talking about Todd as a substance and an addiction makes total sense, all his stuff really sounds like it's made from the same delicious goo, and overlistening really does seem strangely irresistable yet unhealthy at times, makes you queasy, delirious, you can't believe you can listen to something so cheesy and seemingly monotonous for so long. When a track by him comes in in the middle of a mix it's like some parts of the brain get suddenly switched on that you forgot existed. So it's the key changes and the microsampling, so many different emotions crammed into a bar, but what else, who here that knows about the technicalities of production can tell us? Akufen's stuff is deliberately disjointed like most IDM, but Todd's connects wild disparities into a single squiggly line. I wouldn't call it his best track but the one I've listened to most and have the most special connection to is 'Shut the Door' simply because it was at the start of a CD I had in my car, and I listened to it before and after I rang this girl and got rejected. It makes me melt.
 

DigitalDjigit

Honky Tonk Woman
Terror Danjah Australis said:
Akufen's stuff is deliberately disjointed like most IDM, but Todd's connects wild disparities into a single squiggly line.

Yes! Isn't the latter so much better than the former (not that I don't like Akufen, only his "disjointed" parts)?

So can anyone point out any of those weird keychanges in the mix DJL posted?
 

mpc

wasteman
never really liked todd edwards. a few kids in my school used to collect his records, which i found funny at the time.

ALTHOUGH, i once remember listening to a mix of that kind of stuff my friend had done while i was off my face and thought it was fantastic. reminded me of click house with all the micro sampling and stutters.

his remix of phoenix is amazing.
 

DJL

i'm joking
DigitalDjigit said:
Yes! Isn't the latter so much better than the former (not that I don't like Akufen, only his "disjointed" parts)?

So can anyone point out any of those weird keychanges in the mix DJL posted?


Its weird - that mix is the first time I've played all those tunes together and it really takes away some of the disjointedness of the tunes. It's much more noticable when they are played on their own or next to regular UK Garage.
 

Sarki

New member
it's great to hear that there are fans from all over the globe, it's always good to see Todd when he comes over the UK!
 

Grievous Angel

Beast of Burden
I love Todd but I don't have any of his records, sadly.

Can someone repost / email me DJL's mix? It's expired...

And if there's a Todd CD recommendation here I missed it, can someone point it out for the hard-of-thinking?
 

nomos

Administrator
i'm really late, i know, but i think i'm catching this thing, which would follow, since i've been discovering all of this stuff backwards from the present. it has everything to do with falling more and more for itchy 2step with the mashed up vocals.

anyway, am i right in noticing a religious streak through his music? i've found at least one christian pop music site that bigs him up for this. "god will be there" is a good example of tune that i think is musically fantastic but which i wouldn't want to play out or put in a mix. it's jarring, this sound that i associate with london pirates and a bit of hedonism next to this image of ardkore fundamentalist ravers peaking on G in the american heartland.

a little contextual help...?

and is "the best of i! records - 10 years of garage" a good entry point?
 
Last edited:

reactiv.cd

New member
anyway, am i right in noticing a religious streak through his music?

Yes. He is apparently a true blue born-again church-going Christian.

It's a bit mystifying to me as well. Call me a God-hater if you want but platitudes about Jesus in the middle of dance tracks make my dancing penis go soft.
 

DJ PIMP

Well-known member
It's a bit mystifying to me as well. Call me a God-hater if you want but platitudes about Jesus in the middle of dance tracks make my dancing penis go soft.
Anyone inside... that restless soul?

A welcome return of this thread. I love Edward's stuff, the way it shifts up and down in movements, like classical music painted in smeary pop disco watercolours. Great b-lines.
 

swears

preppy-kei
I got this Akufen CD "My Way" a few years back and the liner notes had this little essay going on about "microsampling" and the death of author, how nobody is really creative, etc, etc...
Well, yeah, especially people who rip off Todd Edwards as blatanly as you mate!
Not a bad album, maybe a bit dry and academic.
 

mms

sometimes
I got this Akufen CD "My Way" a few years back and the liner notes had this little essay going on about "microsampling" and the death of author, how nobody is really creative, etc, etc...
Well, yeah, especially people who rip off Todd Edwards as blatanly as you mate!
Not a bad album, maybe a bit dry and academic.

the music is fine, but yes that attitude of complete disregard for a strong linage, from hip hop sampling thru to any other street music and without a shadow of a doubt todd edwards, is pretty grim.
 

swears

preppy-kei
His remix of "Show me love" by Robyn S is crap, don't think he was into all the microcuts yet then.
 

mixed_biscuits

_________________________
His latest album, Odyssey, is the very quintessence of cheese and all the better for it.

The second track, Next to You, sounds like it has Bjork on vocals. :)
 

henry s

Street Fighting Man
there's also a track that features a Michael McDonald clone, and a cheesy sax shows up on yet another...I want to hug this record!
 

MATT MAson

BROADSIDE
Hello everyone, my name is Matt, I first heard the dub mix of Alabama Blues on a Ministry Sessions CD by Frankie Knuckles in 1995 and promptly stopped going to jungle dos and started going to Twice as Nice and buying garage records as a result.

He does indeed live in New Jersey, he's a really, really nice guy. I've had the pleasure of interviewing him and hanging out with him a few times. I think its actually pretty exceptional that he manages to get hie religious message out through his music without alienating the listener. I mean think about it - he's a total God-botherer from Jersey (influenced by the work of Enya no less) yet a pirate DJ in London can play a two hour set of just his records and no one bats an eyelid. Imagine if the Jehovah's Witnesses figured out how to do that!

I think the reason is he doesn't ram it down people's throats, he conveys spiritual ideas a lot of the time that cross boundaries and even though he uses words, the messages that come through his music aren't in the language as much as they are the sounds, and they are only religious ones to him. If he put out "Gay Marriage Is Evil" (The No Stem Cells dub mix) he'd probably lose me, but he sticks to very primitive ideas of spirituality, which isn't unusual in house music. He has talked to me about the ultimate spiritual experience for him being working in the studio and feeling like God is there with him. He's a pretty intense guy, in the nicest possible way.

As for Todd the DJ - I've never thought he's the best guy for the job. He's a great producer, but if you really want to hear a DJ bring out the full potential and energy in his stuff, listen to EZ doing a live Todd set if you get the chance. He's really the only man up to the challenge. He used to do it a lot at Twice as Nice and people would be crying and shit.

My all time favorite Todds are the aforementioned Alabama Blues dub, Don't Turn Your Back On Love by Jay Collins Super 20, Accident, Winter Behavior and Fly Away. He also sings the vocals on a lot of his stuff (like Fly Away) and even vocalled a track for Daft Punk called Face to Face which is very Toddy and worth a listen.
 

mixed_biscuits

_________________________
He has talked to me about the ultimate spiritual experience for him being working in the studio and feeling like God is there with him.

Not wanting to appear too pretentious, the ease with which T E smoothly joins the ostensibly ill-fitting suggests the aid of a divine hand. As the devotional poet, George Herbert, said of the Almighty's crucial role in the creative process:

When thou dost favor any action,
It runnes, it flies;
All things concurre to give it a perfection.
That which had but two legs before,
When thou dost blesse, hath twelve: one wheel doth rise
To twentie then, or more.


TE = GH - quill + garage :cool:
 
Last edited:

Ulysses

Not a half-steppah
todd edwards

Sadly I've never heard him dj, but I hold his work in really high regard. I can hear his influence from Akufen to UKG & 2Step. The religious aspect of his tracks doesn't bother me either, puts him in the deep house camp, somewhere near Boo Williams, even Tea Dance house. For me, its about hearing his heavy bouncing basslines and staccato sequencing. Yet another great producer out of Jersey.
 
Top