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Q-Burns Abstract Message

By John Hood

Published on June 22, 2006

If the name's the game, then Q-Burns Abstract Message is the right play. Taken from the DJ term for the scars a record gets from too much cueing or scratching, it's the kinda tag only a divining vinyl enthusiast would devise — the mark that spells all, the read between the grooves we've gouged. And there's a helluva lotta read to Q-BAM's gouged grooves. Louisiana-born and Orlando-based might account for an en-Gulf-ing arc, but it's the whole wild aural world that's given Q-BAM his breadth. And his depth. As remixer, he has recast a cast that stars everyone from Rabbit and the Moon to Lawrence Welk (really); as remixee, he's had fine folk like Tetris and Lovesky repay the favors. As producer, Q-BAM is even among the stellar sound-slingers who twiddled the knobs behind Jim White's Luaka Bop offering, No Such Place, which gives him cred no mere turntablist could ever muster. Collagist, sculptor, environmentalist, magician — even when he spins, the man stretches sound into something more than all we hear. Are you listening?



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