Strictly 4 My Underground Homo Deep House Thugs: DJ Sprinkles - Midtown 120 Blues

i haven't heard this on good speakers but it sounds awes on my alritish headphones.

the production is deceptively great on this. when i first heard it, it sounded kind of thin, but after listening on some really nice headphones I'm impressed. the lack of peak limiting and obvious compression makes it seem really spacious.

my biggest complaints are that his voice sounds really thin and awkward in the first track (maybe not really a production critique), and the break in "House Music is Controllable Desire You Can Own" seems just a few milliseconds off to me. That may be intentional, though, to make it sound more old school or something.

I don't like his monologue in the 'intro' track at all. I find it the lowest point on the album, and I always skip it.

Xposts Good analysis.

I've been thinking a lot about this record lately, mostly in adoration. Ultimately, I can't think of a dance record that makes me think quite so much as this has, it's ability to give birth to discussion is nothing short of admirable, far beyond most records where the discussion ends when you decide whether it'll work in a club or not.

Irregardless: it really isn't a house record, imho, but an electronic treatise on house music, philosophically speaking.

― gonna be a long hot summer for the MS Word paperclip (the table is the table), Tuesday, July 14, 2009 12:42 PM (1 month ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

I think is pretty OTM. Critiques of it being just a rehash of older sounds, I think, are taking a not so great reading of it. It seems to me more that this work is more a collection of the canonical signifiers of House music, turned on their head, than any attempt at making something new within the traditional category of House. Stop me if I start sounding like I don't know what I'm saying, but it's almost post-house in this respect: it resembles house because house is it's referent (take Grand central pt 1. which buries very traditional drum machines and synth sounds under abstract sounds. It's not a house track per se, so much as something that makes house its subject), it sounds like it because it is addresses it as such, hence the voice overs, samples, self-conscious use of 808 in GC pt. 1, etc.

And I've said it before and I'll say it again: you can't separate the autobiography and the arguments. This is an incredibly personal document (i.e. Grand Central pt. 2), and I admire Terre's ability to be so open. I believe this to be more the story of one individual's experiences than any sort of diagnosis of the problems of house (and of course the latter is articulated in the former, as someone who has presumable experienced and seen a good deal of disenfranchisement and marginalization).

Also, it really does sound that good.

Most, if not all, great political music is personal.

Yes.

Also, I forgot to talk about the end of the album, The Occasional Feel-Good, which, more than just a very nice track is such a perfect end to the album: Despite the pain, suffering, the disenfranchisement and disillusionment, after all of this there still remains those occasional moments of ecstasy you find on the dance floor or in your room listening to records.

It's kind of optimistic and beautiful, really, as a re-framing of a raison-d'etre of the whole thing.

> my biggest complaints are that his voice sounds really thin and awkward in the first track (maybe not really a production critique)

yes, his voice is thin and hard to hear/understand in other albums, too ("trans am" and "silent passability" from couture cosmetique, "lovebomb" from lovebomb, etc. - even in his two radio dramas filled with voices, the voice mixing is often not up-and-front). it always sounds like he mixes it "inside out" compared to how normal voices would be inserted. i assume this is some kind of statement against artistic ego - a half-baked solution to get his voice into the track, but to do it uncomfortably.

according to a recent interview on soundslikeme (where terre talks about omd's dazzle ships), the discomfort is probably his as much as the listeners... sounds like he has voice hang-ups:

Q: Do you think there is a reason why so many Synthpop bands of the 80’s have this combination of electronic instruments and very distinctive voices?

A: It’s a very British male vocal reminiscent of Gary Numan, Pet Shop Boys, etc. Actually, my own voice is very similar to these voices, and listening to their records tends to make me uneasy in the way hearing one’s own voice is uneasy. In fact, it’s one very private reason I have just always fucking hated the Pet Shop Boys. I can’t get over it....

http://www.sounds-like-me.com/news/terre-thaemlitz-on-dazzle-ships-by-orchestral-manoeuvres-in-the-dark/

maybe terre skips the "midtown 120 intro" when playing the album, too, ha ha! it is kind of awkward to listen to, performatively. but that is also a kind of "underground" thing - not an image of underground, but really underground in terms of non-professional voiceover. kinda cool in that sense, just to think the document exists as it does.

does "ball r (madonna free zone)" sample alexander o'neal "the lovers"? or just coincidence?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzEogTBtNMA

uh i mean "brenda's $20 dollar dilemma"

man i do love DN's history lessons...

i like this LP too, often boring but almost always beautiful (esp 'Ball'r') if that makes sense. i'm sure there is better stuff, i just hardly ever hear LPs like this in recent years.

Midtown 120 Blues chosen as album of the year by Resident Advisor.

yes, still need to hear this.

got this a couple of weeks ago. one of those records that gives me that 'why can't all music be this good' feeling.

It's a magic record, no doubt.

Strangely absent from a lot of end of year polls. Must be because it leaked in 08

The samples I've heard (from this URL) are intriguing. Is this disc available for download anywhere (legally, I mean)? I didn't see it on eMusic, 7Digital or Lala.

hmmm, looking at amazon, they don't have it on mp3 and only have the cd available as an import

Yeah, I'm just spotting that too. Four sellers of the disc (new).

I bought it on download from Juno

http://www.junodownload.com/ppps/products/1395328-02.htm?highlight=DJ%20SPRINKLES

Hm. That's certainly better than waiting for a physical copy via Amazon.

So Juno is totally reputable/cool/secure, yes? I always hedge a bit when asked to download a new media player, which I'd have to do with Juno (never heard of that site before, tbh). OTOH, seems like I'm downloading a new media player every day now.

You don't need to download a new media player, there is a embedded player on the site where you can hear clips, but you are actually buying a zipped folder of mp3s. You can pay by paypal or card, I've never had any problems with it.

I listen to it a lot at work.

Yeah, I (finally) figured that out. Downloads worked like a dream. It's an interesting site. Lots of stuff I've never seen anywhere else (I spotted a remix of Off The Wall that gives the song new, frantic energy (or at least so it seems from the sample)).

Anyway, thanks to all for the guidance on buying this disc.

(xp)

yeah, this and the redshape album tie for album of the year for me.

Ball'r was my song of the year before the year began. I.e. technically released in 08 there wasn't a moment I new of a better track this year.

I think this was the only album I bought/heard in full from 2009, actually.

oh yeah, here's the RA link: http://www.residentadvisor.net/feature.aspx?1121

They sez:

DJ Sprinkles - Midtown 120 Blues [Mule Musiq]
"There must be a hundred records with voiceovers asking 'What is house?' and the answer is always some greeting card bullshit about life, love, happiness."

In 2009, it seemed like there were at least one hundred more. But the above quote, taken from DJ Sprinkles "Midtown 120 Intro" and the album that followed, was a striking moment in which the complexity of life—and music—was laid bare in 80 minutes of house music. Questions became more important than answers, ambiguity more important than certainty, hearing just as important as listening.

Midtown 120 Blues provided plenty of pleasure as well. The sublime, building "Sisters, I Don't Know What This World Is Coming To" and the otherworldly ambience of "Grand Central, Pt.II (72hrs. by Rail from Missouri)" are two of the finest representations of the most important loves—deep house and experimental electroacoustics—ever put to tape by Sprinkles, AKA Terre Thaemlitz. But the album is RA's favourite because it went far beyond making a crowd move, providing music journalists with angles or satisfying the home listening contingent. It's the best album of 2009 because it makes us wonder that if other producers—hell, other people—were as consistently brave as Thaemlitz, what this world indeed would be coming to.

the Redshape album is actually really amazing. highly rec'd.

huh, my top 15 has four of those. most of the ones listed there made me snore, though i'm glad Lawrence got big ups, cuz that album was really lovely.

weird that the resident advisor list was so close to my list, i don't really listen to that much techno, still I think M120blues is gonna do well in the ilm yr end poll, i'm voting it #1 tho so persp

So, ResidentAdvisor picked this as their album of the year and it's great. Was it popular on here (i've only lurked for a bit, was too intimidated to in the past).

its really from abt the seven minute mark that sisters kicks off, still the best track imo

Dwight, check the thread, this seems to have gotten a lot of love on ILM including from people who don't haunt the usual dance music friends. Pipecock doesn't like it but that's like a roundabout endorsement really.

Tim Finney, I salute you for this thread and alerting me to this record, my fave of 2009 (tied with Memory Tapes)

Man this record is just too good. I've said it before and I'll say it again, the fact that it has caused as much as as considered discussion it has - even if you don't agree with what TT says - is a testament to the success of not just a 12" but a whole album of that not only transcends the 'can you dance to it?" criteria that forms so much of the backbone in current dance music discourse. Moreover, I'd identify its ability to really make you feel things (like, emotions and stuff) that gives it that sort of edge, where for me, a straight white man at the beginning of his 20's, to examine my relation to dance music.

i always wonder what brenda's $20 dilemma was and if it worked out okay

I love this record. I feel like an outsider to this discussion -- I don't really understand the nuances between different sub-genres of electronic dance music -- but after reading the thread and spending a few days with the album, some thoughts have developed for me:

• I think Sprinkles' rant in the opening song is a crucial table-setter. He is bitter (e.g., "Most Europeans still think deep house means shitty vocal house tracks"), but that's okay, and he softens it with humor (I thought the point of his anecdote about not being able to get into The Loft at the exact moment the DJ is playing his song -- "I shit you not" -- was to lighten the mood, as opposed to him just passing along some weird experiences he's had).

• Ironically, in spite of Sprinkles' dismissal of "shitty vocal house music," I think the vocal samples save the second song (Midtown 120 Blues). I say "saves" because repetitive instrumental tracks sometimes go on too long for me, and I look for something to hold onto (vocals work well in this regard, even if they are just clipped samples, like in this song).(n.1) I think this highlights a difference between experiencing the music in a club versus on headphones; in a club, I imagine you want the groove to lock-in and keep-going while you're dancing, but on headphones, I get anxious to move on to the next new sound or nuance or development.

• I love the idea of the club as a political arena and dancing as an act of political opposition or expression. Maybe Sprinkles doesn't mean it this way, but that's how it comes across to me.

• The way the piano softly drops into the songs is really lush and inviting.

• Has Madonna ever addressed this charge that she didn't give due-credit to trans-gendered culture (not sure that's the right phrase) in Vogue? My first thought when I heard the accusation in the song was that maybe she couldn't comfortably fit those references into the lyrics, but that doesn't make sense, and it's an even thinner defense if she directly lifted the notion of voging directly from that dance community.

• In some ways, this hit me like Burial's Untrue record. I felt like the sounds had floated in from outer space, even though I'm sure it's old-hat and uninteresting to those paying closer attention to the genre.

________________________________________
(n.1) For instance, someone upthread said that Sisters I Don't Know What This World Is Coming To doesn't take off until about the 7:00 mark.

Ughhhh. Sorry. That all sounds so stupid.

Let me just stop at: "I love this record."

Daniel, it isn't really necessarily 'transgender' culture. It's really about Madonna not giving due-credit to the culture of voguing, which was (arguably) a liberatory phenomenon mostly involving African-American men dressing up in expensive, often androgynous clothing, and posing/dancing/voguing in these costumes as a way of subverting dominant paradigms of white, straight culture. Leo Bersani (himself an old white guy) has critiqued the culture because he claims it essentially reinforces the repressive mores and cultural styles that the African-American men were trying to subvert. I don't know how I feel either way, but there are two great movies about the subject. One is "Paris is Burning," which is essential viewing for anyone and everyone, imho, and the other is a short documentary called "Tongues Untied," which discusses African-American gay men in Harlem in the 1980's, among other things...

That's interesting. Thanks. FWIW (not much, I admit), I took my cue from the lyrics I found online: "She had taken a very specifically queer, transgendered, Latino and African-American phenomenon and totally erased that context with her lyrics."

I mean, there were pre-op trangendered people in those houses, certainly, but many of the young Latino and African-American men were doing their own, more stylized and contemporary version of what might have been called 'drag' in the past.

here's a clip from Paris is Burning:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGzfFaj2Jv4

you can watch the entire thing in segments on youtube, too.

"Ball'r (Madonna-Free Zone)" is also in reference to this culture— it was called 'Ball Culture,' forgot to mention that.

Wow. Never seen anything like that before (re: the YouTube clip). Puts a new gloss on the disc, and Sprinkles' comments.

DO watch the entirety of Paris is Burning. It's all on youtube.

Paris Is Burning is so fucking amazing

http://i386.photobucket.com/albums/oo305/lejospopo/pibyo.jpg

looks like a good doc - stuck it up on my netflix queue.

btw, the infamous Tongues Untied clip that has pretty much become part of my everyday spiel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHZxRvCldlE