Extra Medium
THE UZI SLAYER
+79|4165|Oklahoma
These parties look gay as fuck. When I was a kid we would party listening to Lynard Skynard while drinking Milwaukee's Best under the biggest dirt road bridge we could find. I used to finger bang this girl I knew at the time on the back of my four wheeler down there.

Best times ever.
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
classy.

that argument basically boils down to the "disco is gay" redneck shit that america was full of in the early 80's. real smart.
DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+794|6654|United States of America
To be fair, disco was profoundly gay. "Disco sucks" was a response to the massive popularity of awful music. Rock fans say the same sort of thing about a lot of what's on the radio today.
Extra Medium
THE UZI SLAYER
+79|4165|Oklahoma

Uzique The Lesser wrote:

classy.

that argument basically boils down to the "disco is gay" redneck shit that america was full of in the early 80's. real smart.
The fact you just tried to defend disco proves you are a colossal fag.

Have you ever even ridden an ATV bro?
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224

DesertFox- wrote:

To be fair, disco was profoundly gay. "Disco sucks" was a response to the massive popularity of awful music. Rock fans say the same sort of thing about a lot of what's on the radio today.
the "disco sucks" movement is analysed today as nothing but a virulent outbreak of the worst forms of homophobia and cultural conservatism in american life. a bunch of angry and confused white dudes burning records. wow.

disco wasn't "gay". disco was a melting pot of many different marginalized and repressed people who all came together, regardless of race, religion, or creed... to have a good time. i guess in america, where everyone is "born equal", disco as a celebration of that untruth would seem painful. calling it "gay" is the lamest thing you can possibly do. yes, a bunch of people dancing and having a good time is "gay". put on some more angry rock music that expresses how "people don't understand you". pound some more cheap beers and push people around in a muddy field to prove what a "man" you are. i mean, angry music where men show off how macho they are to each other isn't homoerotic at all, is it?

and no, i don't listen to disco. i'm not really a fan. i'm sure it was a 'time and place' thing. but calling a music genre homosexual puts you on the same intellectual peg as roc. shine my shoes, please.

Last edited by Uzique The Lesser (2013-06-05 08:48:06)

Extra Medium
THE UZI SLAYER
+79|4165|Oklahoma

Uzique The Lesser wrote:

DesertFox- wrote:

To be fair, disco was profoundly gay. "Disco sucks" was a response to the massive popularity of awful music. Rock fans say the same sort of thing about a lot of what's on the radio today.
the "disco sucks" movement is analysed today as nothing but a virulent outbreak of the worst forms of homophobia and cultural conservatism in american life. a bunch of angry and confused white dudes burning records. wow.

disco wasn't "gay". disco was a melting pot of many different marginalized and repressed people who all came together, regardless of race, religion, or creed... to have a good time. i guess in america, where everyone is "born equal", disco as a celebration of that untruth would seem painful. calling it "gay" is the lamest thing you can possibly do. yes, a bunch of people dancing and having a good time is "gay". put on some more angry rock music that expresses how "people don't understand you". pound some more cheap beers and push people around in a muddy field to prove what a "man" you are. i mean, angry music where men show off how macho they are to each other isn't homoerotic at all, is it?

and no, i don't listen to disco. i'm not really a fan. i'm sure it was a 'time and place' thing. but calling a music genre homosexual puts you on the same intellectual peg as roc. shine my shoes, please.
FAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAG!
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
yeah i'm so gay, with my girlfriend, and my tolerance of other cultures

damn this curse! i swear it's genetic. please love me and accept me as one of your flock, lord.

Last edited by Uzique The Lesser (2013-06-05 09:03:54)

Extra Medium
THE UZI SLAYER
+79|4165|Oklahoma

Uzique The Lesser wrote:

yeah i'm so gay, with my girlfriend, and my tolerance of other cultures

damn this curse! i swear it's genetic. please love me and accept me as one of your flock, lord.
They don't play Disco in Heaven boy.
DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+794|6654|United States of America
I was referring to how disco arose in minority and gay clubs in New York. It certainly didn't help that the "look at me dance" self-centeredness of it fit with the flamboyant image of homosexuals in the 1970s. You showed surprise and condescension earlier when I said I'd never been to a club, but I think you fail to realize that sort of thing isn't everyones cup of tea, which is what disco was. Combined with the oxymoron soft rock, the popular crazes of the 1970s would make a rock fan weep. I don't really know what sort of angry white male emo "rock" music you're referring to with the "people don't understand you" and the whole manliness thing, though. Possibly some hard rock bands and early metal ones would fit the bill.
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
clubs are about losing yourself in a crowd and embracing anonymity and personal freedom - to be who you want, do what you want, etc. yes that involves a certain amount of licentiousness sometimes and outre behaviour. it's all part of the carnival. clubs are not "ooh look at me!" places. even with people who are good dancers. the point of clubs, from disco onwards, was to lose yourself to music and break down social/behavioural taboos. no idea how you can read disco as some egotistical-narcissist movement. all the lyrics and music are about having a good time with friends. rock music on the other hand... especially in the 70's... since i figure you are now referring to the 'decent' rock fans' canon, all noodling introspective guitar-solos and pathetic romanticism-lite lyricism... is extremely narcissistic. the 'cult of the rock-star', worship of the body, complete proggy abstraction and self-wanking... yes. okay. but it's disco that was irritatingly flamboyant. not the 15 minute woodstock guitar solos.
DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+794|6654|United States of America
Disco/dance music shifted the focus from the musicians to the dancers. The music wasn't important. DJs became minor celebrities for playing the thing, and it became normal to have a DJ in lieu of live music. The '70s were a strange time for everyone though. I see interviews or behind the scenes stuff from bands I actually like and just wonder what the hell they were on... before remembering all the drugs they were on. I'll agree that rock music could be self-aggrandizing, and major bands like Zeppelin certainly are guilty of that (in that case, as well as stealing music). A 15-minute guitar solo isn't annoying if you're into that, though. You enjoy your electronic stuff, but that sort of music is just as dry to others as some rock is to you.
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
the point is that a 15 minute guitar solo is nothing but a long masturbation on a rosewood fretboard. it's far from self-effacing. which is ironic when you accuse disco music of being flamboyant and attention-seeking. it has nothing to do with taste - whether you like it or not. it's just the form. the guitar solo is supreme egotism.

and to complain that disco/club music shifted from the live performance to the dancing... is to kind of miss the point. very badly. the whole celebration of disco's new values, and the early success of clubs - the very reason people heralded them as exciting and socially progressive - was because they defused the 'traditional' performance/crowd dichotomy. they broke down the passive audience model. you were no longer going to hear music all looking forwards at a stage to appreciate a few individuals. instead the 'event' was composed of all of you, equally, all at once, facing all directions. just purely getting lost in the music. what leads to 'more' musical appreciation in terms of dance-based genres? being rendered passive and a spectator to someone else playing the music... or letting loose and actually dancing, moving to, immersing yourself in the same music? the "music wasn't important"? uuum dude, clubs put music at the CENTER of the experience. no rock-star personalities.

i think you may need to think this through a little more. perhaps read a book. i recommend the ones with paper pages.

Last edited by Uzique The Lesser (2013-06-05 09:39:54)

DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+794|6654|United States of America
Strangely, I have. On this very subject of rock and roll and how it evolved and interacted with other genres of music since its creation. Don't give me any of that "OMG I can so FEEL this music!" crap. People are able to flail their limbs about to all manner of cacophony as Skrillex has demonstrated. Appreciating well-made music took a back seat to your ironically also narcissistic "I am ONE with this music. It was made for me" 'tude despite having fuckall to do with making it.
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
how is just dancing to music claiming to be "one" with it? and how is that narcissistic? you have a very strange definition of narcissism.

i find in clubs (proper nightclubs, not drinking venues for people to exchange saliva and std's), people are there to dance and really feed off the music. nobody cares how you're dressed, nobody cares what you do or where you're from, people just want to be guided by a competent DJ or performer to dance and lose themselves in time and place. the music is ENTIRELY prime. it isn't "relegated" just because there is no stage to face, or band of players to regard and 'show respect' to. that is completely fatuous. clubs invest most of their budgets on sound-systems. the music is THE MAIN FOCUS. the risk is always of "dj personalities" and people starting to lapse back into this rock-centric approach, where the person playing the music or the person conducting the evening's entertainment starts to arrogate all the praise. no. the best clubs/audiences will always have the prime appreciation for the music. so much so to the point that people will stand around near the booth to see what record is spinning on the turntable. to the point where they'll reach over and rewind records that are getting massive appreciation/feedback.

nobody is turning "getting into the music" into some quasi-buddhist zen one-ness bullshit either. that is just a silly misrepresentation by someone who is too socially anomic to ever go into a proper club and see for themselves. people just enjoy regaining some anonymity and freedom amongst all the darkness, finding a corner to themselves or with some friends, to be overwhelmed by the pure sound and just bliss out for a while. nothing spiritual. it's just a better way to appreciate certain forms of music (e.g. dance music, electronic music), rather than standing crushed in a crowd, people pushing from the back, everyone looking forwards, everyone holding a lukewarm pint of beer. that's fine sometimes, i still go to rock gigs, but if i really want to appreciate music i'll go to a club with a $50,000 sound-system and find a sweet-spot on the dancefloor.

i think it's pretty telling vis-a-vis the "egoism" argument that rock-gigs nowadays are littered with mobile phone recorders and an entire audience of people trying to 'capture' some of the 'aura' of the rockstar/band/performer on their phone. doesn't really happen at nightclubs. most proper dance nightclubs that take it seriously will kick you out if you start using a camera phone. the danger with dance music's newfound popularity - particularly in mass culture - is that people don't bring their preconceived 'rockstar' notions and apply it to a DJ. mobile phone/camera on a dancefloor == bad thing. focus on the booth or DJ is NOT the point. dance music removes the personality and the 'human' performer, and thus removes the empathic/individuation process that goes with it (there is a huge tradition in detroit-originated techno music of the 'anonymous' producer, who never puts a name or face to the release process, from the record to the club performance). dance music venues subtract the human element so all you have is a free-exploratory space and a lot of sound. but okay. claim it's more "egoistic". get back to me when you've actually been to a club, though. right now your 'source' is a rock-ist history book. sounds very balanced. commenting on a cultural scene your own senses haven't even experienced. seems legit.

Last edited by Uzique The Lesser (2013-06-05 10:27:59)

DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+794|6654|United States of America
The music has nothing to do with you. It is put out there for you to appreciate it. Involving yourself into it is an awfully bold move. I don't know why you don't have anonymity without going to a dance club, though. I've never understood either why people bring out their cell phones at concerts to capture poor quality video and audio of the band. I just chalked it up to the age of do-everything phones that has also compelled a large segment of the population to take pictures at every meal. My source was relevant to the disco-ussion (dohohohoho) we were having earlier. At this point we're both just talking from experiences.

EDIT: Also, I'm sure there are the sort of pure-dance clubs you're talking about in Chicago somewhere, though I imagine I'd need someone into that to find out where. The majority of the ones you are exposed to are the douchebag magnet bar sort with the air of either faux-classiness or "WOOO PARTY ERRYDAY" atmosphere.

Last edited by DesertFox- (2013-06-05 10:46:16)

Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
i think you're taking the "involvement" thing too seriously. and dance music is very often conceived of as communal. it's a repetitive, abstract beat, for the most part. it has a whole different set of aesthetics than a 'song' when penned by a songwriter who wants to make a 'statement' or give you something to perhaps tentatively 'identify' with, in a sense of emotional transference. you are applying rock standards of songs/music to dance music, which is conceived of and written in an entirely different process. but okay. tell me some more.

"anonymity" in a club is a whole different thing to anonymity in a crowd. in a club you can exist in a sort of quasi-legal, fenced-off interzone. you can take drugs, dress how you want, engage in whatever behaviour you want - within obvious bounds. that's why clubs have historically been places where black people, gay people, alt-lifestyle people etc. congregate (though they by no means constitute a majority in the clubs). they are zones where people can act outside of 'official' society standards. where taboos don't really exist. my friend has been to a serious techno club in germany where a girl was blowing a guy on the dancefloor. nobody batted an eye-lid. where there are side-rooms given over to all sorts of niche activities. weird to some -weird to me - but i love the fact that clubs let this exist. complete hedonism. it's great. that's the 'anonymity' i'm talking about.

and yes, dismissing dance music because the clubs in the mid-west suck. that's like me dismissing all rock music because the only access to it i have here is in stadium tours.

Last edited by Uzique The Lesser (2013-06-05 11:00:09)

DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+794|6654|United States of America
I neither dismissed it, nor made the claim that all available clubs suck.
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
well the point is the whole "the song is put out there for you to appreciate" thing really doesn't hold in dance music. you don't stand around stroking your chin studying the differing and intricate velocities of the hi-hat programming. you don't stand there giving a polite applause to the original producer, in absentia. you should study the history of repetition in music - and not just in dance-music, i mean in high-classical and avant-garde music too, for e.g. steve reich. repetition is there as ritual. it's there to immerse people in a musical trance-like state. the 'song' isn't released and presented in the same way as it is in rock music. people frequently talk of "slabs of techno" when they refer to a vinyl record with a techno loop on it. the phrase is telling: people compare producing electronic-dance music more to architecture or design than music. it's not like many dance songs have virtuosic solos or respect-demanding musicality to them. it's not the point. the point is to 'sculpt' sound through a process, and to give you songs to inhabit and live inside (in the club environment). dance music is more like architecture than rock music, as it stands, as a sort of stage-show where musicians use their honed technique to 'perform' music.
DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+794|6654|United States of America
You may be right in suggesting I'm listening to it the wrong way or atmosphere then. I have noticed the repetition, which bothers me as I keep waiting for something to happen as the song goes on. When I see you and others talk about "losing themselves" within music, I pretty much go , but I am aware of the role music can have in creating trancelike states (woo cognitive psychology). Perhaps I should experience it at some point. I have observed when I listen to music I like that I get a sympathetic physiological response. However, even at places with dance floors, I've still never heard anything close to what you listen to. Usually it's the sort of pop stuff you could hear on a current radio station. I would like to see what would happen inside some places I've been if they put on your stuff.
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
that's because you live in a cultural backwater.
DesertFox-
The very model of a modern major general
+794|6654|United States of America
Goddamn it, Earth!
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
oh and 'things' do happen in dance music. just it's iterative - as you'd expect based on music with a repetitive loop/sample based structure. the 'things' that happen are small phrasings, subtle changes, small sculptural ornamentations or layered/atmospheric effects, etc. it comes in and it drops away. it's a whole different structure, really. sometimes a techno track will take 12-15 minutes and will just pulse away, with nothing but subtle rhythm syncopation or phasing to propulse the thing along. there is no verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/chorus structure in most 'proper' dance music (by that i mean the real club-material, not the crossover hits you see fergie and rihanna singing along to, which are obviously tailored to pop's structures). you might get a 'drop', although not often anything as pronounced or as egregiously vulgar as you get in fratboy EDM, where the 'drop' takes its stylistic cues more from the heavy-metal drop/breakdown than it does the dance-music 'drop'.

techno music actually has fairly high-art roots. even though it may seem stylistically simple, or without ostentation, that really doesn't mean it is not 'sophisticated' or 'due attention'. everything from the sampling and arrangement to the sound design is meticulously done. some people spend weeks just honing a single kick-drum sound for a track. i think it deserves just as much attention and has just as much capacity to grab you as rock music. the thing is with rock music - which i listen to a lot of, and i love - is that it's so empathetic. when you listen to most forms of modern rock/indie music, you basically have to be in a mood to listen to a guy whinge about his problems, or sing about some topic he likes/believes in, and you have to want to invest your emotional attention to his lyrics and whatever. say for example a rock song that tells a story: its narrative demands your attention. it's very hard to listen to bruce springsteen if you don't give a fuck about middle america. i just find rock music a little emotionally over-demanding sometimes, in that way. you have to 'identify' very particularly with the singer or musicians' situation or emotional state. with electronic music, it's more abstract, more 'atmospheric', more figurative and hence on the level of interpretation. but, to me, having listened to enough of it, it's more evocative than any well strung-together rhyming couplet.



my $0.02 anyway. im outta here. this is way past 'sensations' and 'tiesto'.

Last edited by Uzique The Lesser (2013-06-05 13:09:16)

Extra Medium
THE UZI SLAYER
+79|4165|Oklahoma
Just give up, Uzi clearly lives to a higher standard than the rest of us.  He is more intelligent, more cultured and more traveled than anyone on the internet.
Extra Medium
THE UZI SLAYER
+79|4165|Oklahoma

Uzique The Lesser wrote:

oh and 'things' do happen in dance music. just it's iterative - as you'd expect based on music with a repetitive loop/sample based structure. the 'things' that happen are small phrasings, subtle changes, small sculptural ornamentations or layered/atmospheric effects, etc. it comes in and it drops away. it's a whole different structure, really. sometimes a techno track will take 12-15 minutes and will just pulse away, with nothing but subtle rhythm syncopation or phasing to propulse the thing along. there is no verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/chorus structure in most 'proper' dance music (by that i mean the real club-material, not the crossover hits you see fergie and rihanna singing along to, which are obviously tailored to pop's structures). you might get a 'drop', although not often anything as pronounced or as egregiously vulgar as you get in fratboy EDM, where the 'drop' takes its stylistic cues more from the heavy-metal drop/breakdown than it does the dance-music 'drop'.

techno music actually has fairly high-art roots. even though it may seem stylistically simple, or without ostentation, that really doesn't mean it is not 'sophisticated' or 'due attention'. everything from the sampling and arrangement to the sound design is meticulously done. some people spend weeks just honing a single kick-drum sound for a track. i think it deserves just as much attention and has just as much capacity to grab you as rock music. the thing is with rock music - which i listen to a lot of, and i love - is that it's so empathetic. when you listen to most forms of modern rock/indie music, you basically have to be in a mood to listen to a guy whinge about his problems, or sing about some topic he likes/believes in, and you have to want to invest your emotional attention to his lyrics and whatever. say for example a rock song that tells a story: its narrative demands your attention. it's very hard to listen to bruce springsteen if you don't give a fuck about middle america. i just find rock music a little emotionally over-demanding sometimes, in that way. you have to 'identify' very particularly with the singer or musicians' situation or emotional state. with electronic music, it's more abstract, more 'atmospheric', more figurative and hence on the level of interpretation. but, to me, having listened to enough of it, it's more evocative than any well strung-together rhyming couplet.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z3uNPMOgR-c

my $0.02 anyway. im outta here. this is way past 'sensations' and 'tiesto'.
OMG.  Ohh my god.  There it is. 


I never thought I would see it.




It's the shittiest post ever made.  Everything in life can only get better from here. 


THREE CHEERS!
Uzique The Lesser
Banned
+382|4224
yes, well done. expounding on dance music's formal qualities. somehow it's just so much easier to be dumb and ignorant and call everything you don't understand "gay". you're a real role model. i know your spawn look up to you. maybe one day they can be as open-minded and knowledgeable as their deadbeat dad.

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