Indie-Dance / Punk-Funk - What Went Wrong The First Time?

This question could surely be posed about any fashionable sound that isn't entirely new?

(I am really hoping someone will have something brilliant to say, as I always flouder with this question).

Having said that, I do like that Junior Senior hit song that's been playing on MTV, but that's exactly because it has little to do with indie or even rock.

and yet your favourite band of all time are the Happy Mondays

(Actually Dr C, Hopkins etc to thread ha ha)

but then i dont really hear any dance music in dfa et al, it is more a rehash of an established and rediscovered hybrid than anything else, ie, its not a hybrid at all

I've never heard Gang of Four, incidentally, and am going entirely on received wisdom here, but surely the difference between 80s punk funk and 90s punk funk is that we've had 15 odd years of post acid house dance music in between whose influence is naturally going to permeate?

I agree with Gareth, incidentally, it is a weak genre because any type of fusion of house and rock generally involves putting a curb on the best aspects of house and rock.

I don't know if this is the case, to believe that you have to believe that this fusion isn't possible because putting a curb on the best aspects of both renders it not a fusion at all. if you listen to something like the dfa remix of dance to the underground I think there's a clear rock vibe to the whole track despite it fitting the house mould in terms of being instrumental, centred around a repetetive beat and drums.

Even the drums are totally, undeniably like real rock drums but it isn't a rock track. It's the old ILM description of rock ideas done with house instruments or vice versa.

ah but the Chromeo remix...

With something like House of Jealous Lovers (which is one of the few examples I can think of where this sort of thing is done well), you always get the feeling that the house people are digging it for the house aspects of it and the rock fans are attracted by the raucuous guitars and shouty vocals. Maybe I'm wrong, but a lot of the indie webzine articles I've read on the Rapture don't even seem to acknowledge the house influence.

This is all good stuff. Steve otm about the ahem, "fusion" process. I bet this will just end up like my favourite arg. abt infinity by people saying "well how do you define dance" and we all giving up as PROVED BY SCIENCE dance music = the sisters of mercy.

x-post, Sarah the beat is about as housey and loud as you can get a real drum kit to sound like, and the breakdown fits the house structure, even if it is all rock. I remember reading alot of interviews with the DFA where they stressed how long it took them to make it so it would sound really good in a club, and also how many arguments they had with the Rapture about it.

I would say though, HoJL is less dancey than loads of other DFA stuff, it's big because it happens to be the best, regardless of genre.

(xpost, or what Ronan said, and he is right about the lines blurring of course)

Or I might just go for the Rapture now you've reminded me how much I loved em at Glasto.

I don't think the pernicious influence of Morrisey on UK indie music in the mid-Eighties can be understated.

You're wrong. Every fule knows that that was the Byrds 'What's Happening'. ;o)

This from an article about Punk Funk written when Weatherall's 9 O'Clock Drop compilation was released (2000/2001?):

"With the breathtakingly precise and endlessly seminal ESG having recently played over here to enthusiastic crowds (most will have still been at school the last time they visited the UK to play the opening night of The Hacienda in 1982) and Nuphonic Records about to release a Weatherall complied selection of post punk/industrial funk, there is something clearly in the air.

So why does a brash and quirky culture clash sound from 20 years ago have an enthusiastic Evisu -wearing post-house generation in it's grip? The most obvious answer is also the right one. Punk Funk's shaky humanity- the sound of human beings struggling with the exacting  near-mathematic precision pulse of James Brown's rhythmic templates- and the exotic collision of black and white musics is really the only fun in town when formula dictates almost all other forms of dance music."

and this from liner notes he wrote for a Patrick Adams compilation:

"Though many have tried, it’s hard to free disco of the negative associations that have shadowed it. ‘Disco Sucks’, they still say. Boney M and Baccara, Syndrum mania and shallow glamour. It’s not real music; it always sounds the same. I could invite you round to my house and play you 1000 records which would open your eyes to a world of music as rich and as meaningful as any revered in rock or jazz or whatever else you care to write post-grad theses around. But you’d want to bring your mates and I haven’t the room, or the teabags. Instead, you should purchase this record immediately- an empirical document no less, and witness to the fact that there is more to disco than the Brothers Gibb and the glitterball conceits of Hollywood directors."

-That's- what went wrong the first time.

The interesting thing about that excerpt quoted, though, is that it doesn't actually say anything negative about those acts, merely that people automatically assume those acts are proof of the genre's badness somehow. (Admittedly I'm probably splitting hairs here).

Too much of a pop band, probably, though Rip It Up works perfectly just before Central Line's Walking Into Sunshine -- due in large part to that synth bass Dan mentioned.

Any mention of Patrick Adams on ILM makes me fall out of my chair.

The Orange Juice = Chic + Velvets thing has always struck me as entirely bogus and existing only in E. Collins's head, especially the original line-up. Just indie/Byrds jangle really. Main problem = the drums : too busy and no feel.

And Zeke Manyika was a pretty dandy drummer.

incidently, you may keep the change.

Was that a pop at me? If it was I'll see you outside.

I like Ewing's question on this long and involved thread, and I like still more N's responses, which are very funny sometimes. I wonder what happened to him.

Great thread indeed, think I'll settle in for a reread. Tom's point about why revivals happen when they do in the original question is key but also I think now potentially changed irrevocably thanks to ye olde Internet.

look, it's simple really. at some point 80's synth-pop and dance music started sounding good to 90's punkers(i recall a long ago men's recovery project show during their kraftwerk phase), but they also grew up with similar sounds all around them. on the radio. on mtv. etc, etc.it wasn't completely alien to them.and joy division has been a badge of high school honor for years. they didn't even need to hear actual dance music

...

so really the question is: why did it take indie rockers so long to latch on to something that's been in the air and on the airwaves since 1982? which is easy to answer. indie-rockers are notoriously slow, unimaginative and desperately afraid of looking foolish and for a long time in indie-land admitting that you liked old synth-pop singles just wasn't cool. but now it's okay and we can all feel free to marvel at their ingeniousness.and i do marvel at dfa's ingeniousness or at least that new lcd single which i love.(but it's more dance music than anything else-not really rock)

Yes, I read the whole thread. I like it and find it quite thoughtful and interesting, except when this geezer comes on and starts making lists of things that he would play at a disco.

:(

Stacy Q - "Two of Hearts"

thx

I listened to Paul Morley's 'Rock's Beating Art' radio doc yesterday - it's very good (but only talks to Eno and Byrne briefly and is more based on stuff before with Cage as starting point).

How is Screamadelica not mentioned on this thread?

it's only called indie-dance because the name on the sleeve was primal scream.

idk if the band of that name really had much to do with it.

Not that that means it isn't worth asking, but the wider question of fashions come and go is a big one.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 11 December 2003 11:39 (6 years ago) Bookmark

sunspots is the answer to this one

all music and fashion and political cycles definitely tied to sunspot activity

I'd ask where Red Hot Chili Peppers fit into this but I fear shitstorms
― nate detritus (natedetritus), Thursday, December 11, 2003 1:08 PM (6 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Andy Gill produced their debut, yo.

The Guilt
The Guilt
(HepTown Records)
Release Date: 5/5/2017
Formats: LP, Digi

http://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/01/db/7d/01db7da5b91febda793ae82140e9b13c.jpg

http://open.spotify.com/album/0FsLgwYCB20DdyW0Jc8iZM
http://guiltswe.bandcamp.com/album/the-guilt

This seemed like a good place to plug The Guilt, a Swedish duo whose eponymous album I am currently smitten with. Though they don't seem quite as politically motivated as Le Tigre or as intentionally outrageous as Peaches, the band's extremely accessible dance punk will impact the same neurons.

Some video clips from the album:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhCbGanLErY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lVKu5gI0y4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmxcPYQ7Hgw