Focus Your Attention On A Spot

Today’s post accidentally fits in really well with David Byrne’s ideas about finding vocals and using them in new musical places (see yesterday’s My Life In the Bush Of Ghosts post). A while ago someone somewhere, sorry I can’t remember who, posted two Orbital tracks both released in 1990, one the B-side to Chime and the other a remix of that B- side from the Omen 12″. Deeper and 2 Deep take the voice from a relaxation tape, designed to help people who were unable to relax or get to sleep, calm down and chill the fuck out. A warm, calming voice appropriated by the Hartnoll brothers and laid over some techno. Knowing, ironic, a bit trippy. ‘Close your eyes and relax…’

2 Deep

I put both versions onto a compilation CD along with other similar stuff and found that they sounded really good driving to and from work. Thankfully they didn’t cause me to relax so much that I fell asleep at the wheel. That would not have been relaxing.

Also from 1990 and in the same ballpark is this from Ed Ball’s Love Corporation- sparkling, inventive acid house with a vocal found on a New Age, meditation tape, remixed by the King of Shoom Danny Rampling. ‘Close your eyes and begin to breathe slowly and deeply…’

Palatial (Danny Rampling Remix)

‘Revel in this sleep and I will return in a minute’

Just Landing

More instrumental, blissed out vibes for late December, this time courtesy of Cantoma (Phil Mison). Phil is a veteran of the legendary Cafe del Mar, the scene for those Mediterranean sunsets. Many say that the true Ibiza experience has been ruined by mass tourism and corporate sponsorship- they may be right- but Phil has put out several records in the last few years attempting to capture the true spirit. Firstly, in 2016 in his Cantoma guise, a beautiful album called Just Landing. Physical copies are long since sold out (although relatively pricey Japanese imports are available on eBay). It can be bought digitally at the usual places. This co-production with Danny Rampling, Claudio’s Theme, is spot on.

This year Phil put together a compilation called Out Of The Blue, a trip through a laid back and open minded record collection, which has this Frank de Wulf  recording from 1992 on it, a starry-eyed, sun-going-down moment spread over seven minutes of vinyl.

The End

Hypnotise Us

Two slices of early 1990s dance music to whisk us away from December and all those pre-Christmas irritations. First up is a song I’ve posted before but only recently saw the video for the first time.

Released by Creation in 1990 Dream Beam is a wonderful slice of house music, bleepy and spaced out with vocals from Denise Johnson. It was this song that got her the gig with Primal Scream and led to her singing on Screamadelica. Tony Martin’s production is perfectly in tune with the times- he put an album out too, also called Hypnotone, which is worth pulling out from the shelf or looking out for if this kind of thing is your bag. Dream Beam is also on Creation’s definitive 1991 Keeping The Faith compilation, along with Fluke, Weatherall’s MBV remix, World Unite, Sheer Taft, Love Corporation, Primal Scream and a couple of others. Keeping The Faith is among the very best things the label ever released.

I saw Hypnotone perform at a mini-festival in Sefton Park, Liverpool (I think it was summer 1990). Larks In The Park was an annual affair starting in the early 80s. Famously in 1985 The Stone Roses and The La’s played the same night. Hypnotone went on way after dark. We were on a grass bank across the boating lake from the stage and the bleeps came  from the bandstand, drifting across the water towards us, followed by Denise’s voice. Everyone was very chilled and happy. It was one of those moments.

Dream Beam (Danny Rampling Remix)

I posted Papua New Guinea by Future Sound Of London fairly recently, back at the end of August. August seems like a long time ago now. This is another video I’d never seen before until recently, FSOL playing Papua New Guinea on Top Of The Pops in 1991. And playing it live. Papua New Guinea is one of those records that takes you away from it all.

Weatherall’s remix takes things up several gears, a thumping kick drum over that throbbing synths and the rushing rewind sounds. Tom toms. Seagulls. Chanting.

Papua New Guinea (Andrew Weatherall Remix)

I Hate Hate

Well that- the referendum, as if you didn’t guess- was a total disaster. It’s a strange day indeed when I can’t get any satisfaction from David Cameron resigning. We’re screwed. Completely.

The Sound Of Shoom released this single in 1991, later compiled on Creation’s Keeping The Faith compilation (a very important record round these parts). The Sound Of Shoom was a production name for dj Danny Rampling, the man who started Shoom, a somewhat influential acid house night heldin a leisure centre in Southwark. The lyrics to I Hate Hate sound a bit trite and hippy-dippy now but fitted perfectly into the times and the song is in fact a cover, a soulful housed up version, of a 1974 Northern tune by Razzy And The Neighbourhood Kids.

And, to everyone out there who’s peddled hate over the last few months, enough with the hate yeah?
Fat chance.

I Hate Hate (Southwark Street Mix)

Aciiieeed

I’m on an acid house tip right now. These two pictures go some way towards proving the maxim that it was a scene where the crowd were the stars. The one above of party goers at The Hacienda, indie kids losing it, is a favourite.

I had navy blue James Come t-shirt back in the day. It was really good quality, kept its shape and colour really well. It also provided opportunities for wags to point out that I had come all over my chest etc.

This picture (below) from the legendary Shoom is a cracker too- shame about the watermark, I couldn’t find a version without it. The clothes, bandannas, the look on the faces, the wide eyes…

Shoom was held in a leisure centre in Southwark, a wonky version of what Danny Rampling and others had experienced in Ibiza the previous summer. Danny Rampling has recently uploaded this two hour acid house mix. Not entirely nostalgia either, being a mix of acid house old and new. It will rock your house. It has been rocking mine.

https://www.mixcloud.com/widget/iframe/?feed=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.mixcloud.com%2Fdannyrampling%2Fforever-acid-house-danny-rampling%2F&hide_cover=1&light=1

Palatial Creation

Watching the documentary on Creation Records on BBC4 on Friday night reminded me of just how many great bands and how many great records Alan McGee’s label released, certainly in the period before signing Oasis (after which it all went wrong). It was a little flawed as a documentary, and full of ‘we were so crazy, we took so many drugs’ but overall the music and the misfits in the bands shone through. So I thought we’d have a few Creation inspired posts starting with Love Corporation, Ed Ball’s dance project, included on the still magnificent 1991 compilation Keeping The Fath. Alan McGee invented acid house, didn’t you know?

Palatial (Danny Rampling Mix)

>Hypnotise Us

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I posted a different mix of Hypnotone’s Dream Beam ages ago, the Ben Chapman version with it’s huge bleepy intro. This version was by remixed Danny Rampling and on the Creation does dance Keeping The Faith compilation. Rampling keeps the big vocal, gives us synth stabs rather than pianos and a well Balaeric rhythm to hypnotise us, as the vocal sample says several times. A friend of Bagging Area reckons the over-riding thing about records like this one was the sense of possibility in them. He’s not wrong. I saw Hypnotone play Dream Beam at the Sefton Park festival in Liverpool in summer 1990, sitting by the pond in almost complete darkness. It’s stayed with me ever since. Tune, as people used to say.

Dream Beam(Danny Rampling mix).mp3