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Artist Spotlight

Open Mike Eagle
Open Mike Eagle Press Release

"I think there's a place for art rap, or lit-rap, or smart rap, or whatever, and I don't think it has to be some corny nerdcore shit. I'm willing to bet my rap career on it. I think its possible for it to be a "thing," something that can have legs... Maybe be indie-rock's retarded cousin." - Open Mike Eagle

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Up-Coming Shows
08-06-2010	Open Mike Eagle	Chicago, IL, US	Flatiron Historical 212
08-07-2010	Open Mike Eagle	Minneapolis, MN, US	7th St. Entry
08-09-2010	Open Mike Eagle	San Francisco, CA, US	Elbo Room
08-11-2010	Open Mike Eagle	Palm Springs, CA, US	Space 120
08-12-2010	Open Mike Eagle	San Diego, CA, US
08-13-2010	Daedelus	Woodstown, NJ, US	Salem County Fairgrounds
08-13-2010	Open Mike Eagle	Phoenix, AZ, US	The Hidden House
08-14-2010	Open Mike Eagle	Pasadena, CA, US	Terrace Cafe
08-20-2010	Listener	Florissant, CO, US	The Nature Place
08-28-2010	Eliot Lipp	Charleston, SC, US	Music Farm - Meltdown Massacre II
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News
07/2010 - Deru Podcast For Plasmodium
Deru recently mixed a hypnotic set for the Seattle-based internet radio show Plasmodium. Everyone from Haiku D'etat to Mos Def to Mush's own Qua gets a makeover at his deft hands. Listen here!

07/2010 - LA Weekly Interviews Open Mike Eagle
LA Weekly reviewed Open Mike Eagle's album Unapologetic Art Rap this week and talked to him about it at length for good measure. Read the conversation between Mike and seminal Los Angelean music journalist Jeff Weiss here.

07/2010 - Open Mike Eagle Tours With Everyone Good Ever
Open Mike Eagle is OFF! The summer will become his loyal puppy as he embarks on one amazing tour after another. First up is an extensive west coast jaunt with Moka Only, Ceschi and Factor that begins on the 8th of July. Check out the show preview Universatile Music did for their Phoenix show here and get the details for the tour on the shows page here. Next, he's off on a handful of dates with none other than Psalm One from Rhymesayers! Once the dust has settled from that roadrunner-worthy sprint, he teams up with the man, the myth, the impolite abstraction, Abstract Rude, for another smattering of west coast shows. Don't sleep, don't nap, neither should you blink, because Open Mike Eagle rapping in your town is not an event to be missed.

06/2010 - Open Mike Eagle Listed In 10 Best Hip Hop Albums Of 2010
Open Mike Eagle's critically adored album Unapologetic Art Rap has been picked as a tie for #4 best hip-hop album of the half-year by journalistic luminary Jeff Weiss. Check out the full list and Mike's write-up on Jeff's blog Passion of the Weiss.

06/2010 - Head Like A Kite West Coast Tour
Head Like A Kite is touring the west coast and are kicking things off in the northeast, bringing things to a close in California. Check the shows page for more dates.

06/2010 - Lymbyc Systym Takes Asia
Lymbyc Systym is poised on the brink of a comprehensive tour of Asia. They're meeting up with fellow Mush artists 4 Bonjour's Parties in Tokyo to play the first date, and then it's off to China, South Korea, the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia and Taiwan! Details are on the shows page.

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Recent Reviews

MH-268
Deru - Say Goodbye To Useless
Aiding & Abetting

Deru starts this album somewhat elliptically, with something in (I think) French. And then things slowly begin to pick up. The skill involved in such an impressive slow rollout is almost impossible to fathom. Very few folks can pull it off. After a couple of listens, I can't imagine a better way for this album to kick off.

MH-265
Qua - Q&A
Two Thousand

The latest release from Qua (pronounced, "kwah") bounces into your grey matter like a wave of technicolor cartoon plushies. Q&A is a shimmering sonic lolly bag; it wouldn't seem out of place to hear 'Ritmo Giallo' soundtracking the latest Super Mario Brothers game.

MH-265
Qua - Q&A
The Silent Ballet

Writing about music can be really difficult at times. It can be difficult if you hate an album and it can be difficult if you love it because in both cases you lack the objectivity to describe it accurately and resort to adjectives that don't mean much to the readers of the review. It's even more difficult, however, to write about albums you're not sure what to think of. What usually happens in that case is that we end up listening to the album so many times that every second of it becomes so familiar, we have no idea whether we like it or not.

I had the above thoughts while listening to Q&A, the new album by Australian electronic musician Cornel Wilczek, aka Qua, not so much because I didn't know what to think of the album, but because after a while I felt I had listened to it so many times and knew it so well that there was really no reason to keep listening to it.

But before I delve deeper into the issue, let me explain what is good about Q&A and what I could have done without. Qua creates a kaleidoscope of sounds on his laptop that remind me of both Dreamsploitation and the more jazzy works of Four Tet. Using guitars, drums (that sound awesome I might add) and digital sounds, his music is very colorful, and to some extent unique. Listening to Q&A is certainly an enjoyable experience and fun from start to finish, but for some reason I felt there was something "off" about it. Why did I feel this way?

The best way to determine whether an album is great or simply good, in my opinion, is by listening to it many times. Most albums after repeated listenings tend to bore you to death, but when an album is great you discover something new in it every day. Perhaps it's the fact that the opening track "Lapsang Souchong", which attempts to stand out with a barrage of electronic noise, ends up developing into a rather typical dance track and becomes more and more boring every time you listen to it. It's not a good idea to start with one of your worst tracks, but thankfully what follows is much better. There are quite a few gems that make Q&A worth listening to, such as "Magnificent Mister" with its distorted, computerized vocals and dirty background noise which he somehow blends with upbeat shoegazing sounds that bring to mind Kettel. Another favorite of mine is the more experimental "Evening Bell", but the best is "The Lion's Flying Dream", where Qua makes jazz for the 21st century. It's interesting that while all tracks are electronic and the differences between them are not always evident, at their core, they're all different, which tells us that this is an artist that is willing to experiment and make music that is original. And that is probably what keeps me from dismissing Q&A as another album the music industry had no need for. The reason all these positives don't amount to a masterpiece is because his experiments in some cases either don't work, or don't go far enough, and the album ends up being uneven. That awe we often feel when listening to something we love seems to be missing here, and as nice as I want to be after listening to it for as long as I have, I can say that I know it pretty well, and no surprises await me the next time I press the "play" button.

Are my expectations too high? Perhaps, but as unfair as it might be, it suffers from a problem that often plagues recorded music - it all feels too perfect, and soon loses its shine. While that is no reason to dislike it, it keeps an otherwise worthy effort from reaching greatness. - The Silent Ballet

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MH-265
Qua - Q&A
This Is Book's Music

The opening track on Qua‘s Q & A (Mush) sounds like what Prince could’ve sounded like if he grew up being influenced by equal parts of Larry Dunn, Daft Punk, and The KLF. The music has an incredible amount of not only melody and counter-melodies, but with an equal emphasis on bass frequencies and an ear for out-of-nowhere samples, with the drums in “Circles” as an example. It would make for perfect music for films, surfing documentaries, porn, video games, or wedding presentations. Okay, maybe wedding videos would seem left of center but then again Q&A (a/k/a Cornel Wilczek) isn’t creating music from any rulebook. He plays by his own rules, creating these deluxe productions that somehow manage to limit themselves perfectly, a bit of chaos within a bit of structure. Some tracks, such as the mid-tempo “All Breath, No Body”, would sound great with vocals from Madonna, Nicole Scherzinger, or even Omarion. What I also like about the track is that when it begins it sounds as if it’s ready to take off and take you along for what could have been a luxurious journey. Sadly the song only goes for two minutes, working as a link between two sections of an album. But what it leads to is the incredible “Goodmorning Sun”, beginning in a folksy manner before opening itself to intense drums and a maniacal synth groove. It comes off like a manipulated revision of 808 State‘s “Pacific” mixed in with Chemical Brothers‘ “Block Rockin’ Beats”.

MH-269
Open Mike Eagle - Unapologetic Art Rap
Playground Mag

I’m stepping a little out of line to recover “Unapologetic Art Rap”, by Open Mike Eagle. It’s put out by Mush, and that is enough of a clue to tell us that we aren’t looking at an orthodox hip hop album. This California MC corresponds to the profile of the restless rapper, with a little culture, progressive tastes, who likes the latest Fashawn album and the latest from TV On The Radio. The indie-arty connection is on the scene once again, with splendid production and the work of a promising MC. - Playground Mag

For more reviews, visit the detail page for the Release you are interested in.

Latest Releases
MH-269 Open Mike Eagle Unapologetic Art Rap 05/11/2010	MH-268 Deru Say Goodbye To Useless 03/09/2010	MH-045 Deru Peanut Butter & Patience 01/26/2010
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	MH-043 Qua - Goodmorning Sun/Circles This complimentary download is a thank you for supporting our artists and releases. Enter your email address and a link will be sent to you. Spread the word about this give-away, but please DO NOT upload the album to your blog or any file sharing service.
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