Damn you kids with 116+ posts in a day. Anyway, in answer to Toshie's
questions:
I think that part of it has to do with the way in which the discotheque
tradition never completely died in Europe and continues today. When I
was living in Toronto, the phrase "let's do something tonight" more
often led to a round of beers at a pub than a night dancing. My
experience elsewhere in North America has been similar. When you think
about it, dance music's 'big break' in North America occurred as a
repackaging of "American" (read: Chicago/Detroit/NYC) music by the
booming European market. So we were getting into a European scene's
re-reading of an earlier Chicago/Detroit/NYC scene, and it was fighting
against the hostile post-disco legacy of the 80's in N. America.
Interestingly enough, the N American 'scene' that has kept up a strong
tradition of dance music up until now is the gay club scene. The
styles have shifted and you're more likely to hear 'tribal' and
'circuit' flavours rather than techno or chicago-styled house, but the
tradition(s) continue. It was mostly in these scenes that the remnants
of disco percolated and eventually morphed into the Chicago house and
NY garages scenes, so I wonder if this scenario might replay itself
again.
Hmmm.
Luis
On Wednesday, October 6, 2004, at 05:25 PM, Tosh Cooey wrote:
All the North Americans I know who have been over to Europe in the
last year keep saying the same thing over and over, that electronic
music culture in America is dying.
No clubs, all the smaller cities are non-existent for a DJ/live
performance, etc. how true is this?
I have seen some evidence via some of the labels I work with having
trouble setting up tours that get outside of New York, Chicago, San
Fran/LA.
Is it really that bad? What would some of the reasons be? How would
this be connected to the previous discussion about techno not selling?
Tosh
--
McIntosh Cooey - Twelve Hundred Group LLC - http://www.1200group.com/
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"Politics is parlour tricks."
-W. Jean
