Ramble John’s back, and on next year’s The Third Hand, the man behind Stereogum’s favorite album in ’04 is kicking the samples to the curb and going the self-recorded, live instrumentation route. But that’s not the only switch for RJ; he’s moved from Def Jux to XL, and he’s making a pop record this time, setting the rap aside, and punctuating that premise with a little blue-eyed soul, a little folk, and a lot of up-front vox.
You probably got a taste of “You Never Had It So Good,” the first track from the Hand, on RJ’s MySpace (where you can also hear “Get Up”); now hear the man’s voice riding a down-tempo, head-rocking beat on this, the next cut from the album.
The Third Hand is out 3/6/07 on XL. Get psyched.
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I really like this.
I always forget about RJD2 until my iTunes serves up their remix of the Polyphonic Spree’s ‘Solider Girl’ and it totally explodes my brain.
optimus,
any chance you can upload that version of soldier girl please?
cheers
your wish is my command. just posted it.
If this is representative of what The Third Hand is going to be like, it may be better than Since We Last Spoke which was also one of my favorites of ’04.
It’ll piss of the dieheard Deadringer fans. Don’t get me wrong, I like that one too, but Since We Last Spoke was a whole new level. And, among its best was his gossamer-gorgeous take on Labi Siffre’s “Making Days Longer.” From what you say, and what I hear on this one, we’re headed more or less in that direction. I can’t wait.
RJD2 and IMEEM remix the concept of the remix.
World-renowned musician/producer RJD2 and IMEEM, the leading online community for social media, have teamed up to present the PRE-mix, a unique opportunity for fans and music enthusiasts alike to work with the individual tracks that RJD2 uses on his song ?Sweet Piece? off the forthcoming album XL Recordings release, The Third Hand (March 6, 2007).
Immediately available for download on IMEEM (http://rjd2premix.imeem.com/) are the .wav files and .snd files that comprise ?Sweet Piece?. Rather than just uploading audio loops, RJD2 deconstructs each sample into single notes, as he explains, ?Somebody brought up the idea of doing one of these re-mix things for a song, where you have all the parts of a song and you can move them around or whatever. These are cool, but where I always thought they failed was in the fact that all the parts would be broken down just as loops. This makes it hard to really get away from the basic vibe of the original song, for a few reasons. So I was thinking about how this could be improved upon, and realized there was an opportunity here. So now, you get to mess with these, you can see how somebody else would do with the same batch. When the record comes out you can see how it got put together and where it came from. Who knows; maybe all these versions are gonna sound the same. Maybe not. I hope not. I hope there?s a crunk version, a house version, a premiered out version, whatever.” IMEEM?s unique online capabilities allow participants to upload their versions of ?Sweet Piece? to share with each other and the rest of the world. All posts are embeddable making their creations readily available to ?post? on their personal sites or where ever they choose.
RJD2 Pre-mix group: http://rjd2premix.imeem.com/ – Check it out!