Recycling!
Special Request – Amnesia
Paul Woolford, AKA Special Request, just put out Modern Warfare (EPs 1-3), full of banging throwback rave CHOOOONS.
But that’s not what I came here to talk about, exactly.
I came here to talk about that instantly-recognizable (to people of a certain age, anyway) drumbeat up there in “Amnesia”.
When I heard it, I immediately thought of this:
The Stone Roses – Fool’s Gold
A more genius piece of loose-limbed, whiteboy-doggerel funk was never made. When this one comes on in the car, I still want to recline my seat, hang my arm out the window, and be the surly, cool, lowriding star of the slow-mo movie in my head.
Seriously, turn that up LOUD, and if your arms and legs don’t start to move of their own accord, I don’t even want to know about it.
(And as soon as I can figure out a way to do it, I’m going to write about the album it appears on. It’s just surprisingly hard to write about something I consider essentially perfect.)
“Fool’s Gold” was a rave and Madchester anthem; but its skeletal bounce is actually pretty unrepresentative of the rest of the band’s output.
And that’s in part because the drum loop that provides the song’s backbone didn’t actually come from (excellent) Stone Roses drummer Reni, either.
It likely comes a drum break on this record, from James Brown associate Bobby Byrd:
Bobby Byrd – Hot Pants (Bonus Beats)
(The same drum break was probably also sampled for the rhythmic basis of this.)
“Fool’s Gold” also has a minimal, shadowy bassline that is instantly memorable, playfully cavorting around that insistent head-nodding drumbeat.
But even that isn’t 100% original; since Stone Roses’ nimble-fingered bassist Mani was inspired by something else:
Mani added his own unique contribution. His all-night partying often met with disapproval from Squire at rehearsals, but Mani said clubbing was for research, and he was looking for ‘things to pinch’. The bass line from Young MC’s club hit “Know How” was a case in point, and it was used as further inspiration on “Fool’s Gold”.
Young MC – Know How
This short video sums up how the Dust Brothers (and probably Flea, though I’m having trouble verifying that bit via Wikipedia), in turn, concocted the Young MC track from prior sources:
From Shaft to Fools Gold – How 3 seconds of Isaac Hayes changed British music
As we get older, it’s tempting to think “it’s all the same old song”, and bemoan the lack of originality in the world today.
But in another way, realizing that all these different people – separated by years and genres and scenes and geography and color and class and circumstance and technology – are in fact all literally playing (and dancing) to the same beat;
Well, that’s indescribably-beautiful.
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(From Wikimedia Commons):
CC BY-SA 3.0
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Created: 24 November 2010
It is. Thank you for this.Report
You’re welcome! Without getting political (NO POLITICS), one of the things that gets so frustrating sometimes, is the insistence on viewing something via one frame only.
So here, we COULD be talking about cultural appropriation – the fact that these white musicians could be viewed as “stealing” from black ones. We could be asking if the originators were fairly compensated (probably not, if I had to guess; though I put that less on the samplers, than the industry/labels), or talking about copyright law; we could be complaining that the kids don’t come up with anything new.
And some of those conversations are important, and interesting, and necessary; don’t get me wrong (and if people want to discuss them, they can!)
But: the “frame” of enjoying the music and dancing, is usually better.Report
Man, I hadn’t heard “Know How” in forever. It is fire.Report
You kind of forget for some reason that Young MC was actually pretty good, don’t you? Why is that?Report
Nice post. Great song.
And as soon as I can figure out a way to do it, I’m going to write about the album it appears on.
It’d be worth the effort, tho, yeah? We’d all hold you in the highest regard. Well some of us anyway. Maybe try repeating in your head, over and over, like a mantra: “I wanna be adored.”Report
I think my problem is this: much of the stuff I like, I am well-aware that it can be an acquired taste. Maybe the feedback is kind of loud, or the songs are pretty fragmented, or the lyrics fairly esoteric, or it’s very repetitive or minimal or maximal, or the singer has an unusual voice, or the melodies are off-kilter, or it’s too fast or too slow.
IOW, if it doesn’t move you – I can totally understand how that could occur; and there’s no hard feelings. Taste is after all subjective.
But I just cannot see how something as perfect, to my ears, as The Stone Roses could not make anyone feel the same way. In some way I think I take it personally, if it doesn’t work for someone else. That person will appear objectively-wrong to me.
It’d be like not liking, I don’t know, the world’s sweetest, coldest ice cream on the world’s hottest day – “WHADDYA MEAN, ‘MEH’?! What is WRONG with you?!”
Maybe I’ll disable comments, to avoid having to use my AK.Report
I hear ya. And I agree with you about that album. “I am the Resurrection rolling into Fools Gold? Yikes! The whole album is like that. To me.Report
OK, I wrote something.
It’s long.Report
Sweet. I can’t wait. That’ll definitely be a for-headphones-only post!Report