Arturo Capone's New EP On Bear Funk

Amid all the reminiscing there is still time for some new tunes across a whole range of styles. Those gorgeousful types over at Bear Funk in the UK sent me this little doozy a coupla days ago and I have to admit it’s a keeper. This three track EP is a is a sampler for Italian producer Arturo Capone’s forthcoming album, Miocuore, and is firmly in the neo-Balearic — that’s a new sub-genre I just invented ‘cos we really need another one, no doubt — Cosmic disco ballpark. “Curcuma” and Max Essa’s mix of “Waves” really do it for me and will be receiving repeated spins. It drops on Monday the 10th of November so rush out and scoop it himmediately. Hokay?

Orr

Blame It On The Boogie Part 3

Months went by and the Virgo LP didn’t show up in my local vinyl emporiums. I was living in Galway on the west coast of Ireland and though some good US, UK and Italian imports would come through, the Virgo Four album didn’t materialize and I wasn’t flush enough with cash to do mail order from the UK. I figured if I waited it out, it would show up, being the tightwad Scotsman men that I am. The Techno 1 album I’d heard from my buddy Damian who made a timely trip to London in late summer of 89 and came back with some gems, including Model 500’s Interfearance EP on Metroplex. I liked Techno 1 a lot and I needed one for myself. Now I have a few, que shouts of "Sad bastard." Thank you!

Then one day months later — probably a wet, cold Saturday evening in January or February of 1990 while scurrying around Derry, Northern Ireland during a trip back home to the north — I stepped into Woolworth’s and while looking through their vinyl section and its sale items I found a mint Virgo Four LP for one pound sterling. Nice! I was delighted, and I still am. This is a great record, it continues with the cerebral house music that Larry Heard blueprinted with Mr. Fingers and the Amnesia album.

While the phrase deep house has been misappropriated and misunderstood — mostly by showboating new jacks who near sightedly associate all house with yuppies and jazziness — the Virgo Four and Amnesia records are the true essence of deep house, as is Baby Ford’s first LP. The sounds are still electronic and abstract however, the rough, yet endearing, corners of the early jack trax have been smoothed off, leaving a machine music that is at once robotic and utopian. This is the music that would lay the foundation for the visionary dance music that was beginning to come out of New York and New Jersey, garage as it was known. That music form fused the lush creations of the Chicago innovators with the canon of club classics that had been played by Tee Scott, Larry Levan and Bruce Forest.

To be continued

Orr

Blame It On The Boogie Part 2

It seems that we are indeed on the cusp of a new era, but will that mean a new era of music also? There are definitely rumblings in the underground — an underground that can’t stay underground for too long these days — Balearic signals, promises of future party euphoria, and perhaps a move away from the raucous irony that has befallen us, and the bling that won’t stop.

If a wave of the type of music on the record pictured above fell on us I wouldn’t be complaining at all. Virgo Four’s album from 1989 is essentially a UK compilation of two separate EPs on the infamous Trax Records label out of Chicago. One of the EPs is credited to Virgo Four, the other to M.E., but both are by Eric Lewis and Merwyn Sanders, who moonlighted as Ace & The Sandman. Virgo Four was often confused with the Chicago project that featured Adonis, Marshall Jefferson and Vince Lawrence, and which gave us the magic EP that featured the stellar, abstract house/boogie creation "R U Hot Enough." Wrongly naming the Virgo Four album Virgo by Virgo didn't help matters either.

I read a review of this record in the fall of 1989 in an electronic keyboard magazine that also featured an interview with Derrick May and a review of the Techno 1 compilation on KMS. I was intrigued by the description of the music and also by the fact that the reviewer used the word 'electronica' to describe tracks on the Virgo Four record and Techno 1 as well, R-Tyme’s “Illusion” in particular. Electronica wasn’t a word that was in general use in 1989, 1999 maybe but not ten years prior, and even if wikipedia says it wasn't used until the early 90s in the US, it is incorrect because it is used in that review in a British magazine from 1989 and I'll wager the term was floating around in the pre house/non-dance electronic music scene from the '70s onwards.

It’s use in this article was in relation to the fact that both records featured tracks that had a dreamy mood, an ambience much like that of the heady German music of the mid to late ‘70s. To me this is the real meaning of electronica, not the bastardized version of the word that popped up in post rave America as the perfect tool to sell dodgy compilations to dotcom yuppies. Ashra, Cluster and Kraftwerk; this was the electronica that the review referred to and to place the lusher and more abstract Detroit techno and Chicago house tracks in that realm was interesting to me at the time — though everyone around me was too busy having a good time to indulge my earnest chinstrokery, and a typical reaction to any poignant thoughts by me on the subject was a salty, Irish wave of "shut up Orr, quit the pontificating and put on another record, ya bollix." Nice, huh?

To be continued

Orr

Blame It On The Boogie Part 1

Maybe it’s just me, maybe it’s some kind of collective end of decade psychosis or it might just be all the economic panic that’s been happening of late, but I’m a bit out of sorts. I’ve been shaken from my work-a-day routine and pushed in the direction of some unknown future. I’ve been through some unknown futures before and faced them bravely, but perhaps I was younger then and not as bedeviled by self-doubt. I admire those who are rarely plagued by this frame of mind, but when those who show no self-doubt hit some snag or encounter some disaster I rarely want to be around for the ensuing egoist melt down. It’s just not my bag!

I’m also encountering other things that are not my bag as the decade — thankfully — fades out. One of these things is the slavish adherence to retro music styles, especially within the realm of dance music. I’ve done my fair share of frantic digging, believe you me, but the current uber fixation on disco, Italo, and in particular boogie, seems not only a little late but also a reflection of a past time, surprise, surprise!

In 1987 in London there was a similar retro fixation. It was called Rare Groove. It centered around obscure ‘70s 45s and LPs. DJs and collectors would spend silly money on the tunes, and a faithful would show up, often decked out in the then trendy '70s look (often referred to as 'radical chic'), and a lot of posing and semi dancing would ensue. Sound familiar? Even though I am up to my armpits in obscure records I have always viewed dance music as a continuum, from which you could pull some appropriate classics and mix them with stuff that was newer or brand new.

Focusing on one retro era or genre just seems redundant to me and, like London in the late ‘80s, a harbinger of the shock of the new about to hit, and what a timely day to think about this. In 1987 rare funk and hip-hop ruled the London cool dancefloors and hi energy and Euro-disco ruled clubs in general. In 2008, we have rare groove boogie and we have the high energy sound of electro, in its crunchy, glitchy, ultra white, Ed Banger derived form. In 1987 house music culture swooped down from Manchester, Sheffield, Leeds and Nottingham cleared all the posing, standing about, cocaine yuppie fests and bad music out of the way. And of course there was the London crew of Oakenfold, Holloway, Weatherall and Boys Own whose frequent trips to Ibiza had also shaped the musical outlook of that city's dancefloors.

Who needed to pay three hundred pounds for a funk 45 that was sampled by EPMD when you could buy a new Rhythim is Rhythim 12 inch for six quid? The new is not always good, but a glut of anything is just that, and when you’ve just lived through a decade that has been a re-run of the ‘80s do we need a last hurrah of  idolatory for that decade, and for the next one to be a re-run of the ‘90s? Maybe not, but there are some late ‘80s/early ‘90s musical attributes that might be welcome.

To be continued.

Orr

Oíche Shamhna Shona Daoibh

You wot, come again. All the post title means is Happy Hallowe’en To Everyone, but in Irish Gaelic. Hey, the Celts started all this spooky stuff hella way back in the day, as they say. Hallowe’en is a Christianized version of the ancient Celtic Festival of the Dead and the Celtic New Year, or Samhain in Gaelic, but I won’t bore you with tedious details just check out the links for some more info.

Hallowe’en in San Francisco is a whole other kettle of bananas altogether, or is it? Dressing up, getting down, painting the town red, or a nice shade of pink, preferably with some No On Prop 8 stickers festooned throughout — bigotry ain’t big and it’s not clever. Anyway, Hallowe’en is always a blast in this here town. And although there is an arse load of stuff going on tonight I think I will be pointing myself in the direction of the newly re-opened Paradise Lounge, where the man like TK Disco and Conor of Red Dot have teamed up with Maly and Ryan of Gun Club to bring in UK electro-funk DJ legend Greg Wilson. It should be a blast, the tunes will be exceptional and I will be on the dancefloor.

Wherever you will be, have a happy, happy Hallowe’en folks. We’re living in ever toughening times, so whoop it up tanite, aiight?

Orr

Spirit Catcher in San Francisco, Friday November 14th

Belgian outfit Spirit Catcher will be playing live at Mighty on Friday, November 14th. The duo is comprised of Jean Vanesse and Thomas Sohet, a pair of synth nuts who imbue their chunky house sound with ample helpings of squelched out electro funk that tips its hat to Earth Wind and Fire and Mr. Flagio. They have recorded material for prolific labels like Silver Network, Freerange, Winding Road, Missive and Moodmusic, and played at clubs and festivals the world over Mighty is the perfect setting for these guys, with its warehouse like feel and sterling reputation for kick ass shows.

I’ll be donning my dj hat and laying out a set that will touch down in Detroit, Ghent, Riccione, Chicago and SF. Come through, it’s gonna be a rocker, no two ways about it.

Orr

Shoegazer Disco

Richard Morel, aka Morel, and Pink Noise, is an extremely prolific musician based in Washington DC. He has worked with Deep Dish on many occasions, co-producing, co-writing and singing on tracks from the house music duo’s Junk Science and George Is On albums. He also co-produced and co-wrote songs on Cyndi Lauper’s last album, Bring Ya To The Brink, and has remixed Depeche Mode, New Order and the Killers amongst many others. And if all that wasn’t enough, he promotes, and djs at, the montly Blow Off parties in DC, a collaboration with Bob Mould, of Hüsker Dü and Sugar fame, in whose touring band Morel also plays. Expect Blow Off shindigs around the country soon, including San Frandisco.

His new album, The Death Of The Paperboy, which will be released November 4th on his own Outsider Music label, is a refreshing amalgam of sounds and influences that range from shoe gaze rock (Richard Morel calls the sound of this project ‘shoegazer disco’), to house, electro, indie rock and disco. On top of this, it is a two disc set, with the first disc being more or less straight ahead rock, albeit with the lushness that is a prerequisite of shoe gaze, and some subtle electronic touches.

The second disc opens out into house and electronic vistas, with remixes of tracks from the first disc and extra tracks like “Sweet Thing” and Shoegazer Disco.” The whole package is a surprisingly adventurous, yet listenable and accessible album, which will appeal to people who like Brit pop, shoe gaze, alternative rock, house music and downtempo gear. As this decade wears on, or out, it is obvious that there are more ways than one to skin the cat of dance/rock fusion. Here’s another very worthy addition to the canon.

Orr