EL MAHBOOB

Category: Electronic

  • Otherwhere

    British responses to Black diasporic music, and other sounds from formative walks in SSM and Toronto, via a recollection of refrains, harmonic worlds visited and the journeys between

    Omar | You’ve Got to Move
    Working Week | Inner City Blues
    The Brand New Heavies | Dream On Dreamer
    Colourbox | Philip Glass
    Young Disciples | Get Yourself Together
    Massive Attack | Daydreaming
    Level 42 | Coup d’etat
    Soul II Soul | Fairplay
    Mica Paris | Contribution ft. Rakim
    Ronny Jordan | See the New ft. IG Culture
    Jamiroquai | Blow Your Mind
    Matt Bianco | Half a Minute
    Prefab Sprout | Enchanted
    Sade | Hang on to Your Love
    Incognito | Don’t You Worry ‘Bout a Thing
    Caron Wheeler | Kama Yo
    Swing Out Sister | Twilight World
    Loose Ends | Hangin’ on a String (Contemplating)

    Otherwhere: UK 84-94

    Ibrahim El Mahboob
    March 2018

  • Best of 2017

    Alarm Will Sound with Meet the Composer Splitting Adams (Cantaloupe)

    Sarah Cahill with Regina Myers and Samuel Adams Eighty Trips Around the Sun: Music by and for Terry Riley (Irritable Hedgehog)

    Ars Nova Copenhagen First Drop (Cantaloupe)

    Julius Eastman The Zürich Concert (New World)

    ÌFÉ IIII+IIII (Discos Ifá)

    Kelly Moran Bloodroot (Telegraph Harp)

    Sampha Process (Young Turks)

    Tyshawn Sorey Verisimilitude (Pi)

    Moses Sumney Aromanticism (Jagjaguwar)

    SZA Ctrl (Top Dawg/RCA)

    Thundercat Drunk (Brainfeeder)

    John Williams Close Encounters of the Third Kind · 40th Anniversary Remastered Edition (La-La Land)

    Music by Linda Catlin Smith, Martin Arnold, Isaiah Ceccarelli, Chiyoko Szlavnics, Marc Sabat Canadian Composer Series (Another Timbre)

    Various Artists Spiritual Jazz 7: Islam (Jazzman)

  • 1996+21: limina

    limina, for two pianos and percussion (1996), was composed as an exploratory diversion between larger projects. The title, “thresholds,” is meant to suggest points of transition or spaces between categories.

    There are two sections; the longer and more eventful first is in duple metre and features a pop-like, four-chord progression in A major. The second is in triple metre and A-flat major, with an outro-like quality. The transition between sections introduces more complex harmonies and a percussion break.

    All of the music is built around the initial melodic pattern, a loop that descends in fifths and ascends back to its starting point in fourths. This line is in fact the opening chord unfolded horizontally, and it becomes the rhythmic motor, layered against itself in canon. The final chord is the same as the opening one, though transposed down a semitone.

    Composed and recorded August 1996, Korg 01/WFD
    Remixed May 2017

    Photo: composer, 1997

    Music and composer’s notes copyright Bruce A. Russell 2017

  • Best of 2016

    Childish Gambino “Awaken, My Love!” (Glassnote)

    Vicky Chow A O R T A (New Amsterdam)

    King We Are King (King Creative)

    Laura Mvula The Dreaming Room (Sony · RCA)

    Holly Roadfeldt The Preludes Project (Ravello)

    Solange A Seat at the Table (Saint · Columbia)

    Esperanza Spalding Emily’s D+Evolution (Concord)

    reissues · remasters · restorations · box sets

    Wally Badarou Back to Scales To-Night (Barclay · Expansion)

    The Emotions Blessed: The Emotions Anthology 1969-1985 (BBR)

    Philip Glass The Complete Sony Recordings (Sony)

    Bernard Herrmann Twisted Nerve (Stylotone)

    John Williams Jurassic Park · The Lost World: Jurassic Park (La-La Land)

    Various Artists Doing It in Lagos: Boogie, Pop & Disco in 1980s Nigeria (Soundway)

    Various Artists Star Trek: 50th Anniversary Collection (La-La Land)

  • Best of 2015

    Some great new discoveries and otherwise the usual company in abundance.

    John Adams Absolute Jest · Grand Pianola Music San Francisco Symphony · Michael Tilson Thomas · John Adams (SFS Media)

    Bang on a Can All Stars Field Recordings (Cantaloupe)

    eighth blackbird Filament (Cedille)

    Mahan Esfahani Time Present and Time Past (Archiv)

    Morton Feldman · Erik Satie · John Cage Rothko Chapel [Gnossiennes, In a Landscape, etc.] Kim Kashkashian · Sarah Rothenberg · Steven Schick · Houston Chamber Choir · Robert Simpson (ECM)

    Floating Points Elaenia (Luaka Bop/Pluto)

    Kendrick Lamar To Pimp a Butterfly (Top Dawg · Aftermath · Interscope)

    Steve Martland Band Martland (NMC)

    Steve Reich Music for 18 Musicians Ensemble Signal · Third Coast Percussion · Brad Lubman (Harmonia Mundi)

    Max Richter Sleep (Deutsche Grammophon)

    Linda Catlin Smith Thought and Desire Eve Egoyan (Earwitness Editions)

    Stephen Sondheim Liaisons: Re-Imagining Sondheim from the Piano Anthony de Mare (ECM)

    Ann Southam Glass Houses for Marimba Taktus (Centrediscs)

    Tennyson Like What EP (self-released)

    Kamasi Washington The Epic (Brainfeeder)

    John Williams Star Wars: The Force Awakens Gustavo Dudamel · William Ross · John Williams (Walt Disney)

    reissues · remasters

    Bernard Herrmann Obsession Special Archival Edition (Music Box)

    The Spinners Spinners (BBR)

    John Williams A.I. Artificial Intelligence Expanded Archival Collection (La-La Land)

    John Williams Jaws and Jaws 2 (Intrada)

    John Williams, Herman Stein, Hans J. Salter, Joseph Mullendore, Alexander Courage, Cyril J. Mockridge, Gerald Fried, Leith Stevens, Robert Drasnin, Fred Steiner and others Lost in Space 50th Anniversary Soundtrack Collection (La-La Land)

  • Boogie Dedication

    The Salsoul Orchestra ft. Loleatta Holloway | Seconds

    Linda Williams | City Living

    Stephanie Mills | You Can’t Run from My Love

    Esther Williams | I’ll Be Your Pleasure

    Odyssey | Inside Out

    Pleasure | Nothin’ to It

    Unlimited Touch | I Hear Music in the Streets

    Kool & the Gang | Steppin’ Out

    Prince | I Wanna Be Your Lover

    Eighties Ladies | I Knew That Love

    Logg | Dancing into the Stars

    Change ft. Luther Vandross | The Glow of Love

    Stevie Wonder | As if You Read My Mind

    B O O G I E D E D I C A T I O N

    79-82

    To Nehal and Masimba

    beatmixing and harmonic mixing has been employed
    without altering the tempo or pitch of the original tracks

    I B R Λ H I M ΞL M Λ H B O O B
    July 2015

  • An Evening with Barrière and Saariaho

    My review for I Care If You Listen.

  • Best of 2014

    John Adams, The Gospel According to the Other Mary – Los Angeles Philharmonic, LA Master Chorale, Gustavo Dudamel

    John Luther Adams, Become Ocean – Seattle Symphony, Ludovic Morlot

    D’Angelo and The Vanguard, Black Messiah

    Morton Feldman, String Quartet No. 1 – FLUX Quartet

    Flying Lotus, You’re Dead!

    Philip Glass, The Complete Piano Etudes – Maki Namekawa

    Meredith Monk, Piano Songs – Ursula Oppens, Bruce Brubaker

    Laura Mvula, With Metropole Orkest Conducted by Jules Buckley at Abbey Road Studios

    Steve Reich, Radio Rewrite – Jonny Greenwood, Vicky Chow, Alarm Will Sound, Alan Pierson

    Ann Southam, Glass Houses Vol. 2 – Christina Petrowska Quilico

    tuku, moonday sessions:the black

    reissues

    Herbie Hancock, The Complete Columbia Album Collection 1972-1988 (rel. late 2013)

    Odyssey, Happy Together (Expanded Edition)

    Sly Stone & various artists, I’m Just Like You: Sly’s Stone Flower 1969-1970

  • Spring Affair

    Peter Brown | Without Love
    Deniece Williams | How’d I Know That Love Would Slip Away
    Táta Vega | Mr. Troublemaker
    Greg Phillinganes | Lazy Nina
    Ronnie Laws | All for You
    Patrice Rushen | Music of the Earth
    Michael Wycoff | Looking Up to You
    Herbie Hancock | Stars in Your Eyes (Special Disco Remix)
    Pleasure | I’m Mad
    Donald Byrd | Love Has Come Around
    Evelyn “Champagne” King | What Are You Waiting For
    Loleatta Holloway | Love Sensation
    Logg | Something Else
    Donna Summer | Spring Affair
    Gene Harris | Losalamitoslatinfunklovesong

    Spring Affair

    1974-1985

    Analog keys, horns, vibes, strings, human drummers and sangin’

    Classics with a tempo flow and a little harmonic mixing (no pitch shifting)

    Dedicated to Nehal El-Hadi (aka Nina), writer, poet,
    researcher, editor, producer, mother

    Thank you also to Nehal for the title graphic on the cover photo

    I B R Λ H I M ΞL M Λ H B O O B
    April 2014

  • Best of 2013

    Eve Egoyan – 5

    Philip Glass – Visitors

    Kuniko Kato – Cantus

    R. Andrew Lee – November

    Laura Mvula – Sing to the Moon

    Omar – The Man

    Quadron – Avalanche

    Thundercat – Apocalypse

    Hans Zimmer – Man of Steel

    Best archive/reissue:

    Sly and the Family Stone – Higher!