NEW 30th SEPTEMBER - Click here for the latest pix and the protonucleus of a new and more organised photo-site.
Otherwise... carry on!
NEWS NEWS NEWS
AS USUAL HAVENT THE TIME TO EDIT THIS PAGE PROPERLY, BUT, TWO BIG DEVELOPMENTS.
1) The cubans have much more stuff out, both on the web and soon to be released in more normal fashion. Details soon. Plus I think the link to the official OSFS site may now be dead so I might mirror the 'proper' files on this one.
2) COMING SOON a whole brand new website. For now, clicky this link to get an oh-so-small taster of it. (ARGH ARGH just checked to see if it worked - half the pictures are dead - haven't a clue why, it all worked when I loaded it off floppy disc and I've transferred ALL the files. I'll try and fix it later but I've gotta run)
Signing out.
What this site currently is
Some links. Sorry, but I can't get rid of this bit so I may as well use it!
The Cuban Boys, musical terrorists extraordinare, and the originators of the sounds found on this page
Seeing as I'm browsing this link at the moment, I though you might like to as well. It's a comic strip.
And another comic strip (slightly adult content)
And, yes, a third comic strip. Sorry, but I just don't use the net for very much stuff. Email, comics, sounds, some newsgroup silliness and the occasional Yahoo search or webpage is about it.
Welcome, random visitor to my site! Because, that it what you will invariably be until I managed to properly memorise the address and tell some people about it. www.angelfire.com/rant/ravey... wasn't it?
OK, here we go. Finally broken free of all that obligatory crap up above. I'll be removing that with a blunt pair of garden shears (AKA windows notepad) as soon as I can find the time, but for now you'll just have to live with it.
So on with the show. What do we have for you lovely people? Not that much at the moment, it has to be said. Though, I'll probably end up moving a fair amount of my websitey stuff here because of the greater capacity over Geocities. Eleven megabytes? I'm sorry, but a site showcasing a few great but lesser-known tracks through the joy of MP3 --- amongst others --- requires a bit more space. 50Mb is much more like it. Thanks, Angelfire. Please don't chuck me. Like I said, this stuff is fully legal. At least, as far as I can tell. No Metallica or Limp Bizkit (etc) here...
The files:
Side B:
3. Ten Happy Fingers
4. Open the Door, Richard!
All in all, about 12 minutes 30 seconds. At 128k MP3 quality, that's a little over 12mb
(those already familiar with the cubans and the EP, please skip down until there's a double gap)
The EP itself was a four-track 7", on fetching flourescent yellow vinyl, in a limited run of 1000. Such a limited run has become a common thing for the Cuban Boys over the past year and a bit, they have been (returning to?) "keeping their heads down" to a considerable extent. There was also the Intertia Kicks CD-EP, celebrating the crapness of the England Euro 2000 attempt, which came in a plasticy football-shape case. A rather fine 72 minute album, Eastwood followed in September, which could have done quite well if EMI had advertised it at all and got the attention of the teenyboppers, kids, ravers and other small-time fans who still spun the disc from time to time. Alas, they didn't, and so sales were incredibly disappointing. The fact that very few copies were actually shipped to stores didn't help. It can be found fairly easily today in reputable branches of Virgin and HMV, but it took it's sweet time arriving. Needless to say, the band we'rent too chuffed with EMI for that.
Thus followed a few internet-only releases. The Vinyl Countdown for one, as well as Duncan Wayne, and they might even - it was rumoured - have been responsible for the fine protest contained within Napster vs The Music Industry. Plus, of course, a couple of collaborations contributed to Artists Against Success' Now that's what I call VALID online compilation.
(Previous releases had also been fairly low volume... The EP Blueprint for Modernisation, and the now-legendary 7" single Oh My God, They Killed Kenny! were both of a limited run and sold out fast). Murmurs abound on the web-board about an upcoming, commercial, full-on single release. I may soon start to hold my breath...! Maybe.
But, I digress. This EP was a compilation of some of the tunes listeners to the John Peel show, and other radio programmes upon which the band appeared, had heard and loved through the previous 12 months or so, including a paen to a record company, also supposedly their legal company (?! :-), Prim and Proper productions. It is a celebration of old-school happy house, and the first track contains a wanton (um... one tonne...) amount of samples from the film School For Scoundrels. Hence the name.
So, as I have stated, Theme for Prim & Proper was a tribute to their lawyers :-) (err, I think - if anyone else knows for definate please tell me as I have no way of checking right now!) )of whom they make much use, as well as being "somewhat of a cucumber sandwich to satisfy the jolly rotters. Rah!" (it sez 'ere). Apart from that, check out that synth! I say, I'm most terribly sorry. Sweaty hands!
Flossie's Alarming Clock, is, in the wrong hands, supremely annoying. In other hands, a work of techno genius. Think of it as C vs I's belligerent, japanese cousin. Yes. It's the Pikachu Song. They were at Peel acres, when John's son came home from Japan. He brought with him a monstrous Pokémon alarm clock for his sister, Flossie. It had a Pikachu on it. Which made Pikachu noises, very loudly, to wake you up. The Cubans, of course, found this fantastic -- wouldn't you? -- and immediately set about sampling it and turning it into a song. And here it is. It's the track that first turned me on to the band, and boy is it glorious. Put it on a tape, and into your car, and crank it HIGH on the high street like I did when it first (well, second) got radio play.
Ten Happy Fingers. Everybody likes Ten Happy Fingers. What do you mean, you haven't heard it? Look, just get the disc and listen to it, OK? Even my Cuban-Boys-hating friends like this tune. It's like Flossie's, but more serious. It's got a thumping beat that the stupid rabbit out of Bambi would be proud of, and is both a solid piece of techno and wonderfully silly at the same time. As Mozza would say, putting on a silly face: "The Bomb? But what goes on? I gotta get outta here, this is crazy!"
Open the door, Richard! I'm personally not -so- enamoured with this one, but it's still an alright tune if you like the general feel of the other three. I think it's a sample from some old blaxploitation-jazz 78, or an ancient hair gel advert. Or both.
These actual files here aren't wonderful quality, even though they are 128-kilobaud MP3 files recorded in reasonably high quality. The reason being they came off a vinyl disc that had received a rough time in the post, before being played on an ancient music centre (the only one that I could find within family & friends with a working turntable) and recorded, via a dodgy audio lead, into a fairly old sound card in my computer. They were then filtered expertly to remove noise, and then filtered entirely inexpertly to remove clicks. In retrospect, I think maybe I should have done it the other way around. Oh well.
These monstrous CD Quality files were then treated in the only sensible manner, and burnt onto a CD (along with a load of other cubans stuff), number one in a press run of one. CD writers are wonderful things, are they not?
Then, sometime later, the MP3s of the original master tapes (4-track...!) were put up on the web, and I got to hear how good they originally were (sounds bloody good for audio tape, I can tell you that!) compared the the wierd scratchy, tinny, resonant sound I got from my EP.
I immediately popped the CD into my computer again (the vinyl disc having being mothballed after a few plays to prevent damage... it's since disappeared. If this is another one of mum's rabid tidying cockups, pain will be administered. She once managed to 'accidentally' throw out a whole bloody computer monitor that was sitting in the cupboard awaiting sale...) and set it to work making MP3s of the tracks. 30 minutes later (hey, it's a slow machine) they were ready. I immediately committed to get them up on the web for other people to have a little listen to (obviously, those with fast net connections would have a big listen.. :-) and to compare with their own copies so that I could find out whether I had a dodgy needle or the disc was just, well, like that... I got as far as asking people on the Cuban Boys website chat-board for their verdicts, before going out to put the files up.
Unfortunatley I didn't have enough web-space on Geocities! Since then, it's taken an age, but I've finally managed to get onto another service -- Angelfire -- and upload the things. I reckon even if I don't get a verdict on it, I can 'spread the word' a little... who knows, maybe because of this page someone else will buy the record (purchasing details on the cubes' website, folks!) and THEN be able to get back to me... high hopes, but hey..
Bye now.
Look, this is the end. Sod off!
