Juan Atkins has never had a S&D thread...

Ten years ago, I would have not accepted any answer other than "Derrick May", but now, I'm convinced that the most valuable treasure trove lies in Kevin Saunderson's work. Atkins' complaints in the 1994 Wired interview about commercial radio not accepting techno are a bit baffling, considering that KS had supplied the blueprint for radio-friendly techno years earlier.

thing is they really do set their own stalls out so well, each one covering an area (not in terms of what their tracks do but in how they sound doing it) the other two tend don't so much (with some exceptions no doubt e.g. when i heard Atkins 'Other Side Of Life' i wished Inner City had sounded a bit more like that)

i don't know if Atkins had in mind the kind of music Saunderson hit with when he said that but yeah if he meant 'why can't we hear 'Game One' or 'Star Dancer' during drive time?' then altho i agree with him that would be 'unrealistic'

"by the numbers" very meaningful. good to see the trite criticisms shot down convincingly with that ray of meaning.

RS: 12 | Guns n' Roses: Chinese Democracy

They had this ranking all gift-wrapped and ready to go by September, didn't they?

whoa, wrong thread, sorry!

"by the numbers" is at least saying something about the music in relation to other musics, whereas "shopping mall music" just tells us about the listener's social prejudices

in relation to the listener's opinion of other musics you mean?

a lot of shopping malls play a sort of house music that you don't hear in clubs too much, which is heavy on melody, eg all those "bargrooves" compilations. I agree with the above poster that dub house/techno in 2008 (esp the Detroit guys like Scott/Huckaby etc) is veering towards this territory, albeit with a great deal more respect given. it's some seriously gloopy shit which is great to listen to but can't imagine dancing to it apart from perhaps way afterhours.

As to whether calling something shopping mall music denotes prejudice, think you're jumping the gun there.

think you're grasping at straws there

great counter argument, ffs, for someone who rebukes so freely you also rebuke pretty lazily.

you honestly think the "starlight" remixes set sounds like bargrooves?

sorry to be lazy, but if that's honestly what you think i'm not going to bother putting in the work

No I honestly think what I said above. Don't bother putting in the work then, for all I know you're actually asleep. The sheer amount of times "this is wrong" is thrown about without any worthwhile discussion on dance threads around here lately is a fucking joke...

you said it's "shopping mall music", i'm telling you it's not, because unlike isolee or lindstrom or michael mayer you're not actually going to hear those in a shopping mall (i heard all three of those in major chain mall stores this year)

you're telling me it's "more melodic" than other dub techno. actually, i disagree. i won't argue that the source material ("starlight" itself) is more melodic than most dub techno, but compared to other recent high-profile releases (like, say, "the coldest season" or the recent mikkel metal album) the remixes of starlight are pretty spaced out.

but even compared to monolake or maurizio tracks ...

I said it's equivalent to shopping mall music...techno with no purpose.

also you've way reduced several other points too, where did I say it was "more melodic than other dub techno"?????

a lot of shopping malls play a sort of house music ... which is heavy on melody ... dub house/techno in 2008 ... is veering towards this territory

maybe if you hate all ambient techno, this really isn't the right thread for u?

http://videodetective.com/photos/118/004966_3.jpg

x-post

fine vahid, you tell me what I'm saying by selectively editing and then argue with that. far be it from me to stop your narcoleptic zings.

(tim otm)

oh, ok, here's your original with MEANING PRESERVED!

a lot of shopping malls play a sort of house music that you don't hear in clubs too much, which is heavy on melody, eg all those "bargrooves" compilations. I agree with the above poster that dub house/techno in 2008 (esp the Detroit guys like Scott/Huckaby etc) is veering towards this territory, albeit with a great deal more respect given. it's some seriously gloopy shit which is great to listen to but can't imagine dancing to it apart from perhaps way afterhours.

anyway what proportion of juan atkins infinti / model 500 output is dancing vs listening music, do you think?

I must say those sound like way upmarket shopping malls. I associate Bargrooves with hairdressers and cafes more. Dub-techno with neither: I sort of think of dub-techno as th stuff they play at vinyl stores as a counterpoint to the uptempo stuff. Or maybe that's just the only place I tend to hear it in public.

I think my point is pretty clear but you've making it overspecific to this particularly Huckaby remix when I was speaking more generally as the part in brackets shows and my specification of "dub house" does too. I think there is a lot of very well sound designed stuff which is functionless listening music, which runs the risk of just being "lush" and little more.

My point wasn't necessarily related to comparing this music with other dub-techno...as for Atkins/Model 500 I'm not sure I'd care to specify on that because it's not really relevant to the point I'm trying to make. Again I took up on the Huckaby remix cos it's an example of what I'm talking about, not specifically cos of the Model 500 connection.

When people are making 4/4 music that doesn't actually work in clubs it's kinda suspicious...not least when people heap praise upon it endlessly. Obv some of eg Scott's productions are not like this, but the tendency is there. (NB I'd also add someone like Lawrence to the mix here, or hell Move D)

maybe I should have said "shopping mall muzak"

I'm not suspicious of the music itself, a little bit suspicious of (or at least distant from) the discourse that automatically bigs it up.

It's Boomkat discourse basically.

But my suspicion is probably not productive: I love the Move D and Benjamin Brunn album but resisted checking it out for quite a while because of this.

I guess the other reason that "bargrooves" doesn't work as a point of comparison for me is that that implies a certain communal functionalism (even if that functionalism is its unthreatening pleasantness) whereas what I infer in people's fanboyism for neuvo dub-techno is an identification with its air of privation.

I sort of feel like this discourse wants a replacement for Pop Ambient albums, which it can't continue to endorse given Kompakt are so overground now.

To be sure, Kompakt occupied this role circa 2000/2001.

In other words the test is: what is the techno that you can buy at "out music" record stores? It's definitely Echocord etc. at the moment. They stopped stocking Kompakt et. al. in 2003.

the techno you can buy at "out music" record stores is dubstep

Ha yeah that too.

Not necessarily a diss - obv I liked Kompakt in 2001!

"whereas what I infer in people's fanboyism for neuvo dub-techno is an identification with its air of privation"

privation analogous in meaning to "out music" record stores?

i think tim means exclusivity

or maybe he really means privation, i dunno ... though i doubt there's anybody who seriously thinks dub-techno is a healthy aesthetic ordeal in the same way ∅ records are

i have a suspicion about nuevo dub techno because it's like, "we're here. again?" like lots of other techno and house this year. however i appreciate the way the arc of time has descended on the music and a de facto lazy suspicion (my own, i mean) is often proved wrong by the quality of the tracks. it's not "shabby chic" ya know? faux aged or reliant on credibility thru association. it's like real chic: expand on or within the details of an artist/label's output, create a micro-genre, and do it with exceedingly high quality. like the mikkel metal album for example or even the "starlight" remixes in question or andy stott or the coldest season, which has become one of those go-to albums for me when i can't decide what else to play.

xp, ha

A little bit exclusivity, but also "privation" in the sense of, I dunno, isolationism. But obv not as extreme as a lot of stuff in out music stores. This stuff is the out-music equivalent of chill-out perhaps; which makes dubstep the out-music equivalent of those bass mixes designed for playing from your soup-car speakers while patrolling the block.

it's so formulaic, some of the dub techno, even when I like something on say, Sandwell District it's like, this is just a big slab of music with a very clear dimension of gloom to it but there's no multifacted way to like it, it's just so easy to praise lazily.

maybe it just depends on whether you like your musical pleasure with rigor or your pleasure to just be floaty and nice (have the words "warm blanket of fuzz" ever been used to describe this music?). depends on the day, right? btw, my listening model is almost always daydream-mode. xp, again.

you know, i'm generally skeptical of most dub techno because i feel like Basic Channel did it best. however....

"a lot of shopping malls play a sort of house music that you don't hear in clubs too much, which is heavy on melody, eg all those "bargrooves" compilations. I agree with the above poster that dub house/techno in 2008 (esp the Detroit guys like Scott/Huckaby etc) is veering towards this territory, albeit with a great deal more respect given. it's some seriously gloopy shit which is great to listen to but can't imagine dancing to it apart from perhaps way afterhours.

― Local Garda"

is straight nonsense. perhaps it is best experienced when played on a system that allows the bass to properly pummel you, but that shit when done right is deep dance music 100%. Patrice Scott (can't see why he is getting lumped in with dubby shit) and Mike Huckaby are definitely doin it right.

"I sort of think of dub-techno as th stuff they play at vinyl stores as a counterpoint to the uptempo stuff. Or maybe that's just the only place I tend to hear it in public.

― Tim F"

this probably goes without saying, but you are simply listening to the wrong disc jockeys.

http://www.ngfl-cymru.org.uk/fact_or_opinion.gif

Fact:
1. Dub techno is just like any other genre. Some of it is really formulaic, and some of it isn't. If you like it at all, it is necessary, as with any other genre, to do the hard work and figure out what records are really pushing the boundaries.
2. Dub techno records do attract a certain fanboy contingent that can be off-putting to what I guess could be called the anti-purist.
3. Ultimately the purists and anti-purists are both necessary in this music to keep each other honest.
4. Like any other type of record, a dub techno record can be functional depending on the context and the DJ.

Opinion:
1. There is a certain laziness is how reverential SOME of these records are.
2. I think there is something vaguely cynical about the current preponderance of dub techno and house records that are always coming out in limited pressings of 500 with colored vinyl; this phenomenon seems to simultaneously exploit purists and make it hard for the "normal" lover of this music to get their hands on things. This is especially a problem when the label is a European one and the buyer is in America.
3. I think there is more reason to be suspicious of some of the discourse around "non-functional" 4/4 music than the music itself. I love Lawrence, play his records at home and when I DJ (sometimes even in the middle of the night! Contrast is important to me.).
4. Some of the nu-detroit-basic-channel stuff os fairly by the numbers. The "Starlight" remixes are above average but not the greatest example of this kind of music.

"I think there is more reason to be suspicious of some of the discourse around "non-functional" 4/4 music than the music itself. I love Lawrence, play his records at home and when I DJ (sometimes even in the middle of the night! Contrast is important to me.)."

Yeah this is right - as per my comment upthread I almost feel like I approach all this stuff a bit to sceptically owing to the typicality of its praise, and then I'm pleasantly surprised by how great a lot of it is.

""Starlight" remixes are above average but not the greatest example of this kind of music"

what are some, in your view, better examples of this kind of music? cause i dig the starlight remixes and would love to hear stuff that is similar

I am just now since the beginning of this month trying to catch up with techno after a long hiatus... so i can most more releases as this process continues...
so far, I think that on echospace itself, my favorite release is the Intrusion 2x12 (echospace 7). i also like the convextion lp that came out a couple of years ago on Down Low Music. his early singles are hard to find and cost a bunch of money. If you can find them for less than $40, go ahead and pick them up, especially the first release on Matrix and also his release on Tektite. Also check out Ornaments Music, which has like 5 or 6 releases now. Some of them are exceptional. Obviously Basic Channel and Chain Reaction. There are plenty of threads on those labels.

Anyways, I don't know how experienced you are and whether these records were already all well known to you or not... but these are good places to start.

"3. I think there is more reason to be suspicious of some of the discourse around "non-functional" 4/4 music than the music itself. I love Lawrence, play his records at home and when I DJ (sometimes even in the middle of the night! Contrast is important to me.)."

to the "dance critics" on here, if its not lowest common denominator peak hour Ibiza crapola, it cant possibly be effective on dancefloors. this is why i wonder what the dance culture theyre taking part in is like. if i played most of the tracks they line up to praise at one of my gigs, i'd probably be chased from the building and asked not to return. of course when i drop one of those boring Sistrum records like the recent Mike Edge one, the crowd goes nuts. culture makes a huge difference.

"4. Some of the nu-detroit-basic-channel stuff os fairly by the numbers. The "Starlight" remixes are above average but not the greatest example of this kind of music.

― Shh! It's NOT Me!"

of the actual artists from Detroit, who are the ones making the bad dub tracks? Deepchord mix of Pacou was one of their best dancefloor moments, Modell's "Incense & Black Lights" is diverse as hell in its texture and mood, Luke Hess' 2nd Fxhe 12" adds even more to the sound palette, etc. sure, some of the excessive remix comps (Starlight, Vantage Isle, Miranda, etc) have been unnecessary and redundant as well as ridiculous with the limited colored vinyl thing (which i was critical of over a year ago already on my blog, not a new issue) but even those seem to be less obnoxious when played beginning to end on CD instead of trying to pick out one track to put in a deejay mix. to me the laziest record in this style was the Sebo K joint that straight jacked a Basic Channel loop.

which basic channel and what sebo k track?

i don't mean that in a snarky way or in a "prove your mad track id skillz" way. i am just curious.

slight mistake on my part, the track is by "sebbo", not "sebo k". jeez guys, can't we find a better name?

http://www.discogs.com/release/1277283

jacked loop is from one of the Quadrant tracks as per the note on that link. moritz's rmx is of course brilliant, though.

i guess moritz wasn't as offended as you were

"i guess moritz wasn't as offended as you were

― moonship journey to baja"

did i say i was offended? i said it was lazy, which is absolutely true.

i get what you're saying, but ... i can't kick this feeling when it hits ...

man i loved both sides (well, i bought the mp3s) of that sebbo single!

i bought "ocean to ocean" today. i never knew "infoworld" had an actual vinyl release. wooooooooo