The Good Foot goes down every 2nd and 4th Friday at Temporary Spaces in East Hollywood. We play soul, funk & rare grooves. End to end burners all night long, keeping it hot, funky & sweaty…from 10pm – 2am, No cover, 21+.  Just FYI, Temp. Spaces doesn’t have a ton of street parking surrounding it, but there is a little valet across the street. Expect it to be packed inside by Midnight…

UPCOMING GUEST DJS FOR THE GOOD FOOT:

August 14th: Jeremy Sole (Afro-Funke/Musaics/KCRW)!!!

August 28th: O-dub (Soul-sides/Boogaloo[la]) & Rani D (Soul In The Park)!!!

Oumou Sangare – Wele Wele Wintou

This record has actually been out for a fairly long time, but I only recently discovered it after hearing in on Tom Schnabel’s show at KCRW. Great contemporary sounds out of Mali from perhaps the reigning queen of African music. Rhythm king Tony Allen is a guest on one track and sounds like he could be on this one too, a bit of modern Afro-beat that is a lyrical critique against child marriage pratices.

Our first post in this new feature is a sweet bit of indie-rock from Atlanta, GA (my hometown) based group Deerhunter.  This song, “Agoraphobia,” was featured on their 2008 album Microcastle, one of the best releases from last year.  “Agoraphobia” is defined as an abnormal fear of open or public spaces.  On the face of it, much of that comes across in the lyrics to the song, where it seems the subject wants to be locked away, perhaps in an asylum, isolated from the world.

However, when I listen to this song, especially the way Bradford Cox sings the beautiful use of alliteration in the opening, I’m strangely reminded not of a person who is scared of being in public and wants to be alone, but instead someone who is madly, blindly, obsessively in love (more…)

I am very pleased to announce that I’ll be starting up a new weekly at a legendary spot in downtown Los Angeles, beginning Sunday August 2nd. The night is called “Gris Gris,” and it will go down every Sunday night from 10pm-2am at La Cita, located at 336 S. Hill St.

This night will feature a variety of styles, Soul, Funk, Latin Bugalú, Salsa Dura, Yé-yé, Mod, Beat, Psych, Proto-Punk, Tropicália, Ska, Rock Steady, Reggae, and other Rare Grooves to recharge your mojo and start the week off right. We’ll primarily focus on original sounds from the 1960s & early 1970s, but also include contemporary artists that channel the spirits of the past.

CéU- Bubuia

CéU had a busy 2008, basking in the after-glow of her debut record, touring all over the world and releasing collaborations with Sonantes & Tres Na Massa. Here in 2009, she’s released her second album Vagarosa. The album, with its mix of samba funk, reggae, jazz and samples, builds on everything she’s done so far and cements her status as one of the best in the current movement of new music out of Brazil. Highly highly recommended (and yes, that double “highly” is by design…).

Quantic – The Dreaming Mind Pt. 1

It seems like it took forever and a day for this album to finally be released. I think we had an advance copy of it a full two months before it came out. Now, Oliver at Soul Sides actually just did a nice write up on the record, so my words are minimal except to say that “The Dreaming Mind” is one of the best things I think Will Holland AKA Quantic has ever put down, all the elements just beautifully put together, especially the strings arranged by Arthur Verocai and of course Malcolm Catto’s drums. A perfect introduction to his greatest album to date.

Marlene – Sinal Vermelho

I’m a major fan of Brazilian music (see Tim Maia in Dig Deep) and have been hoping that Strut would dig deeper and put out a second volume of Brazilian funk/soul and lo and behold here it is, a good 8 years after volume #1. The first volume had some bigger names, but this one has deeper cuts.

The Aggrolites – Tonight
The Aggrolites – The Sufferer

If you just judge a book by it’s cover, the Aggrolites appear to be the kind of guys who routinely get profiled by LAPD as gang bangers. However, aside from the lead song “Firecracker,” which is more of a cautionary take on a guy with a “short fuse” instead of a call to bash heads, the sound of the Aggrolites doesn’t match their image (besides, could they really be THAT tough, they’ve been on Yo Gabba Gabba!). (more…)