Category Archives: Madtone

Oi mate, that’s my Egg Nog okay?

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A Happy Boxing day to all! Here’s the audio of The imaginary Stations Winter Holiday Special which was broadcast via Shortwave Gold on Christmas Eve on those shortwaves. There’s a load of festive tunes throughout the hour plus “A holday Mix” from One Deck Pete at 40.38 minutes in. Here’s the tracklistings:

Forgotten employee – The Backroom Tapes
Snow Palms – Evening Rain Gardens (Excerpt)
Kohei Yoshi – Cold Ice Dub
Frost – Munch RIP (instrumental)
Bodyswitch – Gee Whiz it’s Christmas
Jacob Miller/Ray I – Deck The Halls
Kibble – Warm Fireplace (Excerpt)

 

 

A tune for bin-night’s eve

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Now here’s a tune that is getting under our skin. It’s from an artist called Paper Sailboat from Ottawa, Ontario and it’s called Numbers Stations. We can’t hear any recognisable number stations samples (but remember we are getting a bit mutton jeff in our old age) and this one really get under your skin, it’s nearly 6 minutes long but you wouldn’t think so. One for turning up loud knowing that the binmen will be here at the crack of dawn.

Gone are the days when the binmen in Coventry would knock your front door on Christmas Eve holding a bin bag saying “Merry Christmas from the Coventry Binmen”. It was like an adult version of trick or treating where if you didn’t comply, your bins wouldn’t be emptied for a couple of weeks, allegedlly. It’s a whole different world now…

Festive tune of the week

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This excellent tune was found when compiling a shortwave mix, a great spoof of The Normal on a festive tip. We hope even Daniel Miller would have a chuckle at it while he’s listening to it around the open fire.

Bass and drum plus some gurgling and groaning

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Last night we found a wonderful track on Bill Laswell’s Trojan Dub Massive Volume One compilation on Bandcamp. It’s a version of Delroy Wilson’s Have Some Mercy (first heard on the John Peel show many years ago) and George Faith’s To be a Lover called Lovers Skank (Spanglers Clap) by The Upsetters. Crazy minimal dub with all sounds of strange things over the top.

This track also appears on the vintage King Tubby’s Hometown Hi-Fi recording from Jamaica in 1975 (Thanks to Who Cork The Dance for cleaning the tape up) at 11 minutes in. As the great U-Roy says while the track is playing “It’s kind of scratchy, very very scratchy but the brother asked to play…” Tune!

Here’s an excellent interview with the great U-Roy where he talks about King Tubby’s electronics wizardry at 11 minutes in.

Dreams less sweet

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On Saturday afternoon after our Mystic Meg-like prophetic dream, the “vibes” (or more than likely the guilt) forced us out in the garden to do some tidying up. We only did a couple of hours but it was a pleasure to spend some time out the back.

We tidied up the patio and moved the carrots in the big pot we found in the street from the bottom of the garden up nearer the house. It’s all tops and does need thining out but there are baby carrots there and the decorative foilage ain’t bad. If anyone asks we’ll them they’re some sort of exotic microferns.

And we finally cleaned the leaves off the pond netting and gave it a good once over around it and it does make a difference to the look of it. With this weather God only knows when we’ll be able to get out there again though next Saturday is looking dry.

And finally we retrieved some beetroots, not many but enough to boil and to fill a small bowl and stick in the fridge to eat this week. Cheese and beetroot in a white bread sarnie, a treat you can’t beat!

And here’s a few random tunes for a Sunday evening.

 

 

We can’t control the weather but we can control the music

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The above picture was the weather we had at the start of the week and by all accounts will return tomorrow. That’s all we need but the heating’s on at the moment and the stereo has been turned up high. The first tune of the night is Straight to Mad Professor’s head from the set Mad Professor meets Channel One: Round 2 by Mad Professor and Channel One. It is one subtle dub!

 

We heard a Hugh Mundell dubplate on this week’s excellent Rhythm Doctor’s Waiting Room on IDA Radio (Tallinn). While we were looking for it we found a great Augustus Pablo Dub of Feeling Alright.

 

And the best “out there” tune of the night is from a LP called Folk and Pop Sounds of Sumatra Vol.1 on the excellent Sublime Frequencies label from out of Seattle. No idea who it’s from or what it’s called, all it says on the notes is that it’s in the Sumatran Dangdut style. It has a hook that sounds like an interval signal from a numbers station which we can’t place, that is sometimes played on a rasping bagpipe sounding keyboard. The LP has a wonderful cover too, what more do you want? Wonderful stuff which will worm its way into your brain as it’s so catchy.

Let’s temporarily forget the crap weather and dark times and listen to some decent tunes to soothe, inspire us and give us a break so to speak.

Heavy (Dubwise) Showers

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Blimmin eck, it didn’t half come down in the early hours today in London, so much so that the water in the pond is quite close to the top. If it rains any more those goldfish will be touching the pea netting which is there to keep the Lewisham Heron out.

Talking of showers or “music like shower” to be exact, a big shout goes out to Steve Barker of the excellent long running On The Wire radio show for getting back to us on the name of the mystery tune on the compilation from the Little Axe label. It’s called So long baby/An Irie Version by Derrick Morgan & Paulett/Prince Trinity and it’s a heavy tune!

If you want to hear a top show full of reggae and all sorts of great records tap into the latest shows of On The Wire on Totally Radio here or have a look through the archive on the blogspot here. You will enjoy it! Cheers again Steve!

Rocking all over this Earth

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Here’s Sunday night’s transmission of Skybird Radio International which was broadcast through the services of Shortwave Gold. There’s tracks from all over the map and genre’s galore.

At 45 seconds in is One Deck Pete‘s third mix for Skybird Radio International and here’s the track listings:
Madtone – Diamonds in the Sky (Excerpt)
Les Maîtres Fous – La Mort d’Icare
Aselefech Ashine & Getenesh Kebret – Wegenne
Narcy – Nehaya
Wilmoth Houdini – Blow Wind Blow
Unknown Track off “Cantos Oscuros” from Little Axe Records (at 05.18 in on Side 1).

Enjoy the sounds from all around this Earth of ours!

 

On the shortwaves this weekend

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The Imaginary Stations Crew present a couple of radio shows on those shortwaves of ours this weekend. On Sunday 8th October 2023 at 2000 hrs UTC on 3975 & 6160 kHz we have KPET beamed to Europe via Shortwave Gold. This show goes out to all pet owners and will feature lots of pet related tunes for collie dogs, guinea pigs and budgies owners everywhere. One Deck Pet(e) contributes a mix called A tribute to Fido, Twinkie and Sheba with tracks from oofoe, Naslah, Cat Stevens, Benhayyi Al Baghbaghan and Soothsayers/Victor Rice.

And via WRMI on Monday 9th October in the small hours we have WSTL first at 0200 UTC on 9395 kHz and then repeated at 0300 UTC on 9455 kHz . Expect tunes that feature whistling and we also have a choir of whistling sports referees coming in live doing a rendition of “Sitting at the dock of the bay”*. It should be a shrilling show!
*subject to availability

Stars on 45

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Here’s the Imaginary Stations show WS7S – The Skybird Seven Inch Vinyl Special a show in praise of the humble seven inch single that was broadcast on Sunday 10th September 2023 via WRMI. There’s some gems on here with some light scratches and a little bit of off-centre pressing madness.

At a few seconds into the audio One Deck Pete brings you a mix called The Skybird Single Club. Here’s the tracks:
Rotary Connection – Like a rolling stone
Weekend – The view from her room
Earl Curry – One whole year baby
Felice Taylor – I feel love comin’ on
Toby Nelson – You don’t need me (Version)

Have a listen to the show and rediscover the world of the humble seven inch single.

Talking of radio shows this Sunday 17th September 2023 we have two imaginary station related programmes on the shortwave. At 2000 hrs UTC on 3975 & 6160 kHz via Shortwave Gold we have DJ Frederick’s Shortwave Music Library where he picks some choice classics and rarities not usually aired heard over the wireless. Expect all sorts of eclectic stuff.

Talking of wireless, at 2200 hrs UTC on 9395 kHz via WRMI the Imaginary Stations crew bring you WTAB. A trip back in time where trebly voices and music flowed through horn type loudspeakers and when it got too loud a spare sock would dampen the sound. Expect some old tunes from way way back in the day!