English to be precise. I’m Daniel Stallard (more commonly known as Stelf), and I’m 19 years of age. I am a full time Document Imaging Specialist for Xerox Global Services, and when I’m not having a blast of a time at work I will either be listening to music, piss assing about on GTA IV or watching one of the worst Football clubs in England…..Cheltenham Town. I used to waste my time listening to artists such as Kanye West, Lupe Fiasco and N*E*R*D….luckily times have changed. SofaKing Diligent’s very own Magnus has revolutionised my iTunes library and for one of the first times in my life I can truly say I am proud of what I listen to.

While Magnus is galavanting in Alabama I will do my best to recommend some of the awesome albums he has introduced me to. I also look forward to reviewing Kanye West’s “much anticipated” new album ‘808’s & Heartbreak’ (what a lame album title). I may even slip in some good old Indie Rock albums that I used to listen to as a youngster that I feel people with a positive/creative view towards music will appreciate. I look forward to doing stuff on here and seeing what Saku has to post, peace. (Just incase you wondered, there is no reason for the Madlib picture, I just thought it would look good)

When talking about jazz legends and musical masterminds you HAVE to mention Herbie Hancock. In the 60’s he was a member of the #1 Blue note jazz group Miles Davis Quintet. He was one of the most important persons of Jazz Fusion and the early days of hip-hop. And his almost 50 year long carreer so far has been a series of ups and downs, but one thing has remained: He’s one of the most influential jazz musicians of all time.

But that’s not what I’m here to talk about. You see, he is also the single most influential musician in MY life. He alone introduced me to the wonderful world of jazz, funk and groove. He started my collection of columbia contemporary masters’ albums. And he’s the reason why I’m right here, right now, doing what I’m doing.

It all started small… I bought a PS2 video game Tony Hawk’s underground. It had a song from Quasimoto, called Low class conspiracy, I fell in love with that song but never did anything about this love. Years went by and I had already forgotten about the song and the game. Then in 2005, if I recall correctly, I bought another game, called NBA street V3 and it had this excellent song, Me, myself and I by De La Soul. Yet again, I fell in love with the song but this time I couldn’t get the song out of my head so I went and bought their 1989 album 3 feet high and rising. That was the first so-called Jazz-Rap album I ever bought.

Later I also bought Quasimoto’s The Unseen deluxe edition (instrumentals FTW) and I was head over heels in love with jazz-rap. Guru’s Jazzmatazz, A Tribe Called Quest, Nas‘ Illmatic, Don Johnson Big Band’s entire discography (I’ll tell you about them later, aight?), The Roots, Jurassic 5… Eating only made me more hungry.

In my desperation I was looking from the internet what I could buy next… Then… There was a mention of Herbie Hancock. I decided to check him out. I visted a music sharing website and there was only one album… Head Hunters (don’t worry - since then I’ve bought 2 copies of the album). When I first time pressed play and heard the funky rhythms of Chameleon it was like I was hypnotized. I could listen to the album 100 times in a row and still wouldn’t get bored of it. I played it to all my friends, and they all thought I was crazy. Who likes jazz? Well I for one…

Even though HH is being considered his best album by some, and best jazz fusion album of all time by some others I wouldn’t call it his best. When I had my craze of buying Herbie’s albums I bought all I could find (luckily so far I have only found good ones) I bought his two WB jazz records Mwandishi and Crossings. And in my eyes those 2 are in making Head hunters’ awesomeness a laughing stock, and so is one of his later albums, Mr. Hands, which I think is the best Jazz record of all time. Big words but I know what I’m talking about. It has a perfect balance between funk and jazz, it has enought variations between tracks and still has a nice consistent flow throughout the album. I have yet to hear another album that can do all that… Do you know any?

Then there’s his ‘electro’ albums. I only have future shock so I can only make a (bad) generalization. To me they aren’t so great. Shure rockit is excellent and the rest of the album is tolerable, but it’s not very jazz. It kinda reminds me of Afrika Bambaataa and his totally 80’s electronic sounds. ehh… Luckily after years of releasing albums that I don’t care for in 2007 he finally releasd an album I liked. River: The Joni letters won the Grammy for album of the year (take that Graduation’s ‘not quite as good as the previous two’s’ sound). This Grammy brought some hope to the goodness of humanty and made me actually happy the Kanye didn’t win. A jazz record winning album of the year in the 21st century is something that nobody would expect and is an achivement that would make anybody an instant classic.

But to me the thing about Herbie that stands out is that his music was a gateway drug to bigger and better things. For a while Herbie was all jazz I listened to, but I built some courage and bought some albums from other artists, such as Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Weather Report, Jamie Cullum… the list goes on and on. And it’s been only 2 years since I bought my first jazz records but now I have a load of them. Jazz has molded my taste of music to the right track from the never-ending river of bad rap albums, each lamer than the last, to a glorious celebration of all difrent kinds of genres and artists. From Trip-Hop to Indian classical to house. From Jamiroquai to Metallica to Barry White. It has taught me so much about music, and I owe it all to my man Herbie.

And even though I never listen to Head hunters anymore it has remained as one of the turning points in my life and I will always remember it as a heartwarming experiment/experience that made shure that things will never be the same again…

*tear* Thank you Mr. Hancock

Saku Vehmas to be precise. (17 yrs. old, Finland.) I’m currently a full-timed high school student who does comics, photography and now sells sofas in teh web.

I’m most likely going to be your jazz guy, but mainly because more writers will be added to the site (unless they turn this opportunity down…), who know more about hip hop than I do. Things are still a bit unsure but we’ll get back on track in no time.

Unfortunately Magnus won’t behere to keep the site alive as much as he used to but this also means that more diverse music taste will be represented… so let’s just celebrate for a minute and then get back to work.

I can’t blog from here. Email me

Am in Frankfurt atm, thought i’d blog something before i leave for chicago and internet might be gone for 8 months

I. don’t care if you’ve heard about this already, just listen (read).

Dudley Perkins is from Los Angeles (I think oxnard… we’ll get back on that). But anyway, the following video is beautiful.

The following video: 

Dudley Perkins is a really good guy, a real soul singer which we all can relate to in some way (wishing we we’re soulful). His album Expressions (2010 A.U.) is an album you want in your life. Beautiful singing and good of all (=not best of all) it’s ALL produced by Madlib (a quality guarantee in my opinion, not alls opinion). Good good good. I’m rather shaken up right now (exchange studenting etc etc etc) so I’ll leave it at that. 

Fave songs: Me, Testin’ Me, Dear God

Let me just emphasis how sick Dear God is… buy now.

Will have a bloggers per 28′000 people upgrade on Friday…

IF YOU CATCH MY DRIFT?! WINK! WINK!

Activities in Alabaster, Alabama.