In the year and some change that Justice et al have held a tight grip on the Hype charts, I’ve tried to avoid posting the bloggariffic bangers and superpopular French stuff (and not completely successfully). Not that I don’t adore Justice, SebastiAN, Mr. Oizo et al, it’s just…you can get it almost anywhere else, ya know? Of course this is contrary to the back-of-our-heads goal of being, like, uber popular. But we DiscoWorkouters just wanna post what we wanna post that day, not what people are searching for. Maybe we’re idiots to ignore the will of the people. But it’s how we roll.
HOWEVER. Today I was excited like a little schoolgirl to find a link to Ed Rec III show up in my RSS blogfeed geek thingy. Given the label’s history of being all over the nets in a huge way with the presumption (I imagine) that what they lose in MP3 sales will be made up on sales of their gorgeous 12″ collection, live shows and of course the So Me’s much imitated shirts, I’m gonna go ahead and assume that sharing this link won’t lead to a late nite knock on the door from Busy P’s Disco Enforcement Unit of the French Police (he does have a badge, after all)…
This is possibly my very first Italo-disco post, but its gotta be like the millionth on the blog. I’m pretty sure my friend who sent me these songs wanted me to post them, so I am. I am very fond of them. Fockewulf 190, named after a war aircraft, is a band that is both disco and from Italy. The lead singer was a mime for a time which is funny considering his role in the band. In 1984, the two singles, “Body Heat” and “Gitano”, were released. Due to problems with mime turned chaunter (is that spelled correctly?) Victor Life, the album was shelfed indeffinetly. Interestingly enough, after all these excuses and a lengthly story on their myspace, it turns out that later this year they will be releasing thier debut album. Its only 24 years too late.
Two addictive synth-fromage melody lines intertwining across a Stacey Q meets Bobby Orlando hi-NRG bounce. A female singer trades curt vaguely French phrases with an incomprehensibly vocodered male vox and a second female voice, and the only English word I can make out is a frequently repeated “Stop!”
And that is the sum total of the psychoacoustic fragment of this song stuck on repeat in my head for years and years before I accidentally unlocked its secrets in one of those serendipitous Youtube moments one day:
Video: “Living on Video” - Trans-X
Eureka! It’s 1981’s “Living on Video” by the Canadian hi-NRG outfit Trans-X aka Pascal Languirand. And it’s not my fault my sleuthing was for naught, the cards were stacked against me: turns out the singer is a dude, not a chick; it’s in English (albeit heavily accented, and with foreigner-songwriters-only things like rhyming “action” with “button”) AND French; and it’s pretty much their only hit.
The French language version is funny because it’s the exact same music but the lead vocal is sung an octave higher with a Stefani-esque swoop at the end of very line. If anything you would think it’d be the opposite: give the French the subdued, Gainsbourg-like approach and load on the melodic histrionics for the pop-crazy English. But no.
P.S. Johnatron is DJing 2nite with our homiez in Short Shortzz for Eli’s bday bash tonight at Beauty Bar here in San FranDisco…I’ll be there but I do not wear short pantzzzzzz.
Floarian Senfter is truly a great success story. Since 99, his alter ego of Zombie Nation has remained high profile. Not only has he enjoyed worldwide success, but he has managed to still amass a great amount of “CRED”. Senfter has managed to be heard in sports stadiums around the world and still be a hero of the small club as well. He’s been played at raves filled to capacity and still plays noisy techno under Zombie Nation, ZZT, and John Starlight, which this post focuses on. This is his new single and it is massive and unobtrusive at the same time.
San Francisco’s premiere venue of filth and fury is coming out heavy! Lights Down Low has been setting the bar for all to follow for over two years and this week is no different!
WHITE GIRL LUST
Bringin’ that WEST COAST BUMP! Renown for for dropping the bass to make your girl’s panties wet.
WGL just dropped their second release on their own SOLID BUMP RECORDS featuring remixes from KRAMES, Sir Nenis & DJPUSHUPS, and more.
Currently the release is in the top selling releases on Turntable Lab.
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DJ ALONA
This luscious disco vixen of Gritt and West Add Radio’s LOVENOODLES has records for days and curves for months.
She is notoriously known for as a selectors selector and a dancefloor seductress.
MEOW!
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BARON VON LUXXURY
One peep at his myspace page tells you he is no joke.
Remixes galore of everyone from Glass Candy to Hilary Duff.
Its been a couple of weeks since I posted any new edits so I had this great idea to do a complete re-edit of something. Then I restarted and restarted and restarted. In the end I did something that is borderline cringeworthy. Maybe it can get lots of play at Ruby Skye or your local danceclub with dudes wearing crappy dress shirts and patent leather shoes. It’s alright I guess. Better look next week dear internet surfers.
Marianne Faithful is a living legend. Born to a Jewish Baroness, and a great-great-neice of Sacher-Masoch (from whom we have the term “masochism”) she was a ballerina under Brecht and Weill before moving to London in the early 60’s to become a singer. She was spotted at a Rolling Stones party by Andrew Loog Oldham, their manager, who convinced Mick and Keith to write a song for Marianne. “As Tears Go By” was actually the first original composition by the Stones (who had started as a cover band), and it was a massive hit for Faithfull years before the Stones recorded their version.
Faithfull became an overnight superstar and left her heroin-addicted husband to become Jagger’s paramour and muse for the rest of the decade. “Sympathy for the Devil” was said to have been inspired by a book Faithfull lent Mick, and her growing heroin and cocaine addictions inspired both “Wild Horses” and “Sister Morphine” (which she co-wrote). Faithfull’s life became darker and increasingly drug-addled during the 70’s, which began with her breaking up with Jagger and ended with her career in tatters (shadoobee).
But then came 1979’s Broken English. The music created by a crack team of session musicians led by producer Mark Miller Mundy sounds at times like a cynical stab at a commerically viable comeback. But coupled with Faithfull’s voice, which had become deeper and more gravelly, and her lyrics covering sunny topics like cold war terrorism and un-Faithfull lovers, the overall effect is apocalyptic post-punk/new wave of the highest order.
The album’s centerpiece is the title track, featuring a mesmerizing, neverending loop of a bassline bySteve Winwood. I have tried and failed many times to compose an equally flawless series of notes which, like Winwood’s line, move about anxiously yet somehow stay rooted in place. Along with the bare-bones disco beat, the overall effect is of a perpetual motion machine with a gorgeously sinister melodic underpinning. It sounds like David Bowie trapped in east Berlin (as he was at the time), circling around the wall in a coke-fueled paranoid haze (as he was at the time) looking for a means of escape. It is one of my all time favorite songs, and a stealth disco classic.
The original version is a bit too light on the drums and bass for DJing purposes (I almost always play it out), so I remixed it to include a new rhythm track, an extended intro and outro, and a few little synthy things here and there. I’ve also made a second version that’s a bit faster (129BPM instead of 121). The song is such a classic I tried not to mess with it too much, but it’s slightly more involved than a typical re-edit - hence the name “Baron von Luxxury Light Touch Remix.” Enjoy!
The Kylie U.S. press blitz is in full effect! Sure, most of us blogkidz have had our hands and ears on the album and remixes for many months now, but “X” was just released officially here on Astralwerks/Capitol, Tuesday. Which means the the album is now available on iTunes and Amazon.
To celebrate the release, DiscoWorkout is giving away a Kylie prize pack that includes:
* a U.K. Enhanced CD single of “2 Hearts”
* stickers
* a poster
* and postcards!
To qualify, just leave a comment below this post telling us about your most guilty-est pop pleasure - song, artist, album, video, whatever. Mostest cleverest (as picked by moi) wins.
According to the “X” press release, “Minogue has sold more than 40 million albums worldwide and scored 46 hit singles, including five Top Ten dance-chart singles in the U.S…She also won a Grammy Award for “Best Dance Recording”…has performed for royalty, inspired a 2007 costume exhibition at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum, and had her likeness replicated in wax four times by the world-famous Madame Tussaud’s (only Queen Elizabeth II has had more models created).”
Which is all fine and good. But what really impressed me was this: Bitch speaks Japanese!
On a side note, I’m officially done with iTunes. Amazon’s MP3 store has almost everything now, plus it’s cheaper, the files are all higher quality 256k files by default, and it’s all DRM-free. For example: “X” is available in the iTunes store in the 256k Plus format for $12.99, while it’s only $8.99 for the same quality files on Amazon. And huge bonus: Amazon sells MP3s, which means I can use the songs to DJ in Ableton Live or sample/remix them in Pro Tools etc.
Right now I am over at the apartment of D++ (of Short Shortzz fame) waiting to go to their amazing monthly party, One Night Stand, at the Beauty Bar in San Francisco. Therefore, I am checking emails trolling for some great stuff to post. It just so happens that we have been sent two great remixes of “Sirens” by Dizzie Rascal. One is by Black Lights who is also heavily blogged about Ryan Justin and his Tenori-On (was it used this time?) The second remix is from ex-bloggers (current bloggers) and DJs/producers extrodinaire Acid Girls. Here they are in ysi and zshare forms since I can’t figure out FTP on her computer.
Dizzie Rascal - Sirens (Black Lights Remix) (zshare link) Dizzie Rascal - Sirens (Acid Girls Remix)
By the way, come to the afformentioned party tonight!
Ha ha ha, just when you thought I’d gotten all blogtardedly behind the eightball, not only am I posting twice in two days, but I’m posting Disco Sunday on a FRIGGIN’ SATURDAY! Effin’ A!
All that is known about Altair Nouveau (indeed, all that humans can, or should know about it) is that he appears to be John Holmes reincarnated as a Seattle-based disco practicioner. Also as I’m sure you geeks already know, the Altair was famously one of the first DIY computers, for which one Bill Gates created a version of BASIC upon which he founded his empire.
Also: his name is Brandon.
I was hipped to this jive courtesy of the fantastic curatorial powers of American Athlete and I felt I just had to share it with you. So now, prepare to have your hips jive to the synthtastic slow disco splendor of Altair Nouveau:
Johnatron, Baron von Luxxury and BearBaby are three kids from San FranDisco. We run this blog and we do a monthly DJ night, also called The Workout (aka "Disco Workout") at various locations in S.F. Check
www.myspace.com/discoworkout
for information about (or if you want us to book you for) our upcoming events.
Labels + musicians: if we've posted your music here it's because we love it and want to help spread the word. If you'd like us to take it down, please let us know; or, even better, if you want to send us some music, hit us up at:
vip at discoworkout dot com
We can't guarantee we'll post it but we'll definitely listen to everything!
