A Blog About Musics And Nice Bangs – Version 2.0 Soon Come!
Despite the fact that messageboards and forums devoted to electronica tend to attract some of the most maladjusted argumentative people online, the genre has thrown up surprisingly few good old fashioned diss tracks.
So it’s quite refreshing to hear one (must remain nameless) producer vent his frustrations at pretty much every other bedroom knob twiddler in several minutes of grin inducing autotune heavy electro funk that takes aim at nearly every cliche within sight.
I missed the first wave of acid house, my descent into the strange labyrinthian world of clubs, warehouse parties and raves starting around 1992 (which horrifically may still be before some of you were born), but there was still a lingering sense that all the old rules had been swept away and we were working with a clean sheet.
Of course in retrospect we were in many ways retreading a well worn groove laid out by previous generations, but at the time trapped in the eye of the psychedelic hurricane it was easy to believe we were generally pioneering something dangerously new and exciting.
From jungle to electronica every party, frequently in venues which if you managed to clear your head and look through the smoke you realised were quite possibly someone’s office during the week, seemed to throw up strange new sounds which though today might play in the background of a Tampax advert seemed so utterly alien at the time.
Of course nowadays with every piece of music recorded at our virtual fingertips it’s easy to deduce the subtle evolution of music from one form to another, one slight mutation in every generation inexorably leading us forward, but at the time it was easy to assume the mantle of sonic creationists believing that in the blink of an eye we’d somehow conjured up these delirious new sounds.
What did and to some extent does still seem so revolutionary though was how club culture, the good and unfortunately the bad, swept the nation through the mid to late nineties. From underground cult to mainstream hegemony, the rise of dance music and its avatar the DJ was as astonishing as it was unstoppable.
In the short space of a few years I remember going from screaming rows with my parents over the weird druggy music I was listening to, to waking up to the sound of my mother hoovering the house soundtracked by Fatboy Slim’s ‘You’ve Come A Long Way Baby’ album, a remarkably apt title.
One of the best books to make sense of this strange time was Matthew Collin’s Altered State. Published in 1997 it charted the rise of acid house and club culture in loving detail, from the orbital raves to the impact of the Criminal Justice Bill and the pirate radio stations that at one point seemed to be transmitting from every tower block (shout out to Don FM!).
This month sees the release of a new updated version, with Collin charting club culture’s trajectory past ‘97 as it rose and rose and then spectacularly collapsed under it’s own weight around the turn of the century. If you were around at the time you’ll want to buy this to remember exactly what on earth you were up to, if you weren’t well buy it and learn from history, so much of what is sometimes missing from today’s commodified club experience can be found within these pages.
Carrying on the theme another book published later this month is Raving ‘89, aimed squarely at the coffee tables of those who once wore knocked off smiley t-shirts but now actually own coffee tables. A beautiful collection of Gavin Watson’s photographs from the year acid house exploded, it’s a perfect document of a time before camera phones had become ubiquitous in clubs.
Published by the esteemed chaps over at DJhistory.com, this really is an essential document for anyone interested in seeing the early raw days of rave and has brought back some awful memories of my own sartorial mistakes (the drugs were very strong then, ok!).
For a sneak peak check out this sampler of the book.
Luckily for you we have 2 copies of Altered State and a copy of Raving ‘89 to give away, simply email the answer to the question below before Friday 17th and we will pick a couple of winners at random.
Q. Where was Danny Rampling’s Shoom originally held?
Anyway all this reminiscing calls for some music so what better than a brand new mix of old tunes courtesy of the always quality Placid
Tracklisting
Bam Bam – Give it to me – Westbrook
Farley – Love Can’t Turn Round – House
Hex Complexx – I Want You – Sunset Records
Maurice Joshua – The Other Side – Needle
Mix Masters – House Express – DJ INternational
DA Posse – In The Heat of The Night – Future
Shawn Shegog Featuring Barbara Shegog – Love Traxs – No Name
DA Rebels – It’s Time To jack The House – Clubhouse
Pierre’s Fantasy Club – I Can’t Stop For You – Max
Steve Poindexter – Mainiac – Housetime
The Children – Freedom – Dj International
Ten City – That’s the Way Love Is – Atlantic
James Jack Rabbit – Only Wanted To Be – White
The House Master Boyz And The Rude Boy Of House – House Nation – Dance Mania
Model 500 – No UFO’s – Metroplex
Master C & J – In The City – State Street
Rocky Jones – Choice of a New Generation – DJ International
Adonis & The Endless Pokers – THe Poke – DJ International
Fast Eddie – My Melody – White
Marcus Mixx – I Wanna House – Missing
Laurent X – 12am – House Nation
Fingers Inc – Never No More Lonely – Jack Trax
DA Posse – It’s My Life – Future
Scrappy – Freeze – Zap
Nouveaux Nation – Strip (Rock Yo Body) – SRO
KA Posse – Stick Music – Dj International
Jeanette Thomas – Shake Your Body – Chicago Connection
With the sun seemingly waving goodbye to London for the rest of the summer, there’s a sense of suitable smugness in the fact I’ll be basking in the glorious rays of central Barcelona all next week.
Those left in London could do worse than seek shelter at the newly opened Tabernacle way out west in Notts Hill next Wednesday where charidee War Child are putting on a rather hype looking fund raiser with live performances from Filthy Dukes, We Have Band, The Phenomenal Handclap Band and Crystal Fighters
Requisite DJ sets come from Leo Green’money’slade, Pure Groove posterboy Stopmakingme, our buddy Firas Filthy Few and Matthew Horne (you fckn wat ?)
By way of musical segue from the above information, here is the Allez Allez of remix the Hot Chip’s cover of Joy Division’s Transmission that was included on the War Child Heroes Compilation released earlier this year.
Yet more reason to get all flustered about forthcoming original material from Allez Allez!
Ever the purveyor of relevant journalism, we interviewed Tim Noakes, Music & Deputy Editor of Dazed & Confused Magazine
(the first of many wasted hyperlinks to come, one may as well be a capybara) in the Old St office-come-warehouse on a busy Thursday morning.
Flo: Hi Tim. So what do you do?
Tim: Well it’s a varied role, but basically I commission all the music features and co-edit Dazed with Rod Stanley, the editor.
Flo: So you don’t have a separate music editor, you’re deputy and music editor?
Tim: Yeah, that’s the thing with Dazed, because it’s an independent magazine, we haven’t got a huge budget to hire a lot of people, whereas in bigger companies like Conde Nast they probably have 20 people trying to do what 3 people here do so, we wear a lot of hats.
Flo: And what did you do to get there?
Tim: I slept with a lot of people.
Flo: That is the way.
Tim: I didn’t… Well it’s been weird, I was kinda trained as a photographer. I wanted to be a photojournalist, travelling the world, going to warzones but somehow I’ve ended up in a fashion bunker in Old Street.
Basically, I had to do a work placement unit for my college in East London. I sent out about 300 letters and one of the only people who replied was Dazed. It was an interesting time, Rankin had his shoots going on, Jefferson was going out with Kate Moss, you’d see Bob Geldof and Bono walking through, I thought, ‘what is this place, this is crazy.’
I got on really well with Callum McGeoch who used to be the music editor and he gave me a big break, by saying ‘why don’t you try doing a few record reviews?’ We had a lot of musical taste in common, both being hip hop heads back in the day. I then went on to work at a record company, Ninja Tunes, Big Dada, getting paid in free records, then someone left Dazed and I came in as the editorial assistant. Gradually people left, so just worked my way up really.
Flo: So how do you pick what goes into the music sections, are they your personal likes or what you get sent from PR?
Tim: Generally music content gets sourced by myself and my team of contributors whom I trust, young fresh writers who love everything from dubstep to lo-fi rock, glitchy electronica. We try to cover the whole base of genres, to expose brand new talents but also big artists, like Madonna, orJustin Timberlake.
But I guess all of the music comes from a variety of places. There is a lot of PRs sending me CD’s but I’ll be honest, 90% of them are shit. Terrible, terrible music.
Flo: If they were that good, surely you would’ve heard of them already?
Tim: Yeah exactly, and you can’t blame people for it, they obviously need publicity to get noticed. But generally the bands we put in are mainly bands you find on Myspace, out playing gigs, I talk to a few people and check them out or find them myself.
Flo: What are you listening to right now?
Tim: Well I’m getting married in a few weeks, so mostly bad 80’s pop music. But I listen to everything. I used to be a really big hip hop fan but I got bored of it in the last few years, I don’t think anything fresh or interesting has been released in ages, apart from the Clipse record which was amazing. There are a few exceptions like the new Mos Def album, but that kind of genre’s really died out for me. I really like old music, ‘60’s psyche stuff, the new lo-fi sound.
Flo: Wavves thing?
Tim: Yeah, Wavves maybe not the best, I prefer like, Thee Oh Sees, I like Eat Skull a lot. I just like new music that has an original voice and a good energy about it, a good persona, if your band’s cool, having fun with what you’re doing then..
Flo: Ah, I’m probably on the opposite end of all that, more minimal tech-house, a lot of Turbo, which you had a teeny tiny thing on in the last issue?
Tim: Oh really, yeah Turbo Recordings! I like all that electro stuff too, a few years ago we were bang in to all the Justice Ed Banger when it was going off. I’m not the biggest minimal tech house fan in the world.. but I can definitely appreciate the good stuff. I like this new guy Gold Panda, he’s not too ‘minimal’ but he changes his sound quite a lot, I think maybe you’d like it.
Flo: Yeah there’s been a lot of blog coverage on him recently.
Tim: Yeah actually, blogs… We’re like everyone else, we always look at blogs, obviously the internet is so important to journalism these days, I guess blog writers aren’t particularly that great..
Flo: Errr…
Tim: MOST of them! I mean there are a lot of great ones, I really like Gorilla Vs Bear, Discobelle, 20 Jazz Funk Greats, I like all that stuff, they usually have great taste and can get away with things that we can’t.
Flo: Posting mp3’s readers can listen to immediately..
Tim: Exactly, if we did that we’d get a big lawsuit and get closed down. I do like the freedom bloggers have and see how they set their own agenda of taste, so I definitely admire and respect what they do.
Word. Check www.SocialStereotype.com for all of Tim’s Dazed articles and interviews.
For those with a Durrrr shaped hole in their hearts, why not let The Lovely Jonjo, resident at every Lndnrs fav Monday night indie disco (RIP), fill it with his Hot Boy treatment of We Have Band’s You Came Out that crams a whole evenings worth of Durrr sonics into just 5 minutes.
Like a well oiled hardbody the new effort from horrorcore italo disco maestro Antoni Maiovvi throbs and glistens in all the right places.
You can just imagine this playing in the background as the gakked up leaders of the G8 simultaneously hang out in Berlusconi’s pool and the back of perilously young models this week.
Antoni Maiovvi – The Chase (Part 1)
New album ‘Shadow of the Bloodstained Kiss’ muscles its way into our lives on the 3rd of August via the evergreen Seed Records.
Whilst my other half (or third now I guess) is out being wined and dined by PRs and watching bright young things prance about on stage, I am, as usual, at home indulging in a double bill of NCIS and DIY.
Still it does give me the chance to get the jump on the Slutty Fringe inbox and post up two new remixes from Rong/DFA/etc etc types WhateverWhatever.
This time the NY duo have taken it upon themselves to slice and dice ginger chart topper La Roux and Trouble Andrew and the end results sound a hell of a lot better to these ears.
Just sometimes the social diary of the average London blogger makes up for the constant email harrassment from Don Diablo’s management and pointless EMI mailouts.
Last week it was private listening party for Tyondai Battles forthcoming debut on Warp (which incidentally sounds like Disneys Fantasia dipped in LSD)
Tonight it’s a dapper affair for Flo & Co’s album launch and a second chance to impress for Flo & Co after their performance at Hoxton Square Bear & Grylll last year left us cold.
Then Saturday we’re hanging with our Swedish pals Discobellers at the Awesome party in Shoreditch – they’re playing with Cobra Krames, DJ Wool from The Glass and lots of Berlin types- we’ll be indulging in the free bar and discussing the merits of Reebok trainers combined with hot pants.
Should the prospect of free drink and jumping music in Shoreditch entice – drop a email entitled AWESOME here and you’re in – simple son.
If you want some musics here are remixes of NiYi by Krames and DJ Wool.
Bugged Out hold hands with Kill Em All and descend on Fabric once more this Friday in celebration of Brodinski’s forthcoming induction into the Suck My Deck hall of fame.
Such a joint venture joins the dots betwixt the acid houseos, technos and the discos effortlessly with the likes of Holy Ghost, Moon Unit, Reeeton, JoJo Da Freq and The Techno Patrick Swayze adding some additional wow factor to a lineup topped by the beardy frenchman.
The one blot being the appearance of the rumblestrips on the lineup…
The nice kids at Fabric have decided to entrust Slutty Fringe with two copies of Brodi’s aforementioned Bugged Out debut which, in a rare act of charity, we have decided to give away.
For your chance to win such a prize simply compose an email with the title Brodi Sucked My Deck, include an answer to the following quandry and send here
Which Peanuts character did scary looking 40 something B.E.P. singer Fergie voice in her youth?
I’m never totally sure if we’re supposed to be over Ed Banger. Doubly so since last week’s brutal Stalinist editorial witch hunt after we were described as being a ‘Banging Electro Blog’.
Anyway whether we’re feigning indifference or not, I’m sure they couldn’t care less and there’s a big Ed Banger party at The Coronet here in London next week marking their 6 1/2 birthday, that will no doubt be big fun.
If like me though you’ll be literally 100 yards away at the sexier Magic Waves Festival and feel left out/too old then you can download this mix Feadz has knocked together and throw your own crazy Ed Banger party in your flat.
Actually I think it’s time for Feadz to put Uffie down and get on with a solo album, I was listening to some of those early releases on Bpitch tthe other day and they still sound solid, something I’m sure he’ll be happy to hear.
N.A.S.A. – Strange Enough Feat. Karen O, Odb & Fatlip (Mr Oizo Rmx)
Young L – Climbin’ Up That Pole
Black Eyed Peas – Let The Beat Rock (Boys Noize Rmx)
L’il B – We Can Go Down
Das Glow – I Want To Wake Up With U
Major Lazer – When You Hear The Bassline Feat. Ms Thing
Rob Threezy – You Bad (Dj Sega Rmx)
Feadz – Age 21
Alex Cortex – Reminisce
Tiga – Shoes (Mr Oizo Rmx)
Joakim – Watermelon Bubblicious
Cashmere – Horny
T Pain – Can’t Believe It Rmx Feat. Justin Timberlake
Ceephax – Acid On Sea
Das Glow – Jerrycan
Siriusmo – The Door
Kanye West – Robocop (Motor Club Rmx)
Diddy – Hold Me Down Freestyle
Corey Rockstar – I’m Cut
Feadz – Constant Ovulation
Tc – Where’s My Money (Caspa V L-Vis 1990 Dubblestep Edit)
Lil B – Rave Rap
Keri Hilson – Turning Me On Rmx Feat. T-Pain & L’il Wayne
Shady Nate – Baby Baghdad
Siriusmo – Night Off
Can’t help but feel underwhelmed by SMD’s Audacity of Huge and it’s many remixes.
The original has a quite embarrassing attempt at whiteboy rap from the Yeasayer dude, whilst the remixes seem to exist solely as filler in mixes – sad state of affairs when a Chicken Lips remix doesn’t rattle our shiney disco balls.
Here, in what is something of a blog exclusive, Allez Allez attempt something more with a remix that uses less of the original – some nice warm melodic 808 led techno perfect for the current heatwave.
Whilst we enjoy a mini heatwave here in the UK I’ve decided to make the most of it and bust out the white suit, espadrilles and Wayfarers. Who says British men can’t do fashion.
Unfortunately as much fun as that sounds, with my record collection currently boxed up I’ve been lacking the essential soundtrack for such attire.
Luckily riding to the rescue today came Casionova, leading light of the Cyber Dance / Magic Waves crew, with this fruity mix of italo classics, old and new. Perfect.
Casionova – The Man From I-T-A-L-O
Now if you like the sound of that, and for the future of our ongoing relationship I’ll just take it as read that you do, you’ll also want to buy a bus/tube/train/plane ticket for the Magic Waves Festival.
Featuring what is probably the most obscene line-up of italo/electro live acts and DJs you’ll find under one roof this year (Fred Ventura, Legowelt, Alden Tyrell, Heartbreak, Den Haan… seriously the lineup goes on and on and on, far too many to list here) it all goes down on the 10th and 11th of July at the much loved Corsica Studios.
For lots more of this kind of thing check out the Magic Waves archive where you’ll find tonnes of mixes to download or stream.
It looks like all that lurking around in the background has finally paid off and it’s the turn of Shit Robot to get some of that top LCD/EMI dollar thrown their way. With two years having elapsed since the release of Chasm, Marcus Lambkin is finally back with a new EP ‘Simple Things’ and this time people are starting to pay more attention.
Of course the fact that the EP has an absolutely sublime Todd Terje remix is one reason it’s been high on our wish lists for months now, but generally there’s the feeling that this year Lambkin will properly emerge from the shadow of his labelmates much like The Juan Maclean have done.
Anyway there’s still a couple of weeks to wait for the EP to drop (street date July 14th), so in the mean time sate yourself with this mix that the robot recently assembled.
Mathias Modica aka Munk aka the boss of the wonderful Gomma label dropped by Be the other week to play quite a poptastic set.
Luckily he was caught in the act and now you too can get your freak on to it at home.
Also playing that night were The Chap, who as you can see below were on top form as usual. Pretty good night all round really!
And that serves as a handy reminder that if you’re in London tonight and at a loose end we’re throwing a party with The Chap’s label Lo Recordings, and Parisian legends Tigersushi.
Come join us, Joakim, Krikor, DyE, James Rutledge, Gatto Fritto, Cursor Miner and mooooore at Corsica Studios, it should be incroyable.
Right I’m off to collect the Tigersushi crew from L’Eurostar, ooh la la!
