Talk to me about Patrick Cowley's 'Menergy'

I can't remember the names of instrumental tracks, but I guess I worded that post a bit badly: I did like several of the tunes on Muscle Up, just not the ones that felt like they weren't completed. School Daze was such an amazing record, everything on it was so sublime and felt polished, so MU was a bit of disappointment compared to that. Also, SD had some amazing proto-trance tunes with hypnotic synth work, so particularly that one track on MU which sounds like a standard disco rhythm track with a missing lead voice/instrument felt too generic in comparison.

I'd still recommend both comps to everyone, it just that felt that they got all the diamonds for SD, and on MU they had to include lesser material too.

But yeah, I get it that might be different if you bought and listened to them as one work instead of waiting 2 years in between.

I'm listening again now to MU thanks to this thread, and I hear what you mean about some of these sounding unfinished. I'm coming at Cowley from a decidedly non-disco background, so I tend to gravitate less toward the bangers and more toward the stranger things on here, which may explain my unreserved embrace of it as a whole, including the things that sound like sketches.

I wonder how much is left in the archive, if anything? At this point I'd buy p much anything with his name on it

I'm sure I read there are a couple more volumes due.

The clunky 'demo' of STLT is charming. And there's nothing really like Deep Inside You, The Jungle Dream or Don't Ask on the first one. If anything overall I thought MU was a bit stronger, or I prefer the slightly more space music / kosmische tilt.

ditto

I've listened to the STLT demo approx. 10 times this week! It reminds me of some of the best Not Not Fun stuff.

"Kickin' In" still gets stuck in my head. Awesome awesome tune.

I adore the instrumental version of "Somebody To Love Tonight", but I suspect that's in part because I first experienced it in its original context rather than as a track on a compilation. The arrangement seems woozy and debauched rather than clunky when received through that lens.

In some ways I might even allow that to over-determine my experience of this music given it's not necessarily the case that these tracks were composed with a film soundtracking role in mind, but it makes everything feel much vibier to me.

Muscle Up can't really surprise in the way School Daze did if you'd already heard the latter, but otherwise I'm not sure I'd be able to say which is the stronger release.

I'm not sure who claimed the Muscle Up version of "Somebody To Love Tonight" is "clunky"? It's not one of the more rough-sounding tracks on MU, but since I heard and fell in love with the Sylvester version years before this one, it just feels like something is missing. TBH I have the same feeling with most instrumental versions of disco tunes, unless they're proper dub versions with some extra tricks and gimmicks.

But I can imagine that hearing it on the soundtrack of the porn movie where Cowley intended it to be used is different. A lot of soundtracks leave me similarly cold if I haven't seen the movie, feels like part of the narrative isn't there.

i find most songs sound better if i'm watching porn while i'm listening to them

Note how carefully worded my last post was = I was on the office.

lol narrative

Kickin in, kickin in
Doo doo do-do doooooo

-oooh

OTM

DARK ENTRIES & HONEY SOUNDSYSTEM PRESENT AFTERNOONERS
THE FINAL PATRICK COWLEY ARCHIVAL GAY PORN SOUNDTRACK WORK
OUT OCTOBER 19 (LP / CD / DIGITAL)
LISTEN TO "HOT BEACH" HERE
https://soundcloud.com/darkentriesrecords/hot-beach?mc_cid=2ba5bf13d0&mc_eid=32e64a6326

Dark Entries and Honey Soundsystem Records have teamed up once more to release the final volume of gay porn soundtracks by San Francisco-based musician and producer, Patrick Cowley. One of the most revolutionary and influential figures in the canon of disco, Cowley created his own brand of Hi-NRG dance music, “The San Francisco Sound.” Born in Buffalo, NY on October 19, 1950, Patrick moved to San Francisco in 1971 to study at the City College of San Francisco. He founded the Electronic Music Lab at the school, where he would make experimental soundtracks by blending various types of music and adapting them to the synthesizer.

By the mid-70’s, Patrick’s synthesis techniques landed him a job composing and producing songs for disco superstar Sylvester, including hits like “You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)”, “Dance Disco Heat” and “Stars.” This helped Patrick obtain more work as a remixer and producer. His 18-minute long remix of Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love” and his production work with edgy New Wave band Indoor Life were both of particular note. By 1981, Patrick had released a string of dance 12″ singles, like “Menergy” and “Megatron Man”. He also had founded Megatone Records, the label upon which he released his debut album, “Menergy”. Around this time Patrick was hospitalized and diagnosed with an unknown illness: that which would later be called AIDS. Throughout 1982, he recorded two more Hi-NRG hits, “Do You Wanna Funk” for Sylvester, and “Right On Target” for Paul Parker, as well as a second solo album “Mind Warp”. On November 12, 1982, he passed away.

In 1979 Patrick was contacted by John Coletti, owner of famed gay porn company Fox Studio in Los Angeles. Patrick jumped on this offer and sent reels of his college compositions from the 70s to John in LA. Coletti then used a variable speed oscillator to adjust the pitch and speed of Patrick’s songs in-sync with the film scenes. The result was the VHS collections “Muscle Up” and “School Daze” released in 1979 and 1980. “Afternooners” is the third collection of Cowley’s instrumental songs, recorded in May 1982. These recordings were culled from two 23-minute reels in the Fox Studio vaults. This compilation also includes three bonus tracks found in the archives of fellow Megatone Records recording artist Paul Parker and the attic of teenage friend Lily Bartels. Influenced by Tomita, Wendy Carlos, and Giorgio Moroder, Patrick crafted a singular sound from his collection of synthesizers, percussion, modified guitars, and hand-built equipment. The listener enters a world of forbidden vices, evocative of Patrick’s time spent in the bathhouses of San Francisco. The songs on “Afternooners” reflect the advances of the equipment available at the onset of the 1980s. Cowley's unadulterated electronic forms are stripped down and dubbed up. Lush electronic percussion, soaring synthesizer riffs and low slung funk grooves comingle on these magnificent soundscapes.

Featuring 70 minutes of music never before released on vinyl. All songs have been remastered by George Horn at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley, CA. The vinyl is housed in a gatefold jacket designed by Berlin-based artist Gwenael Rattke, featuring black and white photos of Patrick in his studio that opens to a full color array of x-rated scenes from the Fox Studio vaults. Included is a fold-out poster featuring a handmade collage using photography and xeroxed graphics of classic gay porn imagery and an essay from Drew Daniel of Matmos. For Patrick’s 67th birthday, Dark Entries and Honey Soundsystem Records present a glimpse into the futuristic world of a young genius. These recordings shed a new light on the experimental side of a disco legend who was taken too soon.

There will be a celebration of Cowley's life and work on November 9th at CounterPulse in San Francisco with performances by Group Rhoda and Jorge Socarras, and talks from John Coletti (Fox Studio), Theresa McGinley (Angels of Light), & Chris Njirich (Remember the Party) as well as screenings of original 16mm films from the Fox Studio Archives.

https://patrickcowley.bandcamp.com/album/afternooners

Patrick Cowley
Afternooners
Dark Entries + Honey Soundsystem
10/19/17
LP / CD / Digital

1. Big Shot
2. Surfside Sex
3. Hot Beach
4. The Runner
5. Furlough
6. One Hot Afternoon
7. Leather Bound
8. Bore & Stroke
9. Cycle Tuff
10. Jungle Orchids
11. Take A Little Trip
12. Love Come Set Me Free

for all the above + images & contact info:
http://mailchi.mp/d4fb010a5270/85myiiza98-2808093?e=32e64a6326

That SF show in November sounds like a treat. And this news was also the prompt for me to finally get Muscle Up.

And here's Mr. Daniel's liner notes

http://www.thefader.com/2017/09/18/patrick-cowley-drew-daniel-surfside-sex-afternooners?mc_cid=e6cc5656c7&mc_eid=ea4c199572

Sounds good!

'New' EP released tonight out of nowhere:

https://patrickcowley.bandcamp.com/album/kickin-in-3

During the 70s, Patrick was the lighting technician at The City disco in San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood. This was SF’s largest Gay entertainment complex, where everyone from Grace Jones to Sylvester would perform. Frank Loverde was performing there with his band Loverde when Patrick asked if the band would like to do backups on some songs he’d been working on. Frank, Linda Imperial and Timmy went to Patrick’s studio and laid down vocals for songs, most of which were never released and remained buried in the Megatone vaults.
In 2007 Honey Soundsystem was contacted by the former owner of Megatone Records John Hedges. Hedges’ was moving to Palm Springs and invited us over to his basement to collect over 2,000 records from his collection. Among the archives we noticed three moldy boxes of quarter inch reel to reel tapes. Included was the final mixed down reel for “Kickin’ In”, an epic 9-minute journey through disco, that Patrick recorded with Loverde in 1978. From the introduction of a bouncing arpeggiated Prophet IV to the harmonized vocals that transport the listener to another realm, the song encapsulates the Hi-NRG dance music that Patrick became known for. It was an “up” sound for the gay disco scene, music that would compliment and sometimes enhance all night dancing. On the flip are two earlier songs produced between 1975-77 featuring bass lines by college classmate and studio mate Maurice Tani. Both songs feature Patrick narrating erotic gay sex fantasies inspired by San Francisco’s leather bars, back rooms and bathhouses. These songs show the sleazy side of Cowley’s slow burning, oozing electronic creations with layers and layers of synthesizer, guitar, drum machine and vocoder.
All songs have been mastered by George Horn, who originally mastered all of the Megatone Records releases at Fantasy Studios. “Patrick parted the veil and entered a dark world of forbidden vices, wondrous musical panoramas and bold, strident, hopeful possibilities. Patrick brought the future to us and laid it at our feet.”

Also in a couple of weeks is a new collection of unreleased work in general:

https://patrickcowley.bandcamp.com/album/mechanical-fantasy-box

Which itself is paired with a reproduction of Cowley's sex diary. Details and some screenshots at the link as well.

Pretty cool! Seems like Kickin' In originally surfaced a few years back (https://www.factmag.com/2015/10/21/stream-patrick-cowley-kickin-in-ep/) but it passed me by at the time.

I'm in for the 2xLP + softcover book. I missed Afternooners somehow but Muscle Up and School Daze are all time favorites

By the timing on the Bandcamp download, the "Kickin In" track is 3 minutes shorter than the 2015 release.

Holy shit, I haven't listened to this in ages but I was listening to my music on shuffle and this popped up right after some Soul Jazz reggae compilation. Timely revive!

Decided to just get the LP without the book. Might pick it later if I love this album as much as Muscle Up and School Daze but money is tight atm and I'm not sure how many times I'll actually read Cowley's cruising journals

This is sounding really excellent so far. The two songs I listened to have some of the seasick wooziness of Muscle Up and School Daze but with the energy and textural variety of Megatron Man and Menergy. "Lumberjacks in Heat" almost sounds like something that could have been released on Innovative Communication in 1985. Really eager to hear the rest.

Anybody get their copy yet? First impressions?

More archival material!

https://patrickcowley.bandcamp.com/album/some-funkettes

Per the PR mailout:

Some Funkettes, the latest addition to this series, is a collection of previously unreleased cover songs recorded from 1975-1977. These raw, unembellished tributes both showcase Cowley’s early musical interests and chart the development of his production techniques.
Some Funkettes opens with Cowley’s sauntering instrumental rendition of “Do It Anyway You Wanna”, the disco classic by People’s Choice. Next is a psychedelic reworking of the Temptations’ “Papa Was a Rolling Stone”, here hazily retitled “Papa Wuzza Rollinston”. Over its 7 minute runtime, the track’s metronomic, minimal groove builds to a frantic synth solo - this is pure Bay Area motorik. “Spiked Punch”, a curious riff on Herbie Hancock’s “Chameleon” follows. Cowley’s lurching, minimalist reimagining of Hancock’s opus prefigures the work he would later do on Sylvester’s masterpiece “I Need Somebody to Love Tonight”. Side B opens with a truly important historical document: Cowley’s cover of Donna Summer’s “I Feel Love”. The Moroder-produced disco anthem was a critical influence on Cowley - he would later resculpt the original song into arguably its highest form with his 15-minute-long remix. The instrumental cover version here is sparse and euphoric, brimming with classic Cowley synth signatures alongside the infectious Moroder bassline. A relatively faithful take on Bazuka’s 1975 funk classic “Dynomite” follows. The record closes with the dub version of “Spiked Punch”, which highlights developments in Cowley’s recording and synthesis techniques by way of its resonant burbles and spring reverb-laden passages.

Came here to post that - sounds like a good time.

Great clips sandwich on Soundcloud, linked from his bandcamp---thanks so much!

damn this sounds great

https://soundcloud.com/darkentriesrecords/do-it-any-way-you-wanna

here are the clips

I will buy this even though the Cowley reissue campaign has been mostly diminishing returns for me since Muscle Up

yeah i'm .. not sold on that tbr

'menergy' on the other hand. has it been remarked upon in this thread that the uh 12" version comes 3 times in 8 minutes? the orgasm is the rising chord sequence with the boom at the end obv.

agreed, every one of these archival issues seems to get worse and the clips are not that interesting.

I wouldn't say worse necessarily, but I think I listened to that Mechanical Fantasy Box thing twice, which is one more time than I listened to both Afternooners and the "Candida Cosmica" 12". tbf the bar was set pretty high by School Daze imo

Some Funkettes is out today. Ignore my worries and misgivings above - it's great! I already like it much better than Mechanical Fantasy Box. "Spiked Punch" is basically proto-acid and sounds like a very early version of the "Somebody To Love Tonight" remix (and in fact had me going back to Muscle Up to compare that version), but with a surprisingly proggy breakdown in the middle. Still just getting to know this one but if you're on the fence I'd say this one is worth the plunge

Yeah this is great. Love that he got the inspiration for "Somebody To Love Tonight" by playing around with Hancock's "Chameleon"

@darkentriesrecs
literally the day after the anniversary of Patrick Cowley's passing we unearth a Mega Mix he made of Donna Summer's "I Love You / Happily Ever After"

Dark Entries Records
@darkentriesrecs
Replying to
@darkentriesrecs
18 large reels
1980-82 tech-no
he was a genius
if anyone knows where tape 5 is, please tell me
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/EmxN865UUAAqyjr?format=jpg&name=large

As I said on What Are You Listening To?:
Patrick Cowley, Some Funkettes: Firmly packed studio rat EP, sassy and fresh from the can, man, mid-to-late 70s queries--fave so far is instrumental version of "I Feel Love," with as much or as prominent organ as synth, maybe 60s garage fave Farfisa, bringing out seedy soulful punky Latin highlights from melody---other fave is finale, "Spiked Punch Dub."

― dow, Tuesday, October 27, 2020 11:58 PM (two weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

sorry, meant to link, whole thing is here, with much else:
https://patrickcowley.bandcamp.com/

from my blogged 2021 round-up, in which White Trash stood tall amidst Top EPs:

Patrick Cowley remains the still-warm black leatherette motorcycle mustachio cap Arthur Russell of posthumous popologicical offerings, thee gifts that keep on giving, though Crowley's are more like poppers and flashbulbs going off in the garage. His later leavings get more and more 0 budget, if possible, but soundz still make it through v. vividly, even musically, even from the junk shop 7" single sources of his latest:

…four tracks culled from some of Cowley's earliest rehearsal tapes. In 1972 Patrick was living in the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood with Theresa McGinley and Janice Sukaitis, friends of his from New York. In 1973, Theresa and Janice formed White Trash Boom-Boom, an all-female avant-garde performance troupe. Reacting to the Angels of Light and the Cockettes, they captured the spirit of the times: camp, confrontational, and delirious. Theresa recalls, "We brewed a brand of performance that steered away from the doctrinaire and reveled in ambiguities." Patrick provided their theatrical experiments with appropriately zany musical accompaniment. Side A features two songs from the "Country and Western" skit, "Bride" and "Beer and a Pizza", which were written by Janice and Karen Dunaway and produced by Cowley. The feminist skit tackled the issue of women's limited life choices in society. The B-side contains "Baciami" and "Spengo la Luce", two songs from "Goes to Little Italy", a skit addressing Catholic expectations of female chastity, performed in 1974 on top of the bar at the Stud. These songs were lifted from an Italian folk 7" found at a thrift store, and feature "improvised" Italian. The material on Boom-Boom shows Cowley flexing his synthesizer muscles to create curiously camp genre pieces. This is an essential document of a bygone era.https://patrickcowley.bandcamp.com/

More from the archive

https://patrickcowley.bandcamp.com/album/malebox

Recorded from 1979-1981, these six tracks illuminate what was one of Patrick’s most creatively exciting periods. “If You Feel It” and “Love Me Hot” were both early Paul Parker demos; the former is a peak hour hi-NRG bomb,while the latter dips into Cowley’s zoned-out space disco sound. Jeanie Tracy’s soulful vocals feature on the demo version of “Low Down Dirty Rhythm”, which was later re-recorded by Sarah Dash. The slower, less-varnished rendition here hits with a wild psychedelic edge. Meanwhile, Patrick’s gifts for careful orchestration and infectious melodies shine on “Floating” and “Love and Passion”, which were likely demo tracks for Loverde.

Dark Entries is opening a record store in San Francisco

https://thevinylfactory.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Screenshot-2022-11-28-at-11.57.29.png

The store kicks off with a launch party on December 10.

Dark Entries Records is set to open a brick-and-mortar store in San Francisco on December 10.

Located at 910 Larkin Street, San Francisco, the store will host a special launch event on opening day with DJ sets by Carlos Souffront, Topazu and Jeremy Castillo from 6-9pm.

Founded in 2009 by Josh Cheon, Dark Entries’ aim is to release out-of-print and unreleased underground music and contemporary bands. Since then, the label has put out 100 releases from Severed Heads, Crash Course In Science, Patrick Cowley and more.

https://thevinylfactory.com/news/dark-entries-record-store/

Menergy: San Francisco's Gay Disco Sound by Louis Niebur

For most of the US, disco died in 1979. Triggered by the infamous "Disco Demolition" night at Comiskey Park in Chicago on July 12, 1979, a backlash made the word "disco" an overnight punchline. Major labels dropped disco artists and producers, and those mainstream musicians who had jumped on the bandwagon just as quickly threw themselves off. Gay men, however, continued to dance, and in the gay enclave of the Castro District in San Francisco, enterprising gay DJs, record producers, and musicians started their own small dance music record labels to make up for the lack of new, danceable music. Almost immediately this music reached far beyond the Bay, with Megatone Records, Moby Dick Records, and other labels achieving worldwide success, creating the world's first gay-owned, gay-produced music for a dancing audience. This music reflected a new way of life, a world apart and a culture of sexual liberation for gay men especially.

With Menergy, author Louis Niebur offers a project of reconstruction in order to restore these lost figures to their rightful place in the legacy of 20th-century popular music. Menergy is the product of years of research, with dozens of personal interviews, archival research drawing upon hundreds of contemporary journals, photographs, bar rags, diaries, nightclub ephemera, and, most importantly, the recordings of the San Francisco artists themselves. With its combination of popular music theory, cultural analysis, queer theory and gender studies, and traditional musical analysis, the book will appeal to readers in queer history, popular music history, and electronic dance music.

I'm about halfway through this book. Highly recommended if you are familiar with the source material.

I really think that “Disco Demolition” night had nothing to do with the decline of disco. It was a baseball promotion where you could go to a double header for free if you brought a record (and it didn’t have to be a disco record. No one was checking at the gate) That’s it. It wasn’t the catalyst for a zeitgeist change.

Bad Girls by Donna Summer was the number one Single on Disco Demolition night and remained so afterwards. Until it was replaced by Chic’s Good Times. Off The Wall came out the next month and had 2 number one “disco” singles. It’s such a lazy Forrest Gump style reference for a writer to make.

But that rant aside, I have always liked that Patrick Crowley made soundtracks for porn. Some of his stuff is on this mix of late 70’s/early 80s gay porn soundtracks

https://m.soundcloud.com/carparkrecords/montag-porn-archives-lo-fi

Ehh, it was a tipping point and a cultural touchstone. I don’t think the writer—or anyone—is saying it “caused” disco to die. But it was almost certainly big enough news that it made it okay to hate on it.

I would also venture a guess that there were a bunch of DJs—from bigots to rockists—who felt vindicated and empowered that this trend was getting its just desserts and thrilled they didn’t have to play it anymore.

i think at this point it's become said so much that it's become true in that sense where we access and construct history through everything that's happened between then and now. but also i think that it's useful and compelling shorthand for a fracturing point that broke along patriarchal lines to pretty strong degree, patriarchy that's always been in the music industry and always will be but has been on an interesting journey.