New Yorker's top 100

[dert]

15. Scott Grooves - Basic Part (Finished)

Triumphant house tune by Mr Grooves. The guy has been honing his craft for 20+ years at the time of this recording, once delighting in major label budgets and splurging on conga players, now likely based in his home studio on the outskirts of Detroit, he's one of the few who can convincingly synthesize a group effort from just himself on his lonesome. Pretty rad synths and expert addition of each new part in its rightful time and place. A profound statement of self in 6 minutes.

 

[dert]

16. 51 Days - Paper Moon

This record crackles with electricity towards the middle, and the mumbled vocal sample has subliminal powers. I heard this one time and it sounded like I'd connected one electrode to one ear, the other to the other, and somebody was trying to revive me with hundreds of volts, I couldn't control myself. As the man says, so deep, so liquid.

 

[dert]

17. Fingers Inc - Mystery of Love (Instrumental)

I puzzled over this record in the box in the basement for several days, maybe even a week. Where had I heard that title discussed in such vaunted tones? Was it the right song? Heard's finest moment from his early career, in my opinion. Limitless potential for how you can move to this. The overall tone is somewhat laid-back, but the onwards and upwards sound to the main bass melody takes you up, up, up

 

[dert]

18. Black Rascals - Keeping My Mind

Another very specific vocal house record. Great breakup tune but the simple looped melody puts it in another class. I played this for a friend who's not into dance music and it sounded very "poppy" to him. Damn right! The way the vocal was recorded definitely has limitations, but it's got everything, hook, vamps, variations on the central melody, but I guess the relentless drum track kept it out of the charts too. I'm grateful that it's 7 minutes long. Also, holy crap, the label's headquarters were on Central Park West.

 

[dert]

19. Gene Clark - No Other

The first time I heard this song, the guy playing it said Clark was in a very "coked-out" portion of his life when he made this. I've never felt this good on cocaine. "Power is perfection". Always looking for more like this, let me know.

 

[Corpsey]

I'm all for Wagner but its inclusion has confused me as to the nature of this list.

 

[Corpsey]

15. Scott Grooves - Basic Part (Finished)

This is lovely, and has reminded me that I used to cane Scott Grooves Resident Advisor mix (I think it was recorded off a cassette?) all the time.

 

[pattycakes_]

Top thread 🔥

 

[Corpsey]

11. Wagner - Das Rheingold (Prelude) conducted by Georg Solti[/url]

How amazingly new this must have sounded at the time.

 

[yyaldrin]

looking forward going trough these songs dert, keep going!

 

[mvuent]

same. although I have yet to properly go through craner's list, thirdform's list, webeschatology's list, woops' list, droid's '95 jungle list, barty's list... so it may take a few hundred years

 

[dert]

20. Funk Fusion Band - Can You Feel It (Progressive Version)

 

[dert]

21. Cousin Ice - Catch Your Glow

I actually much prefer the LP version on this, but it's not on youtube. It has enhanced female choral vocals and the instrumentation is more complex too. One of the better "city" narratives out there.

 

[dert]

22. Mr Fingers - Sands of Aruba

Completely mysterious repeated vocals here over a super loungey instrumental, very nice saxophone playing and piano flourishes, excellent rhythm section too. All in all a nice jam with words that pull more than their own weight.

 

[dert]

23. Cerrone - Give Me Love

Heard Tom of England play this on a boat and immediately had to know what it was, later realized I already had Cerrone 3 but just hadn't paid any attention to the B-side...

 

[dert]

24. Lil Louis - Fable (Director's Cut Mix)

DJ Harvey, Output, those sequences of 5 crash cymbals, one of my favorite simple production tricks

 

[dert]

25. Red House Painters - Strawberry Hill

I don't really like going to concerts, but I like going to this guy's concerts.

 

[dert]

26. Purl - Sargyll

A sui generis dub techno masterpiece, someday I'm going to bootleg this and put it out on a 12".

 

[dert]

27. Donald Byrd - Wind Parade

Funnily enough, you can generally find the two 12"s with the three essential tracks from this album for a better price than the LP itself, and guess what, they sound better too!

 

[dert]

28. David Axelrod - The Warnings

This entry is for the entire side of this album, but I couldn't find a youtube video with all of them together, so here's part 1.