I NEED SUGAR

The HaiHaiTO benefit was Feb 11, 2010 at the Courthouse in Toronto. The evening contributed to over $22,000 being raised in support of ongoing Haiti relief and rebuilding. I played for an hour, including some Haitian music and hip hop. Here's the entirety of the more uptempo vibes from yesterday's live recording.

Download HaiHaiTO Miniset by Nathan Lee

Track list:
U2 - Magnificent (Fred Falke Full Edit Remix) 2009
Pnau - With You Forever 2007
La Roux - In For The Kill (Lifelike Remix) 2009
The Knife - You Take My Breath Away featuring Jenny Wilson (Manhattan Clique Remix) 2005
Kläder & Vapen - What Have I Done featuring Anna Ternheim (Extended Mix) 2009
The Black Ghosts - Any Way You Choose To Give It (Extended Version) 2007
The Sounds - Tony The Beat 2006

Continuing the decade review, tracks 31 through 35.

Naughties.35 Santogold - Shove It This is one of those tracks that so completely transcends mainstream Hip Hop I just don't get how anybody can enjoy that overproduced pap.

Naughties.34 The Strokes - Last Night Oh 2000, we remember you for your garage rock revival, all that talk about yellow, and that pre-9/11 bubble.

Naughties.33 Golden Boy with Miss Kittin - 1234 The best pop song from a top album of the decade. Maybe you can convince me Rippin Kittin is better, but this is a lot more fun. From 2002.

Naughties.32 The Streets - Weak Become Heroes (Röyksopp's Memory Lane Mix) While the original has a decent UK garage vibe, Röyksopp's remix is a perfect early 2000's summer fresh progressive vibe. "All of life's problems, I just shake off." From 2002.

Naughties.31 CSS - Fuck Off Is Not The Only Thing You Have To Show Cansei De Ser Sexy's debut was a revelation. And Fuck Off Is Not The Only Thing You Have To Show epitomizes their dance rock team dream. From 2005.

Dance Baby Dance recorded Feb 1, 2010. Booty shaking good vibes.

Download: Dance Baby Dance by Nathan Lee

Tracklist:
01 Abonné - Voodoo Child (Art Bleeks Sunny Redub) 2008
02 Sade - By Your Side (Ben Watt Lazy Dog Remix) 2001
03 Manuel De La Mare - Born Slippy (MDLM Mix) 2008
04 Deep Dish - Dreams featuring Stevie Nicks (Extended Club Mix) 2006
05 Oxia - Whole Life (Part 1) 2009
06 Kaiserdisco - Chordalia 2010
07 Oxia - Whole Life (Part 2) 2009
08 Jay Bliss - Diffuse 2009
09 Ray Okpara - Brainows featuring Nikki 2010
10 Trentemøller - Charge 2005
11 Kasper Bjørke - Alcatraz (Kenton Slash Demon Remix) 2010
12 The Clover - Love In Da Wood 2009
13 And.Id - First Talk 2009
14 Hatiras - Your Love 2009
15 Massimo Di Lena - Delirious 2009
16 Rusty James - Stop Lying 2010
17 David West & Inkfish - Ghetto Feel 2010
18 Rondenion - Sun Glare 2009

Continuing the decade review, tracks 36 through 40.

Naughties.40 The Postal Service - Such Great Heights (John Tejada Remix) John Tejada was prolific throughout the decade, but nothing compares to his remix of Such Great Heights. So subtle, it draws you right in. The original sounds like happy hardcore after hearing this version. From 2003.

Naughties.39 The Kooks - Sofa Song The punchiest, danciest, singalongiest acoustic song of the decade. Just plain fun. From 2005.

Naughties.38 Silversun Pickups - Lazy Eye (Curtis Vodka Edit) Curtis Vodka tossed out a whole whack of bootleg mixes on his MySpace page back in the day, this was the best of the lot. The added kick and percussion ups the intensity of the original and makes for great dance floor fodder. From 2007.

Naughties.37 Deep Dish - Dreams featuring Stevie Nicks Kindly reviving one of the great tracks of the 70's and having Stevie Nicks sing on it, no less. (There's a great story behind that, too.) This song was great even before 2006's Montreal club excursion, but hearing this on a big room system at 4:00a. Epic!

Naughties.36 Underworld - Dinosaur Adventure 3D (Funk D'Void Vocal Remix) Funk D'Void's remix warms up Underworld's banging techno track, opting to focus on synths over the heavy bass line of the original. A top progressive vibe. From 2002.

Continuing the decade review, tracks 41 through 45.

Naughties.45 Pearl Jam - Sad Every once in a while Pearl Jam remember what it is to rock with conviction. From 2000, their best song about lost love since Black.

Naughties.44 Miike Snow - Animal Can't say enough about Miike Snow's Animal. Rhythm, melody and melancholy. Simple but precious pop song. From 2009.

Naughties.43 Bent - Waiting For You featuring Simon Lord (Danny Howells Remix) Simon Lord followed 2006's massive Simian success by collaborating with Groove Armada and Bent in '07. Danny Howell's epic remix of Bent's Waiting for You was a nice precursor to the Black Ghosts and, along with Groove Armada's The Things That We Could Share, really cemented Simon Lord as the king of earnest dance rock vocals.

Naughties.42 Ida Maria - Going to Hell Singing along to damnation never felt so right. Inexplicably not included on her album release, Ida Maria's chant friendly Going to Hell. From 2007.

Naughties.41 Babak Shayan - Flowers Warm and soulful with a light vocal mid-track pause. Good late night vibe and great loud. Deep house at it's finest. From 2004.

The first decade of the new millennium was a great decade for music, as noted in this article on my personal blog which was inspired by Street Boner's 90s lament." So, what better way to celebrate this much improved decade than by counting down I Need Sugar's best.

Starting with number 50 and working our way up. Here we go!

50. Underworld - Trim "Sugar. Sugar. Clear your mind. Leave it all behind." Nice vocal synth pop off Underworld's underrated 2002 release.

49. Ada - Maps (Michael Mayer & Tobias Thomas Mix) Before my '06/07 infatuation with Yeah Yeah Yeahs there was Michael Myer's remix of Ada's Maps cover. Glorious DJ track from 2005.

48. Cut Copy - Future Marks the early 2000's punchy crossover tracks and a sign of things to come from Australia. Sounds even better sped up. From 2004.

47. The Organ - I Am Not Surprised The Organ's stoic live shows came to an end following their Drake underground European sendoff. They'll be missed.

Here's a run down of two other top 2009 music lists. Pitchfork, who seem to be keenly interested in reviving the Beach Boys, and Resident Advisor, who love it when people mumble "house music" over a muffled beat. I took a listen to both sets to see what was what in the world of internet music lovers and have gathered my rankings below in fancy image format. Of course, the last image in the set is the trusty I Need Sugar list, which I hope is a much more varied collection of stellar tracks.

Pitchfork's Top 50 Tracks of 2009

Resident Advisor's Top 50 Tracks of 2009

I Need Sugar's Top 50 Tracks of 2009

Hear the top 10 I Need Sugar tracks at blip.fm.

This 126bpm melancholy mix was prepared with lots of love. It's breaking my heart a little but I'll get over it.

Tracklist:
01 Underworld - Headset 2002
02 The Black Ghosts - Full Moon (Appleblim & Komonazmuk Remix) 2009
03 Cut Copy - Future 2004
04 Memory Tapes - Bicycle 2009
05 Ascii Disko - Seven Angels 2008
06 Agoria - Les Violons Ivres 2006
07 Superpitcher - Tomorrow (Kaito Mix) 2004
08 Daso - Daybreak 2005
09 Partial Arts - Trauermusik 2007
10 Alex Smoke - Telemetry 2005
11 Anna - Green 2007
12 Vector Lovers - Genevieve 2007
13 M.A.N.D.Y. - Tonite 2003
14 Closer Musik - One, Two, Three--No Gravity (Ewan Pearson's 2004 Remix) 2004
15 Radiohead - Nude (Ripperton Edit) 2008
16 Guy J - I See You Next Time 2008
17 Lucky Misu - Puzzled 2007
18 Booka Shade vs Plastic Operator - Night Falls Won't Back Down (A-Side Remix) 2007
19 Perfume Uniform - Out Alone Tonight (Lucky Misu Mix) 2007
20 Ebb - I'm All Made of Music (Jori Hulkkonen Remix) 2006
21 The Postal Service - Such Great Heights (Remix by John Tejada) 2003
22 The Raveonettes - Lust (Trentemøller Remix) 2008
23 Apparat - Useless Information 2007
24 Cortney Tidwell - Don't Let Stars Keep Us Tangled Up (Ewan Pearson's Objects In Space Remix) 2007
25 Gui Boratto - Beautiful Life featuring Luciana Villanova 2007
26 The Chap - President At Last (Zilla's Premier Remix) 2007

Download here. Or listen online with People Downtown.

On Sep 30, Second Cups across Ontario participated in Pay It Backwards Day (PIBday) in support of the Hospital for Sick Children. By buying a coffee for the person behind you, $5.00 would be donated to SickKids Foundation. With more than 150 participating locations, upwards of $10,000 was raised. I had the pleasure of supporting the event with a morning and evening outdoor set at Queen and John's Second Cup. It was cold but worth it! Here's the morning set tracklist and download.

01 Róisín Murphy - Overpowered
02 Mekon - Please Stay featuring Marc Almond (Röyksopp Remix)
03 Hercules and Lover Affair - Blind featuring Antony (Frankie Knuckles Remix)
04 Stardust - Music Sounds Better With You (Bob Sinclair Remix)
05 Star You Star Me - Antidis
06 Underworld - Cups
07 Bag Raiders - Shooting Stars (Kris Menace Remix)
08 The Little Ones - Lovers Who Uncover (Crystal Castles vs The Little Ones Remix)
09 Tiga - Beep Beep Beep (Extended Mix)
10 LCD Soundsystem - Tribulations (Tiga's Out Of The Trance Closet Mix)
11 Sam Sparro - BLACK AND GOLD (Al Usher Remix)
12 Zoot Woman - We Won't Break (Phonique Remix)
13 Nina Simone - Here Comes The Sun (Francois K Remix)

Unfortunately, I was running on 2 hours of sleep, forgot my USB cable and my coffee friendly downtempo playlist at home. Pulled this one out me arse from 11:00a to 12:00p and then forgot to record the 6:00p to 7:30p evening set. Fun!

Download here.

So, yeah, we had our launch party on Saturday night. It was a mixed bag of chaos. The good part was it was an eclectic venue that could probably handle more loud and about double the people; there were tasty popsicles; great people; and the shirts kicked my ass.

The rough part was not having a chance to chat to too many of the awesome friends who came out (I didn't even say hi to Nicole or Anita, and that's pretty much all anyone else got out of me) and massive insane technical difficulties which derailed my spinning intentions: while I wanted to get much filthier with the tunes, I couldn't access my main hard drive for the last 3/4 of the night. No playlists meant mad scrambling. It wasn't too bad, but it meant I was completely occupied trying not to have dead air or trainwrecking all over the place. Anyway, I'll make sure that doesn't happen again.

In the meantime Abdul Smooth and I have been working on getting some pics up, with mixes to follow. Here's the Jeremy Wright popsicle porn. And here's a set of pics from the evening.

So, what did you think? How was the patio friendly venue? Do we need more people? I think we need less cover charge and crazier music. Agreed? Let us know your thoughts. We'll be doing it again, and it's going to be even better!

Underworld will be at the Kool Haus this coming Aug 11. I've seen them there twice before. Really, the only times they've been here as the dance outfit. (They previously opened for the Eurythmics back when they were sporting a more traditional band setup).

If you haven't seen them live, even better than the mad dancing and live video work, they have a tendency to jam out tracks and play with their standard tracks (not the impression you'd get from the Everything, Everything DVD, which pretty much only included hits).

Here are a couple of live tracks which were originally released to members of Underworld Live as live videos. If you haven't seen the daily blogging, shop, and other treats at Underworld Live, you should go there now.

My favourite version of Dinosaur Adventure 3D, live from Electraglide, Tokyo, Japan 03.11.28 (Download AAC)

A nice mix of Born Slippy.NUXX and Born Slippy.NUXX 2003, live from The Akademic, Sophia, Bulgaria 2005.07.06 (Download AAC)

And here's the last.fm event page for the Underworld show.

Photo also from Underworld Live.

We'll be throwing down some beats in a couple weeks on Saturday June 13th when we launch what will hopefully become a monthly residency in Toronto.

You'll hear a wild selection of beats being mixed up by Abdul Smooth and I Need Sugar blogger Lee Dale (also known via Say Yeah).

Got a track you'd like to hear? Upload your selections here and rate other people's tracks. We'll include the top vibes on People Downtown radio and of course we'll spin the best vibes live.

We'll post more info as it comes, suffice it now to say that this gig is gonna be superfresh!  Free popsicles all night long to welcome the summer vibes, plus a free drink if you pre-purchase a ticket online for just $10.

Click here to buy tickets online: http://peopledowntown.eventbrite.com

Here's the full low-down:

People Downtown presents the launch party for I Need Sugar

Saturday June 13th, 2009 from 9PM - 2AM

@ the Central - 603 Markham St in Toronto, Canada (just south of Bloor st, steps away from the Bathurst subway station)

$10 entrance; (*pre-sale/online tickets include a free drink)

with DJs:

Abdul Smooth (http://www.abdulsmooth.com) + Lee Dale (http://www.ineedsugar.com)

And you can show your love on Facebook on the event page.

Update Jun 4:

We got tees!