Daniel Wang – Influences

Found this on the Loft Classics bootleg vinyl in the early 1990s and fell in love. I have still never heard any other DJ play it in a club, ever! The funky legato bass, the dubby effects, and the gliding synth strings are priceless!

First heard this at an afterhours with old-school gay black friends in Chicago in 1993. Sixteen minutes of nonstop live jamming with that electric piano solo which flies upwards like a bird.

I first heard Tee Scott playing this at voguing balls around 1994. The opposite of a live jam, it is all drum machines and synths, yet programmed and laid out with so many interesting changes and effects, so that the 16 minutes also become a deep journey.

This track is really a disco cliche, but in the best sense. The passionate voice and the galloping octave bassline are incomparable. I actually saw Thelma Houston perform it live at a small gay bar in New York about 20 years ago. Honestly, I have never really wanted to see another live rock or pop singer since I saw her sing – every note was so perfect, joyful, brilliant.

But besides Thelma Houston; I suppose Gladys Knight would be my other favourite disco-soul diva. And the songwriting and production from Ashford and Simpson here is another witty, ironic highpoint. Plus the basslines and Valerie Simpson’s acoustic piano.

Back to electronic music from machines – the crisp Linn drum machine; the square wave synth bass which was a forerunner of the whole Mr. Fingers Juno-106 and TB-303 basslines later in the 1980s… Totally unique, mechanical yet soulful.

I love a few good house tracks too! This one especially, like a declaration to the dancefloors of the world, so dark and so strong. With the same simple bassline as Adonis “No Way Back”.

I didn’t even understand this thing when I first heard it in 1990 at some underground gay clubs in NYC. Pure electronic percussion from a TR-909 drum machine, yet deeply African – a direct bridge between Mali Africa and Osaka Japan, nothing in between. Masterpiece.

Written by Vince Montana, leader of Salsoul Orchestra, obviously. This piece has those amazing strings with a melancholy touch of Russia, a bit Tschaikovsky almost, then the jazz guitar solo by Norman Harris. Underrated, I think!

This producer was the guy behind Newcleus in the ’80s, then he did this rare deep house EP in 1990. The dream-like TB303 bass with the tinkly piano solo on top haunted me for 18 years until someone sent me a YouTube link of it.