Minimoog
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Uncertain Times reacts to my TAFKAP post[1]. And posts wm classic #55; "Tainted Love"[2] by Gloria Jones. I'd like to throw in Ann Peebles's "I Can't Stand the Rain"[3] and O. V. Wright's version[4] of Latimore's "Let's Straighten it Out" as number 56 and 57.
The "Rain" track by Peebles is a curious example of an 808-sounding bassline (but more probably generated by a minimoog) which can also be heard on "Why Can't We Live Together?"[5] (which was wmc #2) and some of Perry's work, such as "Kentucky Skank" and to a lesser degree "Soul Fire"[6], with its cow-bell-style percussion.
While we're on the subject of Perry: check "The City Too Hot" and a very nice selection of other Perry material.[7].
Ann Peebles http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CCrA5Lq5XU
The Fold (2008) will premiere 2008 August 3. It is an erotically-based science fiction series.
I may have dismissed Philip Sherburne's piece on the current state of beats too quickly in my recent comment.[8]
The piece came my way via Simon Reynolds[9] a couple of days back:
- "Philip Sherburne addresses the malaise in electronic dance culture (i didn't know the economic side of it had gotten that parlous) and convenes a kind of brain trust to come up with remedies. --Simon Reynolds
And thus starts Sherburne's piece:
"Everything feels fucked up. The environment, the economy, war, terrorism, ..." --Philip Sherburne [10]
Regarding the economic side Sherburne says:
- "Still, dance music is suffering from some very real maladies, many of them economic. Record sales are declining-- labels that once could confidently move 1,000 copies of a 12" single now struggle to sell 250-- and legal downloads, while presumably growing, aren't taking up the slack."
As I said in my comment I find it hard to imagine that beats are going out of fashion.
Witness these beats set to The Stones's "You Can't Always Get What You Want"[11] remix[12] by Belgian dance-punkers Soulwax. Listen for the choral arrangements by Jack Nitzsche.
Regarding beats going out of fashion from a theoretical point of view.
The beat is a celebration of dance, dance is a celebration of hedonism. Hedonism flourishes in economic booms. Today is an era of poverty. Beats do not fit in poverty. Perhaps. But. Counter example one: the beats of Lindy Hop during Depression America. So evidence inconclusive, but if I had to investigate I would follow the economic boom/malaise route.
