Month: August 1990

BEATS AND PIECES

EN VOGUE return in full live concert to Prestatyn, the scene of their UK breakthrough, as stars of the November 2/3/4 Prestatyn 8 weekender, which will also feature a live performance by Light Of The World and other star attractions including guest jocks Dancin’ Danny D and Soul II Soul DJs Jazzy Q & Friends — booking details on 081-364 1212 from LiveWire, who are also collaborating with London’s Jazz FM radio station to stage the 1st Jazz FM Weekend at Camber Sands over November 23/24/25, with Roy Ayers, Pharoah Sanders, A Tribe Called Quest (really?!), Steve Williamson, Working Week, The Brand New Heavies, Galliano, Steve White, Incognito, Snowboys Descarga and more all playing live, plus many PAs, and the station’s Gilles Peterson, Jez Nelson and Chris Philips heading the DJ line-up (booking details for this event on 081-364 1666) . . . The 45 King’s original ‘The 900 Number’ (107¼bpm), having bubbled around the bottom of the chart for over a year before inspiring Chad Jackson’s ‘Hear The Drummer (Get Wicked)’ adaptation, could finally be the smash it’s always deserved to be in its own right now that it has been reissued (Dance Trax DRX 912, via Big Wave/BMG) coupled at last by a vocal version for radio — an, unfortunately not very good, extended remix of LaKim Shabazz’s ‘The Posse Is Large’ (110¼bpm) — plus still the dull ‘The King Is Here’ (100¾bpm), with even a CD single too this time . . . DNA’s ‘La Serenissima’, pre-released and reviewed as a phoney Italian import, is now chart climbing in its regular pressing (Raw Bass Records 12 RBASS 006) . . . Rumour Records have “snapped” up and are rush releasing here the hot Hi Power ‘Cult Of Snap’ (RUMAT 24), reviewed on import last week . . . Sha-Lor ‘My Love (Has Gone Away) (The Musto/Bones Remixes)’, also reviewed only last week on import, has been rushed out here by new label WGAF (NGY 12 101, via Castle Communications) in just its Tommy Musto NY Garage Mix  (122¼bpm) and Frankie “Bones” Belgium Freestyle Mix (122½bpm), both now slower . . . Lalah Hathaway’s excellent revival of Jaki Graham’s ‘Heaven Knows’, produced like the original by its writer Derek Bramble, was only promoed in its already reviewed import pressing and is now out commercially (Virgin America VUST 28) . . . ‘Who Dares Wins’ is the correctly titled extra track on Derek B’s newie . . . Linda Carriere is in fact the vocalist featured on Loose Ends ‘Don’t Be A Fool’, due next week also in a tinkling vibes and ‘Funkin’ For Jamaica’ trumpet accented jerkily jittering Twilight Mix (97¾bpm) (10 Records TENR 312) . . . Cooltempo, including the label’s dynamic club supremo Simon Dunmore and his new assistant Laura Barwick, have joined the record company exodus to West London and moved along with Chrysalis Records to the Old Phoenix Brewery at Bramley Road, London W10 6SP (telephone 071-221 2213), tucked under the Westway by Latimer Road tube . . . Power Promotions’ now four strong team are however moving in the opposite direction to Kentish Town on September 3, when their address becomes 32 Holmes Road, London NW5 3AB (071-482 0728) . . . Emily Leggatt is updating the DJ mailing list at independent pluggers IRP, 112 Talbot Road, London W11 1JR (071-727 3458) . . . Beats Per Minute that pop jocks might find useful include Bombalurina ‘Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini’ (Remix/7 Inch Version) 126; Prince ‘Thieves In The Temple (Remix)’ 130-128¾/Thieves In The House Mix/ Temple House Dub’ 126¾; The Human League ‘Heart Like A Wheel (Extended Mix)‘ 119½; Bocca Juniors ‘Raise (63 Steps To Heaven)’ (Heavenly Rap/Piano Hoe Down/Philly House Skank) 104/(Redskin Rock Mix) 104½; Primal Scream ‘Come Together’ (Farley Mix) 96/(Weatherall Mix) 93¾; That Petrol Emotion ‘Hey Venus’ (Mad Thatcher Disease Mix) 113¾/(Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy Mix) 113½; UB40 ‘Wear You To The Ball (Extended Mix)‘ 96¾ . . . The UK Voguing Championships are taking place to benefit AIDS research at London’s Charing Cross Road Busby’s tonight (Tuesday 21), the whole frothy event being filmed for future TV broadcast and video release (on Island Visual Arts), so hurry, hurry . . . KICKIN’!

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HOT VINYL  

MONIE LOVE featuring TRUE IMAGE It’s A Shame (My Sister)’ (108bpm) (Cooltempo COOLX 219)
This standout track from her upcoming album, already much played by specialist radio shows and now remixed three different ways, slots sections of rap between girls chorused quotes from the classic ‘It’s A Shame’ by the Motown Spinners (as they were known here in 1970, before a change of label made Detroit a more appropriate prefix), closest to its attractive guitar twanged melody with some added sax in Ultimatum’s catchy gentle Ultimatum Mix, or alternatively in John Waddell’s drier rolling Sister Sledge ‘He’s The Greatest Dancer’-type rhythm based Cool As Mix, and Pete Lorimer’s trumpet brayed wukka wukked jiggly tumbling jazz-funky Hot Shot Mix.

THE GRID ‘A Beat Called Love’ (123½bpm) (eastwest SAM 700)
Breathily whispered with breezy girl group support and a blazing trumpet break over an appropriately pounding massive beat, this gloriously soaring bright pop swinger by Richard Norris and Dave Ball is currently yet another single sided promo on EW’s generic label with no other details of its eventually released form, not that this version is entirely suitable for airplay (not being by Madonna)!

WENDELL WILLIAMS ‘Everybody’ (123¼bpm) (US Minimal Records QAL-251)
An Arthur Baker produced really exciting loose adaptation of the Black Box song (the Italians being credited as co-composers for supplying little more than its ‘Everybody Everybody’ title line), this forcefully charging hip house bounder is rapped instead by a gruff guy and samples much more besides to create its ‘Don’t Stop Til You Get Enough’ swirled (Everybody) Rap Your Body, (Everybody) Swing Your Body, Dub Your Body, and Guru Josh/Adamski inspired bleeping instrumental — get this — Disco Lives Saxophonic Acid Vibe Rock Don’t Stop It Rave Mix! Yes, by all means, do get this! Continue reading “August 25, 1990: Monie Love, The Grid, Wendell Williams, Culture Beat, Beats International”

BEATS AND PIECES

Kiss 100 fm, as the eagerly awaited London dance and black music radio station’s logo now reads, has moved at last into its headquarters at Kiss House, 80 Holloway Road, London N7 BJG (telephone 071-700 6100, fax 071-700 3752), finally ending the months of speculation about its for some reason quite closely guarded location . . . Stu Allan’s consecutively segmented ‘Bus’ Diss!’/’Souled Out’/’House Hour’ Sunday 7-10pm show on Manchester’s Piccadilly KEY 103 (the final hour always including a 40 minute house mix to fit in as much stuff as possible) has proved so popular that he’s been given an 8-10pm ‘Don’t Touch That Dial!’ show on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday too, playing current soul, dance, house and hip hop (no indie or pop) . . . Kid Frost’s excellent Chicano rap ‘La Raza’, recently reviewed off the import pressing that was promoed here, is now out commercially (Virgin America VUST 25) . . . Heather Austin, the original Cool Notes’ lead singer last heard solo on Urban, has signed now to Rhyme ‘n’ Reason Records and her first single ‘All For You’, featuring JB M.C., has already been snapped up by Vaughan Mason ahead of its release here for US release on his Grove St. label . . . Double Trouble, the UK group, are calling themselves Double The Trouble in the US so as not to clash with that country’s rapping The Original Double Trouble (as they are now calling themselves here) . . . London’s The Brain Club is currently up in Edinburgh, for the duration of the Festival, at the Playhouse Theatre’s studio, where Graeme Park and Dave Haslam from Manchester’s Hacienda guest over the next two Saturdays with Harvey and Chocci plus the likes of Jay Strongman, while bands there include Mr Monday and Ubik (August 18), The Shamen, Irresistible Force, Ramjac Corp, Sunsonic and Deep Joy (25) . . . Joy Barling Loyla (Theo’s missus) and her horse Hero did indeed get to Stockholm for the 100 mile endurance race, in which they came fourth and helped gain a gold medal for Great Britain as part of the overall winning team! . . . KICKIN’!

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HOT VINYL  

CANDY DULFER ‘Saxuality (Ben Liebrand Mix)’ (123bpm) (RCA PT 43770)
The attractive Dutch saxist coos and squawks through a lightly scampering hip house groove that’s sorta like Janet Jackson being produced by Prince in Fast Eddie’s basement while Jr. Walker practises some jazzy new licks next door — in other words, sizzling! — flipped by a more frantically jittery Susan Rogers Mix (124bpm) plus the ‘A House Is Not A Home’ paraphrasing tranquil slow soulful ‘Home Is Not A House’ (57/28½bpm).

CLUBLAND featuring QUARTZ ‘Let’s Get Busy’ (122bpm) (US Geffen Records 0-21609)
Selling anew in yet another combination, this US pressing has not only the current King Bee rapped Snap remix, now called The Snap Attack Mix, and the old Original Version, but also David Morales’ more jerkily episodic cantering The G Mix (which although unlabelled was secretly included, as the Def Dee Mix, on the Swedish pressing of Snap! The Remix!) plus — the only all new track, note — Morales’ brisk but basic repetitive The G Beats Mix, some Satoshi Tomiie organ chords eventually being all that breaks its monotony.

SHA-LOR ‘My Love (Has Gone Away) (The Musto/Bones Remixes)’ (US Fourth Floor Records FF-1116)
Shamelle and Lori Maynard’s wailed and muttered jerkily bounding “nasty house music” canterer is now in Tommy Musto’s keyboard stabbed thrumming frisky N.Y. Garage Mix (123¾bpm) and piano jangled more episodic instrumental Salsoul Dub Mix (124bpm), Frankie “Bones” buzzing jiggly Belgium Freestyle Mix and similar chugging instrumental New Beat Madness (124bpm), plus a full vocal driven tight Radio Edit (123¾bpm). Continue reading “August 18, 1990: Candy Dulfer, Clubland featuring Quartz, Sha-Lor, Roé, if?”

BEATS AND PIECES

ROBBIE VINCENT will be one of the stars of London’s incremental dance music radio station KISS-fm, starting full transmission on September 1 with Capital FM’s reggae ruler David Rodigan another star recruit . . . KISS-fm has in fact been only temporarily assigned its distinctive 100MHz wavelength but is likely to have an audience streetwise enough to retune once the frequency changes after 18 months or so . . . A&M’s resolve not to have a separately named dance label has slipped already with the appearance of the clever new A&M/PM logo . . . Def Jam is launching several new labels, including Ruff House, JML, Rush Associated Labels (RAL), and True Blue Records . . . Channel 4 will be screening a new TV dance music series called Dancedaze, starting on September 2 (at 5.30pm), the 10 programmes featuring over 60 UK rap, rave, ragga and soul acts with the emphasis on those who don’t normally get much ‘overground’ exposure (most of the filming is at Brixton’s Academy during the three days of this coming weekend, but there is no word of an audience being needed) . . . BBC Radio 1’s specialist dance and soul output is being squeezed together all on a Friday night in the station’s new schedules, Andy Peebles being due to follow after the ‘Big Beat’ . . . ‘Big Beat’ presenter Jeff Young’s most recent appearance at Jeff Thomas’s heaving Monday in Swansea’s Martha’s Vineyard attracted as usual many pluggers all the way from London, this time A&M’s Bob Masters, WEG(UK)’s Fred Dove, eastwest’s Spencer Baldwin, Cooltempo’s Simon Dunmore and Sleeping Bag Records’ new boy Jamie Tee, plus PAs by Kenny Thomas and Tammy Payne . . . Barry based Alan Coulthard, whose megamix of the ‘Dance Nation 1814’ album’s tracks will couple Janet Jackson’s rocky ‘Black Cat’ here, is now similarly megamixing her old ‘Control’ album too and has also just remixed ‘Tom’s Diner’ with added piano and a different rhythm for imminent release . . . 50 copies of Monie Love’s forthcoming album have been serviced to selected jocks with all its tracks scratched to make them unplayable apart from her brilliant remake of the Motown Spinners’ It’s A Shame’, due as her next single in remixed form but not yet pressed on its own! . . . S*Express appear to be testing the market with successive different promos, the track reviewed two issues ago now being superceded by the tabla blooped and girl wailed vigorous jangling and chugging ‘Nothing To Lose‘ (120bpm) (Rhythm King SEXY 01 TX), still flipped however by ‘Find Time To Be Yourself (Vocal Mix)’ and ‘My Laser (just Won’t Function Anymore)’ . . . Lindy Layton’s commercial 12 inch of ‘Silly Games’ does have the dragging Danny’s Mix as A-side, flipped by the better wah wah accented chunkier Norman’s Mix plus, best of all and the one with which most people will be familiar, a brighter and tighter radio version . . . Steve Anderson’s remixes of Cherrelle’s ‘Affair’ (110¼bpm) turn out to be coupled commercially by his earlier remix of the Alexander O’Neal duetted ‘Saturday Love’ (115¾bpm) (Tabu 656202 6) . . . Tabu in fact is moving from CBS, who now just have the next Alexander O’Neal album to come Jazzie B has been producing Teena Marie . . . LL Cool J’s imminent ‘The Boomin’ System (Cars Drive By)‘ is bassed by En Vogue’s ‘Hold On’ . . . Rob Manley, Paul Witts and vocalist Terri Symon have signed to CBS as a group that was originally to be called Eastern Bloc, but following protests from the well established Manchester record shop of the same name will now be known as Western Block . . . Matt Gray plus Paul Doherty and other guests rave up a Storm audio-visual dance experience this Saturday (11) in two atmospheric areas at Sevenoaks’ Bligh’s Hall, 8pm-1am . . . Deee-Lite PA at Daisy Chain next Tuesday (14) in Brixton’s The Fridge . . . James Brown’s newly reissued classic album ‘Live At The Apollo (October 24, 1962)’ (Polydor 843 479-1) was never really usable by dance DJs but is still worth a close listen as it captures the stage show that originally made him so huge a star, staying high in the US album chart for over a year following its 1963 release — a then previously unheard of feat for such a raw R&B act, helped no doubt by his spreading popularity with the ‘Animal House’-type college crowd . . . KICKIN’!

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HOT VINYL
Reviewed this week by James Hamilton and Chad Jackson

MASTER ACE ‘Take A Look Around’ LP: ‘I Got Ta’/‘Letter To The Better’/‘Me And The Biz’/‘Take A Look Around’
DR PHIBES ‘The Story Two’
R-EARTH ‘R-Earth’
SPECIAL ED ‘Come On – Let’s Move It’
SOUL FAMILY SENSATION ‘Don’t Know If I Should Call You Baby’
EARTH PEOPLE ‘Dance’
JUDIE TZUKE ‘God Only Knows (Mix 1/Mix 2)’
PHASE N’ RHYTHM ‘Swollen Pockets’/‘Hook-n-Sling’
A.S.K. ‘Dream’
HARDNOISE ‘Untitled’
VARIOUS ‘Dance Hall Of Shame’ LP
YELLO ‘Unbelievable (Dub Me Mix/Ford’s 12-inch/Ford’s Edit/X-rated Mix/Morales Mix/Techno Mix)’
STETSASONIC  ‘Speaking Of A Girl Named Suzy’
THAT PETROL EMOTION ‘Hey Venus (Mad Thatcher Disease Mix)’

JAM ON THE MUTHA ‘Hotel California (Orb in Cali Mix 1)’ (91¾bpm) (M&G MAGXR 3, via Polydor)
Now remixed by The Orb and on a new label (at an inflexible 45rpm!), the remade Eagles oldie ploddingly jogs through muttering introed authentic enough strained vocals, flipped by an even more fully authentic sounding really pleasant gentler Like Joe Never Left Mix and a muttering introed then effects washed basically rhythmless Orbitally Ambient Mix.

TRICKY DISCO ‘Tricky Disco (Saxy Mix)’ (124bpm) (W.A.R.P./Outer Rhythm WAP 7R)
Fast becoming the biggest bleeper of all, as predicted, this smurfs punctuated electro leaper’s sparse remix now adds just a little bit of Guru Josh-ish spacey saxophone as the title suggests, with an atmospherically introed twittery Inner Space Mix (124¼bpm) flip.

MONIE LOVE ‘Monie In The Middle (The Remixes)’ (Cooltempo COOLXR 210)
Sadly not as big nationally as its club success suggested it should be (presumably because not gimmicky enough), Monie’s fast talker adds ‘Hollywood Swingin”-type brass in Ultimatum’s Brother Take The Hint Mix (117½bpm) and a nice late Sixties funk feel in their Lavender Hill Instrumental (116½bpm), while, as a total alternative, Massivo amazingly add bleeps to their The Orr-Some Remix (114bpm)! Continue reading “August 11, 1990: Jam On The Mutha, Tricky Disco, Monie Love, BBG, N.W.A.”

BEATS AND PIECES

PLASA (the Professional Lighting And Sound Association) mounts the thirteenth annual disco equipment exhibition, Light + Sound Show ’90, at London’s Olympia 2 from Sunday to Wednesday September 9-12, a must as always for jocks and club owners who want to compare the latest gear, admission being £6 on the door unless you pre-register before August 17 by sending a cheque for £3.50 (payable to PLASA Ltd) with full name, address, telephone number and company or other relevant details to Light Sound Show ’90 Registration, Data House, Carriers Close, Tile Hill, Coventry CV4 8AW . . . Joan Armatrading’s old ‘Love And Affection’ has been given a trendily slinky 90bpm revival for release in four weeks, serviced on white label to DJs both by Rush Release, who coyly credit it to Renet, and by Pitstop, who comes clean and credits it correctly to Sinitta (very classy it is, too)! . . . Snap ‘Ooops Up’ is still wrongly being referred to (even in an answer to a Radio 1 quiz last week) as being based on the Gap Band’s ‘Oops Up Side Your Head’, when all that’s common to both are those five words, whereas its actual rhythm track is of course largely like Shirley & Company’s ‘Shame, Shame, Shame’ – incidentally, a little known fact is that the original US title of ‘Oops Up Side Your Head’ began by being the rather less memorable ‘I Don’t Believe You Want To Get Up And Dance’! . . . ‘A Knife And A Fork’ by Think Tank (who turn out to be the craftily disguised Information Society) lifts its hookline, as Norman Cook helpfully points out (and interprets as “A knife and a fork, a bottle and a cork, that’s the way we spell New York”), from Dillinger’s reggae-funk classic, ‘Cocaine In My Brain’ . . . Janet Kay, originator of ‘Silly Games’, sings back-ups on Lindy Layton’s new revival and then takes over from her to sing the actual lead on Beats International’s next single . . . Bobby Konders is coming to the UK specifically to produce reggae type dancehall talent, while KRS-One is among the growing number of Americans who plan to set up a London office . . . eastwest now becomes the even more latest logo to appear on a promotional slipmat! . . . BCM Records have snapped up for UK release the oddly credited featuring: C’hantal ‘The Realm (Love In D Minor Mix)’, hottest up North . . . Lowrell ‘Mellow, Mellow Right On‘ (OG 4183) could prove the most useful of the latest reissues in the Old Gold label’s 12 inch Gold series, which includes double-sided couplings of further oldies by Chic, Sister Sledge, Detroit Spinners, Modern Romance and the Cool Notes, while the label’s 5 Inch 3-Track CD Dance Greats series interestingly makes available on CD single three probably predictable oldies by each of Mtume, Herbie Hancock, Earth Wind & Fire, Aretha Franklin, Ritchie Family, plus several new album compilations . . . Pete Haigh’s street soul, house and hard tunes Bassix! night has been attracting so many people on Tuesdays that it’s added Fridays too at Blackpool’s Just Ji’s — he reckons that both rave and slow beat tunes are going down equally well in the North-West now . . . Robin ‘Lof’ Moorcroft clarifies that independent reports of his retirement were exaggerated: after running the disco there for 15 years he indeed no longer has any ties with Coventry’s Dog & Trumpet, which far from having closed in fact remains the city’s “best dance space” (to use his words}, while his disco still runs instead at Silvers, Park Lane and Tic Toc nightclubs . . . Coventry’s techno, house, freestyle and sometimes hip hop spinning DJ Shock-C, meanwhile, raves it up at Henley Green’s Chalkies on Atmosphere Sundays and Kollision Tuesdays, joined on the latter night by Technofreak and keyboard ace Lunacy, plus he joins Dobbo, Doc Scott and Technofreak on Fridays at Vine Street . . . Soho’s Milk Bar (next to the Astoria) starts a ‘Thursday Night Live’ season this week (August 2) with BBG, followed over the rest of the month by A Man Called Adam, The Farm, the James Taylor Quartet (invitation only), and the Brand New Heavies . . . Nicky Holloway, as well as several mentions here last week, also managed so be name checked by the Pretentious Music Journalist on Steve Wright’s Radio 1 show! . . . KICKIN’!

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HOT VINYL

LONNIE GORDON ‘Beyond Your Wildest Dreams’ (100bpm) (Supreme Records SUPET 167)
Rightly earning widespread praise, this “I’ll bring you joy” repeating superb sultrily soulful attractive gently undulating jiggler proves for those who might have forgotten that its writers/producers Stock Aitken Waterman can indeed create a classify sophisticated groove when they want, this one featuring another of Matt Aitken’s jazzy guitar breaks similar to ‘Mandy’s Theme’, with a good Senza Voce (literally, ‘Without Voice’) instrumental as flip. Following the sustained criticism from some quarters of their more facile commercialism maybe this switch to class will restore SAW’s chart fortunes, the former style not in fact having been quite so successful of late?

L.A. MIX ‘Coming Back For More (Full Length Version)’ (101¼bpm) (A&M AMYDJ 579)
The first taste of Les and Emma’s new LP, this cops a lick from Chad Jackson — so to speak! — by starting with an ‘Unwind Yourself/The 900 Number’ inspired but totally different fruity sax riff before lightly soulful Francesco elegantly agonises through a softly jiggling Soul II Soul-ish rhythm with some lovely little melodic twiddles, the fruity sax farting about again in the breaks while there’s a jazzier sweet solo too. Should you inadvertently play the 33⅓rpm promo at 45rpm as the label suggests, you’ll find the Instrumental (12″ Edit For Radio, 7″ Version and A Cappella too) comes out a just slightly too frantic 136½bpm!

THE RAGGA TWINS ‘Ragga Trip’ (101bpm) (Shut Up And Dance Records SUAD 5)
North London veteran sound system DJs/MCs, brothers Demon Rocker and Flinty Badman have instantly exploded with this Shut Up And Dance produced jiggly throbbing combination of frantic hoarse raggamuffin rapping and acidically twittering synth, with its Inst. (102¾bpm) too, flipped by the Prince-type “dearly beloved” introed/interspersed bleeping and rumbling ‘Hooligan 69‘ (126½bpm) plus a disjointed backwards tape fluttered and rock guitar droned, decelerating ‘Paro 69‘ loose variation. Continue reading “August 4, 1990: Lonnie Gordon, L.A. Mix, The Ragga Twins, House Of Venus, Keith Sweat”