House Hunting #60 – Various Artists #6
As it’s the 60th edition of House Hunting, it’s that time again when we get a hot house comp on the go. So I get sent to the back of the rack as the vinyl vendors, prime purveyors and serious selectors takeover to wax lyrical about their choice crate crusade whether a bargain bin belter or hallowed house Holy Grail. Time to discard your Juno carts and Discogs wantlists – let these rack raids inspire you to take a jaunt to your local wax haunt for a deep dose of House Hunting…
BAWRUT
Where better to start than our latest addition to the Ransom Note posse, Borut Viola aka Bawrut. The Italian-born, Madrid-based maestro has released arguably the major club joint of the year to launch Ransom Note’s label with the acid-drenched ‘Ciquita’ coming complete with jitterin’ percussion and Latin chants injecting a much-needed dose of carnival spirit to the dancefloor sackin’ off the serious backpack brigade. Have a listen here.
It ain’t gonna fail to make you shake – watch out for the remixes touchin’ down soon… Be sure to check out his The Sound Of Silencio blog and this recent R$N interview, complete with a mix from the main man. Anyway, on to his House Hunting and Bawrut deviates to Discogs for an elusive Environ…
MORGAN GEIST – ‘24K’ (ENVIRON)
I discovered this track just after the Metro Area album in 2002. I strongly became a huge fan of them and started to look for everything about them: records, interviews, radio and club sessions, live gigs, etc… This was the "Napster era”, no YouTube or whatever so was very difficult to find sessions of the duo and I remember the first time Italian Radio 2 aired a mix from them, recorded somewhere between Europe and US, I discovered this gem!
I remember there was a Metro Area gig in Italy, at Maffia in Reggio Emilia (4 hours far from my city) and I went there with my friend Marco. I remember we asked Morgan for a copy via mail and he told us they already finished them. I think this is my first record bought on Discogs and I’m very proud and jealous of it! Very happy Morgan decided to repress this EP but in the end all that time spent to discover the song, write a mail to MG a couple of months later and in the end find it on Discogs is priceless and couldn’t compare to the new one!
BRUCE TANTUM
As a bassist in the band Moot back in early 80s NYC, Bruce Tantum’s formative years was spent soakin’ up club culture playing in club sanctuaries such as Danceteria and The Mudd Club. These downtown dance dens inspired him to get behind the booth, playing at some of NYC’s iconic institutions such as Cielo, Output and Peter Gatien’s legendary Limelight. As well as DJing, Bruce is a renowned music journalist who as well as being the previous club editor for Time Out for nearly two decades he also contributes to Resident Advisor, Red Bull Music Academy, XLR8R and more with features and interviews – check out his latest interview with Kenny Dope for Chicago’s 5 Magazine. As well as DJing and freelancing, Bruce’s busy schedule also includes hosting a show for Brooklyn radio show The Lot Radio with guests including Better Days’ Bruce Forest and most recently Arthur Baker which you can check out here. For his House Hunting choice cut, Bruce unearths a basement bargain belter from the cream of the Chicago crop…
THE IT – ‘DONNIE’ (DJ INTERNATIONAL)
The It’s ‘Donnie’ isn’t the rarest record in my collection; there are dozens of copies for sale on Discogs at the moment, albeit at somewhat inflated prices. And, even though it’s a coproduction of the godlike triad of Larry Heard, Irwin Larry “Chip E” Eberhart II and Harold "Harri" Dennis (with Robert Owens on vocals and Ron Hardy on remix), the 1986 D.J. International release is far from the best—though I do find myself coming back to that Hardy mix even after all these years. No, the reason why this one stands out is how I came to own it.
Back in the late ’80s, there were tons of characters—gentlemen of leisure, junkies, hustlers of various sorts—selling vinyl of all sorts on the streets of my East Village neighborhood, generally for between 25¢ and $1.00 a pop. One day, I was buying a few pieces from a scruffy looking individual, who had a bonanza of ’80s Chicago and NYC house spread out on his blanket. After the purchase, he said, “Hey, I have a room full of this stuff right around the corner—want to check it out?” Of course I said yes, while his “assistant” watched his wares, I walked with him to a burned-out block of Avenue C, which was pretty much still no-man’s land at the time. He unlocked a basement door and walked me down, led me to the center of the dark room switched on the bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling… and I found myself surrounded by not only crate upon crate of sealed 12s, but by a herd of capybara-sized rats, scurrying around as if they owned the place. “Don’t mind them,” he said. I did my best to ignore the teeming beasts, but there were just too many of them (I was also noticing the combined pungency of rodent dung and decaying rat flesh by this point)—I spied “Donnie,” handed the guy a buck, yelled “gotta go!” and hightailed it out of there, hallowed record in hand.
CHIDA
Chida has been honing his craft since the early 90s with his precise programming and superior selections securing him residencies at a range of Tokyo’s club sanctuaries including Club Eleven where he has warmed up for the stellar selectors in town – check out his Boiler Room mix and his recent guest mix for Tim Sweeney’s Beats In Space to hear why he’s the DJ’s DJ. Chida also runs his ‘Ene’ label which has released records from tried and tested tastemakers such as Dr Dunks & Justin Vandervolgen, Felix Dickinson & Nick The Record and Lord Of The Isles plus hometown heroes including Cos/Mes, Sly Mongoose and The Backwoods aka kindred spirit DJ Kent. Following on from his hit joint ‘Danca’ a few years ago on ESP Institute, this year there’s more releases and remixes on the horizon so check out his Soundcloud and keep him on your radar. So, for his hallowed house hotplate Chida discovers some proper obscure allure outta Osaka…
VOICE OF THE INSTRUMENT – ‘BALL TRAXX’ (BALLROOM RECORDS)
I started buying house music records in 1991 (when I was 17) when I met DJ Kent (The Backwoods/Force Of Nature) at University in 1993. We were checking out new stuff at record stores in Shibuya (Dance Music Records, Cisco, Manhattan Records etc.) often after school, had parties together (since 1994) and still do something together (making music/party/touring in Europe). In the early 90’s, some Japanese producers started to make house music and pressing up the records.
This "Ballroom Records" run was by the legendary Japanese DJ and record shop "DJ’s Store" owner DJ Toshi – the store was located in Osaka city and closed in 2001. I’ve played both sides of this record. I missed it in my record shelf for a long time but I found it at RECOfan in Tokyo 5-6 years ago. I picked it up from the one dollar boxes. The ‘Ball Traxx’ E.P. includes four different versions – I’ve played the ‘Old School Edit Trax’ version (on the B-side) a lot. It’s disco sampled from Relight My Fire’s intro. The two versions on the A-side are both beautiful deep house tunes too with simple synth riffs and dreamy pads. Take me to the all tracks produced by DJ Toshi. I still love to play these tunes…*
*No Youtube vid as a super-scarce slice – get house hunting!
DISCO PATRICK
The discernible disco dealer and acetate auteur, Disco Patrick has utilised his disco know-how with partner in crate-crime Patrick Vogt in publishing ‘The Bootleg Guide To: Disco Acetates, Funk, Rap and Disco Medleys’ complete with a foreword from mix maestro John Morales. More recently, he collaborated with Patrick again in publishing some proper coffee table couture in the form of ‘Disco: An Encyclopedic Guide To The Cover Art Of Disco Records’ with contributions from disco forefathers Tom Moulton and Nicky Siano – both recommended reading cop ‘em from Sounds Of The Universe.
Not content in releasing two books, Patrick has recently launched his disco and boogie bible ‘Hot Stuff’ with the magazine covering disco, jazz, funk, rap, hip-hop, graffiti and breakdancing culture, roller disco and vintage ads. Check out the latest edition which also launches the new House Hunting series 'House History' with the first chapter harkin’ back to NYC '83. Anyway, for his find the disco don reminisces about the instant attraction to vinyl in his youth and his lasting love affair with the black stuff – his fave find being an LP with production powerhouses Patrick Adams and Greg Carmichael at the controls…
DONNA MCGHEE – ‘MAKE IT LAST FOREVER’ (RED GREG RECORDS)
Diggin’ in Belgium in the early eighties:
In 1979 I was discovering disco music. With school we went to Brussels in 1979 in Belgium for an excursion and while walking through the city I noticed an import shop called Shaft Imports and saw that the complete window was filled with the Bobby Caldwell heart-shaped red vinyl 10 inch of ‘What You Won’t Do For Love’. At that time, it was the start for me and I didn’t know about import shops so later that year I started to buy records. Until today I still have that window in my mind and wish I had visited that shop. Each time now I see that Bobby Caldwell red vinyl I buy it and I see that shop in my mind. It’s also a great track. From 1980 I started to go to record shops in The Netherlands (Amsterdam and Rotterdam) to buy my records.
Later when I had my drivers license (1988) I went to Antwerp in Belgium and on my first trip I went to a record store called ARS. At the entrance I noticed two boxes of cheap sealed 12 inch disco singles from 1978 to 1980 and most of them had the sticker from Shaft records on it (The shop I saw in 1979 in Brussels). They were a dollar each so I bought all the boxes! Funny to see how I got a piece of the inventory from that import store years later. Belgium was in the eighties a good country to buy disco-funk records because they imported a lot of dance music from the US. Most of the used records in that period cost 100 Belgian francs which is about 5 US dollar. One of my favorite scores in 1988 was Donna McGhee’s album ‘Make It Last Forever’ in Antwerp for 5 dollars.
ENRICO POLICARDO
Enrico is one-half of Italian DJ duo Half Le Mans and hosts the monthly More Downstairs session in Stoke Newington’s diggers den Lucky Seven. The ethos of their party is that they invite a guest to dig deep in Lucky Seven’s lair and see what lethal lacquer they can unearth with the rack raid rules being ‘what you find is what you play’ – killer concept! They’ve hosted a range of serious selectors including Bawrut, DJ TLR, Ruf Dug, Severino and more – check out their YouTube channel where you can watch and listen to the fruits of their labour. Last month they hosted House Hunting too which you can check out here complete with a tracklisting for the hardcore housespotters! Next month they host Miro of sundayMusiq (who runs the Sunday Club at The Pickle Factory with next guest Jane Fitz) so no doubt some supreme selections in store – event details here. For his diggin’ tale, Enrico reminisces about a scarce second-hand slice outta South Africa…
YOU AND ME – ‘COME WITH ME’ (JO’BURG RECORDS)
I grew up in a family where music was and still is very important. I have always been exposed to Jazz, Blues and Bossa Nova, British Folk, Prog Rock and all sorts of stuff that in my family were considered good music. For some reason anything remotely danceable wasn’t included in the lot. I have always been surrounded by thousands of records but for some strange reasons there’s always been a stigma attached to disco music, funk, Motown stuff or anything that might encourage to move your freaking ass. When I was 13 I was already collecting records, going to fairs and all that stuff, I was really into it until probably when I was around 20 or so. Then, I felt all of sudden a complete detachment to the music I had been listening so far, I still liked it, but I couldn’t feel that drive anymore that sense of anticipation when you find something you wanted.
I was missing something and that something was the beat, that beat that brings people together dancing and singing along to a record. Music in its primary and ancient form was a way to be together not something made to be listened on a very expensive hi-fi system, sipping red wine alone in the dark (although I can’t deny I still like doing that). What I didn’t know is that there are so many layers, so many ways to understand and interact with music. You know those friends who were really into Heavy Metal or “you-name-it” kind of genre and they discover when they are 30 or something that there is a thing called Jazz and that they like it? It’s basically what happened to me, just the other way round, which doesn’t mean metal or (fill here your genre of music you want) is necessarily a bad thing. Things need to be explained and lived to be understood fully. I lived the house music era when it was in full swing but I had never been involved in it, I lived it through my friends and schoolmates without really understanding it. 15 years old kids raving on a Sunday in a tacky club on the outskirts of the city, drinking blue drinks and coming to school the day after completely hungover (and bragging about it). I just didn’t get it, it really sounded all the same to me, as I was used to those overelaborate guitar solos and concept albums with just 2 – 25 minutes long tracks inspired by the birth Venus or some other stuff and, don’t get me wrong, I still f****** love those records and if under torture I really had to name one and only one album it would probably be Soft Machine’s ‘Third’, such an amazing and multi-layered album!
I just needed a Sherpa to show me the way, but then House music got me, actually, it blasted me (Luca this one is for you). I still remember the first time I listened to Robert Owens’ ‘Bring Down The Walls’ and going completely nuts, thanks Borut for that (one half of Scuola Furano).
And I took from there, making my journey backwards going from House to Disco and from there forward to boogie and Italo disco, then back to Motown and forward again to electro, techno. Moving constantly back and forth where the inly important thing is not the genre, is not the bpm, it’s the vibe, it’s the story of that track and what you can add or take from it.
My record of choice is a very weird one. I picked it up at Standa (an Italian John Lewis, just way less posh, so basically a Debenhams ahaha). Vinyl was pretty much gone by then, it was already the CD era, but these records popped up out of nowhere, mint, sealed at the ridiculous price of 1.000 liras (it would be something like 20p today). I remember I was with my mum, I must have been 13 or 14 really, and I forced to stay until I had gone through all of them (things don’t change much later in life do they?) and I ended buying a couple of them including this one. No YouTube videos unfortunately but you can listen to it if you skip to minute 22 on this mix we have from the Good Block guy some years ago.
I didn’t really know what it was, a south African record of a label and producer I had never heard of before. So I went home put it on the platter and shame, it’s disco – the forbidden music – WTF, but although I couldn’t admit to myself there was something I liked, something that caught my attention (I was still in my crepuscular, picassian-absinth drinking-blue period). So the record sits there unplayed for years until when I stumble across it in my collection probably 6 later. I was at my parent’s place (as often happened) with lil-Buso (wicked record collector and other half of Scuola Furano). I put it on and we both go like “WTF – this stuff is good” and because I wasn’t playing it a lot I think he offered me the price on the cover to have it, not a big deal. And since then the record has been sitting in my collection and I love it, I love the memories I have about it and it definitely represents in a great way my personal journey through music and life. Now you’re already digging into Trevor Rabin’s discography and, let me tell you, you’ll be rather disappointed. But in the credits of that record there are some wicked musicians…I’m gonna stop here though, go dig!
IAN MCQUAID
About time I got one of my sardonic superiors at Ransom Note to have a house hark back and who better than our contributing editor Ian ‘Nasty’ McQuaid to lay down some lyrics as like me he’s a proper bargain bin burrower. He regularly waxes lyrical on platforms such as The Guardian, i-D, DJ Magazine, Mixmag and Time Out, though for me it’s all about his Gone To A Rave column on our very own R$N covering 20 years of UK rave culture, hardcore and more… As well as his way with words, Ian’s dexterity behind the decks has seen him DJ at a host of festivals such as Glastonbury, Secret Garden Party and Serbia’s Exit Festival plus choice clubs including Fabric, XOYO and Corsica Studios under an armada of aliases including Anarchic Hand, Fear Of Music, OffModern, Helter Skelter, Nasty McQuaid and Oyinboy – check out his Soundcloud for his latest edits and mixes. For his House Hunting Ian brings some UK flavour to the plate with his platter that matters…
BASE TEAM FEATURING VERONICA MARTIN – ‘DANCE TO THE RHYTHM/HOT STUFF’ (HOT MELT)
I’ve chosen a track by UK badman William Alexander Smith aka TC Curtis. Smith was active in the Brit Funk scene from the early 80s and I feel like he’s been unfairly overlooked. His early stuff consisted of tough dancefloor funk, all eminently playable now, and most of it on Discogs for a couple of quid. By the end of the 80s he’d moved towards disco fused house jams, which brings us straight to ‘Dance To The Rhythm/Hot Stuff’. Released in ’88 the track comes with a dub on the flip – this is the only version available on YouTube. For me the full vocal featuring American soul diva Veronica Martin on the A side just edges it – but I'm sure most people are gonna be all about the dubby soundeffects of the video featured today. Whichever side, both are pure good fun house music running on a sick bassline that you can easily imagine getting spun at a late 80s warehouse soul rave. It's released on TC Curtis's own Hot Melt label, which is well worth checking out on Discogs- as with all of TC's stuff, it's currently going for prices that don't reflect how dope the cuts are. Just checking them out now, I was interested to see that he was responsible for releasing one of my favourite pop songs as a nipper – Mai Tai's ‘History’. (in fact, do yourself a favour and check out the mental time travelling video to History right now)
So, anyway, I found my copy of ‘Dance To The Rhythm’ for 20p in a charity shop in Canning Town. Unfortunately, the shop’s gone now – it was massive and 4 times out of 5 full of crap – but on that fifth time woooeeee you’d find some gems, and always at 20p a 12”. I think when I picked up this 12” I also got a stack of Criminal Records bangers, but that’s something to chat about another day…
JOHN GOMEZ
A dedicated diggin’ deviant, John’s crate credentials and supreme selections (as I experienced at Ransom Note’s ‘The Love Hangover’ event few weeks back) have secured him the hot seat for the Rush Hour Takeover on NTS hosting a load of label affiliates such as Soichi Terada, Hunee and the main man himself Antal. He also runs the Tangent parties with partner in crate crime Nick The Record – a bijou basement and superior system the key ingredients with some prime platters added to the mix full of obscure allure exploring the deeper realm of soul, disco, boogie and house. Be sure to check out this recent interview and mix he compiled for our very own R$N plus his Soundcloud for his latest shows and mixes. For his house quest John jets on a Cambridge crate crusade for a spot of market marauding…
TRYBE – ‘PSYCHEDELIC SHACK’ (WILD PITCH RECORDS)
I found this in Cambridge market, where a handful of record stalls rotate throughout the week. Their offering is usually pretty generic, catering mostly to occasional tourists who want to buy a beaten up Pink Floyd LP along with a university hoodie. But if you are persistent – as I was when I lived there – you can walk away with some really interesting reggae, African, and jazz records. Twelves rarely come through, and when they do they are lumped into the mixed categories. Looking through the new stock I came across this record on Wild Pitch, a rap label that put out cats like Gangstarr, Lord Finesse, and Main Source, all of which I was crazy about when I was a teenager. The Wild Pitch label and sleeve are fresh in a really old school kind of way, with bold geometric designs that really grab your attention. But my interest was piqued when I read that it was mixed by Frankie Knuckles, a safe indication that this was not going to be a rap record at all. This is a strangely overlooked oddity, perhaps because it’s a blast of raw Chicago house sat within a New York rap catalogue. It’s intense and tough, with big, yearning vocals building over an organ and a relentless dubbed out cowbell. It’s a proper underground jam.
MARK GRUSANE
A dedicated digger and dealer since his youth, Mark is one of Chicago’s choice collectors who’s been wheelin’n’dealin’ in the Windy City for decades whether supplying DJs, stores or the hardcore house hoarders with his resource of rare records. It was only a matter of time that his diggin’ destiny would lead him to being a vinyl vendor and in 2004 with fellow Chicago crate crusader Mike Cole set up shop launching the legendary South Side store Mr Peabody Records. Though it sadly shut its doors in 2012, here’s a record shop reminisce with this ace advert, showcasing their shop and serious stock. As well as dealing, Mark along with Mike released the killer ‘The Real Sound Of Chicago’ comps on BBE too loaded with underground disco and boogie bombs that are all killer no filler… He’s proved handy in the studio too releasing a series of collectable edits including the seldom seen Truth Is Light EPs (watch out for Vol. 2 of his ‘MGM Edits’ touchin’ down soon on SpaceDust Records hold tight…) and releasing raw rhythms including ‘Time And Space’ on Rush Hour’s house subsidiary Hour House Is Your Rush plus launching his new label Mark Grusane Music which’ll house his new ‘Stand Down’ EP full of that early 90’s Chicago flow a la Dance Mania – check it out here. With his Windy City tale Mark scores a serious house haul from a collection previously owned by a Chicago House hero…
ARMANDO – ‘LAND OF CONFUSION’, ‘151’ & ‘100% OF DISIN’ YOU’ (WESTBROOK/WAREHOUSE)
So, the year had to be around Summer 1998. Years before we even had a store (Mr Peabody Records), me and my former partner (Mike), were thinking of a public location to do hand to hand promotions (passing out flyers) in order to score some record collections. We ended up going to (now closed) Evergreen Plaza in the Southwest tip of Chicago/Suburbs. While in the mall, passing the flyers, a young man takes a flyer, stops and asks, “You all want Vinyl? Those big ones? You buy them?”. We say "Yes, that’s exactly what we buy". He says, "I'm gonna give you a call tomorrow afternoon", and like clockwork he called in the afternoon the following day. After talking on the phone, and prepping him (getting a feel what what he was selling), he also mentioned that the records belonged to his late Uncle, and it was a lot of everything but mainly house music. So, we scheduled a time to meet later that next day to go to the house to check the record collection out.
After arriving at the house the following day, he takes us through the back door, down the steps, and into this old school finished title basement similar to the house I was raised in as a kid. There were 3ft high stacks of vinyl all over the basement with kinda minimal room for walking. You could say literally most of the floor space was records. He explains to us again that the records had belonged to his late (now deceased) Uncle. The family was selling the house and they need to clear the basement out. We took a brief moment to look, and I noticed the majority of house music labels out of Chicago mostly mid 80's thru mid 90's. We settled with the nephew with an undisclosed amount of money we were both happy with. He instructed us to load out asap. I think it must have taken 3 or 4 SUV trips as there was literally a ton of records. As we got down to moving the last stacks of vinyl, I noticed about a 4ft stack of reel to reels in boxes in the corner. They looked brand new, the boxes were so clean. I asked the young man, "what about these?", he says, "Take them, I said everything must go!".
After getting the collection back to my place, I noticed countless, test pressings, promos, and tons of Chicago House music. Trax, Saber, DJ International, Cajual, Saber, small labels, etc… Myself being an old trackhead, I knew a lot of this stuff, like noticing some of the test pressings had never made it into mainstream circulation, meaning the short run of Test Pressings, is all there is, the music was never officially released. This was indeed a premium collection of house music. Then, we started surfacing the old party flyers that was in between the records. I again wondered, who was this guy? After taking a second look at the reel to reels we acquired from the collection, it all made sense then, into a true WTF moment… On the inside of the reel boxes, inside each box, various sheets read, "151, Land Of Confusion, 100% Dissin You, etc.." Our jaws dropped, the collection we had purchased had belonged to no one other than house pioneer/producer, Armando Gallop. The reels were the multitracks (stems) to most if not all of his catalogue. Anyone who remembers back then, remembers the firestorm that was created when we surfaced Armando's collection, lol… It definitely was a memorable moment for myself…
Another prevalent label in the collection was Dance Mania (label copies and numerous white label test pressings) As far as my most memorable record find, outside of the Test Pressing house artifacts that were never releases, one release sticks out in my mind, let me explain.. As many know now, Chicago has a rich history of urban black street gangs, I remember this one record which looked like it was pressed at Barney's One Stop Distributor (Barney's was responsible for pressing the Dance Mania Releases). This particular record, with the Dance Mania label typesetting was titled, "Gang Tracks" or something of the sort. It was different factions of Chicago street gangs that recorded their own tracks/themes for their underground parties. Each track and title represented a different street gang. Although I remember some of the tracks on some early mix cassettes I heard throughout High School, I never surfaced the record again, and have yet to see it show up on any websites such as Discogs. Being I knew it was a record I would most likely never play in public, it was sold some years ago by myself at a record show.
MASA SUTELA
Masa (aka DJ Ionik) is the head honcho of choice Finnish stable Traveller Records which he has been running since 2003. Though I’m always buying old records I always keep Traveller on my radar as love the label’s old-school aesthetic and it’s more discernible discography housing EP’s from the likes of Alphabet City, Bicep and Nick Anthony Simoncino plus records from House Hunting heroes such as Boyd Jarvis and Creation with their long lost East-Coast ether ‘Deep’ unearthed from the vaults – check out the full release roster on Discogs. As well as Traveller, Masa has a host of subsidiaries including Kojak Giant Sounds which specialises in killer disco and boogie edits plus his Techno outpost Black Economy – my advice check out his Instagram page for regular release and label updates. For his House Hunting, Masa chooses a choice Chicago cut he came across via a mixtape marvel…
MR. C. AND CO. FEATURING ALFRED DOONE COLVARD – ‘L-O-V-E’ (SABER RECORDS)
My pick here is a fairly recent one and I suppose non dusty fingers related. I spotted this from a mix few years back courtesy of the Parkway kingpin Mark Seven. I played the mix to death and pm’d Mark about the tune and he simply replied in so many words ‘what’s your address?’ Fast-forward about a week and I was a happy owner of the Trax Records’ sub-label matrix# S-3017.
The track is just that all-out-close-your-eyes-and-lose-yourself garage music; production on point, lyrics with a MESSAGE to drop a tear or two and a groove bigger than any prototype USB stick. Better yet, the B-side dub is on-point too and you can cop a copy for less than 5$. The mastering could a bit heavier dynamic-wise but you guys know how to rock that mixer.
Big big shout to Stockholm and remember, "L is loving you and all the things you do for me".
VINCENT FLOYD
Though he only released a handful of records in the early to mid-nineties, House Hunting hero Vincent Floyd has gained a cult following amongst the Chi-town trainspotters and hardcore housespotters. His majestic productions have attained mythical status whether it’s the serene synths and crystalline keys of ‘I Dream You’ and ‘Cruising’, the harder-edged deep anxiety of ‘I’m So Deep’, or the Gherkin flavour of ‘Cactus Juice’ – hard to pick a favourite but I think ‘I Dream You’ perfectly encapsulates his signature sound. Here’s a House Hunting interview from way back where he reminisces about those recordings. He has undergone a renaissance of late with Rush Hour deservedly re-releasing his back-catalogue and unearthing some long lost dusty DATs resulting in the 6-track opus ‘Moonlight Fantasy’. Watch out for his ‘Love’s Pain’ EP touching down soon housing four ethereal expressions that captures the essence of his early records – this will be released on his newly-launched Dawn Notes label check it out here. For his house hunting Vincent shares a couple of dollar digs scored from the bargain bins…
808 STATE – ‘QUADRASTATE’ (CREED RECORDS)
My surprise find was Frank Hooker & Positive People’s ‘This Feelin’. I love disco music for the musicianship and camaraderie involved. One guy on a computer wont get these results. This record is a long jam with many different musical parts. Although I have heard and purchased a ton of music, it's good find something from 1981 that's new to me. Oh… It was in the .99 cent section which takes a lot of work to go through because it isn't categorized.
One of my favorite recent finds though is the 808 State ‘Quadrastate’ record. Around 1990 ‘Pacific’ was one of the main jams in the clubs. The track always got the crowd moving. I had the 12" of ‘Pacific’ and have been looking for it for a while. My guess is that I let someone borrow it and never got it back. I was happy to the LP for .99. ‘Pacific’ brings back great memories of youth and exciting times. It was also a track that inspired my own productions.
HOUSE HUNTING HERALD
HOUSE HUNTING x FREE HOUSE
House Hunting will be reppin' Ransom Note next month on Saturday 18th June at Bristol's choice club Cosies! for Free House whose previous alumni include serious selectors such as Finn Johannsen, Placid and Shanti Celeste – shout to rezzie Richard Carnes for the invite! So if you’re in town jet on down for some Haute house and original pressings standard – check out the event details here and see you down the front…
