It really is incredible how rapidly the music scene’s been changing these days. Think about it: About a year ago, under the reign of Ed Banger, it was nearly impossible to go ten minutes without having some sort of distorted, fuzzy, static-y, Waters of Nazareth-derived synth rammed into your eardrum, and (needless to say) most of us were loving it. If it wasn’t heavy, it wasn’t fit for the iPod (In fact I’m convinced Mr. Pedro Winter actually just made a typo on his record label’s name. I’m pretty sure it was supposed to be “Head Banger”. But actually, maybe he did it on purpose so as not to draw the metal heads into his own personal genre? I suppose that deserves some pondering…). You know, no one expects any one kind of music to last forever, but even I’m amazed at how fast that blew over. It’s like we all just all of a sudden realized that the guy who invented electro was actually some dead science fiction writer who was promising to build us a space ship. Artists like Circuit Freq and The Proxy almost never make a blog appearance anymore without the blogger commenting on how s/he “Didn’t think people were digesting this kind of music anymore.”

And it’s true; From there, the disco kids decided to get in touch with their roots, hence the massive 80’s revival. Artists like Chromeo, Danger, and Calvin Harris decided they didn’t like all that distortion on their synthesizers, so they started their own revolution, and for a while there, we were all considering buying Delorians, weren’t we? (It’s okay. You don’t have to answer out loud. You were.)

Crookers

The reason I’m commenting is because it seems as though we’ve undergone yet another musical revolution. A couple guys from Italy, working under the name Crookers, decided that they just didn’t like all that noise very much at all, and they decided to do away with it all together. Their tracks are little more than a punchy house beat with a few microsamples, a few vocals, and minimal synth usage, almost like a more progressive, electro-fused minimal, and somehow they’re simply incredible. There’s no doubt the boys have started a revolution: More than just a few producers have recently adopted nearly identical styles, and the news just keeps coming. I’m clueless as to why we’ve gone crazy for merely the skeleton of the music that was so recently such an important part of disco, but that’s not to say I’m not loving it!

Also, if you’ve already hopped on the Crookers bandwagon and are just dying to see those Italian heads bob, you might be happy to hear that they’ve finally make their way out to California. They’ll be throwing down the goods tonight at Cinespace’s Dim Mak Tuesday, as well as at tomorrow in San Francisco.

While you wait, check out their latest body-mover:

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Crookers – Mad Kidz

And you’re just dying to hear more of those delicious housy beats (which I know you are) you might want to look into Aston Shuffle. The (I almost feel ridiculous at this point even having to mention this) Australian artist has a similarly infectious beat, but with a bit of a more traditional electro touch. There’s no doubt the vocoded hook toward the middle of the track will have you clicking the repeat button.

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The Aston Shuffle – For Everyone

A-Trak

Moving in a different direction, there’s been a rather unusual release from the likes of A-Trak today. The hip-hop gone electro dj/producer has recently finished a 45 minute long original piece for Nike that’s intended to be the perfect soundtrack to your workout. According to A-Trak himself, his mix is a cross between his newer Disco style and his hip hop roots, so you can expect to hear a bit of the electro rap we’ve been encountering more and more frequently. If you’re already busting out the short shorts and the ear buds, you might want to grab the mix on iTunes before you leave. It’s under the Nike sports section.

And as a final touch, I simply must include this rather frustrating little video I stumbled across. It’s one thing to have an opinion but oh is Mr. Henry Rollins the ignorant one… If you don’t feel like spending quite a lot of time fuming over the controversial comments on the video, I suggest you don’t read them, lest steam start to leak from your ears.

Tags: a-trak, cinespace, circuit freq, crookers, dim mak, henry rollins, the proxy

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 24th, 2008 at 11:07 pm and is filed under Disco Daily. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.