Stickybuds
I can hardly contain myself right now. We are a mere three weeks out from Shambhala, one of the greatest dance parties on the planet. Tucked away in a forest in Salmo, BC, the annual blowout is quickly becoming the funky home my heart yearns for. If you have been paying attention and caught round one of the Shambhala acts that I’m most looking forward to, you might have noticed that the things that really get me going are among the funkiest. No doubt there’s music at Shambhala that’s more strange or more aggressive, but I’m looking for the funky goods. Follow me as I continue my quest down the road to Funkytown.
Stickybuds/JPOD the Beat Chef
It’s possible that if your home base isn’t located on the West Coast you might not know who these two are, but these veterans embody what Shambhala is all about: being unbound by genres and all about good times. While the duo touches upon similar sounds and build from a similarly funky bass (both are regular favourites of the good people at Ghetto Funk), they occupy different worlds; Stickybuds being the one more likely to delve into harder, more aggressive sounds, and JPOD laying more on the side of sunny fun with heavy doses of world beat, bluegrass and reggae samples. With each of the two celebrating their 10th anniversary of Shambhala by performing back-to-back solo sets on the Friday night, is it possible we’ll see just a glimpse of a reunited StickyPod Connection?
Opiuo
Apparently Opiuo was at Shambhala last year, but as a guy who didn’t know anything, I definitely missed him. But it’s only recently I’ve started to regret that miss. With the release of his second full-length album, Meraki, this year, Opiuo has established himself as one of the great funk-ateers in the game right now. With heavy doses of that so-called “future funk” sound I dig so much, thrown into his very own glitch-hop sound that never veers to the darkness that many of his glitch-hop contemporaries seem to love so much, tracks from the album and whatever else he drops at Shambhala are sure to get some epic writhing and shaking going on the dance floor.
DJ Nu-Mark
Possibly the DJ least likely to indulge in EDM-ness, Nu-Mark (he of the mighty Jurassic 5) promises to bring something completely different to the digital-soaked world that is Shambhala. Nu-Mark told me during a recent interview, “I keep coming back to Shambhala because it seems as if I’m the only one not playing electronic music.” With a deep well of knowledge and respect for world beat, Latin jazz, old-school funk and everything even tangentially related, Nu-Mark is sure to fuse sounds that no one else would think of. And, of course, this is all built on the foundation of Uncle Nu being one of the greatest hip-hop DJs around. His body of work, both his solo material and work with J5, is impeccable.
Skratch Bastid
Maybe it was his awesome name or when he made a seamless drop between Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man” and Dead Prez’s “Hip Hop,” but Skratch Bastid was one of the first DJs I remember taking note of and making an effort to find again. This was years before going to Shambhala was even on my mind, so the fact that I get to see him in the full glory of the festival’s Fractal Forest stage is something extra special. Friends have recounted for me Bastid’s last appearance at Shambhala in 2012, which saw him spin the shit out of his 45 collection and respond to people’s lack of enthusiasm with, “These are 45s! You guys should be way more impressed.” It’s hard not to be impressed with the guy’s taste in music and, more spectacularly, his abilities as a true vinyl-flipper. Dude always has an awesome, shit-eating grin on his face that is pretty contagious. Try not to have fun at this set.
Sweatshop Union/Pigeon Hole
Sweatshop Union is one of the most classicist hip-hop groups around, sticking to established hip-hop norms and cultivating a solid catalogue that never strays too far from a winning formula, while rarely flirting with redundancy. And if Sweatshop are the polite, elder statesmen of Canadian hip-hop, Pigeon Hole are their arrogant, smarmy and wildly entertaining offspring, throwing an EDM/hip-hop tantrum. Where Sweatshop Union sounds like they’d sit down, smoke a blunt and to work out a problem, Pigeon Hole sounds like they’d jump up and down before they ninja kick the problem in the heart (it wouldn’t be a very precise kick, just a foot flung in the general direction of the target). Seeing them share the stage together during Shambhala’s Hip-Hop showcase should be a wonderfully jarring injection of both street intelligence and hip-hop swag.
Shambhala Music Festival takes place August 8-11, 2014 in Salmo, BC.
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