GET MASHED: GHP releases first ever legal mash up compilation

Mash ups eh! What’s that all about then? Well mash ups have been around for a while now but as an underground club thing. It has stayed mainly underground because on the whole they are illegal, they depend on taking the vocals from one song and putting them over the tune of another and unless you have permission from the original artists you are on sticky ground releasing your mix. This week though saw the release of the first ever fully legal mash up album, by Mark Vidler, AKA Go Home Productions. Appropriately enough, it is called Mashed.

EMI threw their weight behind the project and persuaded the artists to give clearance for the project. Apparently David Bowie was very supportive, Mark having remixed stuff for him before. Iggy pop also supplied masters to enable a ‘cleaner’ mix.

As a result we have things like Iggy Pop’s ‘Passeneger’ with Peggy Lee singing ‘Fever’ over the top and Jim Morrison singing ‘Riders on the Storm’ over the top of Blondie’s ‘Rapture’. It is all very clever stuff and on the less familiar tracks they blend so well you cannot tell it is a ‘cut and shut’. When the mixes feature some of our favourites, like the Iggy/Peggy thing, it is wicked; I am sure some of these tracks will get played over and over for years to come here at Iguana HQ. However, there is an awful lot of disco stuff on there, mixing two tracks that we did not like in the first place; these are impressive for their execution, but once the admiration wears off it is unlikely we will be pulling them out to play to the grand kids (now there’s a frightening thought) to show them what we were playing back in 07. A lot of the stuff on here is disposable, but perhaps that is what pop is supposed to be; for the time being it is bringing a smile to the iguana tribe and some of the stuff on there will be keeping us smiling throughout the summer and beyond.

Cant be arsed to pay for the album? Fear not, plenty of MPFREEs on his website.

PEACHES MEETS THE STROKES MEETS THE MUNSTERS (GHP MASH UP)

HOW TO DO YOUR OWN MASH UP