I think everyone is a bit Daft Punked out, but not Dazed & Confused it would seem, as they've commissioned super excellent dj overlord CK303 to produce this retrospective mix of Daniel Vangardes works.

Daniel Vangarde if you don't know goes by the real name of Daniel Bangalter and is dad to Thomas Bangalter from Daft Punk. He's known for writing a ton of famous disco tracks and working with some huge names in the industry.

The mix is spot on, and really interesting when you listen with an ear on the current DP sound and how much it must have been influenced by Vangarde.

There is also a really good interview with CK303 here I really recommend you check it out.

The first post I ever made on Interesting Blends was a re-edit by the Project Tempo collective. It was what went on to be their hugely successful "Why Not?" a re-edit of the Carly Simon classic "Why". that was three years ago i think, and since then they've released two EP's and today have released their third and first digital EP.

One a year may not seem that prolific but I guess it's a case of why not focus on tracks people really want rather than just chucking it out into an already over saturated re-edit market. Interestingly they've decided to go the Bandcamp route with this EP, some people would call it risky but knowing the boys personally I can say they have never been about the money, ease of access and keeping costs low have as far as i know been their motto.

The Ep starts with the much talked about Bumper Fun Pack, a re-edit of a certain Miss Jones. It's been hammered by a lot of big name dj's over the last year. The second track is a remaster of "Get up clap your hands" the A side from their 2nd Vinyl only EP. The 3rd and fourth tracks are new tracks done specifically for this EP. The mighty Revenge(ish) style stomp of "Ruffin It", and the smooth and silky All's Green.

anyway, you can grab it on Bandcamp, per track or as a whole EP with a hidden bonus track.

It's been quite hard to miss the Daft Punk hype over the last month or so, and love them or hate them you've got to admire the sheer scale of the promotional process their have followed.

The track "Get Lucky" is obviously going to be a huge summer hit, as is the album "Random Access Memories" but behind that i'm finding the little glimpses of how the album has been made really interesting – a lot of people seem to be annoyed that they are pushing the "real instruments" angle so much, but I don't think it's a big deal. To me it's just a couple of guys making the music they wanted to make in the way they want to make it and that's how i'll judge the album when it comes.

As I mention above I'm finding the creative process behind the album really interesting, and i really like the fact The Creators Project has jumped in and made the short series of documentary/interviews with the people who have collaborated on it. 

The big names of Niles Rodgers, Giorogio Moroder and Pharrel Willams are obviously getting the headlines but it's the lesser known names who are revealing the most about the project and stepping outside "The Robots" mythology. People like Todd Edwards and Panda Bear. Who seem to go into the whole process behind the scenes far more than the others – especially Edwards who gives some really key insights into how the music put together.

Anyway, here is the playlist for the whole series, a lot of this will be no news to a lot of people but if you haven't seen them already and have  a spare 10 minutes it's worth jumping to the collaborators that interest you as it's a good watch.

Back in the burgeoning Turntablist scene of the 90's there were a lot of Scratchbased mixtapes floating about. Pretty much everyone of note dipped their fingers in that pie, but most were little more than audio rips of practice sessions. Tapes like Hot Sauce in the Dick hole (nice name), DJ Babu's Comprehension et al were all about showcasing how good the DJ was… and there is nothing wrong in that.

But for me one fo the tapes that jumped out was Scratchcratchratchatch by Canadian Kid Koala. The reason being is, to me,  it felt it was more about making music than flexing his scratchy skills, and as much as i loved hearing how good all these other DJ's were an hour of aaaah and fresh could get on your nerves. 

Anyway, the crux of it is Kid Koala has made the Scratchcratchratchatch available on his bandcamp page as a pay what you want download, and i highly recommend you grab this seminal piece of mixtapery fun.

I've had a bit of a hankering for some experimental hip hop of late but the stuff I like seems to have been thin on the ground. Then as if by magic king of the beats Pete SasQwax dropped a new EP.

I worked with Pete a few years ago under his Waxfactor identity, when he delivered a brilliant EP (The Game Face) and album (Sci-Fu) for a label I was dabbling in with a friend at the time. The Two releases were firmly rooted in the experimental Hip Hop sound, heavy drums, spoken word samples, bits' of cutting and  outlandishly named tracks, and he kind of revisits that period with his Sleeprs EP. It's a collection of unreleased tracks and ideas that he's assembled given the once over and turned into fully finished tunes to create this 9 track EP. It's exactly what you'd expect from the man. Down tempo heavy heavy drum samples and dark and brooding melodies that are as disturbing as they are catchy, all deeply rooted in the realms of psych rock, "psych-hop" is you like.

Probably the most accessible track on first listen is LF2, with a fantastically catchy vocal hook and fast funk flavoured drums it's a shame it's over before it gets going (I feel an edit coming on). It's also really nice to see SchoolyardSass finally makes an appearance as this has been buried in his hard drive for a long long time. To be honest though the whole EP holds together really well compiled as a mini-album it's really only the length of the tracks that keep it in the EP category, but it still takes you on a revelatory journey deep into the Interzone of Petes mind.

The EP is dropping soon via bandcamp (I believe) but right now it's up to stream on Soundcloud, and trust me it's Sick.

Now i already knew that he used to be a turntablist, so I was kind of intrigued to hear his "Origins" EP which breaks from his current stuff and goes back to his early days producing Hip Hop, and i've got to say it's pretty darn good (hence me blogging it).

It contains Four tracks, two remixes – one of MF Doom and one of Supastition and two sample based original tracks. It's pretty interesting actually as the MF Doom remix comes accross like a long lost DangerDoom track (which i mean as a huge compliment). It's probably the stand out track on the EP but it's all good.

As you'd expect from Andrei, the beats are crisp, production is very clean, the tracks err on the side of musical over straight up boombap and for a four track EP it feels hugely great value. It's available on Vinyl via Juno so i suggest you grab it early if you can.

People who followed the blog previously will know we've long had a tradition of procuring irregular mixtapes and palming them them off as Podcasts. Well not quite, but we're pretty proud that we've hosted some particularly good ones in the past.

A big contributor to this has been the Parisian based edit project, erm… Project Tempo, of whom i’m an irregular contributor. We’ve regularly provided exclusive edits and mixtapes for the blog (look at the player on the right), and I wanted to go back to having a lot of regular mixes on the site and to get us going so i rounded up the troops to produce the first podcats since the re-launch a few weeks ago. 

In turn we have also roped in the help of The Balkan All Stars and done a little 50 minute house set, taking in Deep House and Nu-Disco taking in old and current tracks and seguing them in typical fahsion with lots of effects and some edits. They are all gems but the real standouts for me are the Tom Demac track "Tanners, 5eya's "Motion" and Haules Baules "Hit me Slow" from a few years ago.

Tracklist is:

01: Mario & Vidis – Changed feat Ernesto
02: Andre Crom – Tell Me (Instrumental)
03: Tom Demac – Tanners
04: Andrew Grant – Satisfaction
05: Le Sale – We go Straight Ahead
06: 5eya – Motion
07: The Mekanism – Can't Believe
08: Eddie C – I'm Sorry (starlight Remix)
09: La Royal – The Crush
10: Haules Baules – Hit me Slow

Hopefully you will enjoy listening to it as much as we did putting it together

Sometimes Youtube just throws up some insanely good finds that you’d completely forgotten about, or like me lost their copy. The Psychonauts – Time Machine (Full Mo’Wax Mix)”>The Psychonauts – Time Machine is one of them.

It's essentially a multitrack/studio DJ mix by Pablo Clements and Paul Mogg, under their Pyschonauts monikers, working their way through the Mo Wax back Catalogue, and it's bloody amazing.

I love when mixes are larger than the sum of their parts and this mix is exactly that. Originally released in 1998 it's arguable that it's stood the test of time better than much of the Mo Wax catalogue that it takes in. The mix is beat, effects and scratching heavy and a real showcase for the Psychonauts production heavy layered mix style – they were well known for four deck mix shenanigans in the club environment and this really showcases the fact they were club dj's that did a little bit more.

Infact if you haven't its worth tracking down the old Cream Live mix they did under their alias James Lavelle (ok that's not strictly true the mix is credited to Lavelle but was actually Clements and Mogg), either way it's brilliant as was their mix for Pete Tongs Essential Mix.

Anyway, the crux of it is this is a superb mix and one that everyone should have in their collection

I reckon most people who are into hip hop are fans of the Wu-tang Clan. Of course everyone has their favourite Wu character within the collective, but most people agree that Inspectah Deck was right up there, but sadly, for me at least, the Wu went off the boil once they outgrew their independent Hip Hop Roots. Yeah, they had their moments, ODB and Method Man mainly for me, but one of my favourite MC’s was Inspectah Deck, his verse on Triumph is one of my all time favourite Hip Hop moments. 

So I'm well chuffed that he's back with an album alongside DJ 7L & Esoteric, called Czarface (very clever), and just look at that album cover.

I lost track of 7L & Esoteric for a while, but I was always a fan, and one of my favourite tracks was Speaking Real Words which actually featured Inspectah Deck. It was a great track and Esoteric really held his own lyrically with a genuine heavy weight of the scene.

Anyway, the album is obviously a progression from that and what you get is two sick MC's flowing over some pretty rough beats from 7L and DJ Premier, and if that doesn't grab your attention they also called in some heavy weight guests in Ghostface, Cappadonna and man of the hour Action Bronson on the mic.

I picked it up recently but have only just got around to listening to it, hence i'm posting about it now. Stand out track for me at the moment is "Air 'Em Out", but if I'm honest the video is really f*cking annoying – for the life of me I don't understand why you would break a track up with the little asides, so instead I'm going to post another sick track from the album in "Czar Refaeili feat Oh No", just check those drums, followed by the LP sampler.

Musically Castex Erwan, aka Rone, covers a lot of genres including Deep House, Experimental Electronica and more chilled downtempo stuff, and in some ways his music reminds me of the beat driven stuff that The Glitch Mob and Prefuse 73 were pushing a few years ago, but when searching out Rones work it's important to remember to be prepared for the unexpected.

Bye Bye Macadam is taken from the Tohu Bohu album released last year, and follows up the equally stunning 2009's Spanish Breakfast both albums released on the superb Paris based InFiné .

Both the track and the video are mesmersing and disturbing in equal amounts – inducing memories of the great 70's film The Wicker Man with it’s Pagan like imagery. But even so, check it out, it might just be the best music video you'll see today. The track is a beautiful bit of music, with the simple tribal sounds flowing as the track ebb’s and flows before everything is ramped up with the heavily bitcrushed drum track

Rones music can be difficult to connect with at times, but if you can stick with it as i think using Bye Bye Macadam as a jumping on point will help his music grow on you.