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Friday, January 20, 2012

Crickets / Music Today in bass techno-utopianism

Posted by Miles Raymer on 01.20.12 at 11:00 AM

shangaan.jpg
In South Africa there's a style of dance music called Shangaan electro—named after the tribe whose musical tradition it's based in—that uses maniacally fast tempos and hypnotically repetitive looping melodies to fuel a dance style that demands such speed and agility that, watching YouTube clips of it, you can have a hard time accepting that the footage hasn't been sped up or tweaked in some way. Which is just about exactly the same way you'd describe Chicago footwork music.

Last year ethnomusicologically inclined London label Honest Jon's released a compilation of Shangaan electro, and some smart person there had the idea of hiring Chicago footwork producers—RP Boo, DJ Rashad, and DJ Spinn—to remix Shangaan electro tracks. Abetting transoceanic collaborations between musicians who work in tiny niche communities that even a decade ago might never have had contact with listeners in the wider world (never mind with one another) makes me want to forgive the Internet for all the other awful shit it does.

Here's a taste of Shangaan footwork:

Rashad and Spinn Meet Tshetsha Boys (clip) by Honest Jons

R.P. Boo Meets Shangaan Electro (clip) by Honest Jons

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I believe the connection is Afropop Worldwide producer Wills Glasspiegel, who "discovered" Shangaan electro and has done a number of NPR pieces on footwork: http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2011/05…

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Posted by Jacob on 01/20/2012 at 11:25 AM

That guy has a pretty great job!

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Posted by Philip Montoro on 01/20/2012 at 11:33 AM

I've lived in this region of South Africa and was truly amazed by how similar the music was to Chicago house music. In the nightclubs the sounds were so familiar I'd forget I was in South Africa.

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Posted by Chi-girl on 01/26/2012 at 3:44 PM
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