David Schneider

It's at the beginning of track four--"Betcha Do"--that you realize "Air Farina," released on Om Records this week, isn't your garden-variety house CD. Blurred syllables stumble over each other, like drunks on a blind corner during a blackout at 3am:

"Slip-whup..."

"Look up dere!"

"Wha-whuh..."

"Ay, you caught that gran..."

"Aw, gawh..."

"An' sweet!"

"Damn!"

Then again, Mark Farina isn't your garden-variety house DJ. Known for both his acclaimed downtempo "Mushroom Jazz" series and his irresistibly funky DJ sets, the Chicago native-cum-San Francisco icon has gathered an almost fanatical international following, and regularly spans the globe, playing hundreds of gigs a year--sometimes covering both the dancefloor and the chill-out room in a single night.

Today known as the principal messenger of San Fran-inflected Chicago house, the curly haired, bespectacled Farina started spinning records as a hobby at 15, influenced at first by the likes of Kraftwerk and Front 242. While shopping for vinyl at Importes, Etc., he ran into the now-legendary Derrick Carter, began working with him on Northwestern's WNUR, and eventually set up shop with him in a loft at Chicago and Halsted, spinning at Smart Bar, the dearly departed Shelter and at the city's notorious loft parties. "There'd be some really raw spaces on North Milwaukee," he reminisces in his easy-to-be voice, strolling in downtempo mellow mode. "We'd hire off-duty cops for $120 to keep the streets clean, so when the cop came by you could let it go on."

Though he left for the West Coast's mountains and beaches in the early nineties ("Derrick Carter hates beaches," he mentions), Farina's sets remain some of Chicago's most desirable parties. He coasts down to his home turf in support of his first album of original work, "Air Farina," Friday at Zentra. Appropriately enough for such a globetrotting artist, "Air Farina" is a concept album arranged around the idea of international travel, with old flight-manual samples comically twined about a superbly eclectic mix, traversing between dubby grooves like "Love Make's" and the liquid breakbeats of "Dropped into Water" into the sleazy funk of "Gramma So" and rap by People Under the Stairs. "It's definitely uncharted waters in a way," Farina says, referring to the album's mix-through, rather than the completed original tracks usually found on an original house CD (complete versions are available on vinyl). "I wanted to try and combine both the producer and the DJ bit, and make it a whole unit."

It's only natural Farina should return to his roots with this departure, having grown up in Park Ridge under the flight path of O'Hare planes. "Pre-9/11 you could take the train out and go to the gate without a ticket," he says. "The Mom Law was that we couldn't take the train into the city, we could only go west, so we thought, 'Why don't we hang out in O'Hare?" Listening with headphones, many of the tracks on "Air" are perfect companions to long layovers, when distractions from flight announcements, irate passengers and the constant itinerant shuffle disintegrate even the most monomaniacal concentration. Conflicting voices create the intrinsic structure of each tune. "I wanted a barrage of quirky things going on that maybe you might not notice the first time you listen to it, with voice bits sounding like percussion bits, which still combine to a full piece, but with a bit of chaoticness going on at times."

There's a real wit to this chaos, with the crewcut seriousness of the airline instructor being undermined by science-fiction movie samples, and both of them flung headlong into a beat. "Since 9/11, air travel's gotten so serious. I just wanted to put a little humor into it. I've always been into that retro airlines feel of the sixties and early seventies, when the flight was more of a trip in itself." And that creates one of the most inspired choices on the CD. Just as you think you've reached cruising altitude with "Talk to Me," with its cheeky samples and ambient chords topping New Wave blips, our flight instructor tells us to prepare for arrival--leading to a collaboration with trip-folk singer Sean Hayes, "Dream Machine." One of the most unusual tunes to ever grace a dance CD, its reedy stream-of-consciousness vocals arc out in a marvelous bittersweet tone, changing colors with each additional listen. It seems to communicate the comfortable embrace of a journey completed, and at the same time emphasizes a loneliness and alienation, as if knowing that a return home is yet a distant place--almost an eighties slow-dance song with a twenty-first-century feel.

But as if to dispel any such melancholies, Farina starts the carnival again on "Futbol" with chants of "Ooohah! Brazil!" and by "Radio (Lost Baggage Mix)," with its dirty smeared piano, even a late night at Midway can get funky.

Mark Farina keeps you off kilter with an in-store session and signing at Virgin Megastore, 540 North Michigan, from 6:30-7:30pm, October 17, and later that night at Zentra, 923 West Weed.

(2003-10-16)

Also by David Schneider

To be or knot to be
"Front to back, bottom to top," intones poet Tara Banks in a solemn rhythm echoed by a trio of knitters
(2003-10-02)

Man at Work
The current print edition of Newcity features a photo-essay featuring the work of photograher John Stamets as he documents the construction of the works of Koolhaas and Gehry
(2003-09-17)

Coming up dry
"I want you to think about your last sexual experience," says the lithe Asian dancer, swirled in gauze and wire and magnetic tape...
(2003-09-10)

Sensuous Chicago: Taste
I was famished for excitement in a relationship gone stale, and consequently whipped up this bad hash of an idea that an `amuse bouche' would curry her favor
(2003-08-05)

about Newcitychicago | about Newcity magazine | advertising | privacy policy | FAQ | employment