While the cosmic seed had been inserted into the body of funk, a new wave of machine-driven dance records invaded the European charts. Euro-disco was born and one of its one main strands sprung out of the minds of a new generation of Italian ‘funksters’, quickly earning itself the nickname of ‘Spaghetti dance’. While most of the production failed to evade a sort of Cuban refugee nightmare, somewhere in between the ‘tropical wet shower’ feel and a poor New Order cover, a few gems rose from beneath the kitsch to invade our minds with sounds imported straight from another galaxy. Here is a subjective selection of such Italo Disco space-age rarities.
Donna Summer (produced by Giorgio Moroder) /
“ I feel love ” (1977)
Legendary producer Giorgo Moroder is no less than the man who single-handedly catapulted the organic sound of funk into the new age of synthetic love, thereby influencing the course of all synthetizer music, from new-wave to techno and electro. While some of Moroder’s personal hits such as “From here to eternity” (under his own name) or “La Nuit Blanche” (under the name “Munich Machine”) are pure gems of interstellar funk, his particular place in the pantheon of cosmic disco stems from the most spaced-out of all his collaborations, the aptly named “I Feel Love” by soul diva Donna Summer. Taken from her 1977 concept album “I Remember Yesterday”, the track’s production was designed to represent the ’sound of the future’. Based on the hypnotic repetition of a robotic bassline, it created a precedent in club music which all tracks ever after sought to emulate, casting into the obscurity the age of acoustic big bands and inaugurating the age of machine funk with one long ode to futuristic love and time travel. Bowie himself, who was recording some of his Berlin masterpieces with Brian Eno as producer when the song came out, has spoken of the track’s influence in terms of a ‘before’ and an ‘after’ :
“One day in Berlin … Eno came running in and said, ‘I have heard the sound of the future.’ … he puts on ‘I Feel Love’, by Donna Summer … He said, ‘This is it, look no further.’ ”
Stefania Rotolo / “ Marameo ” and “ UFO robot ” (1979)
Only just a few years after the “I feel love” landslide, the Italian television dusted itself up and began producing a series of outrageously funny disco-infused programs. Stefania Rotolo quickly became the queen of such shows and an icon for a whole generation. These shows, which were created on the Italian public channel at the end of the 70s, incorporated disco music to produce a new form of spectacle designed to cater for the tastes of a younger, discoball-hungry generation. They focused as much on music as on the general atmosphere of the performance, from choregraphy to costumes, aiming to offer a real ‘feel’ of a disco party to the young public. Here, in these two extracts from “Tilt”, her 1979 success show, Stefania, along with her two young fabulous astro-henchmen, is seen in a mind-blowing ballet of robotic moves that make you think those kids must have spent just about the rest of their teenagehood in rehab.
La Bionda / “ I wanna be your lover ” (1980)
La Bionda is such an ambiguous name. It sounds like one of those nicknames which Italians are so fond of when it comes to their porn-stars reconverted as politicians. But the ”blonde girl” was in fact no blonde and not even a girl, but rather was composed of two brothers, Carmelo and Michelangelo La Bionda. Active as producers and composers throughout the 70s and 80s, they are perhaps best known as the ones the world has to thank for Righeira’s international anthem of Spanish horror, the unforgettable “Vamos a la Playa” (”We’re going to the beach”). Before pouring such wonders onto our undeserving ears though, they took the time to produce the most kitsch of all cosmic disco gems, the mesmerizing “I want to be your Lover” whose video clip itself looks like it must have been watched over a trillion times by Daft Punk. A Personal all-time hit and a special dedication to that special someone who will never take the time to read this post. Cos that’s how the cookie crumbles in the disco wonderland.
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Cosmic Euro Nation part 2
By House of Coma | January 5, 2009
In the next series of posts, we will chart some of the defining historical trends which have presided over the best of disco music. We kick off with a survey of the rise and fall of European space-age disco or, in other words, the great Cosmic Euro Nation. In this first post, we aim to shed some light over early cosmic experiments within some of the genres which have preceded and shaped interstellar disco and to assess their legacy.
Pink Floyd / “Astronomy Domine (An Astral Chant) ” (1967)
“Astronomy Domine ” ( or “the Lord of Astronomy” ) , subtitled “An Astral chant” , was the first song on Pink Floyd’s debut album and is perhaps the most important early space ode of contemporary pop music. Masterminded by the late Syd Barrett whose demise would relegate Pink Floyd to the mass appeal of stadium rock, “The Piper at the Gates of Dawn” is undoubtedly the most significant of all psychedelic rock albums. This song, along with the other cosmically-enclined track, “Interstellar overdrive”, contained the blueprint for the whole ’space rock’ sound and some defining elements for all cosmic music to come. With its intense use of echoing effects in conjunction with an irregular (understand : “trippy ” ) guitar pattern, along with the additional use of a Farfisa organ, it conjured an avalanche of psychedelic frequencies alluding both to hyperspace travel and communication waves throughout deep space.
Here is what the ever wordy Wikipedia has to say about that :
“The song opens with the voice of their manager at the time Peter Jenner, reading the names of stars through a megaphone. The intention of this opening is to replicate the feeling of outer space, with Jenner’s voice sounding like an astronaut’s over an intercom. Barrett’s Fender Esquire then seemingly emerges from the distance and grows louder. At 0:19 a rapid beeping sound appears, again reaffirming the feeling of distant space. At 0:26, Mason’s distinctive drum fills emerge, followed closely by Barrett’s bluesy, sinister-sounding guitar (perhaps reminiscent of Duane Eddy) in a figure suggestive of the brass motif from “Mars, the Bringer of War” in Holst’s The Planets. Wright’s Farfisa organ is mixed into the background. Barrett’s incantatory lyrics about space again support the cosmonautical theme in the song, mentioning planets Jupiter, Saturn, and Neptune as well as Uranian moons Oberon, Miranda, and Titania, and Saturn’s moon Titan.”
David Bowie / “Space Oddity” (1969)
Space Oddity is the song that gave a name to Bowie, launching him into the spheres of fame as his fictional astronaut character, “Major Tom”, got launched into outer space. Despite being a classical pop ballad whose production and melody remain entirely conventional, the theme of the song, as its unashamed parallel between space exploration, mental confusion and a heavy psychotropic subtext, have been seminal in establishing cosmic disco-very as a internal voyage of sorts. As Huysmans’ Des Esseintes reminds us in “Against Nature”: “What was the good of moving when a person could travel so wonderfully sitting in a chair?”. Nonetheless, “Space Oddity” did go down in History far beyond its metaphor and has been associated by generations with (real) interstellar travel ever since the BBC featured the song in its television coverage of the lunar landing.
Kraftwerk / “Tanzmusic” (1971)
Kraftwerk, the art pioneers of electronic music, have been instrumental in catalyzing Krautrock, the first truly cosmic music movement with its long effusions of synth waves and psychedelic riffs, into a more concise pop format, thus leading the way to the later appropriation of space hippie shit by the infamous heir of funk, disco music.
“Tanz Music” is a piece which bears testimony to this transition, with its “Kraut” pattern, all trippy waves and mellow hallucinations, brought back to a recognizeable melody, the essence of pop. It is also a song of a rare hypnotic beauty which lays the foundation for the very sound which will conquer the minds and embody the future over the following decade. The electronic virus, in the meantime, has been inserted almost surrepticiously into the body of pop. Nothing can ever be the same. Cosmic Euronation, act 1. The rebirth of the space age into a disco apparatus.
Roxy Music / “Ladytron” (1972)
Meanwhile, the 70s’ excess offered a fertile ground for all sorts of experimentations. Following his chance encounter with one of Roxy Music’s members in an underground station, pioneering weirdo Brian Eno subseqently joined the band, orchestrating the fusion of art rock’s quirkiness with glam’s sleaze to produce a series of genre-defying sonic objects. In these early Roxy songs, a classic rock matrix collides with Bryan Ferry’s honey-infused crooner style and Eno’s own sound alterations behind the mixing console and various synthetizers. The Glorious ”Ladytron”, taken from Roxy Music’s eponymous debut album, bears witness to the cosmic results produced by Eno’s collaboration with the band. As a matter of fact, the sound which opens the song was created by Eno after Bryan Ferry asked him to produce something reminiscent of the Lunar Landing.
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Cosmic Euro Nation part 1
By House of Coma | December 30, 2008
The late Bettie Page, even though she may strike us now as a classic 50s Bombshell, must be really put back into the context of her heyday in order to see the originality of her outrageous sex-appeal. She was in fact a far cry for the blonde pin-up that dominated the then landscape of female icons.
More Deeta Von Teese than May West, and definitely more Manson than Marilyn, Page, one of the earliest “Playmates of the Month” to be featured in Playboy, became a icon of fetish and kinky erotica through her modelling acts and movies, and due to her characteristic look - jet-black hair and red lipstick, which can be traced back as one of the major influences for the whole rockabilly scene.
Here Page is seen in the cult “Second Initiation of the Sorority Girl”, directed by Irving law, one of America’s first fetish photographers.
Bettie Page ? Queen of bondage.
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Your December Whoroscope
By House of Coma | December 22, 2008
( Image : House of Coma)
Starring: Blessed are the Meek / Process Wave Generations / 12-Bit Voyages / Discount Haackula / Radioactive Mind Dessert / UFO Answering Machines.
Space is the Place by Robot de Niro (Click here to listen / Right click to download)
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Space is the Place
By robotdeniro | December 18, 2008
For the doubters of the sincerity of Brooklyn Neo-Tribalism, brought on by the Sigh-Chedilia of MGMT (originally known as ‘the Management’), here is the heavenly inspiration of the scene godfathers: Gang Gang Dance in their own words.
We continued like this for a while, doing vaguely structured but mostly improvised shows around town, playing fairly consistently. We recorded our first record after about a year of doing this, then shortly after recording, Nathan was struck by lightning on a rooftop in Chinatown and died. This was obviously a very intense thing for us, but very joyous in many ways as well because he had always wanted to be struck by lightning. When this particular storm rolled into the city, he made a point of going to the roof and offering himself to the sky, as he always did, and this time the sky obliged. After Nate moved from earth to elsewhere is when something began to drive us to really work harder on the band and to buckle down a bit and begin really bashing it out. It seemed very unconscious in a sense, as if Nate was pushing us from the heavens, telling us that it was urgent and important to do this. And really from then on we have been playing quite militantly and have immersed ourselves in Gang Gang.
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Gang Star
By robotdeniro | December 15, 2008
A little riddle :
What is the common point between …
- 1970s psychological research on micro-facial interpretation ;
- C.I.A. video analysis techniques ;
- experiencing mass murder by proxy ;
- crossover photo-journalism ;
- PTA fear-mongering and media classic scapegoating discourses ;
- Star Wars ;
- and Kids on LSD but not really ?
Answer here :
and here
Expressionistic zombies of the words unite !
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The Immersion project
By House of Coma | December 12, 2008
Collective concious cataclysm, mark the end
Burst light Hall of Mirrors, alignment 1999
Magnetic self-destruction, cyclic world age
Quantum contamination contribute descendants
Mutating resonance collapse, culmination global night
Breathing Universe, emit pulse prophecy
Time of No-Time; compare, illuminate, verge day 2012
Golden Age empirical plan, dream telepath science
Linear Time Elimination: creation reality
Dawning spirit technology - sync 13 heavens song.
The Mayan End Times Prophecy is not an apocalyptic vision of doom attached to a date picked from a hat. Its foundations are (reassuringly) in an astrological system more accurate than the Greogorian calendar that marks out time - notorious for its frequent need of correction. The prophecy has an affinity in aesthetic symbols of destruction, but a modern interpretation can disregard the mysticism of Kali and Xolotl, instead focusing on the message and its relevance for Now. The similarities between Maya’s ancient-astro-future-projections and contemporary scientists and environmentalists calculated predictions are astonishing in the distance of 1000’s of years that stands between them.
The years 1992-2012 that we are fast coming to the end of are momentously entitled the ‘Time of No Time’, the period of realisation at mankinds self destructive path. Cynicism can easily discount the prophecy’s astrological value, but its theoretical resonance is more concrete, as is its beauty. One aspect of Mayan Time is the belief that time is cyclical not linear, just as the Earth is round and not flat. The prophecy’s persuasion power on the rational mind arguably rests on the fact that it does not proclaim impending annihilation of mankind, the earth and the universe (etc.). That fate is possibility not certainty. The message is essentially the pre-empting of the idea that man as a species must either evolve, or face extinction. The success of which is outlined in abstract fuzz as the promise of mankinds entry into the Golden Age of light. The haze is explicable, the Mayans did not know the answer; they left only the question. Perhaps the solution lies in Genesis, we shall see next time.
Note: read with selective vision to pierce hippy dust and seize radioactive nuggets.
http://www.adishakti.org/mayan_end_times_prophecy_12-21-2012.htm
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Concept Prophecy
By robotdeniro | December 9, 2008
The Situationnists in their time came up with the concept of “pyscho-geography” which Guy Debord defined as a mapping of the psyche via the effects of the environment, especially the urban environment, on human affects - in Debord’s own words, “the study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals.” But what would be at the end of the line if we were to reverse this hypothesis, i.e. start from the psyche and correlated individual behaviours to chart the maps that define a geography of affects ? While the initial Situationnists’ idea was best suited to a relatively small environment, reverse psycho-geography probably works best when applied to a whole nation and country.Targeting one of the largest and probably most neurotic countries in the world, Metamoderne has cobbled together 10 entries towards a remapping of American psychosis, an exercise which takes the form of our very own address to the new President-elect ; an exercise which also finds a special resonance with Baudrillard’s introductory fable of the map and the territory, at the beginning of Simulacra and Simulations :
“If we were able to take as the finest allegory of simulation the Borges tale where the cartographers of the Empire draw up a map so detailed that it ends up exactly covering the territory (…) this fable would then have come full circle for us (…). Abstraction today is no longer that of the map, the double, the mirror or the concept. Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being or a substance. It is the generation by models of a real without origin or reality: a hyperreal. The territory no longer precedes the map, nor survives it. Henceforth, it is the map that precedes the territory - precession of simulacra - it is the map that engenders the territory and if we were to revive the fable today, it would be the territory whose shreds are slowly rotting across the map.“
California Island :
Centuries before the San Andreas Fault was even discovered, California was thought by early cartographers to be a separate entity from the rest of the US mainland. An enduring European misconception dating from the 15th century, this myth was associated with the idea that California was in fact the Garden of Eden, or perhaps an early outpost of the Black Women Liberation’s Front.”Know, that on the right hand of the Indies there is an island called California very close to the side of the Terrestrial Paradise; and it is peopled by black women, without any man among them, for they live in the manner of Amazons. ” (Las Sergas de Esplandián by Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo, 1510)
Miss Teen South Carolina :
From Mythical California to Modern-day South Carolina, it seems cartography hasn’t grown necessarily sharper. Hear Miss Teen S.C. rise up against the lack of education and … maps in the US. “For our children.”
US World studies, Jules de Balincourt :
As indicated by Miss Teen South Carolina, American conceptions of the outside world can be fuzzy at times. American artist Jules de Balincourt, in his “US World Studies”, has illustrated a non-sensical reshuffle of inner state geography mixed with the image of a continent cut out from the obscure forces of an alien and no less non-sensical outside world.
The world according to America :
Beyond the mainland lies … the rest. Here are two famous maps in which “U.S.” sounds like “Us” in the “Us and them” formula.
Wasteland America :
On a slightly more practical note, this lego map offers a playful panorama of disseminated nuclear waste across the country. What was that Obama quote again ?
“You can put lipstick on a nuclear waste barrel…”
Kashistan :
“One Nation under God, indivisible…” ? A summary of the socio-economic, religious and political divides that structure the American complexity has been laid out in this funny rendition of a nation where the states of Kashistan seem to share little in common (outside of Ka$h, that is)
Single America :
Liberal vs Conservative isn’t the only fault line which plays on American psychoses in Red and Blue colours. Note how, in this 2007 map (from the National Geographic), the repartition of single men and women reveals a surprising divide between the West and the Eastern parts of the country. YMCA Frisco Bay vs Sex in the Apple City ? What if that actually was true ?
Ice cream America :
A similar divide actually pops up in the repartition of obesity rates among states. It seems macrobiotics has definitely got a stronger grip oven California than Mississipi then.
Only one thing is sure though, the rule of ice cream is established firmly throughout the land.
“One Scoop to rule them all,
One Scoop to find them,
One Scoop to bring them all
and in creaminess bind them.”
Amen.
(For our children)
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A Geography of American Psychoses
By House of Coma | December 2, 2008
So you thought Marxism was a thing of the past ?
Then ask the real George Lucas (George LucaCs, that is)
” The essence of commodity-structure has often been pointed out. Its basis is that a relation between people takes on the character of a thing and thus acquires a ‘phantom objectivity’, an autonomy that seems so strictly rational and all-embracing as to conceal every trace of its fundamental nature: the relation between people. “
Reification and the Consciousness of the Proletariat, 1923
(http://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/history/hcc05.htm )
When it doesn’t try to rebrand capitalism under the false equation transparency = honnesty (from Swatch to Jean Nouvel), contemporary design sometimes shows us its true colours and the fetishization of the female body has long been one of its favourite vectors.
Yes, under the consumerist Sun, we are all objects, and some of the following folks could hardly put it any clearer….
Pharrell Williams, Perspective Chair (on show at Gallerie Emmanuel Perrotin, Paris)
—
(Heather and Ellie)
—
(David LaChapelle)
—
OK Fuck Marxism : donchu just wanna run and book a table at Japanese restaurant Nyomataimori ?
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Fetishism exposed
By House of Coma | November 13, 2008
DIE ART DIE
‘He had too much control over my life.’
I Shot Andy Asshol.
The ‘Destruction of Art’ in itself, is a sublime contradiction. Art’s nature as a process of creation means that ‘Art’ ironically sanctions its own murder, because although its literal destruction may appear to be sacrilege, the concept that lies behind the destruction of art is unavoidably symptomatic of growth. If a function of Art is human provocation, for art to provoke its own destruction by simply ‘being’, for it to be powerful enough to incite a move beyond the velvet rope that divides the viewed and the viewer, proves its own worth.
‘You’re worshipping the wrong God’s!’
Silenus Anonymous Assailant
Vyner Street E3, within the cultivated decay of the fronts of factories and warehouses is a colony of East London’s fashionable gallery scene. Into this space of white neutrality entered an anonymous person carrying a crowbar. The work this unknown proceeded to attack was ‘Silenus’, an obese, freestanding, phallus clutching Stallion Faun. Whether this desecration was premeditated as art-statement (conceivably even by its own sculptor), or a Hackney resident embittered about the invasion of twats in his local, or as the evidence of their war cry points: someone for whom Silenus had become symbolic of the worship of false idols reflects the endless possibilities of interpretations of destructive acts.
Definition Complexities, on a basic level the destruction of artwork is vandalism, even if its destructor confusingly dedicates the action to art itself. Both the planting of a peachy kiss on an expensive Cy Twombly and the pissing in the Duchamp urinal are hilariously naughty whilst being symbolic of the dialogue between artist and viewer as both Pinoncelli (mistaken euro nation) and Rindy (hot lips pretentious bitch) describe their actions as. These acts are the logical progression of contemporary art’s self-analytical obsession, the question of ‘where will it end?’. A question that has been answered beautifully by conceptual art: implosion. Prepare for Breakdown. Art must become art once it is defined as such, whether it is defined by the creator or spectator: shooting a Rembrandt in the face with a sawn-off shotgun is beautiful expression regardless of what intentions the marksman had for the interpretation of their action.
The establishment of progress is reliant on venturing further into extremity; each successive person engaged in invisible competition. ‘Breakdown’, a statement not the work of a pussy, is symptomatic of this osmosis. In the piece Michael Landy assembled each of his 7227 worldly possessions and systematically annihilated them over a period of two weeks – leaving him naked but for a pair of overalls borrowed from his girlfriend (who was disappointingly spared inclusion) – sans credit card, sans passport, sans everything. Amongst his possessions were his own and other friends artworks including of course Damien Hirst and Tracey Emin, implicit within this aspect is betrayal encompassing the loss of relationships into the breakdown. Landy had a sense of humour about the extroverted elements of the destruction, when asked in an interview ‘What is your favourite smell?’ he replied ‘Burning gloss paint from Gary Hume’s £25,000 painting’. A comment that had the effect of loosing a Turner Prize nomination for ‘vandalism’ and ‘going too far’; the winning of such a prize however would have made his gesture: renouncement of all: redundant. The Turner panel’s judgment shortsightedly ignored the possibility of a fire in Charles Saatchi’s storage warehouse. Breakdown is ultimate in nature and whether intended or not destroyed him, “I didn’t want to make any work, I didn’t want to do anything. I didn’t feel the need to”. Following Breakdown Landy turned his attention to etching urban weeds, pursuit which resulted in lasting eye damage. Fuck.
Inverting this dedication towards self-destruction results in martyrdom. The romantic possibilities inherent within Art and Destruction come from sacrifice. Bas Jan Ader’s (FAILED) solo voyage across the Atlantic Ocean transcends the materialist concern of Landy’s work into the metaphysical - differentiating itself as spirit quest from anti-capitalist experiment. ‘In Search of the Miraculous’ - a grandiloquent title carried in 12ft of fibreglass minimalism. The realm that ‘In Search’ inhibits in retrospect is distant from the physical, it is the concept & not the sparse photographic evidence immortalised, this distance is the reason why the destructive element to the piece is eclipsed by the creative.
“…The question is not yet settled whether madness is or is not the loftiest intelligence - whether all that is profound - does not spring from disease of thought, from moods of mind exalted at the expenses of the general intellect.”(Edgar Allen Poe)
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Art & Destruction.
By robotdeniro | November 12, 2008