top notch, and in particular the pairing the prowling Agent 9 and the toasting Funk’n Irie works brilliantly both physically and musically. Secondly, the material with which they are working is consistently good across a range of genres; it shouldn’t surprise too many of you to find out that Mark Walton knows a thing or two about hip hop and funk (and Got It Like, the standout b-boy track on the album, works even better live) but there’s also dub, jungle, and a wonderfully low-slung read of J.J. Cale’s Cocaine. And finally, it ‘s not just a show that heats and serves the album; there’s plenty of jamming which only adds to the conclusion that this is proper “feet, do your stuff” music. When you’ve finished reading this review, look ‘em up to see when they are playing next. And go see them. I’ll be there and you can buy me a beer for giving you this advice. Kudos also to Richard the sound guy, who deserves more props; he manages to get the sound spot on pretty much everywhere Niche Productions put things on, and so it was tonight.
What then, was the headliner, Swedish DJ Freddy Cruger, going to do to top that? Well, he was going to open a bottle of sunshine and pour it all over both of his turntables, as he started with a gorgeously jazzy flavour that was a perfect counterpoint to where Fretless had left off. I can’t give you too many track names (a couple of Cruger’s own tracks, including the mighty Running From Love and a slinky remix of Angie Stone’s Wish I Didn’t Miss You is probably about the extent of it), but it was a performance designed directly for the feet and for the soul, featuring more than a bit of soul, but genre wise probably being best described as “all the good kinds of genre”. Having been a little underwhelmed last time I saw him, this showing gave me back all the whelm I needed, and the rest of the crowd seemed to agree.
Dancing and being happy until night’s end was, however, a little more than my battery operated knees could manage, but I slid out onto Oxford Street with a big smile on my face. I want to dance and be happy, and for that, I want quality music from here and there and from somewhere else. And I want my Niche Productions events.
fat_tony says...
good review! i didn't know that fretless was those guys. pissed i missed this one...