Greetings! The Mint Collective is a group of people from different beats all using their blessings to promote, market & increase visibility for creative endeavors.
We ♥ music, art, creativity, traveling, technology, food and drink, love, life, laughing and lots more. Its fun, really, sometimes even splendid.
Oh well hello there friends! We are sooooooo excited because one of our fav new artists, Jose James, is about to release his second body of work, Blackmagic, next Monday on Brownswood Recordings. It’s been about a year since his last release “The Dreamer” - an amazing piece of work stitching together hiphop, jazz and soul into a full-bodied musical blanket of lovin!
The Blackmagic album features the glitchy yet soulful stylings of producer Flying Lotus as well as collabs with Taylor McFerrin, Moodyman and Dj Mitsu The Beats. To gather a full perspective on what Jose James is all about please watch this lovely video from our friends over at Friends We Love.
You may remember our post last week on José James’ new Blackmagic album with a lovely profile created by FriendsWeLove. Here is another creative and thoughtful piece from FWL capturing José during the recording session of his first single from Blackmagic, “Code” produced by Flying Lotus. Some sneaky background vocals from FWL co-founder, DjMoni all up in this! ENJOY!
The internet is funny. One thing always leads to another. We follow a cat called DZY as well as an associated blog, Graveyard Shiftin’, and just came up on two (2) very pleasureable media types. The first, a dubstep, downtempo, electronic mix from DZY and the second, “The Light” by Some Freak, Andreya Triana & Ritornell with remixes by Dorian Concept, Patrick Pulsinger & Orakel. WHOA. Listen and Look for the freshness.
Brooklyn’s longstanding record labelBastard Jazz Recordingsis proud to bring you their next 12” from San Francisco based DJ, artist, and producerMophono, akaDJ Centipede.
Mophono’s resume is a long one – he’s released a short string of incredibly successful 7”s on his ownCB Recordsimprint, including theGaslamp Killer’s“My Troubled Mind”vinyl, and Mophono’s“The Edge”7” (which sat at the very top ofTurntablelab’s bestseller list for an astounding number of weeks) , and is the man behind the groundbreaking weekly “Change the Beat”party in San Francisco, an absolute institution for beat-heads, crate diggers, trainspotters, and degenerates of all types. Mophono has also performed live with Flying Lotus’s Brainfeeder Festivaland opened forAmon Tobin,DJ Food,DJ Krush,Dabrye, andDe La Soulwith his Skip on Beat records, drum machines and moogs.
Now, working with Bastard Jazz under the guise ofMophono’s Halftone Society, Benji has delivered an astounding EP that beautifully manages to toe the line between past & future, organic & electronic, dancefloor & heady. Things start off with“Hunger”, a funk fueled stomper with a monster break, horn stabs, tinkling pianos and deep moog undertones.“Bumps”is a 103 BPM chugger that sounds like an unholy meeting between DJ Shadow, Fela Kuti and Pepper Adams - with a chopped, dusty drum break, and filthy Baritone sax lines weaving in and out.“Sinicism”furthur explores Mophono’s penchant for chopping and splicing the breaks, with more larger than life Baritone sax, and an absolutley brilliant mid-song change-up to a hypnotic exploration of the “Post-Dilla” sound championed by artists like Hudson Mohawke, Ras G, Flying Lotus, Nosaj Thing, etc… – complete with flutes, sax, and a skittish, recessed break. Lastly,Tru Thoughts’recording artistNatural Selfdelivers a crushing dancefloor remix of “Sinicism” with an alternately droning and bubbling bassline, synth squiggles, big drums, tribal percussion and more chops & tricks than you can shake a stick at. Also included on the 12” is a bonus beats “drum edit” of both “Hunger” and “Sinicism”.
Check out this super danceable and refreshing track off of FlyLo’s 3rd album album Cosmogramma, out May 4 on Warp Records. Let us know your thoughts on this disco infused, house hop track: minty {at} themintcollective {dot} com.
INnatesounds Radio is back with installation 007 from Miles Bonny. Complete with a head-nodding mixture of jammy jams, this mix will take you away. Seriously. Music from Onra, Reggie B, House Shoes, George Anne Muldrow, Al Green, Jose James, Fiona Apple, Epsilon Project and then some.
So what do you do as an unsigned musician when you get an unexpected Grammy Nomination and end up in (Radiohead) Thom Yorke’s current top 10 list? You put out your first full scale independent release, that’s what!
Known for her experimental bedroom recordings, singer/songwriter/composer, Muhsinah, will make her very first attempt at writing, producing and recording a studio album - which will include everything from live drums, guitar, bass and strings (which she will hand chart).
Through the use of the kickstarter™ fund-raising website - http://kck.st/araZtL Muhsinah and her team aim to raise $31,000 in 31 days through the pre-sale of the intended studio album and accompanying short film, helping to cover the cost of completion for this ambitious undertaking.
Greetings! The lovely folks over at The Couch Sessions are continuing their legacy of epic dedication mixes to rising stars in our music community. UK soul singer Andreya Triana is the focus of the latest, Dream Suite mix - a free download paying homage to the lovely bright and shining vocalist who has worked with everyone from Flying Lotus to Bonobo and beyond. Her album just dropped this week on Ninja Tune and it is absolute fire! Get it here.
Good lawd! The lovely folks over at Put Me On It have done it again with their super splendid mixes. The last bit from PMOI that we posted had an amazing mix from Kid Kanevil and this time around the We Love series kinda kills it with 40 amazing tracks from some artists you may be familiar with as well as some new artists you should be on the lookout for. Download the selections here. Enjoy!
PART 1 Andre 3000- I Do Andreya Triana - Town Called Obsolete (Mount Kimbie Rem… Azealia Banks - L8R Bishop Lamont Feat. Talib Kweli - Get ‘Em Girl (Prod by J Dilla/Focus) Bonobo - Walk In The Sky (Aaron Jerome Glitch Mix) The Cinematic Orchestra- The way we feel ‘Brother/The Revolution (Radio Session) DâM-FunK - NeverTongueInCheek (Edit) Department Of Eagles - No One Does It Like You (Do The) Fatback Band - Spanish Hustle (Danny Krivit Edit) fLako - I Want You feat. Dirg Gerner Flying Lotus - Camera Day The Foreign Exchange - Maybe She’ll Dream Of Me (Album Mix) The Gaslamp Killer - When I’m In Awe (feat. Gonjasufi) Gayngs - The Gaudy Side Of Town Gold Panda - Same Dream China J. Cole - Blow Up (Prod. By J. Cole) K-OS - Zambony (rmx) [Bonus] K-OS ft Drake - Faith Kanye West - Monster (feat. Jay-Z, Rick Ross, Bon Iver & Nicki Minaj) Kidkanevil - Ketto Revisited ft Bonobo
PART 2 Lissie - In Sleep (Live) M.E.D. - Candlelight (feat. Georgia Anne Muldrow) Melody Thornton - Love Gun Miguel Atwood-Ferguson Ensemble - Some Day We’ll All Be Free feat Bilal (Live) NastyNasty - Bleeding Nottz Feat. Alchemist - The 1ne P Money & Blacks - Anyway Phantom Lover ft. Nicholas Ryan Gant - Change (show me how) Quantic Presenta Flowering Inferno - Dub Y Guaguanco Raekwon - Travel Places RLP - Cheat Cords Roc Marciano (Prod. By Vanderslice) - Firepower Ron Isley (feat. Lauryn Hill) - Close To You Roska - Play Gamez Sébastien Tellier - Kilometer (A-Trak Remix) Shad - Yaa I Get It - Oddisee Remix Skyzoo & !LLMIND - Speakers On Blast Teenbs - Japan Field Report Twizz Ft. PM - Rememberlude
José James has masterfully combined jazz, hip hop, soul and freestyle elements into his music, has propelled some of the most epic musical projects of the past few years and is poised to elevate genre-blending consciousness for many years to come. From covering Coltrane’s “Equinox”- which got the attention of worldwide musical tastemaker Gilles Peterson who later put out his first album, to re-inventing Freestyle Fellowship’s “Park Bench People”José James has carved a very special and much needed niche into musical culture worldwide.
Prior to José’s recent Los Angeles show, we had the distinct pleasure of speaking with him to touch base and get a more in-depth look at how he’s gotten to where he is, what this next steps will be and who he’s collaborating with musically, spiritually and wholeheartedly to get there. We rapped about his Panamanian percussive influence from his father, tried to pinpoint why experimental music is more abundant overseas as well as where he’s had some of his most memorable shows.
Watch out for José James + Taylor McFerrin in Jan 2012 with a Japan tour slated and then up next, José’s new album - set to drop in early 2012.
It was a pleasure and honor to chat with José and we are deeply grateful for his music and many infinite blessings he’s shared with us.
Preview Minty posts on José here, here, here and here. Yeah, we ♥ him.
