I never worked a day in my life, goes the vocal sample that opens Fatboy Slim's new mix compilation. "I just laid back and let the big beat lead me." On the Floor at the Boutique draws the listener through one of Fatboy's notoriously body-moving DJ sets. One of his biggest hits, "The Rockafeller Skank," makes an appearance, but the funk-soul brother also gets down on the educational-historical tip, gleefully tripping over classic hip-hop break beats ("Apache," by Michael Viner's Incredible Bongo Band) and technotrance (Aldo Bender's "Acid Enlightenment") like a smiley-faced sonic shaman. Electronica-purist player haters might sniff at Fatboy's pump-up-the-volume populism, but the genre-defying eclecticism and ear for big hooks on display here are undeniable. On the Floor at the Boutique proves once and for all that, despite his commercial success, when Fatboy Slim rocks the wheels of steel, he's still mad, bad and dangerous to know.

“All Along the Watchtower”

Jimi Hendrix got hold of Bob Dylan's early John Wesley Harding tapes and in late 1967 recorded a version of "All Along the Watchtower" with the Experience in London. Dissatisfied with that first development, Hendrix brought those tapes with him to New York in early 1968 when he began work on Electric Ladyland. Eddie Kramer, Hendrix's engineer at the time, told Rolling Stone that Hendrix "was still looked upon by his basically white audience as the mammoth black guitar hero. There was a constant fight within him to expand himself." Hendrix's successful take on Dylan's work has long been recognized by the songwriter. "I liked Jimi Hendrix's record of this and ever since he died I've been doing it that way," Dylan wrote in the liner notes to his Biograph box set. "Strange how when I sing it, I always feel it's a tribute to him in some kind of way."