The Last Great Dance Band

just wanna get this NEW since i like the question so much. my feelings are still where they were in the thread where this originated.

Does Dymaxion count as a "dance band?"

i think i, meaning we, meaning me and tracer (?), meaning ilm as a whole (?), defined dance *band* as anything thats NOT a dj, producer, someone who fiddles around in cubase or with an akai...(not that i think these are bad things mind you, blah blah)...you can get into real tricky territory here, with the deployment of real time sampling, blah blah...so i guess we're saying any band which uses analogue sound *producing* rather than *reproducing* instruments in real time, live...

Do you have to have danced to the band live to vote? Anybody ever actually see ESG live?

no, but your answer will be sorted much higher in the Band-On-A-Tron.

Happy Mondays innit? They were a "proper" band. Date? Somewhere april of 1991 in Paradiso Amsterdam. Other proof? 'Loose Fit'.

MMM yes Omar. I'm realizing that one of my personal criteria, the full extent of which neither you nor I will ever know, is that I'm imagining this Dance Band performing at a CLUB. which i guess the Mondays prolly did. did they?

sub-sub question: when did Prince part with The Revolution?

It's a fact! ESG just played the Ladyfest Midwest in Chicago a month or so ago. It's a fact!

Is EU's "Doin' Da Butt" exemplary of go-go? Or is EU not a go-go band; I thought they were.

From the Snarky Answer Dept. - the last great dance band is OBVIOUSLY the Melvins.

"is that I'm imagining this Dance Band performing at a CLUB"

hmmm..should we tack on a rider to this amendment where we state that *dancing* and *not* the bands actual performance is still the goal of their game?

I saw both ESG and Liquid Liquid live. I danced more to ESG. They were so good. I wonder if 99 Records ripped them off like they did Liquid Liquid?

I don't have a more recent answer to your question, Tracer, except, maybe, I don't know, Luscious Jackson? Except I wouldn't call them "great". But I'm sure they saw ESG and Liquid Liquid many times...

Also, Tracer--loved your "Minutemen as black girls from the Bronx" desciption.

Thank you. I was trying to get at the loose feel they've got, while sneakily building a tension that makes you think thy could just explode all over you. Just so casually brilliant. I'm sincerely jealous that you got to shake it to ESG. What was the place/crowd like? How did you end up going? etc.

That's pretty much what I thought you meant, although much more eloquently expressed than I ever could!

The one ESG show I really remember was at Hurrah, a rock disco on the Upper West Side. It was a slightly posh place, much nicer than CBGB or Max's. They had video screens in 1980. Ruth Polsky, the woman who brought all the big name English acts over, was responsible for booking. I think they were opening for somebody from England, possibly the Slits. Maybe the very early Psychedelic Furs? They often opened for English bands. This was probably 80 or 81.

I know I've seen ESG several times, but that's the show that really sticks out. They were really enthusiastic in a low key way, they really gave off a kind of, uh, relaxed family vibe. The audience was made up of early 80s nightclub people. I don't remember much of a South Bronx element. That crossover was much more apparent at African Bambaata's nights at the Roxy a year or so later. That's where I remember seeing Liquid Liquid.

Anyway, back to ESG-- the crowd--usually pretty reserved and jaded-- LOVED them. It was a dance club, not a bar with a stage, so there was room to move and lots of people were dancing. I seem to remember ESG being a pretty popular act, although apparently they didn't go over so well when they opened for the Clash at Bonds. They played the whole NY new wave/post-punk club circuit at the time: Hurrah, the Mudd Club, the Peppermint Lounge.

I went because I'd heard how good they were, and it was something different from the sort of thing you usually got at clubs like that (British bands, post-No Wave NY bands, that sort of thing). They were just one of the must-see bands in NY at the time. Much better than their labelmates the Bush Tetras.

dear lord, arthur is now my GOD. :)

my eloquent analogy now mortifies me. i'm beyond jealous. what an incredible description! (i think arthur should start a weblog about new york, just so i can read it)

Aw, shucks, you guys. I have a bunch of old journals in a box in my apartment in LA. Maybe I should just type them up and put them in my weblog. They'd be full of schoolboy crushes and anonymous sex, plus loads of post-adolescent insecurity. "I went into Canal Jeans today to buy a mesh t-shirt and that guy from Tuff Darts totally snubbed me. What an asshole! And his band sucks since Robert Gordon left! Fuck him!" That sort of thing.