International DJ and music producer, FreQ Nasty, has teamed up with the Mahasukha Center in Los Angeles, CA to create The Art Sutra; a three day “urban” retreat (September 10th – 12th, 2010) that places emphasis on the skills of music and visual design, dance, and creativity and how they are connected to a much older spiritual system. A path that can generate and sustain, in one sense, all that P.L.U.R. you know exists. The event culminates Sunday night in an exciting new musical form and performance called the Dub Kirtan which will be performed by FreQ Nasty, David Starfire, and a host of other incredible musicians and singers. You can register to attend either the whole retreat or just Sunday nights Dub Kirtan by emailing : hello@theartsutra.com

We live in a fast paced world of commerce and production, an industrial wheel of subjective progress; but, in all its unquestioned frenzy, where is it headed? I asked FreQ Nasty a few questions to better understand this unique three day experience of finding inner calm.

IAAL :: So what exactly is an “urban” retreat? How is this event different than a traditional retreat? Do you stay at the center?
FreQ Nasty :: It’s a retreat in the sense of retreat from the stress of work, car fumes and our internet obsessed life in the big city, but without having to go to the trouble of leaving LA itself. We’re all busy doing our thing but it doesn’t have to be one or the other. With a weekend event like this we can both get a little head space and download some of the wisdom of the 1000’s of year old Buddhism and Yoga traditions, and still make sure our business is being taken care of. In fact teachings like these help our business to STAY taken care of. So you can spend all weekend with us, but no, you can’t sleep at the center!

IAAL :: What is a Kirtan? Has a Dub Kirtan ever been performed?
FreQ Nasty :: Kirtan is the form of call and response chanting traditional to many of the south Asian spiritual traditions including Yoga, various forms of Hinduism, Buddhism and others. Mostly its done in the west in a very trad format of sitar, tamboura, tablas, mrdunga or pakawaj drums, or any combo of these. The idea is to let go of our neurotic and limited idea of who we are thru the music, much like you would at a rave dancing to dope music till the sun comes up. But with the call and response vibe it makes this easier to do without drugs. It’s the same high tho.

Reaching the Buddhist idea of selflessness, or the Hindu idea of the Atman which brings an incredible experience of well being, connectedness to others and grounded-ness. You cut thru the bullshit of the daily grind by riding the music into something that is bigger than us. The difference here is that the performers who are creating the vibe ere are all electronic producers and Dj’s, so we’re going to be experimenting with heavier beats and sub bass that will bring the club vibe to the kirtan, and the kirtan high to the club without having to gobble a load of pills. We’ve never heard it done this way and so wanted to make something fresh happen that would give people who love club music an in to a scene that is traditionally very acoustic.

IAAL :: It seems from all that is being presented over the weekend that there is a wheel of different activities, from yoga, to inner voice training, to meditation. Are they all connected to sustaining peace? Is this what you call a system or “practice?”
FreQ Nasty :: All these teachings are using Art and Music as a metaphor to help us understanding the wisdom of these ancient traditions in a more experiential way. The Buddhist idea of ‘Selflessness’, or ‘Emptiness’ can be a very difficult philosophy to grapple with, but when Art and Music is involved we can see hear and feel these concepts directly. We can come to deep understanding of how we can keep the good feeling of a Yoga asana ( physical postures) practice going for more than 45 minutes after the class till someone cuts you off on the 405 Highway on the way home and you flip them the single finger salute and spoil it all. Yes we’ll have physical asana practice, but its the understanding of impermanence, of change, of how Yoga really works, of accepting reality for what it is and not trying to make it something that it is not which really changes our perception of our lives and those we live and work with.

IAAL :: How will this fuel someone’s art or music?
FreQ Nasty :: Charlie Parker the late great Jazz sax player said “Music is your own experience, your own thoughts, your wisdom. If you don’t live it, it won’t come out of your horn. They teach you there’s a boundary line to music. But, man, there’s no boundary line to art…”

The implication here is that you don’t have wisdom, and you don’t live that wisdom, then your art will be limited and suffer for it. By definition truly great art channels wisdom from somewhere or something greater than the artist, and bad art recycles and imitates the same repetitive suffering that many people experience in their daily lives – like an audio version of what its like to work a shit office job compressed into 5 minutes of music. It could be a very accurate description of sorts, but it’s kinda like rubber necking a car accident. No real use to anyone. Insights come with understanding music to some extent, but as Charlie says, the wisdom comes first, and from it comes great art.

Jimi Hendrix said “Technically, I am not a guitar player, all I play is truth and emotion.” Great artists like Jimi Hendrix knew how to get themselves out of the way, to just be in the moment, unafraid and channel a greater truth. But unless you are as radical as Jimi, a black man in a bright red soldiers uniform in the 60’s, playing industrial space blues in a white dominated genre to a bunch of cultural revolutionaries, then you might need some help in getting your ego out of the way to wail like he did. Jimi understood it was not about him and that’s what made him an all time great.

IAAL :: What is the connection between Yoga, Buddhism, and Art?
FreQ Nasty :: Yoga and the advanced teachings of Buddhism have the same roots in India. When India was invaded by outside forces Yoga went underground and Buddhism went to Tibet and further into Asia. Yoga in India preserved more of the physical postures and the advanced teachings of Buddhism kept the Yoga philosophy alive. They are of the same lineage and tradition but have been largely separated since then. Now in the West we have the opportunity to bring them back together as a whole practice for the first time in 1000 years.

I can talk a little about music here. From a Yoga perspective ‘Your’ great music (whatever that may be) has the same effect on the energies of the body that doing the Yoga asana or physical postures do. Its no mistake that there is a musical component to every authentic spiritual tradition, from the Mystic Muslim Sufi dancers playing crazy proto jungle on the arabic drums, to the tripped out LSD like Ragas of South Asia that sneaked into the Goa trance and chill out scenes, uplifitng Gospel vocals that made it almost untouched into House music in classics such as “Ride on time”. All of them have the same effect on us as a night in front of an awesome soundsystem with a great DJ or band.

When we lose our ego driven sense of self and just relax into a larger and more connected mindset by losing our selves in the music a certain magic happens. Ask any club kid on the dancefloor at 3am…. they aint thinkning about what they are wearing at that point, or who fancies them or when the rent is due. They’re in the zone BECAUSE they are not thinking about themselves. So the point is that this egolessness is hard to replicate off the dancefloor but luckily for us Yoga and Buddhism have been studying these states with great precision for 5000 years. So we are offering some of the back ground wisdom that allows us to extend that sense of groundedness and chill and connectedness that is so hard to maintain in the hyperspeed lifestyle of LA.

For more information go to :: The Art Sutra
Facebook Event Page for The Art Sutra
Facebook Event Page for the Dub Kirtan All Stars

Sugarpill: Some Say The [See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Free Download of “Some Say The” Here:

TRACKLIST:
1.Some Say The
2.Flow Goggles
3.Paper Bounce
4.Disconnect Your Elbows
5.Soul Like A

Here’s my review of the title track “Mean Sound:” Oh yeah. Ahh yes. Here it comes. Good! Was pleasantly surprised when I listend to this gem. Great use of organic hand claps and guitar echos across a groove laden and beat centric landscape. Pure positive motion indeed. Well, check it for yourself. The Strategy Remix will also cook your toast!

Gulls-”MEAN SOUND” by Boomarm Nation

Gulls-”MEAN SOUND” (STRATEGY remix) by Boomarm Nation

TRACKLIST:
A1- Mean Sound – 4:13
A2- Vetted – 5:14
B1- Mean Sound (Strategy Remix) – 4:13
B1- Mean Sound-Slight Return – 3:46

FreakFunk: Experiment Vol.1 Clip [See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Flying Lotus – Camera Day (taken from Pattern+Grid World) by Warp Records

From Warp Records:

When Flying Lotus records hit their stride, all buttons labeled “pause” and “stop” disappear, and this one is no different. “Pie Face” is led by icy keys that could almost be mistaken for classic grime, before the stoned plastic marching band steps in. “Time Vampires” amazingly lands somewhere between vintage DJ Premier and Lee Hazelwood, while the stripped back bass and drum explorations of “Jurassic Notion/M Theory” are as shamanic and ceremonial as anything you’re likely to hear come out of California. If “Camera Day” brings to mind a certain crew of dungeon-dwelling ATLiens, it won’t come as much of a surprise that Killer Mike found its syrupy bounce recently inspiring.

Tracklist
1. Clay
2. Kill Your Co-Workers
3. PieFace
4. Time Vampires
5. Jurassic Notion/M Theory
6. Camera Day
7. Physics For Everyone!

Check this sizzling track of their Japandroids cover of, “Wet Hair.” [See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

This just added: Teen Daze cover of Yeasayer’s O.N.E. = Oh yeah! [See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Not too much info I can find about them other than the minimal links on their Facebook page, Tumblr, and one album, Four More Years, for sale through Arcade Sound LTD. If your diggin this, peep the wicked video to their track of the same title, “Four More Years.”

See them live TONIGHT along with Baths in Downtown Los Angeles at the Heart Music Group warehouse party! We’ll be there!

Christopher Willits creates patterns of vibrations with sound and light.
He occupies a unique corner of the electronic-art-music universe—hovering above the intersection of electronic production’s nuts and bolts, new media art, and a wide-open creative mind. “i am a conduit of the process, a kind of gardener,” he says. “I simply imagine, intuit, respond and do the work laid before me.” Willits’ tireless responding and doing and working has produced 20 albums in 10 years—solo and in collaboration with artists including Ryuichi Sakamoto, Matmos, Zach Hill, and Taylor Deupree—and an organic, multi-faceted sound that expands like the vines of an electro-acoustic kudzu plant. Christopher Willits is a teacher, a label owner (the experimental hub Overlap.org), a meditator, a tech geek, a visual/new media artist, and virtuosic musician in one. In other words, there’s no one out there quite like him.

Matthew Dear: Slowdance [See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Downloaded the album, Music for Our Future, ages ago and discovered that I’m absolutely in love with Lusine (Ghostly International). The album was a free promo for the SyFy original series Caprica and put together by Create Digital Music, XLR8R, and Pitchfork. This could be one of my absolute favorite experiences with songs: The ones you’ve head about 150 times, but it’s on listen 151 that it all clicks and you then have your new anthem. “Gravity,” originally from the album A Certain Distance, did that to me!

Lusine: Gravity [See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

If you listened to music in the late 80’s and very early 90’s there was an interesting sub genre titled Shoe Gaze that came out of the ecstasy fueled indie rock scene in Britain. Most notable were bands like My Bloody Valentine, Lush, and Curve, along with the bands that inspired them like the Cocteau Twins and Spacemen 3. Driving dance beats flown side by side with shimmering guitars that ebbed and flowed with distortion delay and haunting female vocals that drifted through canyons. School of Seven Bells (Ghostly International – yes, I seem to be on a kick here) nails that sound on their second album Disconnect from Desire. “Dust Devil” has all the elements I love: Electro beat, great melody, and dirty whammy guitar.

School of Seven Bells: Dust Devil [See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Since we’re talking about driving beats and pulsing guitars let’s wrap up this weeks 4 Trak Cassette with “Fur Lined” by Trent Reznor’s latest project How To Destroy Angels. Like a groovy drill in your head.

How To Destroy Angels: Fur Lined [See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Bonus Videos: My Bloody Valentine – Soon (Yes – embedding disabled due to corporate fucking greed. Click anyway to get to the video so that you can watch a useless mind numbing ad before the music. Did I say fuck yet.)

Bonus Videos: Matthew Dear – Black City Teaser

American Men: AM System (Hudson Mohawke remix)

[See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Lorn: Cherry Moon

[See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Chip Chop: Bitch Tip

[See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Maximum Balloon: Tiger (feat. Aku)

[See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Bonus Video for Maximum Balloon: Tiger (or something that sounds like that!):

Featuring:

Flyamsam – Brainfeeder
Daedelus – Ninja Tune
Nosaj Thing – Alpha Pup
TOKiMONSTA – Brainfeeder
Jogger – Magical Properties
Baths – Anticon
Low Limit of Laser Sword
+ SPECIAL GUEST

Environmental stimulation by Dr. Strangeloop – Brainfeeder

18 + / 21 + FULL BARS. Doors open at 9:00 pm – 4:00 am
Located at: L.A. Center Studios in Dowtown LA. 451 Beaudry Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90017

THIS EVENT WILL SELL OUT!!!
Tickets available online at GROOVETICKETS

Physical Ticket Outlets
Turntable Lab – Fairfax 424 N Fairfax Ave (323) 782-0173
Poo Bah Records – Pasadena 2636 E. Colorado Blvd (626) 449-3359

Parking info: The parking lot is on the corner of 6th and Bixel which will lead you in to the location.

Direct Download Link : Here

True to his Los Angeles roots, each track has a West Coast Hip Hop inspired “wave your hands in the air” melody; but this is no ordinary landscape. These tracks are a multi-pass to an animated digital world of crystalline data packets, cybernetic assassins, and shimmering pipelines of bass. Squawking robo birds make their territorial calls as bursts of sequenced creatures communicate from the deep of their environment. Like Daft Punk bangers, but with much more open space in which to drive.

R/D’s proficiency as a sound designer has gone into hand crafting each hit, each signature pulsing bass rhythm –there are no stock sounds here. In depth instrumentation forces his computer to chisel the future tones it was meant to. Many times you experience a bold use of early 90’s inspired dry stereo sawtooth bass lines that wind up and down your body to usher you through anthemic panoramas of a vast horizon. By design, these cuts are meant to be played live and loud.

Preview all four tracks below and enter your own landscape. Available now through his BandCamp page with a free track to download. Get it!

Read our previous interview with R/D here: http://iamalaser.com/2009/06/16/rd-cricket-ep-mini-mix/ along with his Fever Ray remix of “I’m Not Done”: http://iamalaser.com/2010/03/29/fever-ray-im-not-done-remix/

[See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

NastyNasty: “Behind the Bushes” Remix. Original Track by The Knife
[See post to listen to audio -yes thatz right! -go to http://iamalaser.com]

Just who is NastyNasty you ask? NastyNasty is the 5th incarnation that a young man, named Jasper, has made electronic music under and it will surely not be the last. Previous to being introduced to Dubstep, he was under the impression that he was making bass heavy southern rap beats. In his own words; “I’m kind of a weirdo who doesn’t go out alot. I feel as if I’m wasting life if I don’t spend at least a few hours a day working on music…it’s really really really ridiculously hot in my studio right now and it doesn’t help the fact that i suck at writing.”

Like what you hear! Check out NastyNasty on SoundCloud

Likes: Coffee, Lady Gaga, Kombucha, Lazers, Danzig-Era Misfits, Cheeseburgers, Hi-Tops
Dislikes: wack bitches
Labels: Frite Nite, Bad Acid/Black Acre, Robox Neo-Tech, Seclusiasis, Made In Glitch
Discography (as NastyNasty):

Heavy Little Things (self released) July 2009
Dancefloors and Deathrattles (Vermin Street) oct 2009
The Reef (Frite Nite)Nov 2009
Can’t Fathom This (car crash set) Dec 2009 (remix)
Nintendont (Vermin Street) Jan 2010 (remix)
Clunge (Seclusiasis) Jan 2010 (remix)
forthcoming:
Better Off Alone (Seclusiasis) july 2010 (remix)
Puke Paint (Frite Nite) July 2010
Myspace (Bad Acid/Black Acre) Aug 2010
“New York Legs” (Robox Neo-Tech) sept 2010
“No Names” (Planet-Mu) 2011???