Je me souviens de la première fois ou j’ai entendu Rocé aka Jose Kaminsky.
C’était un samedi matin d’automne 1997. Comme souvent le week end, Mehdi passait chez moi en scooter avant d’aller digger des vinyls. Ce samedi là, Mehdi était enjaillé à l’idée de me faire écouter une k7 qu’il avait eut par manu k.

Clic clac play et me voici en train d’écouter le texte de “ma face en première page”. Grosse claque.
Un flow dense avec beaucoup de rimes, difficile de tout saisir à la première écoute. Une forte impression d’intégrité artistique accompagné d’une écriture riche et révolutionnaire.

Rdv pris à place de l’odéon qq temps plus tard afin d’enregistrer le titre en entier chez AND studio (big up Armen et david). Je me souviens d’avoir tout de suite été surpris par le coté calme et réservé de José … mais une fois derrière le micro c’était évidement autre chose …

Plus tard de 1998 à 2001, je voyais occasionelement José débarquer au bureau, relax, les mains dans les poches, “Ça va la forme et tout ?” et au bout d’un moment me dire , tiens au fait j’ai enregistré une nouvelle maquette … Evidement les morceaux déchiraient, et sont devenus plus tard des classiques du catalogue Espionnage.

Mais Espionnage était plus un laboratoire artistique qu’un label. Pour des raisons logistiques, nous avons donc décidé de faire l’album sur Chronowax. En cherchant un bon studio pas trop cher, nous sommes partis sur une prod canadienne. Mes amis de Audio research à Montréal (soon to be Chromeo) avaient à dispo un super plan.

Petite équipe parisienne : Ismael, José et moi même dans un avion. 8 jours plus tard “Top Depart” était quasiment en boite ! Logistique géré par Patrick Gemayel aka P-thugs, production exécutive par Dave 1 et moi meme. Realisation par José et Ismael avec le soutien de Dave 1.

Pour l’album on a décidé de produire deux clips. Ceci étant bien évidement pre youtube.

Changer le monde : Jose a bossé avec Romain Gavras des Kourtrajme sur cette video. Je ne suis plus sur du budget mais j’imagine que c’était genre quelques milliers d’euros (investis dans le plan de fin avec la camera attaché à un ballon. Fact : je fais une doublure bmx dans cette video avec Lotfi Hammadi

On s’habitue: Ce fut Alexander Wise qui s’attacha au projet.Je suis fan du morceau et j’aime la mise en relief de l’écriture et de la rythmique. 2 jours de tournages dans le fond du stock de Chronowax distribution et beaucoup plus en after effect ensuite…

Le sampler teaser de l’album fut mixé par dj Feadz. Get it if you can.

10 ans après, Top Depart est considéré comme un classique et est de nouveau disponible. Grosse équipe, Gros souvenirs ! Love u all !

More Links:

Un super web doc revenant sur la genèse et l’héritage de “Top Depart” avec Oxmo, Dave 1, Jay 1, Manu K …

Rio Do Janeiro
Le 20 mars 2012.

Brazil is a huge music place. When a global survey recently asked young Brazilians to rank their passion for music, Brasileiros came first in front of Spain and UK. I must said that i never went to a place where music was so omnipresent in everyday life.

I am spending few month here visiting friends and meeting new people from the music scene.

I must said that i never went to a place where music was so loud everywhere you go and pretty much 24/7 …

In 2011, Criolo, a talented young 27 artist from Sao Paulo, became increasingly popular by successfully giving away his latest album for free -theweeknd style- on YouTube (pronounced u-to-be) and soundcloud. The live scene is vibrant as well.

Music seems to be a part of the national identity.

As Japan, this is a hard market to break for foreigners. Few people speaks english (and fewer seems interested by US music). Local scene is gigantic and constantly changing. Dozens of music genres are sprayed all over the country (as big as Europe) and every year new genres appears too.

Holla at me if you around.

Pics are not mine but from my lovely wife

Where is the fun ?

IS FREE THE RIGHT PRICE FOR NEW DIGITAL MUSIC ?

WHERE ARE THE NEW MUSIC OBJECTS ?

Sales for Dr. Dre´s Beats approached $500 Million for 2011. It would take 50 Million albums´ sales at a gross ppd price of USD 10 in order to generate those same 500 Millions… So, what are we waiting for ?

BBerry pics : the sex issue

I once asked, while cruising mission street in SF, what was this huge military castel there ? It is so-called The armory and it is also now property of kink.com. Last weekend, while being in town, i joined a private visit tour with Lamar Taylor and Hyghly Alleyne from the @XO crew and SF legend Bootsy. A huge and weird place.

S/O to my friend Alexander Spit who has a new video out tonight. Directed by Bobby Hundreds and Alexander himself, here is the “REAL RSWD PT. 1” featuring CBG clip. Rosewood all day.

Its been 40 days now since we lost our friend and brother, Mehdi.
There is so much i’d like to say, so many stories i’d like to tell … but i didnt found the right tone yet to fully express myself. Some great tributes are already been wrote down like this one or that one. Great music had also been posted too here and there.

I am eager to see how people ( Me, You and everybody) will embrace his legacy and honnor him trough actions. Mehdi devoted his life to please and inspire people by making or playing the best music he could. And he was incredibly good at it. He was all about sharing love and emotions.

Right now, we can go straight to the coolcat shop and order the endless love t-shirt. All profits of the sales will benefit Mehdi’s family.

Summer pics … Straight out my Blackberry …

– This is FUN: Remember the ipod battles with your friends ? Remember how cool it is to do ping-pong DJ sets with your mates ?
Well , this is basically the same feeling that you will get when first trying out turntable.fm

- In less than one hour, I Discovered new music and (maybe) new buddies: How ? well i ended up for example in a Bhangra room curated by … dj’s from Bangalore. Well you can’t do better than that if you wanna keep up with the latest hits popping from an ever growing list of new music niches.

You can argue what about Spotify, Rdio etc ? well i never lived in a country where it was available. I sure did played a bit with those but i ended rapidly frustrated by the lack of catalog, especially when it comes to offer the highly diverse new music popping out everyday. Yes, music production is also becoming a real time world.

This is why i would love to see an easy copy/paste URL integration on Turntable.fm. Yes most of today’s production is being first released on D.I.Y services like Soundcloud, Bandcamp, youtube , official.fm….

Beside the fact that this new website is offering tons of marketing ideas (contests, virtual parties for venues, brands, labels …), you can also manage to use it in a passive way (à la Pandora). Although there is no value derived by a passive user in the system (yet), you still can join a crowd in a room that fits your current mood and needs, turn up the volume, and open a new window on your machine.

turntable.fm is growing fast while still very basic. Imagine when new features will included : Mobile Apps, Ipad aps, Geolocation, Facebook integration …

And even if Turntable.fm should stop tomorrow, there will be a before and an after. The game has changed, Music is Fun again.

Discloser: I am consulting for Bands and Brands, Founder at Fairtilizer.com and Official.fm.
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