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Is Dance Music on the Way Out?


Anderton

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I read somewhere that something like 1% of the downloads on iTunes are of dance music. And now that Sirius has merged with XM, they "retired" the System (Channel 82) - their best dance channel IMHO - and made it internet only. Channel 80, pretty much house music, is also gone; it's been replaced by Sirius' The Area (formerly Area 51, guess that was too controversial...) which is much more mainstream. Also, Armin Van Buuren's State of Trance - a weekly fixture on XM - is nowhere to be found.

 

They even bounced U-Pop to internet only. While not strictly a dance channel, it was a cut above your average pop music channel.

 

And when I go into local CD shops, the dance music section keeps getting smaller and smaller.

 

Maybe dance music has become stagnant, and not adapted sufficiently to changing tastes. It's been around for several decades and had a good run, but is that run over? And if so, what's going to replace it? Will people start saying we're "stuck in the '90s?"

 

Discuss...

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Craig,

 

Dance music has been in a death spiral since 2004 or so. Go back 5 years prior to that and you had to spend $200 a week just to pick up all the good stuff - on record...

 

Almost all record stores (or CDs) that catered to dance music and DJs are history - at least in the the Northeast, victims of low sales and high overhead. My local store in NJ closed down in early 2006 - he was probably a little better than break even when his rent tripled with a new landlord. All the shops in Manhattan are gone too.

 

Rap/Hip Hop/R&B is not a replacement for dance music - they existed for over 20 years side by side. I think that in another 2 or 3 years there will be a resurgence in dance music, mostly from overseas.

 

 

Paul

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Has anybody noticed that Heavy Metal is really popular right now? I think kids are listening to this, Hip Hop and pop sounding danceable R&B more than Dance, House and Techno.

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Mainstream dance music goes in and out of fashion like the wah pedal or the TB303. 10 years ago, filtered disco samples were all the rage. Now it's glitchy, ring modulated electro. Who knows what the next trend is? As long as there is life and a reason to celebrate it, there will always be dance music.

 

Have fun in Berlin, Craig. I imagine the dance scene there could be an eye opener for you.

 

V.

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Have fun in Berlin, Craig. I imagine the dance scene there could be an eye opener for you.

 

Well I'm going there for business, so I'll probably only be able to get out of my cage for an evening. But I played a lot in Cologne during the late 90s/early 2000s and also played in some other venues in Germany and Switzerland during that time...had a great gig in Frankfurt with Dr. Walker after the 2008 Frankfurt Messe. But I've never clubbed in Berlin, nor played there, and I hear it's really happening. Don't know if it will be an eye-opener :) but a few hours of good music with some top-level DJs would be a treat.

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Mainstream dance music goes in and out of fashion like the wah pedal or the TB303. 10 years ago, filtered disco samples were all the rage. Now it's glitchy, ring modulated electro. Who knows what the next trend is? As long as there is life and a reason to celebrate it, there will always be dance music.


V.

 

 

I pretty much agree that it's cyclical...but it seems like it might be in a bit of a hibernation period right now, as we await what the next thing will be. There was an acid revival last year, and electro seems to be coming back in a mutated form...and I hear more people adding vocals. It's just too bad it's not getting more mainstream traction, I'd rather see MORE beats on XM/Sirius, not less.

 

But I do find a lot of great stuff on the net, so there are compensations. I guess I'll have to get a 3G phone to replace satellite radio. Technology moves on!

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.had a great gig in Frankfurt with Dr. Walker after the 2008 Frankfurt Messe.

 

 

 

Wait....

 

 

You played with Dr. Walker?!

 

I'm a big fan of the Air Liquide stuff and his DJungle Fever label.

 

 

 

Also, Berlin is the place to be for techno nowadays. It seems that most people move there to help out or jump start their careers and what not.

 

It's also home to like Richie Hawtin and the M_nus camp nowadays as well as guys like Sven Vath and Ricardo Villalobos. Granted, I think the minimal stuff is kind of played out right now, bt a lot of the "heavy hitters" in techno seem to live there and you can catch them playing some of the clubs around there on any given day.

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No - dance music has got overrun by f****** RnB

vomit-smiley-024.gif

 

In the US I think there has allways been a bit of a not-invented-here syndrome about it which probably doesnt help and tends to favour that other bland {censored}e in clubs.

 

Of course Berlin is the place for techno, and tech house (that led to electro house) etc too - thats its spiritual home :)

 

 

Edit: another thing Ive noticed in addition to good clubs drop good tech house/eletro house sets for bland RnB crap is more addandoning skilled DJs in favour of MC type mongs who cant mix and natter over the records - Ugh!!! and worse, keep chopping and changing over all the place.

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Edit: another thing Ive noticed in addition to good clubs drop good tech house/eletro house sets for bland RnB crap is more addandoning skilled DJs in favour of MC type mongs who cant mix and natter over the records - Ugh!!! and worse, keep chopping and changing over all the place.

 

 

I do think the music is dying to the mainstream audiences, but there's still place to hear it....at least in Detroit anyway.

 

I could get into the issues I have with the lack of originality from a lot of the techno producers nowadays, but that's a discusssion for another day.

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Wait....



You played with Dr. Walker?!


I'm a big fan of the Air Liquide stuff and his DJungle Fever label.

 

 

I've played with Walker in Air Liquide, Rei$$dorf Force, and some of his other projects. He's a great musician, I want him to play at my funeral because his beats could raise the dead!

 

He's also done some remixes of some of my music. In fact, the theme music for the AES video promo trailer on the home page is part of his remix of my "NYC01."

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I've played with Walker in Air Liquide, Rei$$dorf Force, and some of his other projects. He's a great musician, I want him to play at my funeral because his beats could raise the dead!


He's also done some remixes of some of my music. In fact, the theme music for the AES video promo trailer on the home page is part of his remix of my "NYC01."

 

 

Wow, that's awesome.

 

I guess you learn something new every day.

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Has anybody noticed that Heavy Metal is really popular right now? I think kids are listening to this, Hip Hop and pop sounding danceable R&B more than Dance, House and Techno.

 

 

I agree with you. Heavy metal and some Maroon 5 songs are what I can hear from kids these days. Where are those people who likes dance music?

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iTunes is not a great way to measure dance music sales because DJs do not buy tracks from there and they are the biggest purchasers of dance music. iTunes is also not a great way to measure dance music sales (at least in America) because consumers do not buy dance music singles unless they have blown up and generally will buy a mix or two and leave it on repeat forever. It's the same thing with CDs.

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I read somewhere that something like 1% of the downloads on iTunes are of dance music. And now that Sirius has merged with XM, they "retired" the System (Channel 82) - their best dance channel IMHO - and made it internet only. Channel 80, pretty much house music, is also gone; it's been replaced by Sirius' The Area (formerly Area 51, guess that was too controversial...) which is much more mainstream. Also, Armin Van Buuren's State of Trance - a weekly fixture on XM - is nowhere to be found.


They even bounced U-Pop to internet only. While not strictly a dance channel, it was a cut above your average pop music channel.


And when I go into local CD shops, the dance music section keeps getting smaller and smaller.


Maybe dance music has become stagnant, and not adapted sufficiently to changing tastes. It's been around for several decades and had a good run, but is that run over? And if so, what's going to replace it? Will people start saying we're "stuck in the '90s?"


Discuss...

 

I know this is kinda thread necromancy, but "The Area" was actually originally "Area 33" and then "Area 38" (and was better back then). Pretty sure Armin Van Buren still has a show on that station.

 

But, in general, the electronica offerings on Sirius were indeed better before it merged with XM ;)

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i like the dance music of africa and caribbean

 

suriname kaseko, congo soukouss, makossa, guadeloupe/martinique zouk, african zouk, cuban timba, colombian palenque and champeta, merengue in general, but specifically stuff in the vein of "la banda gorda" , haitian kompa, colombian cumbia, dancehall (jamaica), soca and chutney (trinidad, st vincent, grenada)

 

some good stuff.

 

not as much bs as what u find in the rap these days, the soukouss, konpa and zouk is especially SWEET!

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i like the dance music of africa and caribbean


suriname kaseko, congo soukouss, makossa, guadeloupe/martinique zouk, african zouk, cuban timba, colombian palenque and champeta, merengue in general, but specifically stuff in the vein of "la banda gorda" , haitian kompa, colombian cumbia, dancehall (jamaica), soca and chutney (trinidad, st vincent, grenada)


some good stuff.


not as much bs as what u find in the rap these days, the soukouss, konpa and zouk is especially SWEET!

 

I am so totally with you on this one, and have a hard time understanding why it hasn't hit bigger in the States. I am finding a lot of Caribbean internet radio stations, though, when I need a fix :thu: And R. Francis records out of Haiti has done some great stuff - don't know if they're still around, though, haven't seen anything lately.

 

Also as you may know Zouk is huge in France, groups like Kassav are almost mainstream. Whenever I pass through the CDG airport in Paris I always pick up some Zouk compilations from the CD stores...sure, it's kind of like the K-Tel of Zouk LOL, but there are always some great cuts in there.

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IMO Anderton the genre is really reorganizing. I think you'll see a reemergence of electronic music as the bar has substantially risen.

 

Before it seemed you could have simple electronic drum patterns going on minute after minute without change. At first this was cool/hip/rad, whatever the kids are saying, but now that's worn old and a change is needed.

 

I'll site a few examples here. Daft Punk was and continues to be a staple in electronic music. But if you listen to their older albums, specifically Homework, you hear that static, catchy the first 2 minutes, sound.

 

But now, their latest release, Alive 2007, while remixing their older material, is much faster between transitions, more creative in beat mashing and sampling over all. Finally using the technology that Djings have developed recently to their advantage. If you listen to Daft Punk's albums from Homework to Alive 2007 you will certainly hear this shift.

 

Some other examples of newer artists I would give a chance are:

Steve Aoki

The Bloody Beetroots

Simian Mobile Disco

Crookers

Boyznoize

 

Also, I'm really interested in DJ AM and Girl Talk. They are more traditional in the sense that they are sampling songs we know and making them into a collage of new music.

 

So, is Dance Music on the way out? No. People like dancing and I'm not talking about moshing to metal or grinding to hip hop. I'm in Minneapolis and there is no better evidence of the popularity of dance music then at First Avenue on Saturday nights for Too Much Love with Soviet Panda and Guests.

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