A Tune For The Weekend 'Cos It's The Weekend!

I know that this one will be a bit too obvious for those of you who will only give a tune a second glance if it was unearthed with the Dead Sea Scrolls by Larry Levan's joint roller, or is a super rare, limited pressing jack track, which was buried four hundred feet below a railway line near Vladivostock. However, for some of us acid house casualties — there are also acid and acid jazz casualties — this one holds a special place in our hearts. Todd was, is, and always will be god; a god of slick sampling, rocking beats that fused house, hip-hop and freestyle, and the purveyor of many gorgeousful remixes. I first heard this at a soul club in Ireland in 1988. I was just back from a long 1987 stint in Sarf London and was Phutured and Model 500ed out the ying yang. The dj at this club was a dude name Derrick Murray and he would drop in some cool cutting edge stuff along with the '60s and '70s soul and r&b standards. He used to play "Starpower" by Sonic Youth, then jump into something like Patrick Cowley's mix of "I Feel Love" and then play "Sympathy For The Devil" by the Stones. It were a right Balearic do I'm telling ya,and the entire club had a bad case of Balearia. Plus there were no purists stroking their chins in disapproval, everyone was too busy getting down and having the craic, as they say in the old country. The club was called The Soul Solution but we used to call it the Skull Pollution. Go figure.

One night in the spring of '88 Derrick dropped a tune that decked all of us. I remember my late — and unbelievably hilarious — buddy Vinnie turning to me and saying, "Jaysus, this is f@#$ing brilliant." We had the dj drop it two more times and each time it got better. Derrick showed us the sleeve, the song was called "A Day In The Life," it was on Champion Records, and was by a group (it was all groups back then) called Black Riot. Brooklyn was indeed in the house, and Todd Terry was the man to watch. And watch him I did, over the years until the mid-90s. Later on, in the summer of '89, Rob Base and DJ EZ Rock sampled it for their "Get On The Dance Floor" single which I believe came out the same week as "Pump Up the Jam" by Technotric. My buddies and I were watching the vids on Top Of The Pops, while taking a break from the Model 500, Separate Minds, Mr. Fingers, Geto Boys, Stetsasonic and Eazy E records that had been scooped by crew members who had been stateside that summer.

Halcyon days perhaps and many years later in 2000, while writing for a short lived dance music magazine called Revolution I interviewed Todd Terry, and had him sign my copy of "A Day In The Life." I'm sad, I know. And he told me something that I will never forget, he told me that the thing that saddened him the most was turning on the radio in New York and not being able to hear his own music, which was a product of New York. Well, you can hear "A Day In the Life" today at the end of this column and in a more just — and less greedy — world, tunes like this would be in heavy rotation beside all the hip-hop classics. House may well be a feeling (though one should never talk about it when one is having a discussion about feelings) but it is also an urban music form. One that has been much maligned and ignored by the US mainstream. It may well have had its day, but it is, as Frankie Knuckles said, "disco's revenge." What's next for disco's vengeful children you might be inclined to ask. Who knows but enjoy "A Day In The Life" in a day in your life.

Orr

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Too premature for a new groove?

Perhaps you're like me and are a little snowed under by crushing electro, and an avalanche of irony. I thought I was just feeling my age, but then friends of mine in their late twenties started echoing my sentiments and I was quite amazed. The whole irony sketch was kinda funny — in a, polite, upper middle class/hipster in art school/daddy's paying for my apt in Williamsburg/Lower Haight/Mission/I'm too gentile to get real sarcasm sorta way — for a coupla years between 2001 and 2004. The '80s were exhumed and rinsed through Ableton/Vice Magazine etc. etc., and a great consumerist peace fell across the land as the U.S. plunged into a smidgen of right wing lunacy and a coupla little skirmishes in the middle east. Don't worry, be ironic. Don't know anything about music/culture/literature/fashon/facial hair? Be ironic. It solves all those problems of ignorance.

I'm dreading the moment when the '90s gets dragged from its crypt in full on mode because we'll get MC Hammer before Main Source and Haddaway before Todd Terry. And perhaps the only respite from all the inanity will be in the shape of that phenomenon that my friend Disco Dave in Socal has been alluding to since the late '90s; essentially how a groundbreaking genre is pounced on by white hispters ten to fifteen years after it was relevant. Currently, early, raw Chicago house is undergoing this process. Jack trax are now de rigeur fuel for the music oriented conversation of blog informed, bright, young, angst ridden rich kids with more than a passing interest in ESG and Arthur Russell. Yawn!!!! It's Marcus Mixx this and Jackmaster Curt that, of course punctuated with a "Oh, you haven't heard of that." Heads up kids, you hadn't heard of it either until you read about it on some blog, 'cos those records never left Chicago, and the only ones that did were smuggled out by savvy djs like Colin Faver and Jazzy M. So said Mark Moore in The Face Magazine dance music column of May 1988. I can photocopy you the killer article on Detroit techno that also appeared in that issue 'cos my copy is falling apart.

Bile aside however, I strayed into a local music emporium t'other day (as they say up north, where it's reputedly grim) and saw the glorious Nu Groove compilations gleaming under the mix of daylight and florescence. Reissues or booties? Who knows, but the toons on there are quite swiftnific. Thrill to "Annhilate" by Joey Beltram's Lost Entity project, gasp at Rob $teal's "Give In To The Rhythm," and wet yourself to 331/3 Queen's Debbie Trusty sampling "Searchin.'" These came out on the Network (formerly Kool Kat) label out of Birmingham, England, which was owned by an ex-Northern Soul dj named Neil Rushton. He recognized that Chicago, Detroit and New York didn't stop innovating musically after the early '70s and sought to expose the restless youth of the isles to the electronic vibrations emanating from those cities in the mid to late '80s.

Thank god he did, because some choice deck fodder was pressed on those two great imprints (Kool Kat is a treasure trove of rare mixes, exclusive to the UK versions). Add the Jack Trax label into the stew and we was drowning in a sea of house. So before you cut your hair into a flat top, try to download House Party from Limewire and practice your walking man dance, please listen to "Legends" by Project 86, and if you think Justice make hard electro shit, listen to the Lenny Dee track in the playlist at the end of this piece. That's what the kids were bouncin' around to in 1992. As the song says, "Whatever comes tomorrow happened yesterday." Give in to the rhythm.

Orr


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Marco Carola's Get Set EP

This is the second release on Italian producer Marco Carola's 2M label, which is a sub-label of Richie Hawtin's Minus imprint. The three track digital EP of tough, dense, rolling techno has been available since late June, while the round plastic version — that you can hold in your hands and cherish forever and ever — came out this week. If you like stark, mechanistic dance music that doesn’t relent in its gallop into the future then you might be likin’ this one here.

Orr

Dance On The Cheese?

"Dance On The Groove (And Do The Funk)" by Love International is a tasty slice of finely aged Euro dance that shouldn't be overlooked ever. It's not every day that you walk into a local thrift emporium and find a little gem like this sitting at the front of some certifiable cheese and it's only a buck fity. Some people would say that this record has a fair topping of fromage itself, but hey, that's part of its charm. This Euro oddity from 1981 has grabbed the attention of record nerds and chin strokers globally due the fact it was used in Baldelli's dj sets and was recently featured on the Compost Records "Cosmic" compilation Elaste Vol 01.

I needn't describe it, just listen to the gorgeous Seepod link below and wallow in it's slo mo, chunky Eurodisconess. And though it is a Cosmic gem and gets major props from beard caressers (chin strokers with more facial hair) all o'er this fair land and o'er yonder too, that didn't inspire me to write this here piece here that you do be reading. A guy called Phillipe Krootchey was part of Love International's line up: this was France in 1981. Jump forward a few years and a few thousand miles to Dallas, Texas in the mid to late '80s and you have the infamous Starck Club, where a Frenchman name Philippe Krootchey shows up as a resident dj.

Could this be one and the same guy? What little else I know of him is that he also shows up singing backing vocals with Arto Lindsay on a Lizzy Mercier Descloux record in 1981. He passed away in 2004, but maybe someone out there is an old Starck head and can give me some info. If he was talented and flamboyant enough to be crafting slick — albeit a little cheesy — French disco then he could also have went on to direct the mix at the Dallas den of ecstatic dancing in the middle of the city's oil boom glitz and hedonism? If you know let me know. And always remember to dance on the groove and do the funk. Hokay?

Orr

Tune of the day even though it's like not even the weekend or anything.

This gorgeousful slice of Detroit electronics came out in 1990 so it's timely that I should write about it as we teeter precariously on the edge of a '90s revival that will no doubt focus on Kid n Play flat top haircuts, raving, flannel shirts and Ace of Base. However, before the omnipresence of irony that serves to revive crap, corporate music and inflate major label CEO's salaries there was a thing called decent music. In the early '90s decent music could be anything from Throwing Muses to Ice Cube to this here record here. I know irony is so irreverent and hilarious, and anyways passionate artistry and earnestness should be clowned incessantly 'cos it says so in the "Staying Hip As You Approach 40" handbook that's de rigeur reading at Vice Magazine headquarters, but for an honest appraisal of its role in youth culture read No Logo by Naomi Klein, she kinda nails it...to the wall, where it belongs.

But, back to the music. Octave One's "I Believe" is a lush, driving and naive slice of Detroit techno and copies of it should be placed in a capsule and shot into space by NASA so that other lifeforms can swoon to its beauty. Supposedly it was crafted on gear bought second hand by the Burden Brothers from fellow Detroiters Was (Not Was) (whose "Wheel Me Out" is essential disco not disco gear and according to Juan Atkins, was the record he learned to mix with). It was released on Derrick May's Transmat label which, at the time was home to Atkins' Model 500 project, and had released serious dance floor numbers like Rhythim Is Rhythim's "Nude Photo," and "It Is What It Is," and R-Tyme's sublime "R-Theme"/"Illusion" EP.

"I Believe" is also sublime, containing the very uplifting original mix, Jay Denham's Inner Cityesque interpretation and Juan's sensational, sensual, sexy and swiftnific mix which features a bassline from the depths of the ocean, layers of dreamy strings and fifteen year old Lisa Newberry's plaintiff vocals. It is the perfect fusion of forward looking dance music, star gazing optimism and hydraulic funk inflected dub. Before any more schminimal techno is written this record should be listened to. It is truly inspiring and sonically stunning, and it will sound great in a mash up with Vanilla Ice. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Orr

The Lines Memory Span

Dan Selzer over at Acute Records in New York Citay is a label owner, dj, blogger, tastemaker, mover, shaker and quantum physicist (who btw only uses the manuals that are written in Chinese). Sheesh! How does he find time to put out a host of excellent reissues on his Acute imprint? Christ, if I boil an egg I need to lay down for half an hour to regain my strength, so hats off to Mr. Selzer and to this latest release, namely The Lines’ Memory Span album. This retrospective of the cult UK post-punk band traces the development of their sound from 1979 til 1983.

The Lines played live with the likes of The Cure, Bauhaus, and The Birthday Party but never scaled the heights of acclaim enjoyed by those outfits, and disbanded after their last album, Ultramarine. However, this Acute retrospective, which has been lovingly remastered by ex-member Rico Conning (who went on to be in William Orbit’s Torch Song project), shows the band at their finest; from fledgling efforts in 1979 like “White Night” and “Not Through Windows,” both from their debut seven inch EP, to more sophisticated tunes such as “Transit,” and “Cool Snap.”

Starting off as a straight up new wave rock/power pop band, by the early ‘80s the Lines were experimenting with funk and dub elements within a starker, more atmospheric and danceable sound. So if you’re a doyen of late ‘70s and early ‘80s new wave and post-punk and you thrill to Young Marble Giants, Liquid Liquid, Subway Sect, The Feelies, Gang of Four, Delta 5, The Undertones, Josef K and XTC then you’ll be pleasantly delighted with this top notch release. It came out a week ago so go scoop it.

Orr

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Rockin' you Cosmically!

The Glimmers’ Eskimo Recordings imprint has put DJ Daniele Baldelli to work compiling and mixing a kick ass cd containing some of his favorite rock tracks, blended, remixed and re-edited for your dancing and listening pleasure. Baldelli, renowned for his multi-generic “Afro Cosmic” sound, has been playing records since 1969, so when he puts a mix together you know it’s gonna be a damned good one.

Eskimo Recordings Present Cosmic Disco?! Nah...Cosmic Rock!!! is a damned good one, and there are no two ways about it. Any dj mix that places Ray Parker Jnr., William Orbit, Martha and the Muffins and Spirit together in a logical way has to be lauded, as does the mind and ears of the person who crafts it. But that’s only part of the story, as Baldelli brought in his friend Marco Dionigi to help him add remix and re-edit touches in order to render the mix compatible with modern tastes without sacrificing its overall musicality. That in itself is a feat — of subtlety seasoned by experience — especially in a music industry that is plagued by generic marketing, linear djing and a minimalism which is presented as a high brow intellectual pursuit, proffering sparse and repetitive music as a logical end to countless centuries of sonic experimentation, and fun, when in fact most of it actually reflects just under two decades of musical lethargy, myopia and inability.

Baldelli’s colorful dj mixes stand in marked contrast to the easy fix, “same beat all night,” cul de sac of most modern dance music, and celebrate the real role of the dj: that is, to find the best tunes from any number of sources and blend them together to create a physically and emotionally compelling dialog with his or her audience.Eskimo Recordings Present Cosmic Disco?! Nah...Cosmic Rock!!! achieves this admirably with its divergent and involving playlist. This includes the tunes listed above plus tracks by La Bionda, Thomspson Twins, Spider (with a tune that Tina Turner later covered) and my personal fave, — being the Plastic Paddy or Mick that I am — “Ulster Defense,” by Bronx Irish Catholics, an electro/industrial track by a New York band that details some of the misery suffered in Northern Ireland during The Troubles.

We not only have to thank Daniele Baldelli’s catholic tastes for the inclusion of an item that exotic, but also the Glimmers’ sense of musical adventure for putting this baby out, as well as dropping two, three track vinyl samplers to accompany the CD and digital releases. They’ve all been out since May (excuse my tardiness) so keep an eye — or two — peeled for them. It’s refreshing stuff, a peek into the past and a blueprint for a musically richer future — I hope.

Orr

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