Notes from a suburban raver - DannyL's list

[luka]

He remembered the first installments of the electric
body, how the new nerves had shivered and trembled.
He remembered Ronald Reagan’s refulgent face.

that;s an extract from a poem i love called the day dostoyevsky discovered the meaning of life in a dream

and i thought of it when i heard a synth line in one these records that played a new set of nerves, the nerves of the electric body which was then under construction an entirely new sensation no acoustic instrument can supply

 

[DannyL]

It's one of the reasons that music spoke to kids I think - it embodied the textures of modern life, made playing a guitar just seem ridiculous.

 

[luka]

the electric guitar must have been a similar thing i guess

 

[DannyL]

This was a contender for the chart above - listen to that fucking bassline

I remember it at the time but it didn't strike me with the same future shock as it does now, as I was immersed.

 

[DannyL]

I wasn't joking when I used the phrase "Neoliberal bangers" -

 

[linebaugh]

Everyone knows The Finest, surely? (Actually starts playing in my head every time I'm in fucking Tescos and see The Finest range), trying to think of a few tunes that are not totally obvious, so I thought I'd go for this slow burner:

13. SOS Band - Weekend Girl

someone, possibly you, posted this camron song that samples this prominently awhile back that I love

 

[linebaugh]

I said these tunes are bringing back weird memories, this one seems mostly associated, not with a terribly sad love affair, but with failing Physics. Me and a couple of mates basically used to sit at the back of the class singing Anita Baker tunes and breaking the equipment. We were challenged on it by the teacher once or twice but had zero motivation. I remember walking out the exam, after not being able to do any of it. I didn't care, I had Anita.

16. Anita Baker - Sweet Love

since youve posted a few of these type tracks in a row, Im always suprised how this stuff is so universal on here. I think most people my age, at least americans, grow up finding this stuff repulsive. like if it came on in company, youd start getting all hot in the face. secon hand embarrassment. I like it now, but only after some 'unlearning.'

 

[linebaugh]

not exactly groundbreaking to say people from different time and places are different, but seeing you all talk about this stuff like its your comfort zone, a return home, while for people like me its physically revolting is always interesting to me.

 

[linebaugh]

and that its the music of your youth is interesting. did you not hate the world/yourself when you were 15? I thought that was universal. stuff like this is completely opposed to that mindset

This was a contender for the chart above - listen to that fucking bassline

 

[DannyL]

someone, possibly you, posted this camron song that samples this prominently awhile back that I love

No I'd not heard that before, cheers.

 

[DannyL]

since youve posted a few of these type tracks in a row, Im always suprised how this stuff is so universal on here. I think most people my age, at least americans, grow up finding this stuff repulsive. like if it came on in company, youd start getting all hot in the face. secon hand embarrassment. I like it now, but only after some 'unlearning.'

That's interesting. There's a similar response in some British circles tbh, esp those strongly invested in more dissonant sounds, alternative rock experimental stuff. In the last few years, these kind of sounds have had a critical reappraisal - lots of smooth jazz, house and garage has all been reframed in this way, so the response to 80s soul is kinda part of that - it almost becomes the vanguard in a way because it's so different from what's come before. This is a half developed thought and I'll have to come back and fully frame it in a minute.

 

[DannyL]

and that its the music of your youth is interesting. did you not hate the world/yourself when you were 15? I thought that was universal. stuff like this is completely opposed to that mindset

In a lot of ways when I first heard it for definite, just as rap was, this music was anti-hegemonic, though it would never have discussed itself in that way. It was black music first and foremost, and as such wasn't played or heard on mainstream radio or TV, you had to seek it out. It was largely heard on pirate radio or small shows squeezed into a mainstream station's programming. It's fanbase was mostly working class, and that's a huge component in England. Indie music/guitar music was for middle class cunts and wankers, the sort of people you'd give a shoeing to if you ever met them, which you rarely did. I mentioned upthread the crossover this this sort of stuff and football hooliganism. It's music for dancing and pulling. Me and a few mates always used to joke we'd never hear the end of "Somebody's Else Guy" by Jocelyn Brown when we were out 'cos a table would always be getting turned over, and someone would be shouting "Wayne! Leave him! He's not worth it!"

That all started to change in England when the brighter working class kids started going off to University en masse but that was a 90s phenomena really, one accentuated by the Blair years. I'm old enough to be talking from an 80s perspective which is when I came of age.

So one of the things you identified with listening to this stuff was it wasn't the mainstream at the time - that's probably less true with Anita Baker than other stuff in the thread tbh.

 

[WashYourHands]

Me and a few mates always used to joke we'd never hear the end of "Somebody's Else Guy" by Jocelyn Brown when we were out 'cos a table would always be getting turned over, and someone would be shouting "Wayne! Leave him! He's not worth it!"

critical point, listening to music where violence is/was immediate and unavoidable but the Wayne line is funnily familar, the girl shouting after Wayne eventually taking a heel off to open up someone else’s face while her man and his mates melee

 

[DannyL]

That probably reads quite weirdly 'cos I'm trying to relate my own personal trajectory and the blinkers I had them to demographic changes I grew up through. The TLDR is that class and race are weird shaping factors in the UK in a different way than the US. I think Gus seems to read this as if I'm still defending or inside these positions and I'm not, they're just absolutely caught up with music fandom though.

 

[DannyL]

critical point, listening to music where violence is/was immediate and unavoidable but the Wayne line is funnily familar, the girl shouting after Wayne eventually taking a heel off to open up someone else’s face while her man and his mates melee

Can literally recall having it said about me, as someone lurched towards me, pint glass in hand, i think his name was Dean though. Jocelyn Brown wasn't playing at the time though to be honest.

 

[DannyL]

Going up to clubs in the West End was a way away from the violence actually. That trajectory - suburbs to West End was pretty common at the time, thus the thread title. The 80s soul was suburban stuff, but the rare groove and jazz was absolutely West End.

 

[thirdform]

and that its the music of your youth is interesting. did you not hate the world/yourself when you were 15? I thought that was universal. stuff like this is completely opposed to that mindset

That's not a thing in the UK in the same way it is in Murika. There are of course outposts of hardcore punk, hare metal, and of course extreme metal is its own self-contained scene which is quite big, but miserable kids music is more Bauhaus and the Smiths. and you know, who wants that? When your 15 year misery has to have a degree of passion.

Also in most of the world miserable music is for adults more than it is kids. I hate the world as a teenager is a very rock phenomenon.

 

[thirdform]

That's interesting. There's a similar response in some British circles tbh, esp those strongly invested in more dissonant sounds, alternative rock experimental stuff.

true, but there's also the indie adjacent balearic dance continuum in the UK, Linda Di Franco, William Pitt, The Wooden Tops etc. Even the Blue Nile, sort of.

Not sure if this exists in the same way in America.

 

[thirdform]

my favourite balearic song is orchestral manoeuvres in the dark - electricity. balearic happy hardcore. whats yours @luka ?

 

[DannyL]

A lot of the 80s soul stuff in this thread was aspirational really - music for an emerging black bourgeoise. And that was kinda weirdly radical - black people with money? Kinda the more refined cousin of hip hop's obsession - gold ropes and ice down medallions.

To reject all those trappings, you have to be in a stronger position to start with. You don't get the unequivocal rejection of society in black music, you get succeeding in it on your own terms. Perhaps you find the strongest message of rejection in reggae but even that rests on a community of believers, and the return to the promised land.