You think you know your friends?  Go spend spend a little time trolling through their music.  Sure, you go to concerts together, talk music, send each other songs…and then BOOM: you see they’ve been shamelessly listening to K-pop for three weeks.

When you’re knee deep in the recesses of a friends music collection, you really start question how well you know them… Like, “Who the hell is this guy?  Is he really listening to Rihanna right now?”  It makes you wonder what else they’re capable of…

…JUST like in the film Universal Soldiers:  Jean Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren were buddies in Vietnam…until Dolph went berserk and started cutting off the ears of innocent civilians.  Paralyzed with confusion, JCVD watched in horror from afar.

Sometimes I feel like JCVD… just in shock on the sidelines while my buddies plow through Top 40 tracks like a gaggle of 7th grade girls.

But then again JCVD pulled it together and beat Dolph Lungdren’s ass in Vietnam, where they both subsequently died, were cryogenically frozen, woke up as robots, and fought again in 1992 (as robots).

Anyway, thats what this VDIF MixTape is all about:  kicking ass, friendship and time travel.  Happy Friday.

As always, you can find this playlist on spotify.  Thanks to everyone that helped out on this.

We’ve gotten plenty of feedback asking us why we dedicate our friday mixtapes to JCVD. And here we were thinking it was obvious! Out of the many reasons we lionize Lion Heart, here are three:

1. He’s open-minded and ahead of his time. Van Damme’s first film role in Monaco Forever is credited as “Gay Karate Man.” In 1984? Hat’s off to you trailblazer.

2. He is literally immortal. Long after the “Muscles From Brussels” passes on in his tangible form, he will live on as the inspiration for the legendary kickboxer Johnny Cage in the Mortal Kombat fighting game series. You can never FINISH HIM!

3. He has fucking standards. Jean-Claude turned down the lead role in The Expendables during a personal phone call from Sly Stallone. He knew that movie was going to be hacky drivel and he would never have his name attached to bad taste. True, he has signed on happily for The Expendables 2, but they must have, like, a sick screenplay or something. Honestly.

Crank up this mixtape, enjoy your Friday, and don’t be afraid to comment with your own reasons why you love our tank-topped testosterone-toting trooper.

This playlist is also available on Spotify

Yesterday, the blogosphere was shocked when the news broke that Jack White had teamed with Insane Clown Posse to collaborate on a new single which puts a modern spin on a song composed by Mozart. We asked HT’s writing collective Three Grown Men to weigh in on the track…

Kevin Smallwood

This combo makes perfect sense. If there is anyone on this planet that gives less of a shit about what you think then Jack White, it’s the Insane Clown Posse. Once you get past the third grade level lyrics, you might find that this is groundbreaking work.

First of all, the song is about Mozart getting his asshole licked. Now, whether the great musical genius of the 18th Century was the happy recipient of a regular rump trumpet is beside the point. This is new material. Scholars will now investigate this conjecture the same way that they tried to figure out if William Shakespeare smoked pot.

Secondly, Jack White is dropping beats. And not only is he dropping beats, he’s doing it all over Mozart’s public domain. Does anyone else realize how dangerous that is? Jack White is going to be the DJ Danger Mouse of the Van’s, Brahms’ and Bach’s.

READ ON for more of 3GM’s take on this controversial track…

HT’s Three Grown Men writing collective attended the Equifunk festival on August 19 and 20 at Eastern Pennsylvania’s Camp Equinunk and have filed some letters describing this one-of-a-kind event. To follow up on Kevin Smallwood’s thoughts posted yesterday, here are the recaps from Conor Kelley and Jonathan Kosakow…

Dear Reality,

I’ve been at Camp Equifunk for almost a day now and I’m having a really swell time! The kids are treating me nice and I’m making tons of friends. We had swim lessons all day and it was really neat. The lake is super and…I…

Actually listen up Reality, I’m gonna cut the shit. I don’t miss you at all. You told me to write you while I was away so here it is, and I’m going to say some things that need to be said. I walked through the Equifunk camp gates 18 hours ago and I feel like I’ve forgotten every lie you’ve ever told me. I just went down a 30-foot water slide backwards with a beer in my hand. You ever do anything like that, Reality? God, you’re so lame bro.

[Photo by Dino Perrucci]

I woke up today to the sounds of my friends sitting around, laughing about the night before. Do you have any idea how refreshing that is? You always wake me up with a face-slapping alarm clock. Thirty lazy minutes and 40 yards later we were poolside, and about to experience the most adrenaline-fueled, carefree hours I’ve had since Manorlu Swim Club in the summer of ‘97. I’m so glad no one invited you, Reality. You probably would have been telling people to slow down and not to swim for a half hour after eating, nerd. The BBQ was hot, the beer was flowing, and the beach balls were being inflated to the point of passing out. It was the best party I’ve ever seen, and the bands hadn’t even taken the stage.

READ ON for more Letters From Equifunk…

HT’s Three Grown Men writing collective attended the Equifunk festival on August 19 and 20 at Eastern Pennsylvania’s Camps Equinunk and Blue Ridge and have filed a pair of letters describing this one-of-a-kind event. Here’s the first of the missives, penned by 3GM’s Kevin Smallwood…

Dear Diary,

Leaving from Virginia six and a half rain-soaked hours earlier, I arrived at Camp Equinunk during sunset on Friday evening. Now, I’ve seen Friday the 13th a few times, so spending a weekend at a camp that is nestled on a big beautiful lake made this festival one of the more frighteningly beautiful music experiences I’ve ever had.

First of all, there was an army of golf carts that carried everyone’s gear from the car to their respective sleeping arrangements.  Considering the mud, I don’t think I’ve ever been happier to keep a pair of $5 tennis shoes clean. On the cart ride to our bunk we passed the main stage, an Olympic size pool with a 30-foot water slide, girls bunks…and more girls bunks.

As I walked into our cabin I was greeted with three bottles of liquor and a note on the floor that read “Welcome.” I thought I might be special, but it turns out that anyone staying in a cabin was greeted with the same warmth any 20-something could appreciate.

READ ON for more of 3GM’s Letter From Equifunk…

In celebration of the Equifunk Festival and the Three Grown Men covering it, this Friday, it’s all about funk horns and ridiculous rhythm.

Here is some conjecture to ease you in:

• If women were made of whiskey, men would fist fight more frequently but exhibit greater general happiness.
• Jean-Claude has made gratuitous nudity an important part of his career, perhaps more so than leotards.
• Lil’ Wayne + Vodka & Milk = Awesome Drank
• This playlist will raise the average Friday conception rate by .01%

Hop out of your haze and let this bad bitch tickle your ear, squeeze your inner thigh and split-kick your Friday into action.

[Textbook Case of the Freedom Fridays]

With Equifunk 2011 approaching this weekend, we wanted to give the lucky few who are attending our breakdown of what to expect from each act.

Band Name: Karl Denson’s Tiny Universe

Why they’re funky: Funk Saxophone. Read that again: Funk. Saxophone. Over the past 20+ years KDTU has built a funk empire. The six-man crew has have served as the torch bearers between the afromatic glory days of late ’70s funk into the present day booty revival. They are a contemporary classic of polished soul-funk and they’ve been known to blow the mothasuckin roof off the sucka.

What to expect: Being that there will be so many funk bosses around, expect these guys to host the most sit-ins. Also, expect to sweat in a profuse manner.

• Previously: Equifunk – The Birth of a Festival

READ ON for more bands to check out at Equifunk…

Counterculture has always fed off of community. It’s the reason why nine-year-olds in California can attempt surfing maneuvers on skateboards and unwittingly start a revolution. A group of people that somehow understands each other amidst the commotion of survival is a rare and powerful thing.

Music is especially responsive to a certain community’s energy. A “scene” develops and musicians are challenged. What you may not know is, a scene is developing among the Pocono Mountains of northeastern PA at a gathering called Equifunk, but this time the musicians won’t be the ones that benefit. This scene is for us, the listeners, and it may just change how we view music festivals.

The community I’m talking about is a summer camp, of all places. Equifunk 2011 will be held August 19-20 on the grounds of Camp Equinunk, and is likely the most intimate musical weekend any fan could dream up. The organizers – who are all former Equinunk campers – have managed to create an all-inclusive weekend of amazing talent, while still capping ticket sales at less than 600. That’s 0.6% of Bonnaroo’s average annual attendance.

READ ON for more about Equifunk…

Now that we’re back and fully recovered from the largest music convention in the country, its time to reflect on exactly what happened to Three Grown Men during their first assignment on the road at SXSW Music in Austin.

Kevin Smallwood

When we decided to do SXSW, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I knew there would be a lot of skinny jeans and flannel -which is not exactly my scene – but most of my apprehension was due to the fact that I didn’t know 97% of the 2,000 bands.

With a cumulative sleep total of 17 hours in over four days, I can honestly say that SXSW is by and far the best music “festival” in the country. First of all the venue is actually the city of Austin. I have never been anywhere where I’ve literally been…everywhere. Indoor venues, outdoor venues, parks, lakes, rivers, monuments, crosswalks; if there was a free space and an open ear, someone was bound to be playing music there.  Overall I’d say we covered about 5 miles per day – and we rarely went to the same place twice.

• 3GM @ SXSW: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3 and Day 4

I can’t say for sure how many bands we saw, but I know which ones gave me that “oh wow” feeling. You know the one – it’s that moment where your sense of hearing is so profoundly pleasured by something new that it fires off synapses that would otherwise lay dormant in the comfort of your musical bubble.

READ ON from Three Grown Men on their SXSW experience…

If the average music festival is a 26.2 mile marathon, then SXSW is a 140-mile Iron Man challenge. Waking up on day four, our skin was burnt, our ankles were swollen, and our ears were bleeding. But just when it seemed like all hope was lost and we’d spend the day sleeping – one brave, grown-ass man poured a red bull into his coffee, gave a stern look across the kitchen table and said the following words:

“…Tighten. The Fuck. Up.”

And just like that we were off for the final day of SXSW.

[Kanye and friends took over SXSW 2011 with a late night concert]

Our first stop was the MOG party for TV on the Radio and Big Boi. TV’s set at Mohawk was basically the same thing we saw of their set the day before at Stubbs. But to see them in a venue like the open-air, multi-level, very limited capacity Mohawk added a great deal of excitement. The energy was fluid throughout the venue, and the band’s huge sound was even more encapsulated than usual.

[Big Boi at The Mohawk]

There was about an hour break between TV on the Radio and Big Boi, and Yuck played the indoor stage at Mohawk. Despite their hype, we decided to hold our place to see Daddy Fat Sax in action. When he came on, he and MC Black Owned C-Bone led the excited crowd in a splattering of old school Outkast tracks and newer stuff from his own solo recordings. As the late afternoon sun started to fade, the onstage dance party kept energy and spirits high.

• Three Grown Men @ SXSW: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3

READ ON for more on Day 4 at SXSW from Three Grown Men…

Nobody said it was going to be easy. The sun alone sucks energy out of you, not to mention the combination of constant walking and our search for seven different kinds of rail tequila (side note: we’ve only found three).

[Crowd surfing at MSTRKRFT]

At this point we’re on auto pilot. We’re drones, zombies. The main things that keep us going are Red Bull and disco bass lines. But we love it. There is great music on every corner and everything we discover is something we wouldn’t have seen otherwise. It’s a freak show, a constant party, and we have no idea if the end is in sight. We could do this forever.

READ ON to check out how we’re doing on our scavenger hunt and the rest of what we saw yesterday…

At South by Southwest, sometimes you ignore your schedule completely and end up in places you wouldn’t have thought about going and doing things you wouldn’t normally do. You might wait in line for an hour for free booze and popcorn at the Fader Fort or you might find yourself in a private party thrown by Entertainment Weekly, again, drinking free booze during a funk show. When you should have been trying to get on camera at Widespread Panic’s show, you might instead wander off course a bit to a rather unknown wine bar and discover a singer who turns Gangstas Paradise into a melody played on glockenspiel. There is also a chance that you’d end up at a DJ set on a smoky dance floor or seeing a good band play in a small bar with a shitty sound system. Also, we saw Wu Tang, and the rumors are true. They ain’t nothing to fuck with.

Even without a plan, we knocked a couple more items off our scavenger hunt. Check it out how we did…

See 18 Bands in a Day

We saw 19 acts perform yesterday and we weren’t even trying. However, our feet feel like whatever happens to pregnant women. Here’s our list:

Givers, The Answering Machine, The Antlers, The New Mastersounds, Fitz and the Tantrums, Alyson Greenfield, Bo Bliz, Morning Teleportation, Ume, Times New Viking, Trouble Andrew, Rocky Business, Marz Lovejoy, Trae Tha Truth, Yelawolf, Fishbone, Wu-Tang, Erykah Badu, The Fresh and Onlys

READ ON for more from 3GM’s second day at SXSW..

At a festival with over 2000 bands, you thrive on the good ones to keep you going. At times you begin to feel as if mediocre is par for the course. You realize by the end of the first day, if it hadn’t already occurred to you, how important a good sound guy is and how energy becomes the most important thing in a live performance.

Forget creativity and tight harmonies, you can perfect those on the album. A good voice or some fast fingers? Those will only get you so far. What you need is stage presence and passion. If you can’t hold the attention of a crowd who’s been on their feet for eight hours in the Texas heat, you probably shouldn’t have the spot. SXSW is a natural selection bootcamp for bands and fans alike.

For those of you following our SXSW Scavenger Hunt, here’s what we were able to check off the list so far…

Find an Incredible Bluegrass Band – Trampled by Turtles

There should be at least one bluegrass band tucked away in a back corner or jamming collectively on a late night stage at every festival – especially SXSW. At 1AM on Tuesday, before the official music events even started, Trampled by Turtles stomped on the Bat Bar with a fiddle and acoustic bass. It didn’t hurt that our search for rail tequila started here (note: Cordoniz seems to be everywhere). READ ON for more from 3GM’s first day at SXSW…

The amount of weirdness converging upon Austin this week for South by Southwest is too much for even a three-headed beast to devour. To better make sense of the insane scheduling, inescapable hype and impenetrable venues, Three Grown Men has adopted an alternative coverage strategy.

[All photos by Conor Kelley]

We compiled the list below to help us get our fill of bands, BBQ and booze. Maybe we’ll hunt down everything or maybe we’ll find nothing, but check Hidden Track every day at 1PM ET to join us on our exploits. You can also follow us on Twitter, and friend us on Facebook for all-day coverage. From March 15-20 we are SXSW scavengers.

• Find the youngest band
• Find five bands that don’t suck from five different countries
• Find the best street musician
• Find a famous person in a band
• Find a great funk band
• Find the best brisket in Austin
• Find the best singer/songwriter
• Find the prettiest guitar in Austin
• Find the drunkest dude at SXSW

READ ON for more of 3GM’s South by Southwest Scavenger List…

Seeing Soulive last Friday at Brooklyn Bowl during their 10-night run got us thinking about what a force the band is in the world of live music. Soulive appeals to the old and young, black and white, jazz-nut and hip-hop fan alike. We danced our asses off and left Brooklyn satisfied at 2:30AM. Below are our musings on the history of the funk/jazz trio and why 3GM officially dubs them NYC’s band, along with photos from the all-star lineup that took the stage last Friday, including Robert Randolph, Living Colour singer, Corey Glover, and many others. (Photos and captions by Conor Kelley)

[Legendary frontman Corey Glover (Living Colour) channeled his '60s idols for an unforgettable guest performance, backed by the best possible soul/funk lineup going right now.]

Jonathan Kosakow on Soulive’s history:

My God, has it been 12 years already? I still remember rocking out to Get Down and Turn It Out like it was yesterday, driving my car through the twists and turns of Connecticut back roads, smacking the steering wheel and the dashboard along with Alan Evans’ drums and practically skidding off the road into the reservoir because Kraz was just wailing, man. Actually, wait, that does feel like 12 years ago, but those moments are still very much in my memory.

[Kraz shows pretty clearly that this was the highest-energy performance of Bowlive II so far and everyone in the house knew it.]

Another time, a friend and I were driving home from the Waterloo Village Music Festival in Jersey, sometime around 2001 or 2002, and needed some solid music to keep us awake through the stench of I-95 at two in the morning. We had just gotten through Medeski Martin & Wood’s Combustication and wanted to keep the groove going, so we put on Turn It Out, Soulive’s second release and first live album. Immediately, we knew something was missing: after the fullness, exploration, and ultimate groove of MMW, Soulive just wasn’t what we were looking for. The talent was there, but something else was missing. My friend ejected the disc and put on Slip Stitch & Pass, a never-fail. I was devastated. I loved Soulive, and I still do, but I had to concede defeat.

I couldn’t put my finger on what was missing until last March when I saw them absolutely destroy the Brooklyn Bowl during the first annual Bowlive.

READ ON for more from 3GM on why Soulive is NYC’s band…