Disco Horror

Straight out of the wilderness I bring you two psychedelic disco goodies today from the ever impressive Smalltown Supersound label. Though they are pretty different in style, these tracks deliver a similarly groovy weirdness not usually associated with dance music. What really matters is that they will both make you shake your ass and lose your mind at the same time, which is pretty much all I could ever ask of a meager little mp3.

We’ve mentioned Mungolian Jetset a few times, but I recently realized that we are  nonetheless severely lacking in the Mung-tunes category here at Disco Horror. Well that is about to change, and you can thank the Norwegian duo’s forthcoming double-disc compilation ‘We Gave It All Away… Now We Are Taking It Back’ for the reminder. The album collects many of their remixes and productions from the past few years and makes a damn strong case for the Mungolians being one of the most idiosyncratic dance crews around. “Creepy” is crawling with life; the track is thick with squiggly atmospherics and oddball synth lines that lurk underneath the clean disco-house facade, resurfacing for the occassional unsettling moment or to enhance the peak of a monumental build. Just be sure to check yourself for leeches afterwards.

Mungolian Jetset – Creepy

I may have written about Bjørn Torske just last week, but I also promised that I would soon post his amazing edit of avant-folk collective Sunburned Hand of the Man‘s “The Parakeet Beat”- and I will not break said promise. Available on this year’s ‘Smalltown Supersound Is On Fire’ compilation, Torske here has concocted one of the beardiest disco tunes I’ve ever heard. It all begins with some galloping, primitive percussion and a krauty guitar lead that eventually fade into warm fuzzy nothingness, and just when you think the party’s over some funky wah-action suddenly erupts and everyone jams the fuck out for another four minutes or so. This is definitely the only remix of an experimental-folk jam session I’ve ever heard (if you know about more don’t hold out on me bro), and if you find that idea even remotely appealing I think you’ll have a pretty good trip.

Sunburned Hand of the Man – The Parakeet Beat (Bjørn Torske Remix)

It’s extremely well-established that we here at Disco Horror are unabashed fans of all things Scandinavian- especially if we’re talking disco. And with incredible releases from acts like the Meanderthals, Mungolian Jet Set, and L&PT themselves, this year has been something of a renaissance for dudes like us. But sometimes other deserving artists can get overlooked in the process, and until recently (for me) Bjørn Torske was one of those artists.

I had always enjoyed Torske’s 2007 album Feil Knapp, but for some reason never investigated any further. But after hearing both his 2008 single “Kokt Kveite” and stellar remix of Lindstrøm’s “The Contemporary Fix” on Prins Thomas’ Live at Robert Johnson mix (the latter was also featured here on this very blog earlier in the year), I decided to stop being lazy and check out the rest of the guy’s music. It turns out that Torske has been recording in Norway since the early ’90s- making his own productions, frequently collaborating with Rune Lindbaek (Meanderthals), doing remixes and starting multiple record labels.

While I couldn’t track down any of those old Lindbaek collaborations, I did discover a wealth of amazing remixes and 12″ cuts that might even impress more than anything Torske put on his proper albums. Along with his inimitable remix of Sunburned Hand of the Man’s “The Parakeet Beat” (which I will eventually post to the blog as well), my favorite ‘discovery’ was Torske’s Kan Jeg Slippe? EP from last year. The title track is a flute-y forest seance that slowly gets subverted by  shambling bongos and sinister atmospherics, all the while subtly turning into a full-on hippie-disco freakout sometime within it’s sixteen-minute duration. “Kan Jeg Slippe?” proves to be worthy of it’s epic length; not unlike the best Mungolian Jet Set remixes or anything Lindstrøm or Prins Thomas have produced in the last year, the track has a way of always noodling yet staying rooted to irresistibly heavy percussion throughout. Enjøy!

Bjørn Torske – Kan Jeg Slippe?