A filtered house remix of “Supersonic” by Jamiroquai. It was primarily done as a project to help teach myself how to use Logic.

rev-o-lu-tion: A sudden or momentous change in a situation
Get on up and dance!

Tracklisting:
1) SupermartXe – Juanjo Martin & Albery Neve ft Nalaya Brown
2) A:M – Eros & Sergio Gadi
3) Devil Toy – Hoxton Whores
4) Witch Doktor – Armand Van Helden (Eddie Thoneick Remix)
5) Ticket To Ride 2009 = Syke & Sugarstarr (Mark Duran Remix)
6) Keep On Dancing – The Free Radicals
7) We’ll Be Free – Alex Guesta (Alex Guesta Club Mix)
I Get Lifted – Erick Morillo feat Deborah Cooper (Michael Gray and Danism Remix)
9) U Should Know – Virolo, Ray Leandro feat Priscila Due (Alex Guerrero Remix)
10) So High – Starchaser feat Lo-Fi Sugar (Thomas Schwartz and Fausto Fanizza Remix)
11) Sensuality – Lee John (Samy D Remix)
12) Cool Summer – Stefano Noferini
13) Trapped – Pagano, Wayne G and Peyton (Soulshaker Club Mix)

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Born into an environment of rich musical appreciation, Zachary Mastoon, aka Caural, learned early on to embrace the limitless possibilities of sound. Starting as young as four, Caural has experimented with compositions by using everyday noises and melodies. By the time he finished college, he had found a thoughtful balance between his background as a trained jazz guitarist and the progressive creativity he picked up on while splitting time between Chicago and New York. The constant changing of scenery was an asset for him in terms of avoiding any one-dimensional loyalties toward a regional sound.

Like many experimental producers who share the same vision, Caural proudly cites luminaries like Miles Davis and Stevie Wonder (specifically their jazz-fusion eras) as sources of inspiration for his lush soundscapes. But what separates him from artists like Prefuse 73 and Flying Lotus is his ability to add a melodic, almost liquid-like motion to his arrangements. He’s collaborated with a wide array of musicians and has released projects under some of the most cutting-edge electronic labels including Plug Research, Sound In Color, Chocolate Industries and, most recently, Mush Records. To say Caural is a connoisseur or musicologist is a bit misleading, so Centerstage caught up with him to hear about his personal musical theories and where they will take him next.

You have a very eclectic background in music. What were some of the experiences that stood out to you as instrumental in your development?
There were so many really; my parents’ stereo system and record collection helping me to fall in love with music from before I can remember, my cousin Andy and I recording piano and toy duets on cassette beginning when I was four or five and then teaming up with my neighbor and surrogate older brother Stuart Bogie to do more tapes together when I was six. I think some of my earliest experiences with music – even recording songs from MTV onto my Fisher Price cassette recorder – brought me more in touch with sound and melody as a part of everyday life, and that’s a connection one doesn’t lose.

You studied music at Wesleyan. How does your education in school compare to the education you received on the road or on stage?
I don’t think you can compare the two. For the most part, academia focuses on strengthening the mind. You learn how to “name” certain sounds and styles, and you build technique and hopefully a broad base of historical comprehension, but these are activities of the mind and the mind only. I think it was John Coltrane who said something to the effect of “we learn musical theory to forget it when we play,” which of course is a butchered paraphrase and possibly a misquote to begin with, but it is true. The academic study separates you from the experience and creation of music, which I don’t think is intellectual at all; rather, it is instinctual. So, if anything else, studying music history allows you to understand context and inspire you to take next steps forward, and music theory gives you the tools with which to do so, though – at least in my case – music theory helped me to better elucidate what was coming through me to begin with.

You have a background in jazz and I think that comes across particularly in how you use your samples. What are the similarities in jazz and hip-hop as far as composition goes?
Although I studied jazz guitar and improvisation, I find hip-hop from a producer’s standpoint to have nothing to do with jazz, to be honest. An emcee or a graf writer or a dancer is better aligned with the spirit of jazz, which means being fully present in a moment, listening, and responding.

Listening is the most important part of being a good jazz player – not playing – and you can tell how aware a musician is by what he or she adds to the whole picture. Producing tracks, on the other hand, can often be a very methodical process. While it may cease to be after you have gathered all the sounds and you begin improvising with what you have, there is still always an element of dissociation from the moment because you are constantly revisiting how everything is coming together (i.e., is this really the snare I want, is this bass sound working, do I like this reverb, etc.). So, in short, producing allows you to stop time – or at least really slow it down – and carve out each moment individually, while jazz is all about now, and listening to what is coming through you and everyone around you.

I think people often call something “jazzy” either because someone samples piano, or upright, or a saxophone, but that doesn’t make it jazz. Kenny G plays the saxophone, and his music is the farthest thing possible from jazz.

You cite Miles Davis as an influence. How did albums like Bitches Brew and On The Corner change things for you?
Miles Davis was perpetually reacting and growing, and he was one of the most monumentally important bandleaders in the jazz period. It’s not that he was a phenomenal player – he really wasn’t; what Miles Davis did was produce. He got the right people together, listened to what was happening outside of jazz and incorporated it into his sound to redefine what jazz itself sounded like again and again.

So, for me, I didn’t and don’t want to make beats – that is the most ridiculously boring and pointless shit possible. I am interested, however, in taking elements of what some consider to be hip-hop, or rock, or ambient, or noise, or whatever, and make songs, and evolve as an artist while hopefully offering something unique to music. The more people who discard these arbitrary boundaries and act on what they feel, the better art will we be. People who have made the same rap records over and over again because hip-hop is this exclusive culture, well, they are the reason that that art form is so completely dead and irrelevant nowadays.

I’ve read in an interview that you?re not part of any particular scene here in Chicago. What is it about the city that inspires your music?
I think that was a particularly old interview, but it’s still true today. I had been living in NYC for the last ten years on and off, and just moved back here almost two years ago now. I don’t think anything in particular about Chicago or New York directly influenced my stylistic choices per se; It’s just how I react to the energy of a place that takes my sound in a new direction. I do think Chicago is a beautiful city, but as far as inspiration goes, it’s pretty hard to pinpoint anything outside of me.

Can you give me a brief description of what a perfect day in Chicago is like for you?
Wake, practice yoga at Bikram College of India Chicago, meet friends for brunch outdoors, maybe take a bike ride on the lakefront or go to a street festival, have some wine, check out live music, try a restaurant I have never been to, and enjoy people-watching afterwards at a lounge somewhere. That’s a hard question…there’s always too much to do!

It seems that you’re just as inspired by the visual as you are the audible. How did you link up with Cody Hudson and what were some of the things you worked on together?
I met Cody years ago through Seven at Chocolate Industries, and have always admired him and his work. Funnily enough, I did music for a documentary called “The Run Up,” and my music was used in his section totally coincidentally!

A year ago, he approached me about doing a soundtrack of sorts to an installation he created out of tambourines, so I made a track out of all tambourine samples. The installation opened in LA originally but, when it came to the Andrew Rafacz Gallery here in Chicago, Cody added a video element to it as well, and it became this almost tribal, cult-like initiation piece – at least, that’s how I experienced it! We have been talking about working on something else together, but time has so far prevented it.

Do you still work with Chocolate Industries? What projects are you working on now and do you have a release date for another solo album?
It has been years since I last worked with Chocolate. My last two albums were on Mush. Lately, I have been wrapping up a project called Boy King Islands, which is more or less shoegaze rock: zero samples. I have done a slew of remixes over the last couple of years which are still getting released slowly but surely, and an artist in the UK is doing a video of one of my newer songs for a DVD on Eat Concrete. I have been performing live with my old friend K-Kruz, and he and I will start work on a collaborative electronic project as well. Though, for now, I have been much more excited about picking up a guitar or beating on a drum set than pushing buttons…

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“I hate world music,” David Byrne famously wrote in a 1999 essay for The New York Times, calling the term a “catchall” for non-Western music of all kinds, and a “name for a bin in the record store signifying stuff that doesn’t belong anywhere else.”

Despite his concerns, though, we’re guessing the cosmopolitan musician would have a hard time boycotting Chicago’s World Music Festival, the latest installment of which runs September 18-24 in venues throughout the city. This year’s fest again boasts a talented lineup, which this year includes 27 acts making their Chicago debuts. While there are plenty of worthy local acts on the bill as well, we’ll stick to recommending the ones you can’t see very often. Sorry, David – foreignness just seems more exciting.

Fool’s Gold
September 19 at Navy Pier, September 20 at Bottom Lounge
This LA collective’s grooves are rooted in African and Middle Eastern rhythms (guitar-centric, not horn-heavy) but with plenty of Western pop influences to keep things from getting too, you know, weird. The opening – and addictive – track on Fool’s Gold’s new self-titled release, “Surprise Hotel,” is a perfect example of how the group makes hemispheres meet on the dance floor.

Red Baraat
September 18 at Martyrs’, September 19 at Navy Pier
If New Orleans’ Second Line brass bands took to marching through New Delhi, they might end up sounding something like the New York-based Red Baraat, which calls itself the first and only “dhol ‘n’ brass” band in the States. The horn- and percussion-heavy songs (a dhol is a double-sided, barrel-shaped North Indian drum) waver between influences, but never lose their groove. Expect a show full of flashy performances and a new way of looking at the world.

photo: Hans Speekenbrink

Blick Bassy
September 21 at Martyrs’, September 22 at Kelyvn Park Fieldhouse
This super-soulful Cameroonian singer admits that it’s not as much about what he sings as the way he sings it, and it’s true – he could be insulting all of Chicago in the sweetly flowing “Massa,” and we’d still find the song irresistible. Bassy pairs his warm, understated vocals with guitar, kora, calabash and bass to offer rhythms that don’t exactly hit you over the head, but linger with you long afterward.

BLK JKS
September 20 at Bottom Lounge, September 21 at Hideout
This South African band has four members, but it sounds as if there could be about ten. The sound isn’t necessarily big, but it’s densely packed with influences ranging from psychedelic rock and dub to jazz and funk. In a sense, this is the sound of a country mining its musical past to come up with something wholly new. Fortunately, you don’t have to be familiar with the history to enjoy the present.

Electric Junkyard Gamelan
September 20 at Uncommon Ground on Devon, September 21 at Daley Plaza
This band, led by Terry Dame, hails from New York City. Its influences are primarily Balinese (though other elements, such as klezmer, funk, hip-hop and Indian music, have been added to the mix). Its instruments? Totally from another planet. The Big Barp (an electric rubber-band harp), Sitello (electric cello/sitar combo), Clayrimba (a three-octave-tuned clay pot “marimba”) and other noisemaking devices were all invented and produced by the group members themselves. As you’d imagine, this makes for some pretty unorthodox sounds. But more often than not, all those twangs and clangs mesh into exceedingly danceable grooves.

Forro In The Dark
September 20 at Martyrs’
If you don’t find your foot at least tapping a little upon hearing this Brazilian band’s high-energy party music, well, you might want to lay off the horse tranquilizers. The syncopated forro sound has been filling rural dance floors for years; these guys (now living in NYC) have urbanized and updated it for a whole new group of listeners. Take a listen to the hyper, flute-filled “Bandinha” and just try to say they haven’t succeeded.

Little Cow
September 20 at Navy Pier and Hideout
Eastern European music has seen a surge in popularity stateside in recent years, thanks to acts like DeVotchKa, Gogol Bordello and Beirut. But Little Cow is the genuine article, having built a huge following in its native Hungary since 2002. It’s not hard to see why, as the horn-filled, Gypsy-dance tunes are all about fun.

Los De Abajo
September 22 at Green Dolphin Street
If you came away from August’s Viva! Chicago Latin Music Festival and Art Fair with a renewed interest in the diversity of Latin music, this Mexico City act would be a good place to start studying. The eight-piece band focuses on Latin ska (yes, there is such a thing), but also includes elements of reggae, cumbia, banda and straightahead rock in its eclectic sound. The group is known for its highly energetic live shows and strong politics, so come prepared to get sweaty and, possibly, inspired.

Mikrokolektyw
September 22 at Museum of Contemporary Art, September 24 at Chicago Cultural Center
Drummer/trumpeter duos are a pretty rare thing – but so are musicians of this caliber. This mostly acoustic (with occasional electronic accompaniment) Polish pair offers avant-garde jazz that wouldn’t be out of place at the Hideout‘s Immediate Sound Series (which is exactly where the band will be playing on the Wednesday before the fest). If you like your jazz with a bit of sadness sewn in, this is something to try.

Naomi Shelton and The Gospel Queens
September 24 at Chicago Cultural Center
Recent Daptone Records signee Naomi Shelton seems to be constantly torn between her spiritual side (developed through years of singing gospel in the church) and the urge to sin (via fiery funk). She finds a good balance on her new release, What Have You Done, My Brother, which is equal parts heaven and hell – sometimes in the same song (“Am I Asking Too Much”). If you don’t believe in a higher power, you probably will after this show.

Watcha Clan
September 18 at Navy Pier, September 20 at Sonotheque
If you missed this hypnotic French act when it was last in town, for the Chicago Folk & Roots Festival in July, you owe it to yourself to correct the mistake. Led by Sista K, the multi-lingual group (songs are performed in French, Arabic, Hebrew and English) pulls its influences from all over the world, with one thing being a constant: the groove. Fans of Thievery Corporation, here’s the next step in your world-music journey.

Kusun Ensemble
September 19 at Rogers Park World Music Festival and Edgewater GRalley Festival
Chicagoans have been lucky to get so many legendary West African acts come to our city in recent years, including multiple appearances by Mali’s Vieux Farka Toure and Amadou & Mariam, and Senegal’s Orchestra Baobab. Now comes the Kusun Ensemble, a Ghanaian group that’s doing things a little differently. Its Nokoko music uses traditional instruments to create a new, unique African jazz sound – and the dancing that comes along with it makes a good seat very necessary.

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Like many singers before her, Isis Rose first started singing in church. Her voice is as silky as it is raw, and depending on the situation she can sound like Ani DiFranco one moment and Cat Power the next. In recent months she’s been working on a solo EP as well as some collaborative projects with Iowa Rockwell, Ill Legit (of The Gent$) and Monster Mash. It’s anybody’s guess where this budding songstress will land in the next few months, so Centerstage caught up with her to see if we can get a heads up on how she got started and where she hopes to find herself by year’s end.

Where were you born and how did you get interested in singing?
I was born and raised here in Chicago and love this city. I’ve always been interested in music since I can barely remember. It was always something that piqued my interest. My uncle had a piano in his house and I remember learning how to play and sing whole songs by ear once he taught me the basics. I just continued on since then. I was in choir throughout school and picked up the guitar in high school.

Can you take me back to the first time you performed live?
I’ve been on stage since a young age, but the very first time I performed my own music was at a church youth event as a teen. I had a 20-minute set with a whole band and all original songs. It was very liberating.

Do you have any singers that you draw inspiration from?
I don’t have one particular group of singers that inspire me. I think it’s more the way a song is structured musically and lyrically, and if it makes me feel like I need to step my game up then that’s inspiration in and of itself. It’s because I draw inspiration from many genres and many artists, and inspiration from life itself.

Chicago has its own resume of legendary soul-singers. What about the city inspires you?
I love the way the city comes to life on warm summer nights. There is always something to do for everyone in Chicago. I think that inspires me the most. Plus it’s such a diverse city. If I want to be cultured in something, I can just go to that neighborhood and learn. It’s like going to a different country in a minute way.

I’ve heard a lot of people sound off on haters, your thoughts?
They’re fans in disguise. I say haters are just people who watch and listen enough to have an opinion. If you have haters, you know that people are paying attention. Of course it would be easier if it was constructive, but we all know that’s never the case.

You’ve worked with The Gent$, most recently with Ill Legit. How did you link up with them?
It was all pretty much a domino effect that I got to work with them. I met artists and musicians that introduced me to other artists and musicians. I collaborated with a couple of them, and wound up at a show that Ill Legit was performing at. We exchanged some great musical ideas and began to collaborate very easily. It was through him that I formally was introduced to Pugz Atomz and Wes Restless. All three are very talented. And the rest is history.

What projects do you have coming up?
Other than singles, I’m working on two EPs right now. One with solo music that will be out by the end of the year and one with myself and Ill Legit that we’re releasing very soon. Look out for them both.

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So, it’s been a few months since my last posting and what a summer it’s been! The eagle-eyed amongst you will notice a slightly different look to the website this month and a change in name. Funky House London Style is now House Music London Style to better reflect the kind of music on the London scene.

This month, I’ve got a great selection of the latest music to be hitting London through the Autumn.

Back in June I featured a track from The Free Radicals Formation called Supernova and boy, did it get a reaction! So many of you contacted me about this track that it is officially the most talked about track I’ve featured to date! The Free Radicals Formation have been taking Madrid by storm, and this month I feature one of their latest offerings from their 3 track EP “To The Stars”. Now available to download, check it out here on Beatport.

Also this month, another amazing tune from Steve Pitron and Max Sanna, you’re gonna love their version of this Beyonce hit.

Tracklisting:

1) In Love With My Life – Arkoss vs Peyton
2) Piano for the World – Velarde & Luque
3) I can’t Stop – Javi Reina feat Ladis (Alex Guerrero Remix)
4) The Healing – The Free Radicals Formation
5) Vicious Circle – Julien Jabre (John Dahlback)
6) Be Free – Sergio Gadi ft. Marlene Duval
7) Always Been Real – Sir G & DJ Sake (Dave Lambert & Housetrap Remix)
How Soon Is Now – David Guetta feat Julie McKnight
9) Let It Shine ft. Elena Vargas – Alex Guerrero
10) In The Air ft Rudy – TV Rock (Axwell Remix)
11) Sweet Dreams – Beyonce (Pitron & Sanna Club Mix)

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