Simon Reynolds on the Slits

“The Slits started where Alternative TV and The Pop Group ended up – total chaos.”

Here’s a great piece on the Slits, written by Simon Reynolds. It’s taken from Rip it up and start again, Reynold’s book on the postpunk period.

RIP Ari Up

Sad news was posted this morning on John Lydon’s website.

John and Nora have asked us to let everyone know that Nora’s daughter Arianna (aka Ari-Up) died today (Wednesday, October 20th) after a serious illness. She will be sadly missed.

And this from the official website of Ari Up a/k/a Madussa.

Yesterday, Wed Oct.20th, my good friend Ari had to give in to some serious illness. I am really sad. She was not only a friend, a major inspiration to me for over 30 years and a wild woman, she did more for music history and as a feminist than ever can be said in just a few words hidden in tears. Unfair, unneccessary and cruel. There is no god!

On the video below you can see and hear Ari Up performing live with Dubblestandart and Lee Perry at a gig she did last year in Brooklyn New York.

And here’s how it all begun, some three decades ago, with all-girl punky reggae party band the Slits. Typical girls, indeed.

Last year city guide Revel in New York made a very nice documentary on Ari and the interests that have shaped her tastes.

“The Slits is my punk band. We started our mission in London as teenagers and the mission was to always be anti-establishment but not really in a political sense, more in a way of culture, free expression and for woman to be more just the heart and the soul.”

Lee Perry and Ari Up performing with Dubblestandart

Nice one. Lee Scratch Perry joining Ari Up (of Slits fame) for an unannounced performance with Dubblestandart.

Want more? There’s a longer edit in higher resolution of the Brooklyn performance over at  vimeo.

Dubblestandart “Return from Planet Dub”

Dubblestandart has a new album ready for release, featuring Ari Up & Lee Scratch Perry. “Return from Planet Dub” is already their 11th album since the early 90s, when they started releasing productions in the name of dub. Those who already heard the album (to be released early june), call it “one aural trip that needs to be heard” (Reggae Vibes) or a “sonic exploration that inches dub further into uncharted territory, taking Perry and Ari Up beyond their own boundaries (David Katz).

From what we already heard of it ourselves, we have to agree with this. There’s of course Lee Perry dispensing his wisdom and madness, aided by the superb backings. There’s Dubblestandard revisiting all time classics such as ‘Disco Devil’ and ‘Blackboard Jungle Dub’. There’s some tunes reminding us of the very best of On-U Sound. There’s the abstract vocals of postmodern dancehall queen Ari Up. There’s the excursions into dubble-though dubstep. There’s even Jean-Michel Jarre (of all people) turning up on Planet Dub.

You can listen to some tracks for yourself on their MySpace page.

Or listen below to the radio edit of Chrome Optmism, not only featuring the vocals of Lee Perry and snippets from an interview with movie director David Lynch, but even samples of Jean-Michel Jarre’s synthesizer anthem “Oxygen”. Weird and wonderfull.

With “Return from Planet Dub”, Dubblestandard have set up to show once again that Vienna still can be Jamaican territory. As they did from the beginning, when they chose dub music as their musical lodestar. For two decades now they have been turning it into a European bass guerrilla driven by political awareness and spaced out sounds. All based on a strong commitment to original reggae and dub. This new album is a big one.