January 22, 2004
Bedroom Disco.
Forget the micro-categories for once. Italo Disco? Let's just call it Disco and be done with it. Italo as a conceptual grouping must be one of the weakest I've encountered anyway. No it's not necessarily Italian, no it's not necessarily European, it doesn't seem to have a sensible window of time (extending back and forth nearly fifteen years), it blurs deeply into Hi-NRG, New Wave Electro, Disco and even House. I'm fed up with the term frankly; if you're gonna categorise do it with panache. It's a bit of fraff innit. Likewise "Grime", but for different reasons. Grime is a crap term I've decided, and henceforth I will be referring to music of it's ilk as Garage. Not UK Garage, just Garage. I've never had trouble confusing it with the Paradise Garage or Nuggets/Pebbles variety in any context, so why should anyone else?
The JPEG above is a scan of the label of Rephlex records latest (re)-release. the Legendary Black Devil Disco Club EP. I think they're shaping up to be the world's greatest reissue label. Hipper than Soul Jazz (by a few nautical miles) and unlike Strutt/Nuphonic (RIP) packing a serious roster of new acts. OK (ahem) only 2 or so records under their belt, but doing proud. I hope they follow this path. You got a problem with that? You got a problem with me supporting them? Good.
The Black Devil Disco Club record has picked up a tranche (well a slither then!) of notoriety right here in the Woebot comments box. Here and here. It's been on constant rotation since I got my copy, a wholly 'riginal masterpiece of Bedroom Disco, up there with later examples of the genre The Black Dog's "Virtual" and KMA's "Kaotic Madness." Lean back and feel the mattresses on the walls. The tracks go and on, pedalling sheer gourgeousness for ten minutes a side, grooves which twitch and resettle, voices doubled and masked by repetitive synthsaxsquelches, hidden depths blinking open issuing striating bleeps. "Timing, Forget the Timing" and "One to Choose" bleed into one another, an upbeat and a drawn breath and we're in the same low-curving re-shaping trance-arc. Wicked.
The whole thing reminded me of nothing so much as this:
Which shares with the B.D.D.C. the same sonic scuzz and after-fuzz; I mentioned this in the Ra piece. Disco but nasty. Euro (White) Trash on a dancefloor field-trip. I know next to nothing about it, and there are only the merest fragments of data covering it on the net. Brilliant.
And check this, a bit of Throbbing Gristle-style Disco proper! I'd like to hear Kevin Blechdom do a cover of this. Awesome.
Posted by Woebot at January 22, 2004 04:35 PMcheck environ records unclassics series of rare and forgotten disco as well ..
http://www.environrecords.com/index_discog.html
Jesus - that track is magic - cheers.
Posted by: jed at January 22, 2004 08:14 PMinteresting theory positing the nu-hip rating of Rephlex vs. e.g., Soul Jazz.
also good idea about 'grime'.
D.C. LaRue?!
is that Danny LaRue??
Posted by: scott at January 22, 2004 08:30 PMThose Rephlex hipsters, eh? can't fault em.
And Throbbing Gristle re-issues are a good idea. But where to start..? Persuasion (motor remix) - it's more click-house than disco but it's been played to death round here.
Dear Woe,
Indoor Life was an american band, yeah, sure they were big in europe but they were from the USA. I saw them live too, it was in a weird jazz/salsa club in paris (la chapelle des lombards, I think) but all I can remember was that the singer had this strange trick of turning his back to us and make it wiggle like there were a whole lotta small bugs inside his muscles. I don't know how he achieved this, his entire back was twitching as if randomly electrified, it was a bit ridiculous come to think of it, but if he didn't have this trick, what would I remember of Indoor Life live ?
Votre,
Guy.
you see who produced the Indoor Life stuff, right?
But I would like to register my disagreement in regards to the usefullness of the term italo. First of all, it's different then most of the micro-categories in that it's not applied retroactively, necessarily. I mean, from 1984 untill now, a large slice of disco with a specific set of criteria has been defined as italo. Maybe I only have an insider perspective as someone who's obsessed over it for a few years, or maybe it's a "I know it when I hear it" thing. Reasons why it exists?/my definitions: Italo is NOT from anywhere but Canada or Europe. If it's from San Francisco it's Hi-NRG and there's a noticable different feel/sound. If it's from NY, it's Bobby O! If it's from the UK, it's New Wave. There is something about these backgrounds, for instance in the UK, where was the electronic disco scene? There was Andy Sojka/Atmosfear but that's something else. Everything else was coming out of New Wave, so there's a very different feel to it. Italo producers were dance music people first, influenced by New Wave, not the other way around. There's a difference you can hear. Fuzz Dance may sound New Wave, and you can sure dance to Yaz and Soft Cell and the Human League, but they aren't Italo.
Part of it that nobody talks about is the DRAMA. The influence of not just Ennio Morricone but like, broadway musicals, these big sweeping melodies. I recently got an italo record, yes, it was from the Netherlands, that sounds like Andrew Lloyd Weber wrote it. Other then the associates, the UK New Wave acts, even(especially?) at their most disco still had a punk aesthetic, or more accurately, they couldn't sing and didn't know how to handle key changes.
Anyway, I guess my main point is this isn't some retroactively applied micro-genre, it's been in use for years and years and years, defining a very specific cannon. Can't say the same for a term like "electro."
dan
Posted by: dan selzer at January 24, 2004 01:15 AMooh you're more slippery than a conga eel dan ;-)
Posted by: matt at January 24, 2004 04:40 PMsee up on the rephlex slate: var "grime" cat 156
wot gives?
I know they have signed Mark One/Plasticman....
Matt?
there is a wee clip of black devil here if your're interested as well as some other stuff
http://wagonchrist.iwarp.com/interview.html