RIP William Orbit

I was quite taken with the Bass-O-Matic album, cringe though the band name is

In the review, I make that cardinal rockcrit error of looking for the dance artist who can sustain at album level.  Writing still from outside the culture at this point (October 1990, a year before the Conversion). 

The technorave-chillout yen for Pink Floyd is worth a mini-essay - wasn't there some ambient house (89-90 phase) track that samples "Wish You Were Here"?  Consults faded regions of the back brain - ah yes, Innocence, "Natural Thing"

The Orb obviously.... 

The KLF too. 

And there was an ardkore track by the wonderfully named E that interpolated from The Wall - "Nobody's Home", the line "I've got a little black book with my poems in"  became "oi! I've got a little black disk with me tune on it", and I think a bit of David Gilmour soloing also got sampled at the end. It's the first tune here

The technoptimism of  this end of '80s /start of '90s moment is endearing - painfully poignant  too, considering all that has happened since, from world stuff to the "bright promise of digital technology" going rancid. 

All this stuff - Shamen and Deeelite particularly, but also The Grid, Adamski, The Orb, KLF, 808 State , Underworld,  Humanoid / very early Future Sound of London etc, One Dove, Hypnotone ie. for the most part house music made by former rock people  -  all of it flashes me back to smart drinks, flotation tanks, Mondo 2000,  Terence McKenna books, Nicholas Saunders, Fraser Clark, "zippies", etc etc

These blogs are Ciccone-free zones but "Ray Of Light" was one of Madonna's more bearable singles. I hope William made a lot of money off it and the album. 

This is an Orbit tune the heads love

I am not sure I ever traced the William Orbit trail back to Torch Song

Joy pipes up: "I loved that song! I didn't know it was William Orbit!"

She thinks she must have heard it at Danceteria. 

Mixmag's 15 recent dance music books you should read this summer

  

Thanks to Gemma Ross for including Futuromania in the Mixmag list of summer reading for dance music fiends 

The full list is here, a worthy bunch to sit alongside indeed 

Before the Deejay Was Cool (slight return)

 

From a 1971 issue of Melody Maker

Still, there are two turntables - plus bonus feature of a built-in cassette recorder!

This slight return is picking up on the earlier post about the extensive prehistory of discotheques and "disco music"  - prior to disco as we have come to misunderstand it. 

A time when the music was as likely to be some form of rockin' pop as it was soul. And deejays used a  a microphone more than a mixer, since patter was a big part of their performance. 

Trawling through a load of early '70s MM's, Sounds, NME's, it is striking how they increasingly have disco sections in the advertising pages, speaking to the burgeoning market for mobile discotheques and all the attendant gear. 

Peace Signs (Flash It)

Pure Gurley gorgeousness in this Rogue Unit mix

Such emotional subtlety to almost anything Steve Gurley touches

The other versions - nice 'n' slinky Ray Keith (+ Nookie) work-over

in two parts

and then the Shades of Rhythm version, the "Hard"

 

Halfway through  there's the pleasant surprise - what the Nuumologist lives for - of the Rufige Cru "Menace" diva  sample appearing. Here it's much closer to its original speed of the Urban Soul source track, rather than the ooh-oohing whipped-soulcream of "Menace", that gaseous bliss-overdose

Still pretty woozy bliss in the original but as the whisked-up tempo drops down, the Urban Soul diva is revealed to be a dude

Back to Shades of Rhythm - where oh where is the "Peace Sign (Classic Piano Mix)"?

Ah seems it was reissued by Kniteforce

At least you can hear the original demo version

Shades of Rhythm do have one other track that really does it for me, really sends me

It's the gaseous diva bliss-groan that is the Moment for me, as sublimely zoomed in on in this reversioning by Pseudo-3