TECHNO

what happened to all the people that used to post about dance music here? is it over? is that all there was?

I haven't been listening to a lot of non-uk funky dance music this year (and most of what I have probably ends up on the balearic thread), but I'm not sure what the broader issue is. My sense is that there's not a lot of erm discursive excitement about house and techno's current trends (US or European) because pretty much every niche is an instance of unflashy 90s revivalism. But I could be wrong!

yeah but even the generally non-discursive bobbins thread is dead now ...

What recent stuff should I be checking out Vahid??

I really like lots of stuff lately...just never think to come here to talk about it. Not that it's bad just not sure what discussion would ensue. I actually hear a few things lately and think "tim f would love this". Eg prob my face record if the year is Arto Mwambe's vocal remix of Manuel Tur. I've been going back to Dublin once a month to dj and playing a lot of stuff like this. Been meaning to do a mix for ages but there is a lot of deep stuff that is actually fun around, i'm prob enjoying djing more than I ever have. I don't know why so little to say about it tho, I'm more likely to post a track on facebook with a ludicrous comment attached. Maybe everyone else is doing that too.

uh, please, uh, make a mix?

Oops I meant my fave record, stupid iPhone. My face record I haven't decided on yet, it's much too early for that.

To answer vahid's question a bit more, I have to say I don't read any websites or blogs either. I clicked a link to RA earlier this week and realised I hadn't been there, even for the podcast, in months. Read a few lines and just felt it was a long article which wouldn't actually tell you very much. I mean the's been a few years of lengthy techno writing and I wonder if the limitless word counts have worn it thin. Perfectly possible that's just personal jadedness, but the total lack of talk here on ILM suggests people are bored by their own voices.

Sometimes reading about music feels like the worst kind of reading too. I mean you read a book, and it seems to provoke you into thinking about things or reassesing your view of the world. I think more about music lately when I read a book about ancient Rome than when I read about music.

Anyway that's some rambling but others may relate. Or not...

i've not been to a club for a few weeks now and have dialled back on the recurd-buying somewhat; ergo i haven't really got anything new to talk about.

did dance music 'win,' is that why ppl want to talk about it less? i mean, everyone listens to dance music now. it is everywhere.

XXpost: I think people have been worn thin a bit, after the last year and a half or so of people talking about how bad the state of techno discourse is I guess most people just don't see the point, and there isn't the same feeling of upheaval as with minimal techno in 2006 and so (although it does sound like you are more jaded than most).
Then again I've been balancing stuff off with more disco/old stuff/other stuff more than I have in the past, and have been focusing more on listening to what I own than what I can just download/stream, so if I'm not as excited about new stuff then who knows.

I am thrilled, however, that this live set has been posted: http://mutek.org/podcast/91-thomas-fehlmann-mutek-live026

I haven't bought a record or gone out to the dancing in a long time and really am not abreast of new releases in any of the genres that I'm into, including dubstep, which was the genre I was most up on. I haven't heard any good podcasts for a while since I've been without internet in my new flat. I've only been listening to my ipod on random so I generally hear Beatles songs, Beethoven arrangements of "uma paloma blanca" and Albert Ayler interview snippets when I'm at work. I know I was never really a big, or constructive, contributor to the dance threads, tho gushing jaggeresque over new Villalobos releases was my forte for a while.

Best bit of dance music I've heard this week was "Feel the need in me" (by the Detroit Emeralds?) being played on Smooth Radio at work.

i've been listening to a lot of stuff, but quite honestly, i gave up on the bobbins thread. i would post something excitedly and then the response would be zerooo...

that said, i have really been digging:
- the new Redshape record
- the newish Alland Byallo record
- the new Italoboyz record
- all the new S2 joints

etc.

i also think i get much less into techno in the fall, favoring more weirdo off-kilter stuff...like i've been listening to a lot of Night Control, and the Proletariat, and so on....

there was a point a few years ago where bobbins thread + various record shop mailouts acted as the main buying/listening guide for many ilmers (including myself). now i think people just go elsewhere for that kind of thing. and yeah i agree it can feel a bit like screaming at a brick wall in the 09 bobbins thread, just post after post of dead eyed enthusiasm over the latest releases (again, i'm just as guilty of this!) with very little interaction between posters. maybe this reflects the state of techno today, i dunno, but personally i'm still excited by new releases on a weekly basis, and go out almost every weekend. i just don't feel like talking about it on ilm as much anymore.

^ cosign this and add the "discursiveness" of the conversations with a certain banned poster

Also, I don't know how this is possible, but in my experience techno and house are faring worse than ever in the US.

God, yesterday I was thinking about how my techno-centric music tastes are so very much because of my arriving at ILM 4 and a half years ago, and I was just thinking how strange/foreign that seems now, that there's no, I guess, encouragement now.

Not going out can't really help either, although I don't find it necessarily hurts.

I don't know where something like Floating Points - Vacuum Boogie would fit in, I wanted to post ecstatically about it on the bobbins thread, but I wondered what's the point.
I've also been enjoying the work of Glimpse and the occasional Deetron remix.

I have had nothing to say about this music for at least six or seven months now. Records continue to be good, but nothing exciting is really happening. I shop every week, buy mostly deep house and deep techno records. Lots of classics, too. I guess I have some strange faith that I will get a chance to use them.

After being broke for so long, I started going out again here in NYC a few months ago. Mostly, the parties have been pretty boring. I have attended House and Home, the "cool" NYC party that Resident Advisor mentioned as being a factor in the NYC house "resurgence" and mostly it is pretty boring. Most of the time, people don't dance. Most of the time, alcohol and cocaine are the drugs, and most of the time, the DJ doesn't seem to be interested in forging any sort of emotional bond between himself and the audience. No anthems, no up and down, just the same deep tech house record over and over. Mostly, people are outside smoking, and congratulating themselves on being at a "cool" party. I don't get it. The only decent party so far this year has been Lawrence a few weeks ago at H and H. He played 1992-1995 deep house classics pretty much exclusively. Not exactly a profound or memorable night, just good records heard over a decent system. I treated it like a house party with a lot more people that happened to employ decent DJs and was relatively satisfied. I got stoned, drank a lot, and enjoyed hearing records I liked over a big system. Didn't dance. Didn't bliss out. Didn't feel any vibe.

The great parties to me are the ones where the most "hardcore" of any style go down the right way. A deep house party where you can't play "Devotion" is not a special one. A party where you can't play "Acid Tracks" or "Age of Love" or "Let Me Be Your Fantasy" or "Circles" or any of the emotional anthems because there is no response from the crowd is almost pointless.

The thing that really irks me about House and Home is the way that people dance. Not that I am a good dancer or a connoisseur but it seems to me that if you dance the same way to a really nasty acid track in a warehouse in Brooklyn the same way you do to "Uncle John's Band" in a field in Vermont, something is missing. Some connection or understanding.

House and techno have decent popularity here in NYC but it seems to be mostly hipsters who have somehow stumbled into it and haven't had those sort of intense formative experiences with this music that would make them understand any of the shit I am talking about here.

I may be a bit of a snob and a purist but this is different that being an anti-rave proper techno-head back in 1991. I am arguing FOR intense experience at the expense of disengaged chin-scratching, not the other way around.

i have had some fun in the past couple months-- it was great to finally see Wighnomy Bros., and some of the locals have been treating me fine, too. but i like what i like, and there's also SO MUCH music coming out right now that i stumble upon a lot through writing jobs and whatnot, but i'm always stumbling onto a much wider range of music.

that and finally, let's say it: a lot of what the heavy hitting labels of even four years ago are putting out now is not as interesting. still, other things have emerged.

add the "discursiveness" of the conversations with a certain banned poster

lol, this is probably the big unspoken. why put the effort in on talking about something you cared about when you were likely to get sucked into some stupid back and forth with pipecock - if he'd turned up in 2004 he would've got clowned off here by the regulars but he got everyone at a weak moment.

i dunno, i think some of the best & most interesting writing about dance on here over the last couple of years has been from ppl arguing with him! it's good to be made to think about why you approach things a certain way i guess.

Feeling Shh!'s post. I live in Brooklyn and went to maybe a dozen key parties this summer - from Wighnomy to Omar S at the Yard - and felt a little underwhelmed. I admit that I was an early 90s feel-the-vibe casualty (as a teenager) but always felt that that sense was what I was looking for. The music has often been amazing - I actually really like the minimal- meets-deep house vibe of Matt Styles, Matthew Dear, Dinky, Shinedoe etc - but often the dancefloor has lacked a sense of getting-in-deep. It seems distracted. I'm sort of happy to sit at home with headphones on and geek out with current techno -cos it is amazing - but I just wish NYC was more fun.

I am entertained by the fact that we are in the middle of a golden age and people are fretting because they don't have a trend to chase. There is a stupid amount of good music coming out right now.

I had a great time at the Theo and Justus Sunday Bests when I was in New York, although probably for a lot of different reasons than Shhh! It's not Me and House and Home; I appreciated, quite a bit, the house-party vibe and the lack of pressure put on you to be into it, the sort of dance if you want do, don't if you don't kind of feeling. Although it seemed like the guys putting it on put a lot of heart into it, trying to get a real connection with the audience, even if many were there to hang out in the back.
I'm not so sure people are fretting about following trends at the neglect of the undoubted wealth of good music, though, to me it just seems like, I dunno, there's not too much to talk about, but I'd blame that more on the preponderance of blogs and available sources for streaming/listening to samples of music than before.

And when I said "feeling of upheaval with minimal in 06" I wasn't so much talking about the music as much as the rapid popularization/widespreadness of it, which let to a bit of everyone-has-an-opinion-ness.

I wonder to what extent "we are living in a golden age" coincides with techno/tech-house etc. (i.e. not chart-dance) being less populist than at any other time this decade.

Pipecock had more of a shaping role on techno discussions than he might have had in previous years because the broad trend of house & techno for the past 3 years has been away from ravey populism and towards connoisseurship, both discursively and musically.

One upshot of this is that I think house/techno discussions are much more forbidding to relative-outsiders than they were, say, four years ago, where the sheer (bad taste?) novelty of it all meant you didn't need to know your history back to front in order to talk about Tiefschwarz or James Holden or whatever. Whereas now even with the currently feted european stuff historical context feels much much more important.

It feels like, now, the techno/house "center" has shed a lot of the kind of extra-techno associations that might have provided some kind of "in" for people who perceived themselves to be outside - dilettantes and beginners are more likely to attach themselves to Crookers style stuff or balearic/disco stuff or dubstep/wonky than they are to house/techno proper. To which the house/techno enthusiast might often say, "well, yeah, all that stuff is really bad taste so it's not surprising that some ignorant dilettante would get into that first."

And as the scene retreats further and further into classicist borders (e.g. deep house/minimal crossover material in 2009 is much more restrictive sonically than it was in 2007), not only are there less outsiders wanting in, but thre range of potential discussion also decreases. I think one of the reasons words like "soulful" and "deep" became so contested again over the past few years is that, for want of anything else to say, people have been thrown back onto these historically invested cliches.

"I wonder to what extent "we are living in a golden age" coincides with techno/tech-house etc. (i.e. not chart-dance) being less populist than at any other time this decade"

I don't get this because I think underground techno and house music are thoroughly populist.

Except in, like, appealing to and being taken up by a really large and broad audience?

Not that appealing to outsiders should be the goal here. I just think there's been an interesting shift here.

Well, I would say it's populist should you choose to participate. And that's a pretty hippie-ish way of looking at it.

XPOST

To EDB:
Nothing wrong with an easygoing party vibe - its really just the lack of any contrast that gets annoying. It may be possible that I am entirely wrong but it seems like there used to be more to culture than just, you know, good records and hanging out. But maybe people don't need that intensity anymore? It's like all parties are chill-out rooms and there is no main room, if that makes any sense.

Tim F makes a good point - no new blood in the techno-house world. Techno and house are still ostensibly populist but whenever they go back to being very purist invariably a lot of kids get into something else. Most of the parties I go to seem to have a lot of people in their late 20s and older, and not too many young people. Maybe that is not always a bad thing (inexperienced drug-users can cause problems), but it also means no new blood, no new energy.

I live in Hollywood next to a trendy upscale hotel where the DJs play deep house classics to bored rich kids all day. It seems to go over well.

Reading Shh!'s posts makes me realize I took kingking for granted when I lived in LA.

(a single tear)

I live within driving distance of Minneapolis and Chicago, and over the last couple years I've gone to various nights with bigger name DJs. I've seen artists like Derrick May, Theo Parrish, Audion, Jesse Saunders, and a bunch of more faceless minimal people. And in all that time I've never been to a night that had more than say 200 or 250 in attendance.

And then I go to this backwards ass little Indie Electro night in my home town and it pulls in 300 at the very least every month or so. Sometimes more, I think when they had Peaches come to town with Drums of Death it was probably a little bit more than that. What does that say about the state of techno and house in America right now?

Its losing space to music that is more flashy and more fun, and more blatantly drug oriented.

I saw half of LA Riots play to more people than came out for Theo Parrish, and he mixed a bunch of lighter Electrohouse with crossover Baltimore in a fluid and really seamless manner. The man was obviously talented, but not aiming for the same places that a Deep House DJ would. And it left me really cold, I felt like the oldest man in the room and I've just turned 25. I'm into all of the music Tim mentioned to a varying degree: Indie Electro, the Pop side of the Disco Revival, and Dubstep. And artists from all of these genres are slowly throwing out feelers into techno and house, but I feel like if continues this way a whole generation of dance fans are going to miss out on some really great music.

Mostly because a lot of critics and DJs have become too absorbed in their Ivory Towers to give a shit.

BPMs need to go back up a little bit, needs to lose the 'polite office music' vibe a little bit

I am sure some of the post electroclash kids will gravitate towards house and techno but what is worrisome is the idea that house and techno will always be a nice glass of wine to other genres' shots of whiskey. I was always into house and techno because I liked it, not because it was the more "proper" option.

"BPMs need to go back up a little bit, needs to lose the 'polite office music' vibe a little bit"

For me 120 BPM is still the sweet spot and I think there is still lots of room to explore even at 110.

okay, while we're at it, everyone should go download the new Model 500 track over at LWE. it is sweet, i have been listening to it all morning.

and yes, there is a stupid amount of good music coming out right now. if you don't believe that then you aren't paying attention, imho.

I actually hear a few things lately and think "tim f would love this".

Ronan, does this include Bodycode's "Imitation Lover"? Because I LOVE IT.

yeah it is amazing.

Hi there. Lurker here. I wasn't sure if this question deserves a separate thread, so I'll put it here.

I just found this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhE-0IDpkiM

I understand that "Sharevari" is often referred to as the (or one of the) original techno songs. Obviously there are some strong similarities to the earlier work of Giorgio Moroder and Kraftwerk. What exactly is it that separates "Sharevari" stylistically from the earlier works of those other artists? Thanks in advance.

I think that tune is still pretty much rooted in Italo disco, especially the vocals. What makes later 80s techno different from Italo is (in most cases) lack of the vocals, harsher beats, and in general a colder, more stripped-down synth sound. Here's one of the first "proper" techno tunes, you can hear the difference:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhKl68Vp6Z4

I understand that "Sharevari" is often referred to as the (or one of the) original techno songs. Obviously there are some strong similarities to the earlier work of Giorgio Moroder and Kraftwerk. What exactly is it that separates "Sharevari" stylistically from the earlier works of those other artists? Thanks in advance.

It was the first self-released record to emerge from the Northwest Detroit prep scene in early 1981. It beat out the Alleys Of Your Mind/Cosmic Raindance 7" by Cybotron by about six months. It's status is due more to where and when it was made, rather than what it actually sounds like.

lol i love the dancing cameos on 'sharevari'. they look like the in-London-for-one-night-only types you get in shoreditch attempting to impress women.

oddly, I see some of my moves right there..!

good luck with finding a wife ;)

Some of those dancers are alright.

Thanks for the tips, guys. Tuomas, I was familiar with "Nude Photo" but it was hard for me to draw a line between "Sharevari" and the earlier stuff. The consensus seems to be that the definition of "techno" is mostly based on the setting it came out of. I thought there might have been some distinction based on the bassline or drums but it doesn't seem that significant. On a recursive side note my question was actually inspired by the discussion here. Hate me if you must.

so who can recommend me some non-laidback, rude, sweaty and intense main-room techno, please?

Doesn't get much ruder than this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYXAKmAXHzA

Or this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTgCDbG5S3s

old Tresor compilations

or at least the parts of them that are not post basic channel pretty and dubby

Another banger from 1994:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKbnD7ZnQmM

This was probably my favourite year in electronic music.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VRbqmb2ul2A

Ahhh! I was going to post changes of life!

really enjoy the playlist i'm listening to of stuff on Autektone. so cool.

love this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_nxNY0B3p0

https://blacklodge.bandcamp.com/album/bl004-the-non-assay-sound-of-the-underground

Zuh

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzG2TmEF8ug

A compilation called 165 BPMs of all tracks at 165 BPMs, and also a perfume. https://ufoparfums.bandcamp.com/album/165-bpms

xp to scott s, Autektone has been a go-to for a while, they really crank out that heavy techno party vibe, good stuff! Filth On Acid is another larger techno label doing similar stuff.