BOOTIE Top 10 - May 2007

We are over a week late in posting this month's Bootie Top 10 list of our favorite mashups! We are soooooooo sorry! Throwing our Bootie NYC party nearly killed us, and we've just been too swamped to compile this thing. Thankfully, it all came together on our flight back to San Francisco ... so here ya go, for your downloading pleasure...

Aggro1 - Stripped Chain (Katie Enlow vs. Rammstein) – Dayton, Ohio
This track effectively proves how mashup culture continues to grow and change, evolving in different directions, as bootleggers come up with new and inventive ways to recycle and re-use pop music. This one at first appears to be a simple A+B - except that A and B are both covers: Boston mashup diva Katie Enlow breathes new life into her interpretation of Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain," which sounds especially dark when paired with Rammstein's cover of Depeche Mode's "Stripped."

Clive$ter - Am I Undone (Erasure vs. Korn vs. Fatboy Slim) – Austria
We've heard Korn acapellas used in quite a few mashups, but none of them really seem to work all that well - except for this one, which somehow makes Jonathan Davis sound completely natural fronting a gay electro-pop group like Erasure. Who would have thought?

ComaR - Mr. Jones In A Forest (Mike Jones vs. The Cure) – Paris
What is it about this mashup? D loved it immediately and became somewhat obsessed with it. And we weren't the only ones. We were surprised when DJ Freddy, King of Pants, told us how he kept playing it over and over ... he was obsessed with it too! Then DJ Reset shocked us by dropping it into his guest set at Bootie NYC. D says it's all about the hooky rap - "Who? Who?..." and how the darkness of the Cure brings out a creepy feel to the lyrics - "He's got a shotgun, so go back home" for example, while the chorus of voices sound almost happy. Whatever it is, we love it.

DJ F.O.X. - Don't Stop The Glamour (Fergie vs. Roxy Music) – San Franicsco BOOTIE EXCLUSIVE!
Sick of Fergie's "Glamorous" yet? Every time we think we're finally done with it, another mashup comes out that breathes new life into this shallow ode to excess. This one comes courtesy of fellow San Francisco DJ F.O.X. Roxy Music's suave and sophisticated grooves couldn't be better-suited. This mashup sounds like the audio equivalent of wearing an Armani suit while sipping an expensive martini in a swanky bar on the top floor of a Miami hotel.

Go Home Productions - Supreme Evil (Diana Ross vs. ELO vs. Michael Jackson) – Watford, UK
As arguably one of the best mashup producers in the world, it's always a treat when Mark Vidler releases a few new mashups. Although his batting average ain't quite what it used to be, he definitely knocks one out of the park with this one. It's classic GHP - by digging a little deeper into pop music history than most bootleggers, he manages to cram a piece of the '60s, '70s, and '80s all into one soon-to-be-classic mashup.

DJ Mix - Sexy Bak (Justin Timberlake vs. C&C Music Factory) – Hawaii / Utah BOOTIE EXCLUSIVE!
Random DJs and budding bedroom producers email us unsolicited mashups all the time ... and unfortunately, most of them suck. At best, they tend to be mediocre and uninspired. At worst, they're key-clashed train wrecks. So it was with great surprise when we heard this one, sent to us by a new bootlegger out of Utah. Sure, Justin's "Sexyback" is a little played out ... but the way he mixes and matches and intercuts these two songs - especially their respective intro parts - is unique and refreshing! It's definitely not put together a like a typical A+B.

DJ Morsy - Roll Out The Rapture (Ludacris vs. The Rapture) – New York City
This is far and away the best track from the Emo-Thug mashup album. (A bit of a misnomer, really - The Rapture isn't an emo band. In fact, none of the artists on the album are "emo." But I guess it sounds better than calling it "Indie-Dance-Punk-Thug." Anyway...) This may just be a stupid simple A+B rap mashup ... but for some reason, we love it. Makes us want to dance around like an idiot, banging on a cowbell.

DJ Paul V. - Tequila Lip Gloss (Lil Mama vs. The Champs) – Los Angeles
Our Bootie LA co-conspirator Paul V. threw this little number together just in time for our Bootie Cinco de Mayo party, and it's absolutely infectious! Lil Mama's "Lip Gloss" is already shaping up to be this summer's big party song, and pairing it with "Tequila" just makes it even more of a summertime jam.

Voicedude - War Bombs (Gap Band vs. Edwin Starr vs. Black Sabbath vs. Outkast) – Orange County, California
Another epic, high-concept mashup from Orange County-based Voicedude. Released on the 4-year anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, this anti-war mashup anthem is pointed and political. Who said mashups were just stupid fun? Done well, they can make a cultural statement as well, as this track amply proves.

Wax Audio - Dissolved by the Water All These Years (PJ Harvey vs. Tori Amos vs. Bjork vs. Massive Attack) – Sydney, Australia
A lot of our favorite mashups take shamelessly commercial pop and rap music and make it sound magically "cool," simply by pairing it with Pitchfork-approved indie and alternative artists. This one, however, forgoes any ironic juxtapositions. It's just a hauntingly beautiful track, sounding like a dream collaboration among three of our favorite female singers, all of whom have well-earned reputations as unique women with left-of-center artistic visions.