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penpusherI'm tweaking this entry ever so slightly because, again, this is going to be more fun for me, and my Fun Quotient has to stay high if I'm going to keep this up! - Original request: A Song That Makes You Dance.
I briefly took dance lessons as a kid as an activity to get moving. But I was always all about the interpretive. In my room, I could dance around to my music and would sometimes get to an almost meditative state during particular songs. Then, I started making mixtapes and that kind of changed everything. Being able to just pop a cassette with the songs I wanted when I wanted them to play... that was amazing. And then, I even had a cassette player that you could program to fast forward and reverse to mix the order of songs, and even played the tape backwards to let you select from both sides of the tape without needing to eject it! SUPER AMAZING TECHNOLOGY!!!
Of course there were lots of record albums, many of which i still own. I don't have my own DJ rig currently (most NYC clubs had their own set up and I could rent a setup for private parties) but I do have one turntable. Problem is I don't have a connector to line in it to start digitizing the vinyl tracks to mp3. I think I've found a lot of the songs from my LPs through Amazon or iTunes, or back in the day when we were trading music on the sly.
And it's from my time as a DJ that I drew this song.
When I was working at "Polly-Esthers," a 70s and 80s themed club, I created "The Polly-Esther Ten," a Casey Casem style countdown of the ten most requested songs that week, which I played each Friday and Saturday at Midnight. Invariably, there were some songs that were never off the countdown for many weeks.
The two that battled it out most frequently for the most requested song, I'm pleased to say, were two Feminist Anthems:
Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive"
and
ABBA's "Dancing Queen"
Both of these songs tell the story of women standing on their own, making their own choices based on what THEY want and are unapologetic in their stance of what is wrong, what it right and what is acceptable to those females.
It doesn't hurt that they both are easy to dance to in addition to their messages, disco classics that have stood and will continue to stand the test of time. But the elements of what these songs say carry them to that highest of pinnacles.
BTW: Currently "I Will Survive" is being used as a QUIT SMOKING campaign, apparently worldwide!
But I wanted to go with something a little less obvious and something that never failed to surprise me. Very much like Skate Anthems, which I talked a bit about on Day 3, there is a song that almost always made everyone crowd the dance floor.
I would say this song was a bit obscure, in that I don't know that everyone would recognize the name of the artist or maybe even the song, without hearing the tune. But the fact is, when you hear that opening brass flourish and that burnning bassline kicks in immediately, you absolutely know it.
My choice for Day 9 - Cheryl Lynn - "Got To Be Real"
I briefly took dance lessons as a kid as an activity to get moving. But I was always all about the interpretive. In my room, I could dance around to my music and would sometimes get to an almost meditative state during particular songs. Then, I started making mixtapes and that kind of changed everything. Being able to just pop a cassette with the songs I wanted when I wanted them to play... that was amazing. And then, I even had a cassette player that you could program to fast forward and reverse to mix the order of songs, and even played the tape backwards to let you select from both sides of the tape without needing to eject it! SUPER AMAZING TECHNOLOGY!!!
Of course there were lots of record albums, many of which i still own. I don't have my own DJ rig currently (most NYC clubs had their own set up and I could rent a setup for private parties) but I do have one turntable. Problem is I don't have a connector to line in it to start digitizing the vinyl tracks to mp3. I think I've found a lot of the songs from my LPs through Amazon or iTunes, or back in the day when we were trading music on the sly.
And it's from my time as a DJ that I drew this song.
When I was working at "Polly-Esthers," a 70s and 80s themed club, I created "The Polly-Esther Ten," a Casey Casem style countdown of the ten most requested songs that week, which I played each Friday and Saturday at Midnight. Invariably, there were some songs that were never off the countdown for many weeks.
The two that battled it out most frequently for the most requested song, I'm pleased to say, were two Feminist Anthems:
Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive"
and
ABBA's "Dancing Queen"
Both of these songs tell the story of women standing on their own, making their own choices based on what THEY want and are unapologetic in their stance of what is wrong, what it right and what is acceptable to those females.
It doesn't hurt that they both are easy to dance to in addition to their messages, disco classics that have stood and will continue to stand the test of time. But the elements of what these songs say carry them to that highest of pinnacles.
BTW: Currently "I Will Survive" is being used as a QUIT SMOKING campaign, apparently worldwide!
But I wanted to go with something a little less obvious and something that never failed to surprise me. Very much like Skate Anthems, which I talked a bit about on Day 3, there is a song that almost always made everyone crowd the dance floor.
I would say this song was a bit obscure, in that I don't know that everyone would recognize the name of the artist or maybe even the song, without hearing the tune. But the fact is, when you hear that opening brass flourish and that burnning bassline kicks in immediately, you absolutely know it.
My choice for Day 9 - Cheryl Lynn - "Got To Be Real"
no subject
Date: 2018-01-11 07:11 pm (UTC)And this son? *cries* So much hate! But I did remember it, from that era when I was barely hanging on to the radio before it finally went off for about 10 years.
Though in general, disco music is third in my hate-list after country, and then rap and its offshoots. *cries more*
no subject
Date: 2018-01-11 09:59 pm (UTC)To my way of thinking, there are great songs of every genre, and if you ever got to scroll through The Collection™, you would see the proof!
I'd be curious to hear the stories behind the hate, but only if you feel up to it...
no subject
Date: 2018-01-11 10:31 pm (UTC)Most pop music is obnoxious to me, because of its simplicity and kind of generic sameness. A lot of what I dislike about disco falls into that bucket. Though (oh, the shame!) there were some songs from Saturday Night Fever that I didn't hate, back in the day...
For country music, the twanginess and sense of "generic" is pretty high. Funny, because I like slide guitar in a blues setting, and also for rockabilly. But not country. There are a couple of borderline country things that I like: the theme song to True Detective, They Were Wrong (Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros), some Chris Isaak (such as Kings Of The Highway) and some k.d. lang. But overall, not. It might be the tendency toward nasal vocals? I have issues with nasality.
Rap and its offshoots don't have enough melody/music for me. Sometimes, the more hybrid stuff does (Gorillaz, Beck), even if it's only the chorus that's sung. But overall, not, and so there's a sameness I don't like.
That "sameness" extends into other areas. I'm not a huge fan of Mozart or Haydn (pretty but often forgettable, background music by design) and Jackson Browne (whom my sister loves) has an unusual talent for making almost anything sound boring. You hear a cover of one of his songs, and "Oh, hey! There's a catchy tune there!" But in his version? ZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzz...