techno and audio-visual fairy tales about machines
Category: music
My enthusiasm for music began with the end of my childhood and the beginning of puberty. When I try to remember it back, vague fragments and titles of pieces of music appear, some of which are now somehow embarrassing for me. Therefore some musical slips will always remain in the dark of history. Almost at the same time I started dreaming of making music myself. Back then – due to the spirit of the times – I imagined how great it would be to play guitar. At that time I could not have imagined that I would end up with electronic music more than five decades later. When I think back and look at my musical milestones, there is definitely a red thread running through them. This thread consists of synthesizer sounds, non-conformism and a preference for danceable music. Welcome to my musical universe. Here you will find many stories about my own and other people’s music, DJ sets and much more. Have fun with it.
30 records in 30 days goes into the 30th round: house music all night long.
This is the end of the 30 days and at the same time a beginning. This record was the spark that set me off in a very specific direction: House in all its different forms. I first noticed this not only during this challenge, but already a few weeks ago, when I discovered a very good remake of the best track on this double album: Let me love you for tonight. Originally by Kariya, remixed by Weiss. That’s it, I’ll nominate myself for the next challenge. Hahaha.
30 records in 30 days goes into the 29th round: the leap behind the glass pane.
Compared to what I’m listening to and playing now, this is no longer a musical hook. No, dear friends of electronic music, this double album was the igniting spark for my DJ career. Sounds a bit strange, but this was exactly the sound I was always waiting for. At least until the end of the eighties. And at my very first gig, obviously, I played most of the album up and down. In the absence of an extensive record collection, even several times per evening. Completely unplanned, I even filled the dance floor and in the end everyone was happy. I will never forget that evening.
30 records in 30 days goes into the 28th round: Me and Jane in Plane.
Another musical hook before we enter the final musical sprint tomorrow. Two important memories connect me with this record. The first concerns the musical style, swing jazz. My father was an avowed fan of this style of music and this band. And – in contrast to his other musical preferences – I liked the music immediately. I even listened to the record often when he wasn’t around. The second memory concerns my father. I can still remember very well how on some Sundays in the morning he put on the record very tidily and enjoyed the music with a lot of commitment.
30 records in 30 days goes into the 27th round: Honni soit qui mal y pense.
Another musical hook. This is the only classical LP I bought when I was young. I got into classical music quite early and still found some inherited pieces in my record collection. Probably not in great condition. I would have bought more classical albums for sure, but in the beginning the pocket money wasn’t enough, later I bought the CDs. Back to the Bolero. There’s not much to say, just great. Almost structured like a modern piece of music. A drum loop and then successively all the other instruments fade in. Have a nice Sunday.
30 records in 30 days goes into the 26th round: Who is afraid of the haunted house?
The end is near. And we’re hitting another musical hook today, towards rap, hip-hop and (according to Wikipedia) e-funk. Whodini’s album was one of the big surprises during this challenge. I couldn’t remember ever owning anything like it. Grandmaster Flash was still hiding somewhere in the depths of my memory, but this album was off my radar. When I then listened to the songs in iTunes, I was surprised again. They are really good. Nevertheless, I never really warmed up to rap and hip-hop, that’s why I only got two LPs. Tomorrow there will be the next hook.
30 records in 30 days goes into the 25th round: Aren’t we all a bit Shango?
A friend of mine infected me with the funk virus when we were in the army together. In 1982-1984, a few limited-edition records called Funk You! were released on the Metrovynil label. The lyrics triggered red ears and stuttering at the time, but the music was the best you could get out of the funk corner.
Unfortunately, you couldn’t buy these albums at my local record store in my hometown and even in bigger towns it was insanely difficult to get them. I had a quick look last night and you can still get them, but at a sporty price (in good condition, more than 20€). I will probably buy them.
Back to Shango. Infected with the aforementioned virus, I was even more pleased that this record was available in normal record shops. The best song on the whole record is the Message. The raw power of funk packed into one song. Simply brilliant. And today‘s message is “Are You ready for the Weekend? Listen to the message! Listen to Shango!”
30 records in 30 days goes into the 24th round: I am not your Father…
Today I present you a musical hook: Kid Creole and the Coconuts, Tropical Gangsters. Funky, Latin, with a strong touch of disco. The ideal music for these gloomy times.
Time for a musical outing: I openly admit it, I’m a child of the disco generation and I love Saturday Night Fever. The dialogues are senseless, the plot – well. But the dance scenes… Dance to Kid Creole. It’s paaaaaaaarty time.
30 records in 30 days goes into the 23rd round: A piece of your heart can be found in every good car.
Today we will close my musical new wave era with one of the best albums from my whole collection, Hard by Gang of 4. As always, I took a quick look at Wikipedia to get an assessment of the music genre. It was quite surprising what I found about Gang of 4:
“The band played a stripped-down mix of punk rock, funk and dub, with a lyrical emphasis on the social and political ills of society. Gang of Four are widely considered one of the leading bands of the late 1970s/early 1980s post-punk movement. […] Their early 80s albums (Songs of the Free and Hard) found them softening some of their more jarring qualities, and drifting towards dance-punk and disco.”
30 records in 30 days goes into the 22nd round: love will tear us apart, and then we travel to Warshaw.
After talking about the commercialization of punk yesterday, today we’re going to take a step back. Joy Division is for me – similar to Alien Sex Fiend – a missing link between the synthesizer-heavy new wave music and the punk of the seventies. This album is really good, but the group lacks the anarchistic sound and synth experiments of Adrian Sex Fiend.
Don’t misunderstand, this in no way devalues the group’s sound, they are just different. Joy Division are so unexcitingly punk-oriented to me that this album is simply a joy to listen to. Quite typical for me: “Leaders of man” and “Warshaw”. It is also not aggressive (nice sample “Love will tear us apart”), like some other punk records, where you would like to tear down the neighbor’s house after two times listening.
