teengirl fantasy, miracles club, mi ami, 100% silk and the rise of HIPSTER HOUSE: S/D

I saw Glass Candy play in a drafty hall at a rock festival, objectively really awful environment to hear real or hipster-fake dance music, but I had a marvelous time.

I think a lot of what you're saying deej elides with stuff like hatchback windsurf james ferraro etc - there's for sure an Outlining The Difference piece to be written but it's probably already in the Simon Reynolds book - the "thickening" of the material by contextual reference results/can result? in a different listening experience is what I think the deal is. but "immediacy" is a pretty rock 'n' roll stated goal, I think with some of this stuff the added dimension of history changes the effect of listening. like somebody could do the most spoton Paradise Garage tribute sound but if it was somebody who didn't actually experience paradise garage, then it's necessarily a different sound. which is interesting to some people, occasionally there's movements like this in metal too, most bands trying that look can't keep it real or interesting for longer than an album tho darkthrone's throwback stuff is incredible imo

i mean i think what we all like is music that seems to impact at multiple levels (maybe i'm just speaking for myself here) -- i like stuff that refers to interesting parts of musical history, i like stuff that feels cutting-edge, that attracts diverse crowds, particularly in terms of gender, that aims to grab my attention as a dancer, etc. etc.

i mean the criticisms of 'real house music' nights in chicago are that they can be boring & trad & unconcerned w/ finding new & novel (& cool) influences. And then the inverse is the criticisms of this stuff, that it's so concerned with being cool & affecting the 'right' influences that it loses touch w/ the kinds of functionality that make 'the real thing' so attractive to diverse groups of people. when it comes down to it i like both of these things working in concert. I mean, its what works about Harvey or Classixx or Tensnake or whoever else.

at the end of the day, though, i like music that has an immediacy -- meaning, music that appeals to ppl who like cool signifiers but that can immediately appeal to people who might not think on those terms ... that you could invite someone who isnt in 'our conversation' about old house records & they'll still enjoy themselves. I guess the gatekeeper aspect of it JUST relying on hip references & chillwave justifications for its 'importance' is extremely off-putting to me.

today is the same as yesterday basically

like, the underground/niche/'scene' element is, in my favorite music, a launching pad rather than a self-sustaining thing, nb this may be from my hip-hop background where so many of my fav artists are trying to 'make it' & cross over and appeal to more people

good post aero, reflecting on it

that you could invite someone who isnt in 'our conversation' about old house records & they'll still enjoy themselves

i have found this to be true (if you can convince people to actually come!)

i think i posted about this before on ilx but i invited some ladyfriends to come see rupture w/ me once & they were supremely 'ehhhh' abt it -- and they're not really 'top 40 only' types, pretty open minded (i recognize rupture is an entirely difft thing this is just an example) but he was only connecting, ime, with people who'd already 'bought' what he's selling

I don't think any of the hipster house I have heard is particularly anti-outsiders in sound. It's more the conversation that makes it seem so.

xp i have heard this about rupture too actually

i mean, clearly going to see the deeep or w/e is going to have a lot less of an immediate impact than something like teengirl fantasy or miracles club. there are lots of differing strands that seem to be intersecting here and a lot of the generalizations itt are totally dependent on the artist

like somebody could do the most spoton Paradise Garage tribute sound but if it was somebody who didn't actually experience paradise garage, then it's necessarily a different sound

sometimes i think its less abt 'access' to a specific xp or context or sound (since access is sort of a degraded concept) but abt our relationship with a present that does little to distance or distinguish itself from the past, like this music isnt really 'the way it is' because its distanced or ironic or suspicious but because thats what 'xp' is like now. the past is now more a foreign country than the present or s.thing

otm Lamp

See the thing is I actually don't think that this music would or should or can only appeal to people who are suspicious of most house music, so it surprises me that some boosters in this thread keep defending the music in those terms.

I think it's entirely possible to both like "the real thing" and to like slightly arch distanced etc. recreations of that thing. People who can only like one or the other are missing out a bit IMO.

i dont think anyone here said that these scenes would, should or have to be mutually exclusive, but rather that this one, for whatever reason, seems to be accessible to people who otherwise might associate all dance music with the "disgusting" club vibe i mentioned before and have been turned off as a result. (not trying to make a normative statement here, just a positive one)

w/r/t this stuff being anti-outsider

i mean that mixmag interview and the writeups on the 100% silk blog seem like they're meant specifically for people who have never heard a house record before, super flowery exaggerated language, no namedrops or insidery references to equipment or hardware or specific musical or geographic legacies the music maybe be interacting with

if anything it is designed specifically for outsiders, even to the point where the DJ sets can function as cliff's notes guides to the most obvious highlights of the genre the DJ's productions are operating in

sometimes i think its less abt 'access' to a specific xp or context or sound (since access is sort of a degraded concept) but abt our relationship with a present that does little to distance or distinguish itself from the past, like this music isnt really 'the way it is' because its distanced or ironic or suspicious but because thats what 'xp' is like now. the past is now more a foreign country than the present or s.thing

― koyannisquatsi hop (Lamp), Wednesday, 12 October 2011 23:34 (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I think this is a good way of putting it but (to the extent this needs to be said at all) I also think it's not a general rule - i.e. this is not expressive of the modern human condition but rather one common experience of it.

Scenes have varying qualities of newness/retroism and then overlaid on top of that have various qualities of self-consciousness about where they sit.

Certainly none of these qualities in 100% Silk et. al. are any different in substance to, say balearic of disco edits or w/e - it's a very similar principle I think.

i mean that mixmag interview and the writeups on the 100% silk blog seem like they're meant specifically for people who have never heard a house record before, super flowery exaggerated language, no namedrops or insidery references to equipment or hardware or specific musical or geographic legacies the music maybe be interacting with

I don't disagree with this but at the same time insiderness/outsiderness can operate along a lot of different vectors.

Like, DJ Rupture can be music that appeals to outsiders vis a vis actual kuduro enthusiasts, but then seem insidery vis a vis music that appeals to people who aren't already sold on the idea of one planet under a groove pan-globalism.

David Guetta also wants to appeal to people who have never heard house but that doesn't mean any of us would conflate Guetta and 100% Silk as partners in ecumenical openness.

that sir stephens youtube sounds like laura jones - "love in me"

ok wau at some of the questions in that mixmag interview...

Do you kick it old skool intentionally?

Where do you find the producers that you put out? Each release seems to be from an underground artist capable of creating pure dance floor gold!

some of the answers are p funny too i guess

I just love making people dance, and if I make them think as well, then that's even better.

she just wants to make people dance guys

which is totally obvious on the 100% silk tour featuring sex worker, dylan ettinger, maria minerva and la vampires

i mean that mixmag interview and the writeups on the 100% silk blog seem like they're meant specifically for people who have never heard a house record before, super flowery exaggerated language, no namedrops or insidery references to equipment or hardware or specific musical or geographic legacies the music maybe be interacting with

ugh, this sounds terrible, but i'm just gonna throw it out there. i'm drunk and will deal w/my sexism tomorrow morn, but this was said by a girl. i know full well girls can get into the nerdy collectorism and name dropping, but that article wasn't that.

I was listening to the Future Times mix for Resident Advisor (which I love love love) again today and was thinking that FT is definitely a case where any archness does not get in the way of the music's functional immediacy whatsoever.

not to stir up the pot more, but I really don't think Future Times is coming from the same place as 100% Silk, despite various connections real or imagined. And the differences may be superficial ones regarding scene and history and fashion and degrees of HIPSTERISM but they're there and they partially dictate the differences.

And for what it's worth, I have no problem bringing the phrase "hipster" into this thread, or calling the genre "Hipster House" (hey, I kinda helped coin Beardo Disco, right Vahid?) because to me Hipster has positive as well as negative connotations...and it's beyond value judgements anyway. I've managed to avoid the several recent threads debating "hipster" (despite being invited to take part) but I felt it worth mentioning here.

Agree re "hipster".

"I've managed to avoid the several recent threads debating "hipster" (despite being invited to take part)"

if i do nothing else with my life i will make sure that these words are carved onto dan's tombstone

dan's probably right re: future times too. that stuff is definitely coming from a different, if overlapping place- which is why i was sorta hesitant to throw them in here, but as you mentioned there are some definite connections.

i unabashedly love FT and have slightly more reserved emotions for the rest of the stuff in this thread, regardless of how fun it is to talk about or go see in a live setting. too bad my future times thread never took off

a lot of the stuff on l.i.e.s. tho is more gritty, definitely more ingrained into crate digging history, they put out a legowelt record, etc... there are tons of differences but if you played this and told me it was on 100% silk i wouldn't think twice:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZ049btJRuM

one could probably say the same for most of the legowelt back catalog too. these things are not the same, but why? i'm not sure i'm the one to articulate this but it has to do with more than just mastering or historical context. i think.

i will openly refute the idea that many of these artists don't know what they're talking about when it comes to older house and techno.

who are you refuting?

i think what ppl are saying has less to do with the artists' actual interest in or respect for the history of house/techno- and ime as well they do seem to be very knowledgeable- and more about that awful interview and it perhaps being aimed at people who are relatively clueless (idk much about mixmag tho, maybe they are just lazy)

table, I think people in this thread were saying 100% Silk appealed to audiences who didn't know much about house and techno (this was held up as being a good quality rather than a bad one).

At any rate I think it's only about half right at most.

all the ppl i know that make this stuff are into 90s uk garage todd edwards type stuff

there's def a growing scene of this sort of thing in london but it seems to be more experimental and less about doing covers of old house trax

i will openly refute the idea that many of these artists don't know what they're talking about when it comes to older house and techno.

know what they're talking about /= knowing the most blogged about / talked about tracks, or what ilx accepts as the canon

super flowery exaggerated language

lol. This is true, but I guess I don't really mind so much. And of course, the selections are relatively straightforward for ILXors - it's hard for me to be overly critical of anyone recommending Luomo's 'Tessio', even if they're writing stuff like "A step in the right direction towards world peace..." (ironically or otherwise).

all the ppl i know that make this stuff are into 90s uk garage todd edwards type stuff

there's def a growing scene of this sort of thing in london but it seems to be more experimental and less about doing covers of old house trax

yeah i mentioned earlier that some of this stuff just seems more like the "future" house/garage / uk bass stuff as opposed to the other stuff in the thread that goes for a feel of the classics, doesn't feel like the same camp to me

amusing to see people always ready to step up for future times - i grew up around these kids in dc/md/va when they were all mostly about hardcore punk/indie/hip-hop, and have seen the label grow and take off with a lot of recognition which is great, go homeboys etc but i can't get into it. feel exactly the same way about dave nada which is the same situation although his spot in dance music is different

it's hard to sort out who's coming from where because of the crossover. That Two Dogs track is Ron Morelli and Jason Letkiewicz. Ron is yr classic old school punk kid turned house/techno guy who's been spinning house and techno since the pre-DFA days. I don't know Jason's background as well because I only met him recently but he's obviously well versed in the history of dance music, with his various projects/psuedonyms, Steve Summers, Rhythm Based Lovers, Innergaze, and he actually vacillates with this aesthetic. Sometimes it's more purist stuff, other times its more hazy/crossover hipster stuff. (again, hipster not in a pejorative sense). They're distinct stylistic choices and there is a difference. Innergaze, which he does with Aurora, cover star of a Minimal Wave comp, has a more lo-fi/minimal synth/experimental influence vibe.

Runaway/On the Prowl etc mentioned above is Marcos Cabral, who was working at Sonic Groove Records in NY w/ Brennan Greene and a serious techno head back before anyone in NY was even playing disco, let alone classic house, (except for actual house DJs, who existed in their own little ghetto separate from techno). It's him and Jacques Renault, and they're coming out of more recent nu-disco scenes, but they're hanging out with L.I.E.S. and going to the same parties.

So you've got people who've been making "techno" and "house" for years and years who are involved in this, and then you have people who are very new to it with varying levels of experience/understanding. In NY there's this whole bushwick yoga house scene, which ties into New Age revivalism as well, and aesthetically is maybe closer to the 100% Silk stuff. They too DJ the real stuff, but when making new stuff, these other influences will come to play.

But a lot of the west coast stuff we're talking about, the 100% silk and Ital stuff, I think has that early Italians Do It Better influence, where it's more lo-fi and artsy take on house music. House music neophytes (recent studies or not) coming out of more experimental noise contexts who don't have the baggage of purism even when they try to be slavishly derivative. But I think Ital just moved to Brooklyn anyway? So maybe he'll suddenly decide to go Diva house anyway. Maybe he's just visiting. In any case, the "difference" doesn't have to be "they don't know how to produce proper dance music" or "hipsters think they're cooler than proper dance music", it's just dance music with a few different influences then people are used to. Maybe that makes it OK for "hipsters" to finally like house music, like Justice made it OK for rockers to like club music or LCD or Glass Candy or whomever. I think there's a noticeable sonic difference from people tweaking dance music from the outside and from the inside. Take Metro Area and LCD Soundsystem. With the former you have artists coming up through "proper" house and techno, bringing in New Wave and Disco and Boogie influences, with the latter you have an artist coing up through punk/post-punk/rock. Both stretched the sound in their times in different ways.

And I think there's a conflict between admiring the mixed to cassette aesthetic, which is a big part of the sound, and an understanding of what sounds good on a system. I know certain hip local labels who started dabbling in music for clubs with similar acts recently and were initially frustrated by the realization that they have to mix and master for the dancefloor if they want it to sound good mixed in with other dance musics. This is a lesson every dance label in the history of dance music has learned, usually the hard way. It's not just about making it work at the Ministry of Sound, if 100% Silk hear their 12"s played enough at venues that aren't a house party rocking through somebody's stereo speakers, they'll get bummed. It's just harder to dance to stuff that sounds quiet and mushy. I'm assuming that's the complaint, I've never heard those 12"s.

Booming post.

dan otm!

i need the welcome roadsigns into brooklyn to note something about yoga and diva house now

http://vibesmanagement.com/

http://bodyactualized.blogspot.com/

Usually when I talk about wacky hybrid genres I'm exaggerating for effect/conversation. Not this time.

The closest involvement I had with all that was on the coldest day possible a few years ago when Market Hotel was still open Jan Woo let Tropical Jeremy and myself host Jonnny Sendar from Konk who was visiting after leaving NY for france a few years before and literally, maybe 12 people showed up. And somebody came, paid with a counterfeit 50 or 100 dollar bill, got change then left, so not only was the party empty, it got robbed. That story pretty much sums up my DJ career.

Oh, I thought you meant you were looking for the "signs", but you mean instead of "Brooklyn, FUGGEDABOUT IT", Marty Moskovitz's signs should promote this.

lol yes fuggedabout it but the signs welcome never heard about it

"Leaving Brooklyn, OY VEY"

Forget that guy. Queens should have signs like that, but they should be in an obscure Nepali dialect.

Again awesome post dan! I was hoping someone would articulate for me all the thoughts I've been having reading this thread the past few days, and have some working knowledge to share of what's happening on the ground.

Actually, I was wondering about 'learning things the hard way' re: 100% Silk. There's some interesting stuff on the label, but I agree that for them to balance out the hazy aesthetic with the demands of big systems is somehow crucial, especially if they expect these 12's to be DJed in a club (and this depends on how these records are taken up, and I'd say there's already some demand or engagement with those releases from that context). They seem to be splitting the difference at the moment between the context of records being documents or even art objects and records being tools for the dancefloor. They're running the label like a traditional dance label, but approaching production and aesthetics from an indie/noise/lo-fi perspective - so there's an interesting tension, but I'm not sure how it will play out in the long term. I'm sure that at the start this was a bit of a coy move from them, but the reception of these releases might ultimately mean they change their game.

I think this is also related to an issue that stems from the turn to analogue medium specificity as a strategy, where the route out from the DIY cassette/CDR scene is as much (if not more) about hi-fi, as well the other familiar path from abstraction/noise/experimental to pop.

Also interesting in this respect that 100% Silk show up not only as a feature in Mixmag, but also as a download on Beatport, and how they move across features/reviews from RA, LWE, or mnml ssgs to Pitchfork, Altered Zones or Gorilla Versus Bear.

Future Times is just put out a comp of relevant artists: Vibe 2 - worth checking out

also, new Miracles Club track on a Wurst comp coming out soon as well that is pretty nice. their place on that comp kind of exemplifies their crossover into the schools of artists who have been making this stuff for a while.

massive post dan, thanks for articulating the sentiments i was trying to say without pissing everyone off! i was trying to convey the relationship to the runaway/let's play house scene because all those people go to the same parties in brooklyn it seems so despite their varied backgrounds there are connections and some cross pollination.

i should say i mentioned blondes further up as part of this movement, if only because of the similarities in their performance styles and philosophies about production. but i was thinking more on this and their relationship to groups like Emeralds, Balam Acab, etc. (who have noise affiliations/legitimacy in those scenes) and i think that while their populist crossover appeal as sort-of stoner-trance goes in entirely different direction, i group them in this hipster-house movement because they have a similar effect on people of making it "OK for "hipsters" to finally like house music" as dan so aptly put it.

sorry, ready "this stuff" as house/disco

and where were all these noise trance hipster house kids at Oberlin when I was there? I started in 93 djing Jeff Mills records on WOBC and working the lights at the Sco while Morgan Geist played Dancemania records to an empty room and ended in 97 DJing a "rave" in South thrown by Paul B Davis and Cory Arcangel. There was a "techno" contigent in Zeke who were all RAVE TILL DAWN compilation CDs and glow sticks, but hey, it was the 90s.