'nuum Poll
blissblogger
Well-known member
Q: why was funky not on the list of choices?
i ask because the other day i was thinking about starting a thread titled something like "funky in hindsight" or something...
something reminded me of it and i was wondering what people now thought about .... what had emerged as a canon of tunes... how many stood up still... etc
cos from my admittedly unengaged standpoint, it feels like... well, hardly anything has ascended to that sort of pantheonic status of your 'renegade snares' and 'terrorist' and 'some justice' or 'Destiny' or "Oi!' or whatever later classics.
funky does seem to be the moment when the N turned inwards, so inwardly focused that it couldn't reach beyond its core demographic.
(with the freak exception - incredibly enjoyable to hear in a car in LA - of drake's "one dance" with its canny salvaging-for-Global-Pop-utility of Kyla /Crazy's "Do You Mind")
not that this would preventfunky from generating a Canon... but, well, is there one?
perhaps there's a legion of funky-nostalgics out there who are fondly recalling the music's moment in the late 2000s
i ask because the other day i was thinking about starting a thread titled something like "funky in hindsight" or something...
something reminded me of it and i was wondering what people now thought about .... what had emerged as a canon of tunes... how many stood up still... etc
cos from my admittedly unengaged standpoint, it feels like... well, hardly anything has ascended to that sort of pantheonic status of your 'renegade snares' and 'terrorist' and 'some justice' or 'Destiny' or "Oi!' or whatever later classics.
funky does seem to be the moment when the N turned inwards, so inwardly focused that it couldn't reach beyond its core demographic.
(with the freak exception - incredibly enjoyable to hear in a car in LA - of drake's "one dance" with its canny salvaging-for-Global-Pop-utility of Kyla /Crazy's "Do You Mind")
not that this would preventfunky from generating a Canon... but, well, is there one?
perhaps there's a legion of funky-nostalgics out there who are fondly recalling the music's moment in the late 2000s
not really i could never get with funky. speed garage has all sorts of little intricate syncopations. in funky it's that same bloody bongo loop. really tedious.
most proper house after 97 doesn't really do much for me either.
thing is speed garage made sense because we don't go to church. so it was that gospel ecstasy retooled for a UK context. funky was UK people trying to do soulful house. pleasant enough and would make for great warm up dance music but there's not really a transcendence there.
blissblogger
Well-known member
oh now i remember what it was that me think of funky
was just in Lisbon where there's a lot of Afro influenced dance music (post-colonial legacy of the Portuguese empire, which was substantial - did you know that the Luosophone sphere is extensive enough that Portuguese is actually the 7th widest spoken language in the world? Yes i read the Wiki entry on the plane)
kept hearing this beat and realised that variants of it or similar things to it inform a lot of dance music of the last 10 to 15 years - not the exact same beat, but a kind of approach to drums and the beat-structure that is the opposite of anything that involves the 808 bass boom - in other words, it's very much NOT working in a funk way, or a Timbaland way (extension / complication of funk), but nor is it a reggae feel either
this is a "calling Barty!" moment innit
partly it's just down to the production, how big, thick, wide you can make a drum with today's sound design capacities
but it's also the pattern
the result = a massive, imposing beat that slashes stridently across the soundfield, juddering your body with each giant thwack of rhythm
the clattery bombast of it makes me think of i dunno Maori warrior chants or spears being bashed against shields
it does seem "Afro" or tribal, in some way but also it's not dissimilar to reggaeton
funky had a beat edging towards to this, what at the time I thought of in terms of "soca" (and thus a turn-off).
But then there's things that are rather different in vibe but similar - Jam City's 'Classical Curves' is an arty IDM variant of it (there's a crashing, smashing-glass, sado-bondage flagellatory edge to it ) and that has been super-influential in a lot of experimental electronic stuff of recent years, your Sophies and all that lot)
anyway, it seems like the Rhythm of Our Time - but it doesn't do a lot for me.
was just in Lisbon where there's a lot of Afro influenced dance music (post-colonial legacy of the Portuguese empire, which was substantial - did you know that the Luosophone sphere is extensive enough that Portuguese is actually the 7th widest spoken language in the world? Yes i read the Wiki entry on the plane)
kept hearing this beat and realised that variants of it or similar things to it inform a lot of dance music of the last 10 to 15 years - not the exact same beat, but a kind of approach to drums and the beat-structure that is the opposite of anything that involves the 808 bass boom - in other words, it's very much NOT working in a funk way, or a Timbaland way (extension / complication of funk), but nor is it a reggae feel either
this is a "calling Barty!" moment innit
partly it's just down to the production, how big, thick, wide you can make a drum with today's sound design capacities
but it's also the pattern
the result = a massive, imposing beat that slashes stridently across the soundfield, juddering your body with each giant thwack of rhythm
the clattery bombast of it makes me think of i dunno Maori warrior chants or spears being bashed against shields
it does seem "Afro" or tribal, in some way but also it's not dissimilar to reggaeton
funky had a beat edging towards to this, what at the time I thought of in terms of "soca" (and thus a turn-off).
But then there's things that are rather different in vibe but similar - Jam City's 'Classical Curves' is an arty IDM variant of it (there's a crashing, smashing-glass, sado-bondage flagellatory edge to it ) and that has been super-influential in a lot of experimental electronic stuff of recent years, your Sophies and all that lot)
anyway, it seems like the Rhythm of Our Time - but it doesn't do a lot for me.
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You got any examples? was quite into dj marfox and dj nigga fox a few years ago but yeah it was missing a sort of bottom heavy low end for me.
I completely forgot about it whilst making the poll.
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As for tunes which still stand up:
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sometimes i think hardcore has ruined my musical taste for ever. like this funky stuff is all too dainty. would rather put on some nigerian funk. had i not listened to jungle till around 2012 maybe then I'd be less sceptical. that being said I'd still play some of it in a house set. actually amazing how much nuum music became side salad after 06. same with dubstep. i don't ride it off like luke, but it has to be a flavour amongst many. you know what it is though it's basically working in the same beat confines and just moving shit around within them.
I ride off deep tech though. I'll still sometimes put on a marcus nasty set. not a strange static deep tech show though. like one or two interesting tunes for 2 hours can't be me.
I ride off deep tech though. I'll still sometimes put on a marcus nasty set. not a strange static deep tech show though. like one or two interesting tunes for 2 hours can't be me.
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blissblogger
Well-known member
big and bangy beats
this sort of thing (sounds much more dominating in a club needless to say)
(i spose gqom is in the vicinity)
(and probably other African sounds that hipsters discovered like kuduro)
it's an idea of "African" that is not at all like the slinky lilt and 2-steppy bob-and-weave of all that lovely ( if over sugary) Auto-tuned Afrobeats
a musical "Africa" that is all about percussion, rather than melody and mellifluousness
this sort of thing (sounds much more dominating in a club needless to say)
(i spose gqom is in the vicinity)
(and probably other African sounds that hipsters discovered like kuduro)
it's an idea of "African" that is not at all like the slinky lilt and 2-steppy bob-and-weave of all that lovely ( if over sugary) Auto-tuned Afrobeats
a musical "Africa" that is all about percussion, rather than melody and mellifluousness
blissblogger
Well-known member
it won't let me post more than 1 video per message so apologies for what follows