Week 22: The Year In Happy Hardcore—1994

This week we're tackling a touchy subject: Happy Hardcore. This genre, defined by its fast tempo, stompy drums, and aggressively optimistic piano rave melodies, is perhaps one of the most maligned genres ever. Much like disco, it's trashed mostly out of ignorance.
Happy hardcore grew out of UK rave at the same time as jungle, and was really delightful for the first few years of its existence. It then went on a pretty fast downward slide, losing a lot of the original rave/jungle elements that made it so great—this later-era cheeseball stuff is a big part of the reason for happy hardcore's bad rap. I still stand by the tunes that came out in 1993-1997, and I plan on featuring them in a few mixes over the course of the year. The first is a bunch of tunes from '94.

Chrissy's Year of Mixtapes Week 22: The Year in Happy Hardcore—1994.

1. Sy Project; Emotions (Quosh Records)
   
2. Vibes & Wishdokta; Feel Good (Asylum Music )
   
3. Higher Level; Visions of Light (Zodiac Records)
   
4. Naughty Naughty vol. 9; Pride (white)
   
5. Ravers Choice vol. 1; Feel Real Good (white)
   
6. The Beatmen; Seventh Way (4 The Floor Recordings)
   
7. Naughty Naughty vol. 10; Voodoo Ray (white)
   
8. Spicelab; The Spirit of Fear (Harthouse)
   
9. Higher Level; Feel The Sky (Zodiac Records)
   
10. Slipmatt; Hear Me (Awesome Records)
    
11. Naughty Naughty vol. 5; Stay Here (white)
    
12. SMD Vol. 2; Side B (white)
    
13. Higher Level; I Need You Now (Zodiac Records)
    
14. 4 The Floor vol. 5; Side A (4 The Floor Recordings)
    
15. DJ Seduction; My Own (Slipmatt Remix) (Impact Records)
    
16. Naughty Naughty vol. 7; Where Love Lives (white)
    
17. Bass Selective; Blow Out Jungle VIP (S.O.U.R.)
    
18. VW001; Sweet Love (white)
    
19. SMD vol. 3; Vol. 1 Remix (white)
    
20. S&A; Peaked Up (4 The Floor Recordings)
    
21. Force & Evoluion; Perfect Dreams (Vibes & Wishdokta Remix) (Knite Force)

NEXT WEEK: Hi-NRG.

Week 21: '90s Dance Pop

Ten weeks ago, I made a mixtape of classic 1990s vocal house tunes. In my little introductory blurb, I wrote the following:

"Oh, and before you mention it, here's what I have NOT included: What is Love, Rhythm is a Dancer, Another Night, For What You Dream Of, Mr. Vain, Strike It Up, Be My Lover, The Vengabus, or Barbie Girl. That is not house music. I love it, but it is not house music. Another day, another tape."

Ladies and gentlemen, here is that tape.

Chrissy's Year of Mixtapes Week 21: '90s Dance Pop.

1. Snap!; The Power
   
2. C+C Music Factory feat. Freedom Williams; Gonna Make You Sweat (Everybody Dance Now)
   
3. Black Box; Strike It Up
   
4. Madonna; Vogue
   
5. Crystal Waters; 100% Pure Love
   
6. Black Box; Everybody Everybody (Le Freak Mix)
   
7. Technotronic; Move This
   
8. Deee-Lite; Groove Is In The Heart (Chrissy Re-Edit)
   
9. Robin S; Show Me Love (12" Mix)
   
10. Army Of Lovers; Crucified (Chrissy Re-Edit)
    
11. The KLF; 3AM Eternal (Live At The SSL)
    
12. Technotronic; Pump Up The Jam
    
13. Snap!; Rhythm Is A Dancer
    
14. Haddaway; What Is Love?
    
15. Bloodhound Gang; The Bad Touch
    
16. Everything But The Girl; Missing (Todd Terry Remix)
    
17. Bizarre Inc. feat. Angie Brown; I'm Gonna Get You
    
18. Technotronic; Get Up! (Before The Night Is Over)
    
19. 2 Unlimited; Twilight Zone
    
20. Rozalla; Everybody's Free (To Feel Good)
    
21. Jimmy Somerville; Heartbeat
    
22. Bedrock feat. KYO; For What You Dream Of
    
23. Gigi D'Agostino; The Riddle
    
24. Culture Beat; Mr. Vain
    
25. The Real McCoy; Another Night
    
26. Corona; The Rhythm of the Night
    
27. Aqua; Barbie Girl
    
28. La Bouche; Be My Lover
    
29. Alice Deejay; Better Off Alone
    
30. ATC; Around The World
    
31. Sonique; It Feels So Good
    
32. The Real McCoy; Run Away
    
33. Ace of Base; Beautiful Life
    
34. The Vengaboys; Boom Boom Boom Boom
    
35. The Vengaboys; We Like To Party (The Vengabus)
    
36. Pharao; I Show You Secrets
    
37. Aqua; Lollipop
    

NEXT WEEK: The Year in Happy Hardcore—1994.

Week 19: Kraftwerk

These famous steely Germans are the most important and influential European music act of the 20th century, period. (I am prepared to go to the mat over this statement.) Without them, there would be no techno, no synth pop, no new wave, and no hip-hop as we know them (which isn't to say that they invented any of those; they didn't. They just ended up having a big influence on the people who did go on to invent them). Basically, they started out as proggy art-rock band, got into electronics, started making their own instruments and by 1974 were making super-rigid 100% electronic pop tunes. By 1977, said pop tunes got picked up by New York disco DJs, who were always hunting for something new and different and odd and pulsating and yadda yadda yadda. Among these were the first wave of hip hop DJs (Kool Herc, Grandmaster Flash, Afrika Bambaataa, etc.), who absolutely ate the stuff up. As Detroit techno legend Carl Craig said, "Kraftwerk were so stiff, they were funky."

So Kraftwerk became part of a sea-change in the then-fledgling hip hop scene: things moved away from party raps over disco records, and toward sparse futuristic compositions made from scratch with drum machines, synths, and samplers. 30 years later, mainstream hip hop still has as much in common with Kraftwerk as it does with, say, Motown.

It's a similar story with techno, in fact—as well as with synth pop, new wave, and a long list of other genres: disco + Kraftwerk = bizarre new hybrid genre with lots of crazy electronic gadgets and a bunch of futuristic posturing. Like many artists lucky enough to have a nearly 40-year career, Kraftwerk have had an interesting career arc: they've gone from being groundbreaking visionaries who changed modern music to largely mimicking the new styles they helped inspire. While their new records can't be called innovative, they're often still quite good.

Anyway, I've whipped up a mix which I hope will appeal to both hardcore Kraftwerk fans, people who hate Kraftwerk, and people who know nothing about Kraftwerk. Part one contains most of the really essential Kraftwerk tunes: the stuff you NEED to be familiar with to be considered culturally literate tbh. The second part is all the stuff that has borrowed from Kraftwerk. Some of it is good, some of it is terrible, all of it is beyond what these four Germans could've imagined in 1977.

Chrissy's Year of Mixtapes Week 19, Part 1: What you absolutely must know of Kraftwerk.

1. Kraftwerk; Trans-Europe Express (1977)
   
2. Kraftwerk; The Model (1978)
   
3. Kraftwerk; The Robots (1978)
   
4. Kraftwerk; The Man Machine (1978)
   
5. Kraftwerk; It's More Fun To Compute / Home Computer (1981)
   
6. Kraftwerk; Numbers / Computer World 2 (1981)
   
7. Kraftwerk; Tour De France (François K. Remix) (1983)
   
8. Kraftwerk; Computer Love (Remix) (1991)

Chrissy's Year of Mixtapes Week 19, Part 2: Kraftwerk's influence on the rest of us.

1. Afrika Bambaataa & The Soulsonic Force; Planet Rock (Tommy Boy, 1982)
   
2. The Egyptian Lover; Egypt Egypt (Freak Beat Records, 1984)
   
3. B.O.S.E.; Rock The World (Rock Well, 1987)
   
4. Techmaster P.E.B.; Bass Computer (Newtown Music, 1991)
   
5. Fergie; Fergalicious (A&M, 2006)
   
6. 2 Live Crew; D.K. Almighty (Luke Skyywalker, 1989)
   
7. The Fearless Four; Rockin' It (Enjoy Records, 1982)
   
8. MC A.D.E.; Bass Rock Express (4 Sight Records, 1985)
   
9. Coldplay; Talk (EMI, 2005)
   
10. Big Black; The Model (Touch & Go, 1987)
    
11. Miss Kittin & The Hacker; Uno (International Deejay Gigolo Records, 1999)
    
12. Frank De Wulf presents B-Sides Vol. 1; Reforced (Music Man, 1990)
    
13. Señor Coconut y Su Conjunto; Home Computer (Emperor Norton; 1999)
    
14. 6Blocc; Digits (LoDubs, 2007)
    
15. Turf Talk f. Kaveo & Young Mugzi; Do The Robot (Sick Wid'It Records, 2004)
    
16. DJ Rashad; Compute (Juke Trax, 2007)
    
17. Godz of the Quad; We Comin' (Cut It Up Def, 1998)
    

Week 17: Philly Soul / Philly Disco

So back in the 1960s you had Soul music—a terribly vague term encompassing a lot of things, but a designation that still gets used nonetheless. The industry was pretty fragmented during this pre-internet era, and pretty much every major city with a sizeable African-American population—Detroit, Memphis, Chicago, New Orleans, etc.—had a distinct local scene and sound. Philadelphia was no exception.

The Philly sound, pioneered by songwriter/producers like Thom Bell, Norman Harris, Ron Baker, Gamble & Huff, and McFadden & Whitehead, really came into its own in the mid-late 1960s, and was a marked contrast to the Motown sound that had typified the previous decade. Philly soul was more mature, more lyrically complex, less saccharine, and a lot bigger: horn sections, string sections, and even full-on orchestras took a front-and-center role in the Philly sound.

Philly continued to dominate soul music into the 1970s, giving the world acts like Patti LaBelle, Teddy Pendergrass, The Delfonics, and The O'Jays. Around 1974, Philly producers started moving in a more dance-oriented direction; beefing up the kick drum in their records, focusing more on the bass line, and creating longer songs geared for the dancefloor. This was the birth of disco.

As the rest of the world moved on, inventing countless good and bad disco sub-genres, Philly kept its distinctive sound: pulsating, dancefloor-friendly records driven by big bass and lush string arrangements. This week's mixtape is a two-parter: a side of the earlier soul stuff, followed up by a good chunk of proper classic Philly disco.

Chrissy's Year of Mixtapes Week 17, Side A: Philly Soul

1. The Delfonics; Seventeen And In Love (Philly Groove)
   
2. The O'Jays; Back Stabbers (Philadelphia International)
   
3. Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes feat. Teddy Pendergrass; Where Are All My Friends (Philadelphia International)
   
4. Love Committee; One Day Of Peace (Golden Fleece)
   
5. The Stylistics; People Make The World Go Round (Avco)
   
6. The Delfonics; Round & Round (Philly Groove)
   
7. First Choice; One Step Away (Philly Groove)
   
8. Gloria Gaynor; Searchin' (Tom Moulton Mix) (MGM)
   
9. Blue Magic; Welcome To The Club (ATCO)
   
10. The Invitations; Living Together Is Keeping Us Apart (Silver Blue)
    
11. Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes feat.Teddy Pendergrass; Nobody Could Take Your Place (Philadelphia International)
    
12. Ecstasy, Passion, & Pain; Good Things Don't Last Forever (Roulette)
    
13. The Three Degrees; Long Lost Lover (Philadelphia International)
    
14. First Choice; Armed & Extremely Dangerous (Philly Groove)

Chrissy's Year of Mixtapes Week 17, Side B: Philly Disco

1. Double Exposure; Everyman (Danny Krivit Re-Edit) (Salsoul / Strut)
   
2. People's Choice; Do It Any Way You Wanna (Philadelphia International)
   
3. McFadden & Whitehead; Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now (Philadelphia International)
   
4. First Choice; Love Thang (Tee Scott Mix) (Gold Mind Records)
   
5. Double Exposure; My Love Is Free (Tom Moulton Mix) (Salsoul)
   
6. Ecstasy, Passion, & Pain feat. Barbara Roy; Touch & Go (Tom Moulton Mix) (Roulette)
   
7. First Choice; Double Cross (Bobby "DJ" Guttadaro Mix) (Gold Mind Records)
   
8. Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes feat. Teddy Pendergrass; Bad Luck (Philadelphia International)
   
9. The Trammps; Can We Come Together (Tom Moulton Mix) (Atlantic)
   
10. MFSB; Love Is The Message (Larry Levan Re-Edit) (Philadelphia International)
    
11. First Choice; Let No Man Put Asunder (Shep Pettibone Mix) (Salsoul)
    
12. The Trammps; Body Contact Contract (Tom Moulton Mix) (Atlantic)
    
13. Blue Magic; We're On The Right Track (ATCO)
    
14. Direct Current; Nothing Can Stop Us (TEC)
    
15. Billy Paul; Only The Strong Survive (Philadelphia International)