Late Night Tales

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Requiem for a dreamstate. It’s possibly somewhere between heaven, hell and high water, down the Thames Delta towards Eden. It may involve techno and a distorted state or simply mates sat listening to music together, drifting on the open sea of their minds. This is Jon Hopkins’ world, not so much joining the dots as colouring the whole damn picture in.

After releasing his debut album 'Opalescent' at the rookie age of 21 in 1999, he’s gone on to work with Brian Eno and David Holmes, produced King Creosote and via Eno, worked on three Coldplay albums. He released the breakthrough album 'Immunity' in 2013, which was nominated for the Mercury Prize.

The story arc with which Hopkins succeeded on 'Immunity' makes its appearance on Late Night Tales too with a perfectly sculpted excursion on this widescreen mix. . Opening with the unreleased 'Sleepers Beat Theme' by composer Ben Lukas Boysen, ghostly pianos skip elegantly hither and thither, among rising strings, as on Darkstar’s ‘Hold Me Down’. Nils Frahm is here, his sonic palette perfect for the job, while labelmate A Winged Victory For The Sullen contribute ‘Requiem For The Static King Part I’. Sigur Ros offshoot Jónsi & Alex’s heroic ‘Daniell In The Sea’ sends us forth towards the Baltic with tears streaming.

Beats occasionally appear, as on the Grace Jones-sampling ‘Yr Love’ by Holy Other or the pair of Black Country acts Bibio and Letherette, whose ‘After Dawn’ is almost spry in comparison to the minor key symphonies on display here. The perfect contrast to this comes from Alela Diane’s wistful ‘Lady Divine’ or even Four Tet’s mesmerising ‘Gillie Amma I Love You’, with its enchanting kids’ choir. Exclusive to this release, Jon Hopkins provides a startlingly vulnerable new piano version of Yeasayer’s ‘I Remember’.

Poet and fellow Brian Eno collaborator (their joint album 'Drums Between The Bells' was released by Warp in 2011) Rick Holland narrates the exclusive spoken word closer 'I Remember', underpinned with additional sound design by Hopkins.

"Putting this album together was a unique opportunity for me to present music that I have been listening to for years, free from the constraints of a club setting or from trying to stick to one genre. I chose tracks not just because they have been important to me but because of how they sit together, putting as much thought into the transitions and overall narrative as I did into the track choices. I mixed by key and by texture more than anything else, using original sound design, pivot notes, and often recording new synth or piano parts to link things together in a way that flows as naturally as possible."
- Jon Hopkins, December 2014

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Late Night Tales welcomes back the cult figure and ultimate musical connoisseur, Bill Brewster to compile his second episode of the curated compilation series 'After Dark'. An obscure and timeless DJ ­led journey which begins somewhere out in the near ocean, the waves are rolling and lolling gently into the shore, while a full moon shines on the surface. It's only faint, but somewhere nearby is the sound of bass, pulsing slowly, almost in time to the waves. Welcome back to 'After Dark: Nightshift'.
Once again Bill Brewster comes armed with a sensitivity and sense of occasion that few other DJs possess. Delivering another batch of slow cooked musical stews, making sure the tempo stays nice and steady and the emphasis is on funk, soul, grits and corn fried chicken, Brewster has done so much digging, Late Night Tales had to hire a forklift truck and tractor. Among the unreleased nuggets, there's the Fernando mix of The Detachments; inordinate excitement about Gino Fontaine, a tune spotted a year ago but has languished in Andy Meecham's Stafford catacombs ever since. Also unearthed are some hitherto secret recordings between Robert Fripp and The Grid, and there are also some proper club faves here, too, like the daft but brilliant 'Mopedbart' by Hubbabubbaklubb and the luminous 'Boutade' by Mugwump, as well as killer oldies like Salsoul Invention and General Lee.
BACKGROUND: Late Night Tales invites the world's best artists to delve deep into their music collections to create the ultimate "late night" selection. The series features expertly curated mixes by MGMT, Friendly Fires, The Flaming Lips, Metronomy, Groove Armada, The Cinematic Orchestra, Four Tet, Belle & Sebastian, Jamiroquai, Midlake, Arctic Monkeys and many more to artists. Afterdark is its quirky and mischievious sibling, born in 2013 with a critically­acclaimed debut speared by Bill Brewster, its a timeless journey into the history of the dancefloor. Originally a chef, a football pundit (co­editor of fanzine When Saturday Comes) and record collector, Bill began DJing in in the late 80s, but he cut his teeth playing Low Life warehouse parties in Harlem and the East Village and anyone hearing Bill today can see how these New York 'roots' shine through. For eclecticism, surprises, amazing unique music and sheer long­haul dedication to the dance­floor; Bill's your man. So, put your glad rags on, the glittery boots with the worrying heels, and some sparkly make­up. Girls, you can wear what you like. Hold on to the rails, it's going to be a bumpy ride. The moon's sinking fast, we better get a move on. After Dark, here we come

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Django Django is the latest band invited to curate a prestigious Late Night Tales collection. Like many of the best British groups, the Djangos met at art school, specifically Edinburgh College Of Art, before reconnecting in London. Django Django released their self-titled debut album on UK independent label Because Music in early 2012 to some acclaim, winding up in many critics' end of year lists (Top Ten in the NME and Top 30 in Rolling Stone, among them).

Their oddball approach to music, which sounds like the rich harmonies of the Mamas & Papas beamed through a refracting prism pointing towards Bo Diddley, Chicago house and outer-space (it's no surprise to learn that Django producer/drummer Dave Maclean's brother John was in the Beta Band, who also shared the same cinemascopic view of the pop landscape).

"Rollicking sing-alongs, galloping into disco sunsets like whisky-addled and leather-saddled bandits on the stolen backs of prairie wild mustangs," is how Django Django describe themselves. Which is another way of saying they're pop adventurists, as at home with Mad Mike's Underground Resistance as they are the blues rumble of Canned Heat. A bit like this delightful mix, then, which darts about like a gurgle of guppies after two too many espressos.

Check out mixes that rock between two-step delights like Roy Davis Jr's 'Gabrielle' to Nilsson's lyrically winsome 'Coconut'. At one end of the Django spectrum there's James Last, the terminally unhip Teuton, whose 'Inner City Blues' shows you can never underestimate the Germans, while at the far reaches of the mix, they manage to sneak in Ramadanman ('Bass Drums') and Hudson Mohawke and Lunice collaboration TNGHT's 'Bugg'n'. You can hear the echoes of influences in some of the selections, like The Beach Boys whose peerless 'Surf's Up' makes a welcome appearance halfway through, while Seals & Crofts' 'Get Closer' show what sun-drenched pop can sound like when it's done well.

And because it's Late Night Tales there's a sparkling cover version of 'Porpoise Song', the theme from The Monkees daffily brilliant 'Head', an admirably lysergic termination to this waltz through pop's nooks and cranberries. "You should never be afraid to make a fool of yourself for art," Dave Maclean once said. Let's raise a dram to Scotland's favourite fools on the hill.

"We wanted to produce a mix that represented the band. It's what we're all into, so everyone put forward suggestions. It's what we are as a band; and we're kids that have grown up with an obsession about our mum and dad's record collections, like '50s and 60s stuff and then got into hip hop and dance music as we grew up. At the heart of it all is our parents' collections, with our tastes mixed in. Our Late Night Tales pays homage to that."
Dave Maclean (Django Django)

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Late Night Tales and Bonobo were pretty much made for each other, it just took them a while to both realise it. Stepping forward into the compiler's spotlight for the 33rd edition is Simon Green -- aka Bonobo -- a musician, producer and DJ perfectly suited to soundtrack an evening spent reclining to some parallel beats.

Six albums to the good ('The North Borders' released earlier in 2013), Green has been on a winning streak since 2010's breakthrough 'Black Sands', which has now sold in excess of 160,000 copies. His music has aided the sales of Citroen cars and Olay creams, as well as soothing the puzzlement of Lost. Wrapped in delicately programmed drums, Green's music is at once both sombre and reassuring. If what comes out the other end is the music of Bonobo, then this is the fuel that keeps the engine running: soul, jazz, classical, pop, funk, leftfield, rock. Pianos and brass are abundantly present. Our ivories are warmed and tickled by the classic, Bill Evans, and new school, with Matthew Bourne's mournfully beautiful 'Juliet' and Dustin O'Halloran's 'An Ending A Beginning'. The brass section comes courtesy of Menehan Street Band's jazzy 'The Traitor', 'Flipside' by the Hypnotic Brass Band. Also included is YouTube sensation 'One Thing' by Peter & Kerry, R&S signing Airhead, jazz harpist Dorothy Ashby and the timeless soul of Darondo's 'Didn't I'. Not only that, but there's Bonobo's special LNT cover version, a brilliant reading of Donovan's 'Get Thy Bearings'. As the light dims, the unsettling sounds of Lapalux or maybe even Shlomo pierce the misty evening air, before giving way to the ethereal splendour of Eddi Front's 'Gigantic' or even Nina Simone's paean to an imagined rural idyll 'Baltimore'. Amble down to the riverside. It could be the Great Ouse, as willows weep into the water; it could even be in Brooklyn overlooking the Lower East Side, as the sun slides down the sides of the skyscrapers. Take a notepad for inspiration. Maybe even a hipflask for a slug of something warm. Sit down and reflect and let those beautiful pianos skim the water's surface. Sometimes, you think, life is good. You can't play a symphony alone, it takes an orchestra to play it: Simon Green is your conductor.

"The way I approached this mix was very different to how I would normally. I wasn't thinking of it as a DJ mix so much as a selection. I've been familiar with the series for a long time, and I was conscious of that, but I really wanted to put together a curated selection. The criteria for choosing the songs was really music I've been playing away from the dance floor over the years. So there's a wider variety of stuff on here, from neo-classical to more abstract electronic pieces to spiritual jazz. It's more a reflection of the stuff my music is informed by" - Simon Green October 2013