machine-tooled electro-boogie

blues-based rock with synths and distorted guitars that's hurtling past you with remorseless efficiency.. this used to be such a dependable genre, it was sort of like the hollywood blockbuster of music: modern, but with an old-fashioned heart. two of the most obvious examples:

Robert Palmer - "Bad Case of Lovin You"
ZZ Top - "Sharp Dressed Man"

tell me about others!

RL Burnstein's entire A Ass Pocket Of Wiskey album, I think

no that's too lo-fi, too indie (iirc) - during the peak years of this stuff, this sound was literally unobtainable other than having a bunch of money to blow in a big fancy studio

Not necessarily blues, but reminds me of something nabisco wrote over here:
Is there a name for that genre of turn-of-the-90s pop-rock with the positive vibes, huge guitar leads, and gated drums?

(...) I think the late 80s and early 90s were kind of a horrible end point of using technology to make really slick, artificial music, but still aspiring to make it in the mold of, like, 60s American rock'n'roll classics, blues, funk, and all -- by the end of the 80s we were getting these weird chromed-out replicas of the old stuff, old-school R'n'R played on digital keyboards and triggered gated drums, and it started to feel uncomfortable, and that sort of thing seems to have died hard going into the next decade.
― nabisco, Wednesday, 29 August 2007 20:21 (3 years ago)

(see also nabs' next post after that)

Though maybe you didn't want to talk about it, just list it! In which case, uh, I suppose I've spent the past 18 years pretending I didn't like this stuff 20 years ago, so it'll take a while to come back to me.

prince - "u got the look"

definitely want to talk about it, that's what this whole thing is for iirc

by the end of the 80s we were getting these weird chromed-out replicas of the old stuff, old-school R'n'R played on digital keyboards and triggered gated drums

this exactly!! i am finding myself developing an insatiable appetite for it

A hot summer night
Fell like a net
I've gotta find
My baby yet

I need you
To soothe my head
Turn my blue
Heart to red

just reading these lines and everything inside me just goes "oh yeah it is fuckin ON"

maybe i'm having a delayed reaction to a decade plus of enfeebled landfill indie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIhlOjmwHXU&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1a_ikfUico

this stuff what you thinkin of?

fabulous thunderbirds a great call!

Danger Zone is bang on with the sonics but doesn't quite have that old-school blues boogie heart to it, doesn't feel quite as relentless, doesn't feel like you could listen to the band just jam on that song all night

only thing letting down the thunderbords song is the lack of synths

in my idealized version of this genre, frankie goes to hollywood would be covering ac/dc's "thunderstruck"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGp47YwDZ48&ob=av2e

It Bites- Calling All the Heroes (though maybe not distorted enough?)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-mU-YSk32I

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxvSGuFbqcA&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFaXTcR4dtE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QSyaBHr1jU

Fine Young Cannibals - She Drives Me Crazy?

'Legs' ups the electro-ante on Sharp Dressed imo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6EXXZVdUJ98

no discernible synths, but what about "twilight zone" by golden earring?

jim capaldi - "living on the edge"

xxpost I'd argue that "Sleeping Bag" ups the ante on both

yeah, lot of zz top; the whole eliminator album
also, more than a few huey lewis tunes
also, "addicted to love" and maybe some bon jovi.....

David Gilmour - "Until We Sleep" and "Blue Light" from About Face:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWmsHHI3d2A

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

Not so much synths as the same kind of guitar+echo he was using a lot back then (i.e. "Run Like Hell" on The Wall)

Fabulous Thunderbirds was the first thing I thought of, too

awesome additions you guys!!

really this is custom made for lady gaga but nasty blues licks have become so passé

tell the truth, few of these approach the cold steel menace of zz top or palmer at their apex, which is really what it's all about imo

honest to god, ZZ Top is just amazing.. it's like Italo blues or something. and on "Brown Sugar" they end up practically sounding like Black Sabbath!

'Eliminator' itself proves that (electroclash) = (the New Rock) which also solves the 'indie trucker hat' thing, altho possibly not in a way the hipsters will necessarily like

― dave q, Wednesday, 18 June 2003 10:23 (7 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zQ41hqlV0Kk&ob=av2n

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtrQ7z3dPVU