Funki Porcini

Funki Porcini is the alias of James Bradell, an electronic music artist on the Ninja Tune record label. The story goes that Funki Porcini left England at age 19 to come to Los Angeles, where he promptly burned through his three hundred dollars in a week on cocktails and hamburgers. He then worked at a department store stacking shelves until he earned enough money to hitchhike to San Francisco, where he bought a saxophone and moved into The Residents old apartment with Snakefinger. Immersed in the San Francisco's scene of radical experimentation, James began his musical endeavors. Eventually leaving San Francisco, James bounced through New York and Berlin before ending up in Italy, where he spent ten years producing music for film and television before finally hooking up with the Ninja Tune record label and returning to making music as his own art.

Although Funki Porcini's musical style has evolved over the years and is difficult to pinpoint, it's generally very multilayered and dense with different instruments and samples weaving their way into the songs, puncuated by his sax. His first album, a double CD called Hed Phone Sex, is full of dark, mellow brooding beats, ethereal saxophone, and sexually themed samples. His more recent works have been almost schizophrenic in nature -- a mellow, dreamy, slow tempo song would break into a frantic flurry of mad drum and bass with his saxophone racing alongside until everything would dissolve into chaos and mellowness again. It's a wonderful journey.

• 9 Lazy 9 'Take 9/The Herb' ZEN1217 12" Nov '93
• 9 Lazy 9 'Paradise Blown' ZEN9/CD9 2LP/CD Mar '94
• 9 Lazy 9 'Black Jesus/Monks Dream' ZEN1222 12" Oct '94
• 9 Lazy 9 'Electric Lazyland' ZEN14/CD14 LP/CD Nov '94
• Funki Porcini 'Long Road/Poseathon' ZEN1224 12" Feb '95
• Funki Porcini 'Hed Phone Sex' ZEN17/CD17 3LP/CD May '95
• Funki Porcini 'Dubble' ZEN1231 12" Jun '95
• Funki Porcini 'King Ashabanapal mixes' ZEN1237 12" Sep '95
• Funki Porcini 'Hyde Park/Suck Acid' ZEN1239 12" Sep '95
• Funki Porcini 'Big Pink Inflatable' ZEN1237/9 CD EP Sep '95
• Funki Porcini 'Love, Pussycats & Carwrecks' ZEN23/CD23 2LP/CD Jun '96
• Funki Porcini 'Carwreck EP' ZEN1247/CDS47 EP/CD Jan '97
• Funki Porcini 'Let's See What Carmen Can Do' ZEN1250/CDS50 EP/CD Apr '97
• Funki Porcini 'Rocket Soul' ZEN1276/CDS76 EP/CD Feb '99
• Funki Porcini 'Ultimately Empty Million Pounds' ZEN40/CD40 2EP/CD Mar '99