Two Ninja MP3s

The Ninja Tune label has finally updated its free Downloads page (here), with a pair of cuts by two of its newest acts: Blockhead and Skalpel. Blockhead is a New York-based solo musician, and “Bullfight in Ireland,” off his Music by Cavelight album, is a downtempo bit of blunted studio fog; its Spanish elements are lonesome guitar and horn parts, and its Irish material is restricted to an unintelligible vocal by an apparently sloshed gentleman, whose chant recalls the waistrel who sang on Gavin Bryars’ “Jesus Blood Never Failed Me Yet” — just in time for Saint Patrick’s Day. Skalpel is Marcin Cichy and Igor Pudlo, a pair of musicians from Wroclaw, Poland, and their “Ninjazz,” the Sculpture single’s closing track, is a languorous bit of fusion, with its emphasis on a lilting keyboard phrases and a rolling trap set. Peculiarly, both the Blockhead and Skalpel tracks are exactly the same length: 4:47. (More on the Ninja Tune label at ninjatune.net. Skalpel’s homepage is skalpel.chlip.com. Blockhead’s is at ninjatune.net/blockhead.)