The Acid House Thread
 

Christ almighty, was it really twenty years ago?

http://youtube.com/watch?v=undsKBCC140
http://youtube.com/watch?v=cQmlaKlvqWg

I've a theory that this is an impossible genre to understand if you weren't there. Someone else who's too young for it prove me wrong please.

I suspect that this is absolutely the case. I was thinking it when I was about to press the 'submit' button. If you were there it was the greatest thing ever in the history of everything. If you weren't it was a bunch of reformed football hooligans arranging holidays to ibiza with new-found mates from rival teams, while listening to Voodoo Ray. Which is still sort of amazing, when you come to think about it. Either way, unless you're British and 35+, this will mean absolutely fuck all to you. But it does atleast deserve documenting.

Either way, Phuture, Shoom, Spectrum, Love, Land of Oz, Miami is Your Friend. Happy twenty years ago.

Still the best record of the last 15 years: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYfL-if_VTQ

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/117/3...6c0738.jpg?v=0
DEAL WITH IT

Now, your man jungle still has a bit of currency, and I was just about getting into it around the time when there was still a smidge of it on the rave scene - just before Size went ballistic and people stopped making absurd jungle and started doing the far more prosaic dnb (which remains awesome at the right time, in the right place).

bleep bleep blooooooppppp

completely disposable dated music

I've not listened to that before - I can dig that ok. Never realised that Acid House was a massive influence on early Take That (and probably the reason why they're alright and the Spice Girls/ Boyzone remain turd).

Oh, do shut up, you sound like your own father.

I think in a way that, at least in the beginning, Acid house was disposable. Moreover it's certainly true that much of it has dated rather obviously. This isn't a criticism, in much the same way that it needn't be a critiicism of something like Motown or early Sugarhill. The real beauty of it I suppose was that, while it was happening, nobody into it really knew what was going on, allowing for some very strange records to come out and be accepted by the 'scene'. These were often aimed squarely at the pop charts but still managed to maintain a certain underground 'cred' by being played earlier, usually in white label form, at clubs. In the case of D-Mob's We Call it Aciied, this went so far as to actually namecheck various key club names in its lyrics.

Things got more serious, and arguably less interesting, once certain artists became celebrated for their more innovative style - primarily those coming from Detroit, including Juan Atkinson, Kevin Saunderson and Derrick May (the 'belleville three'). As Glice suggests, a similar thing took place later in the Hardcore scene, when the more hedonistic 'jump up' Jungle became supplanted by the more cerebral and Detroit influenced Drum n Bass. Although I still believe that the best records that ever came from that scene were those that managed to straddle both the Jungle and Drum and Bass scene - as with the Dillinja track that I posted above, or Splash's utterly incredible Babylon.

my father LOVED acid house! He'd rave it up big time! we have controlling stock in the glow-stix industry, to supply us with constant rave-ups! acid house! background music! dinner music for modern hippies! enjoy!

being at raves is fun, but i never listen to this shit on my own time

i do like chicasgo house, some british 80s acid house, and drum n bass

no one does. that's why at the used stores all you see are endless processions of shit acid house (hell, ANY house) records and 12" singles.

fucking crap I say!

Being music that is designed to be played in clubs, usually in part of a mix it makes little sense listening to this kind of music at home. Truly groundbreaking artists from across all sections of House, Techno, Rave, Jungle, Drum n Bass, etc are celebrated because of their effectiveness on a dancefloor, not for their value as home listening. Saying that, I sort of pity anyone who can't apprecriate the sheer brilliance of something like Derrick May's Strings of Life regardless of whether they're sitting at home or in a packed club.

Yr kidding right?
I cannot stand any of this "music"
It is boring and sounds exactly like what it is, samples arranged by a geek on a laptop or a mixer. sonic youth have more interesting musical ideas in a ten second chunk of skronk than that entire "piece" you posted.

I would run away from any place that was playing this as it's "background" music.

nothing personal, I just enjoy nothing in any house music.

fuck the music the drugs were top!

Fair enough, but I do still pity anyone who can't get beyond the inevitable generic restraints of something like 'Strings of Life'. Clearly it's not for everyone though - nothing of any value is.

BTW, this type of "music" is exactly why people were getting raging hard-ons for Mudhoney and early Nirvana

I agree demonraill, and I appreciate the time it takes to "compose" these tunes, but they are no different to my ears than early super nintendo video game music, meant for background listening and disposable in a way that seesm inherent in it's development. I would not play the soundtrack to super mario bros for my own enjoyement.

i like minimal techno. minimal techno is cool.

is it anything like this NITZER EBB Record?
THAT TOTAL AGE



JOIN IN THE CHANT
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3w3A72L3rj4

This is an interesting point, in that I was one of those people that was listening to stuff like Mudhoney after exposing myself to the whole House thing. Although I was listening to bands like SY, Swans, etc. before it.

Although originating in the US, House music didn't cross-over into the American mainstream until the early 90s - and even then only very slightly. This was a good few years after it completely exploded in Europe, where American artists like Derrick May, Jeff Mills and Juan Atkins now live - aware that what they do simply isn't acceptable in their home country - at least outside of the gay scene.

The attitude behind the 'Disco Sucks' movement in America in the 70s still seems to resonate there today. Why this is I don't know, but it definitely suggests to me a certain conservatism that rests at the very heart of American culture. It's also part of the reason why an album such as Loveless had to come from the UK and not the US. MBV were positively steeped in that culture at the time of recording the album.

i kind of sit on the fence with this, while i'm not as extreme as rob, most house and techno just makes me think of kitchen appliances. that said the stuff from the 80s that is raw and weird sounding is great, like this tune http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hPjRzVtvpw (even though it came out in 1993 i think)

HA HA HA HA!

I think Slam's Positive Education is a perfect example of a track that would make no sense outside of the context of a club. Most people listen to music at home, so it's inevitable that that kind of techno doesn't appear that regularly in many people's CD players. Saying that, while I can't drive, I imagine that'd sound classy pumping out of the old Kenwood while bombing down the M1.

I loved me some drum and bass parties back in 98-99. not on drugs though, i always was more of a booze person

I wanted to post a Phuture link here, but all the stuff on youtube is crappy and pointless. But hail Phuture anyway!

LOL. Rob's gonna have a total orgasm when he hears Acid Trax.

bunch of geriatrics

i love a strain of techno so minimal that it is often mistaken for ambient

Do you mean stuff like this? Listen to it all the way through for some of the most beautiful percussive sound patches I know.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtM4K3_ER8Q

Just a shame the person who made the video cip didn't have a bit more of an imagination.

????

Does anyone have a link to some blogs that have house / techno mixtapes worth inspecting?

I wasn't there in 1988, but lately acid house and equivalents have been something I've bothered to check out further.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APxx_k2vUuE

http://www.rsso-media.net/mixes/Bria...e_Acid_Age.mp3

I love that Jaydee record.