Totally funked up: The playlist

And now for a visual representation of my recent "Electro Funk All-Stars" mix.



Ah, once again, the limitations of relying on YouTube for educational purposes. For the life of me, I couldn't find the rather excellent video for Morcheeba's "What's Your Name," so instead, I've included the video for "The Sea," my next favorite Morcheeba song, along with a Big Daddy Kane video, "Smooth Operator."

To make up for this obvious crushing blow to art and life, I've also included the original video for Tom Tom Club's "Genius of Love," upon which Mariah Carey's "Fantasy" is based. Really, Mariah Carey. I've got my nerve. There are, however, two Mariah Carey songs that I actually will admit to liking, one being "Fantasy," the other, her 2005 comeback, "We Belong Together." The key here is that she doesn't sing either song as if she were doing the vocal equivalent of a Cirque du Soleil routine. She just plain sings. After those two tunes, she's on her own though.

I would have (and should have) included "Genius of Love" in the original mix, but to burn the mix to compact disc, I can have no more than 118 minutes of music in the playlist. Argh. Foiled by technology once again. When I finally invest in that iPod, there will be no such petty limits to my mixography, other than the 8GB confined space of the "Nano" or the 160GB prison of the "Classic."

Finally (or rather initially, as it's the first video on the playlist), I've included a scene from the British comedy show, The Mighty Boosh, which my new online friend Øresund introduced me to. Øresund responded to my rather loopy post about pop music from a few weeks ago. Since then, we have been having some lovely discussions about music and performers, as our tastes overlap greatly, both the low and the high, ranging from Sheila to The Smiths and all in between.

Marvelous that the video links together two key musical components of electro's heritage: Gary Numan and funk.

"Funk? Jazz's deformed cousin?"

You be the judge.