Electroswing.

[MatthewH]

Apologies if this has been mentioned before but I found it curious.

I've been seeing the genre name Electroswing around here lately. The main monthly has been quietly packing out relatively large venues (300-400 capacity, the equivalent of probably 600-800 in London). Then this weekend Piknic Electronik (up to around 6000 capacity) had all electroswing djs, which is as big as things get here.

For those who are unfamiliar with it, it's essentially along the lines of Mr Scruff's Get A Move On but more tech-housy. Very syncopated 4/4 with lots of horns.

http://soundcloud.com/boleklolek/bolek-lolek-summer-kick

In true Dissensian form, I heard the music described before hearing it played and fully expected to find it utterly awful. While it's not exactly forward-thinking, it's harmless enough, and the fans reaction is really interesting.

People seem to be having *actual fun*, doing the full swing dancing-with-partner thing, or their take on it anyways, dressing up n all that. My impression is that it's really a fan-led, not dj-led or music-led scene, which is refreshing. The crowd is young and hipsterish but not really the usual dance music crowd.

Was it Simon Reynolds whose ears pricked up at the mention of the words "cheesy"? This would ping on his radar for sure then.

Anyone see this in their respective necks of the woods?

 

[IdleRich]

I read about this a year or so back. Thought pretty much the same as you that it sounded a bit silly. Isn't a lot of it old swing tunes given a slightly tougher electronic re-rub? Reminds me of the stuff that Greens Keepers and Mike Dixon were doing about ten years ago though I've no idea where this was being played then.



This must be happening round here (Hackney/Dalston) but I've never seen it. Well, I've seen lots of people in period costume but I assumed that they were going to more "authentically retro" (ha) swing nights - perhaps I was wrong.

 

[mistersloane]

I was in a cocktail bar in Soho - about 80 people - and they were playing this stuff this weekend. Worked well for a cocktail bar. No-one in full dress though, more's the pity.

 

[baboon2004]

"People seem to be having *actual fun*, doing the full swing dancing-with-partner thing, or their take on it anyways, dressing up n all that."

Not seen this electroswing thing, but accidentally went to a night where they were playing old swing tunes, and the *I'm having a good time, really I am* quotient was off the scale. Definitely not real fun. Nightmarish.

 

[Gombreak]

I remember walking past a place in Hackney a couple of months ago and wondering why people were so dressed up to the nines to go dance to what sounded to my ears like Rhadoo/Villalobos/Cadenza tech-house. I guess this is what that was.

 

[viktorvaughn]

Book Club in Leonard St has a night of this fairly regularly I think, some mates of mine went.

 

[zhao]

yeah this stuff has been popular in Berlin for a few years now.

after a decade of pummeling monotonous kick drums and vacuous sound design to pass for "substance", if you re-introduce a bit of "soul" or "melody" or some kind of humanity back into the club, even if it's entirely nostalgic and reactionary, of course people are going to "have actual fun" again on the dance floor.

me i can't really give in to the all too easy and perhaps rather guilty pleasures of this stuff, preferring music from other continents which never lost its "soul" (for lack of better obviously), but i think it is in general a healthy turn from too much (unoriginal, formulaic, uninspired) cold machine robot music.

 

[Blackdown]

after a decade of pummeling monotonous kick drums and vacuous sound design to pass for "substance"

ahahahaha. ^ ^^brilliant!

 

[IdleRich]

"Book Club in Leonard St has a night of this fairly regularly I think, some mates of mine went."

Oh yeah, now you say it, it rings a bell.

 

[4linehaiku]

Sounds perfect for the post-'headline act' but pre-'bed by 1am' slot at this.

 

[benw]

this is 'big in brighton'. i fucking hate it. its one of those genres that is based entirely on nicking all the good ideas from another genre and just chucking some kind of dancefloor friendly beat under it.

See also:

Those very sample heavy breakbeat mixes, with entire musical ideas nicked wholesale and just given a beefier breakbeat.

 

[Martin D]

Bit wet and the wrong side of funky for me.

 

[SecondLine]

my gut is telling me there is some cultural overlap between this and the chap olympiad

 

[e/y]

Sounds perfect for the post-'headline act' but pre-'bed by 1am' slot at this.

hahaha

 

[bruno]

nicking all the good ideas from another genre and just chucking some kind of dancefloor friendly beat under it.

not to sully the thread, but there was a classical music and beats thing called hooked on classics, and a hooked on swing offshoot that may give genre-mixers pause. also jive bunny and the mastermixers, but i don't want to degrade the thread further.

 

[hint]

jive bunny and the mastermixers

Respect the architects

 

[paolo]

Yeah I won a Jive Bunny album in a raffle and it's awesome

 

[Benny Bunter]

aaah Jive Bunny. Takes me back to the village youth club on Sunday nights, skidding on yer knees on the dancefloor and thinking you were well 'ard with yer tin of Shandy Bass.

 

[IdleRich]

Jive Bunny make hard house now (well a few years ago) under the name Tidy Boys. Hence Tidy Trax even I think. Can that be true? I think it's true, it sounds too stupid to be true.

 

[bruno]

here they are, crafting the music of the future.