House music is not too far off from AJ in that they both find inspiration
in 70s rare groove. Something off the toronto jazzhedz list a while back:
Yo,
I unfortunately couldn't catch Mike's appearance on EC, but I give
the man mad props if he's going to mix Loose Ends' "Is It All Over My Face?"
into his set! Although I'm a big fan of hearing old breaks to current
hip-hop jams, I think it's even more innovative for Djs to explore old house
breaks. I've heard very few Djs embrace that old pre-disco sound, like Loose
Ends, MFSB or even Charles Earland's "Let The Music Play." If you ever go
to New York and check out Lil Louie Vega on a Wednesday night at the Sound
Factory Bar, you can catch him playing all old seventies Spanish disco stuff,
the kind of tracks that have both rhythm and energy, soul and optimism.
A lot of people, not necessarily those on this list but rather those
at clubs, seem to be afraid of house music. And it's probably because they
still associate it with Crystal Waters' Gypsy Woman, hi-NRG (108) dance music
or even the high school hits of Royal House and Can You Party? But for me,
some of the jazziest, funkiest and liveliest tracks to come out in the past
year have actually been house records, like Black Science Orchestra, KenLou's
Moonshine and the Bucketheads Come and Be Gone. All of these have some sort
of souljazz routes, after all Moonshine is a track entirely based on selected
rare samples of Gil Scot-Heron's Home Is Where The Hatred Is (I could be
incorrect on the title)
It's cool to play a lot of seventies souljazz, but unfortunately alot
of the stuff that gets sampled on Hip-hop records isn't really danceable,
unless the original band is playing it. I don't if it's the Philly sound I'm
talking about, but it's that vibe that pre-cursored disco but was jazzy at
heart.
Big up to Mike, and also to Curtis Smith. It's never a good idea to
compare, but personally Curtis is my favourite because his mixes are always
hypnotic, just like house music. But in the end it's as much about what your
feeling as your hearing.
peace,
Guru Prasad.
....
The kind of "house" rare groove that comes to my mind is stuff like
James Mason (SWEET POWER..., FREE), Roy Ayers (RUNNING AWAY), Gil Scott-Heron
(THE BOTTLE, live version on The Best of...), WAR (a whole lot of their
recordings), a big etc. But there's more to it than just sampling sounds. It's
all the mixing, layering, cutting, the orchestration (the sounds that
come out of the DJs' mixing booth) and the whole hypnotic effect
of a wicked house mix - making you think the words to the tune are
"These sounds fall into my mind" when the actual words are "street sounds
swirling through my mind" (a commercial example but the idea's there).
now add in the drum and bass... it's all evolution.
shanti,
ashwin
ashwin@isgtec.com