ILM'S TOP 77 TRACKS of 2010

Or compare with trance nights, which sometimes will use "futuristic" (in an illustration and typeface on the front of a sci-fi novel sense) font and imagery in their posters but not in a way that would allow you to distinguish one night from another.

vibe which can't be reduced to the music being played, is necessary as a counterweight to the fact of the musical diversity of the DJ sets.

yes this is exactly it. i don't think wifey has it to anything like the extent NS does though (though obv wifey isn't a label). when i interviewed kingdom last year (and even this answer feels a bit out of date now - it was 10 months ago) he said:

“Bok Bok and I were talking about this just now – we haven’t put our fingers on it yet, but there’s this sound aesthetic that’s unspoken but seems to be shared by a group of people; and it’s not closed off enough that you can make a good name for it. Some of us did a Ustream two nights ago – it was Ikonika, Jam City, Girl Unit, Bok Bok, Manara and myself – and though we were all playing different records from different genres, there was still something indescribable about the sound we were doing. I guess it’s open-minded global club bass music with a hint of oddness, and a sense of restraint while still being pretty wild? Oh God, that’s like the worst description ever.”

(he also said that when he's djing he's aiming for "this big, female epiphany moment, you know? I want there to be a fucking booty club moment", lol - OBV going for ~smart~ and ~nerdy~ boys there)

The question at the heart of these different approaches is "how do I create allegiance?" One way is to create allegiance to a specific sound, which is fine if you're a relatively purist club night . But if you've got a diverse, multi-genre sound which itself is liable to change, then you have to create a logic (or the sense of a logic) or sensibility underlying the music that the clubber/listener can identify with, that will make them trust you enough to put their ears and body under your charge on the regular notwithstanding that they're not certain what you're gonna play.

(he also said that when he's djing he's aiming for "this big, female epiphany moment, you know? I want there to be a fucking booty club moment", lol - OBV going for ~smart~ and ~nerdy~ boys there)

I think one of the reasons that these debates can get more heated and confused than they need to be is that we're all (unwittingly at times) operating with these largely uninterrogated notions of the nerdy boy or chin stroker or etc.

Typically, actual nerdy boys don't tend to go to clubs in the first place! And I think "chinstroker" cuts across most sounds and scenes, and can always be contrasted with the full-fledged participant actually getting down to whatever's playing on the dancefloor. To be clear, even when dubstep was not very danceable it wasn't dominated by chinstrokers, more weedsmokers.

At most we can maybe talk about certain types of clubbers being somewhat self-conscious wrt the "fucking booty club moment" - the fact that Kingdom is saying this is what he's going for, for example. I don't think this is ironic at all (let alone a bad thing) - I said this re Classixx dj sets:

"until the sound is so ridiculously utopian that half the fun of being on the dancefloor is simply acknowledging that you're all participating in a somewhat cheesy reenactment of drug-enhanced bonding (which makes them sort of like the Moonbootica to Aeroplane's Get Physical)."

in my opinion, Classixx : "e" music :: Kingdom : booty music

"self-conscious" not in terms of being embarrassed, more "self-aware"? More "this is like a booty club moment", rather than that be something that you have without thinking about it.

I'm always v. self-aware in that sense.

possibly it's a dj's job to be self-aware like that? they are self-aware so we don't have to be.

To be clear, even when dubstep was not very danceable it wasn't dominated by chinstrokers, more weedsmokers.

secret reason that dubstep died (ie dubstep itself got grosser and lairier, appealing to a more commercial crowd, while post-dubstep splintered off and went down its various avenues) = smoking ban.

I'd believe that!

possibly it's a dj's job to be self-aware like that? they are self-aware so we don't have to be.

this is true, but I think audiences can be self-aware as well. Like, that Henrik Schwarz edit of MJ I youtubed in the Schwarz thread - there is amongst the audience an element of self-awareness about that stylistic negotiation as well as in Schwarz's own head, half of the enjoyment is the frission of going to see Schwarz and getting MJ, but MJ filtered through a Schwarz sonic sensibility.

There is no entirely un-self-aware audience, there is no "noble savage" listener, but I think the more purist or the more de-aestheticised a listening context (so, like, a single genre dj set, or conversely a dj who is playing "commercial dance hits" to people who dance to that stuff regularly) the less prominent or noticeable the self-awareness becomes, because there is less of a sense of a stylistic negotiation at work. Conversely, any kind of stylistically diverse DJ set - esp. if it's promoting an underlying sensibility - will enhance

Of course at the very extreme end of self-awareness you get, say, a DJ/Rupture set, where part of the intention seems to be reminding you that the music you're listening to is not organically yours, or a Night Ripper album, where the music itself is deprived of its organic self-image.

I think in a desire to distinguish ourselves from that kind of thing we can sometimes tend to overstate the unselfconsciousness of our own dancing experiences, in the same way that in a desire to reject the label "ironic enjoyment" we might over-emphasise the absolute dumb earnestness of our enjoyment. This is an issue I've been thinking about a lot over the past 5 years or so, and I've retreated substantially from the position I used to take of rejecting wholesale ideas of ironic enjoyment et al.

would say that i'm a bit (only a bit) irked by how ILM can love 'Wut' so much more than the Not Annoying stuff Hud Mo did in 09 especially Overnight and FUSE.

but then i never started threads about or hyped those tunes particularly so nm

Tim and lex- Loving this exchange between you two.

And lex that Kingdom interview is <3<3<3. Was great to re-read it just now.

Yeah there isn't much of a diference between those hudmo bits and wut. I've heard rooms full of people sing the melody to fuse its even a little less clumsy than wut its got a bit of a groove going and it doesn't outstay its welcome. I really like both btw. Its prob just a case of timing I think people where more ready for wut to drop plus it had a good load of weight behind it with press and all that, half the people that heard wut prob never heard fuse.

yeh that all makes sense plus HM turned a lot of people off (inc. me) by being so wildly inconsistent (half that album was unlistenable) and Night Slugs have had crazy momentum the last 18 months so it's more fitting i guess

sorry if that question was condescendingly anthropological or something, i just dont like it much & because it doesnt really map into american musical history that well (i dont buy the 'its like rap' thing really) it sorta like, hmmmm i wonder why ppl are into it?

― *kl0p* (deej), Friday, January 28, 2011 6:36 PM (Yesterday)

hey idk if this has been covered and then someone painted a mural on the covering but i kinda thought this ameri-wise was kindof happening via kingdom who has a p strong diva-vocal/tribaltrance element to his *classic* thus fusing the two major signifiers of gay pride festivals and this kindof seems like a nostalgia-90s+queer parkway to the heart of the 29-35yr old homo urban sophisticate's heart. this is purely speculation tho i mean i live on a farm idk how much you wanna listen to me on this.

Uh, that's sorta way overstating it. I would love any kind of gay or queer night leaning more Kingdom-ish but can't really see it happening.

I know i've mentioned this a few times, but i just wanted to get this out there:

Had I not been so dense and actually ordered my ballot the correct way, my number 1 - Glasser - Mirrorage, would have had 268 points, bringing it in at number 51. As it stands, it barely missed the poll at # 78.

Here it is with a cool video:

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

xp i wouldnt be so sure i've read more abt kingdom in like queer art blogs than anywhere else

"More like Captain Asshat," said Glasser's Cameron Mesirow.

that is to say ive come across him way more internet-wise in the context of homos who go to dan graham retrospectives than dbs who read fact

haha yah kingdom is p faggy in my limited xp

the observation of small narcissisms itt anyway omg

ppl listen to night slugs cuz they think its cool - everyone thinks their music is cool cf: ilm - why it appears to be cool bcuz ppl they know who are cool like it why do ppl they think are cool like it bcuz of blogs and tshirts why do blogs and tshirts ugh its a random cycle who cares

Thanks Jordan, I'll shut up now...

tbh the only reason i like kingdom as much as i do is like the reasons stated above so. dublin pride 99 r whenev/ i feel like i should have a craft weekend where we tie-dye our t-shirts. it helps me get over the surface ugliness of most of the nightslugs aesthetic which im supressing a gag reflex over atm tbh

Night Slugs are kinda hit'n'miss they could do with upping the quality control this year but when they hit they really hit. Wut, IRL, Ecstasy Refix, Square One, No Hooks all hit the spot for me. A few other bits here and there too maybe if I'm in the mood. They're badass DJs though so I have hope that quality track selection will end up seeping into their release schedule more this year.

lol im kindof more vehement abt this right this second bc of hanging out w/ one of my best friends who is considering leaving london to basically live anywhere else for a number of reasons but actually on her list was how terrible club music is here

Link to and description of some user statistics

ppl listen to night slugs cuz they think its cool - everyone thinks their music is cool cf: ilm - why it appears to be cool bcuz ppl they know who are cool like it why do ppl they think are cool like it bcuz of blogs and tshirts why do blogs and tshirts ugh its a random cycle who cares

― Lamp, Friday, January 28, 2011 6:59 PM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

im not rlly keyed into the dance dilineations the way tim & lex are so im sorta giving up on arguing this but this kind of anti intellectualism is blah regardless

ppl listen to night slugs cuz they think its cool - everyone thinks their music is cool cf: ilm - why it appears to be cool bcuz ppl they know who are cool like it why do ppl they think are cool like it bcuz of blogs and tshirts why do blogs and tshirts ugh its a random cycle who cares

― Lamp, Friday, January 28, 2011 6:59 PM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

http://images.encyclopediadramatica.com/images/0/08/Harbfeadtuegwtdlml_bird.png

lamp otm

'i get a sneaking suspicion'

again? from what? like. isn't it possible that djs who do dance nights like this stuff AND house AND rap?

the guys I know who do this stuff have a rap night on Thursdays, a House night twice a month, and produce their own shit in the nebulous space b/t house and 'this stuff'.

― Alex in Montreal, Friday, January 28, 2011 4:59 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

bcuz it seems to me to be music outside of the dj-dancer tension, when its played at the end of the night when ppl are already wasted or when its thrown on & just kills the dancefloor, it feels like the dj just off doing his thing & there are sorta zero traxx in that vein that get recognition from your 'populist' oriented dancer. most genres dont work that way ime & have a balance

ime also canada def has been more friendly to uk music developments

pretty tangential here but im playing the shit out of this mixtape
realniggatumblr.tumblr.com/post/1039941037/dj-arson-best-of-97-for-98-1997-1998-was-prolly
and yeah these arguments are always mad reductive but talk about a taught tension btween 'male'/'female' impulses in music, this era of rap in NY was all 'girly' R&B with straight-up street rappers over it, real disco feel to rap then. The first year where breakbeats seemed to have been ditched entirely, production really clean.

also tim & lex obv will both totally love this mix^^^

taut

prefer a tort tension between male/female impulses tbh.

lol yah thnx didnt proofread obv xp

good spelling is obv v impt to me

jeez deej. bcimg almost imposs. to read yr impenetrably badly proofread posts

I think what bugs me about ilxers being all "hay stop talking people be liking what they like there's nothing more to to it" is that it's usually people who also say in different contexts "oh this is the aural equivalent of an emetic awful and if you like it you are morally and aesthetically reprehensible slash I don't even believe you".

There obviously something more to people liking what they like than people just liking it.

But we need to be talking about why people like what they like, and not why imagined people who might like things in the future will like those things. (while mostly ignoring the people who actually like those things now!)

I'm willing to cede to deej's experience of American rxn's to this sort of thing, though, since I'll admit there's a difference between scenes that spring up around people actually *making* the stuff and the way music made elsewhere filters into existing DJ/dance cultures.

i feel we need to adequatly tackle class, race, and gender to really understand this one

― goole, Friday, January 28, 2011 5:06 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

i dunno if goole was joking like 'here comes the million post thread' or serious like 'this is super complicated' or both (probably accurate) but yeah. otm

btw america is super big

im flipping thru some night slugs stuff on youtube & its kinda lol how much this is like perfectly in my wheelhouse at some level w/ the melodic elements & then at a rhythmic one, the exact opposite of what i like to listen to

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

like the production sound & melodies & samples are cool but theres a stiltedness to it even when it goes into the doubletime four on the floor that registers as weirdly laborious

realniggatumblr.tumblr.com/post/1039941037/dj-arson-best-of-97-for-98-1997-1998-was-prolly
and yeah these arguments are always mad reductive but talk about a taught tension btween 'male'/'female' impulses in music, this era of rap in NY was all 'girly' R&B with straight-up street rappers over it, real disco feel to rap then. The first year where breakbeats seemed to have been ditched entirely, production really clean.

Mix has been deleted :(

kinda want to hear a night slugs version of 'money power respect'

i honestly wanted to be unb& to persuasively make the case that the entire uk funky movement needs to be painfully euthanized but i mean it is w/e you like what you like.

to the degree that theres any type of intellectual umm rigour with these agruments i think were better off looking at the aims of the music itself - who does this music seem to envision listening to it, what is it trying to achieve &c - rather than just conducting some relentless anthropology on the ppl who we imagine are listening which often appears to be an accident of history rather than something meaningful ime.

really? to me it sounds way less weirdly laborious than, say, a lex luger beat.

xxxpost

i have no idea why ppl keep bringing up lex luger lately

I brought him up because deej likes flockaveli

sorry for confusing you

I'll try to namedrop someone less trendy next time

the dj arson can also be found here
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=RAV9P4Z4

Cheers deej

kingdom mix is cool altho around 6:25 it starts sounding like some dude repeatedly stepping on a dog's chew toy