Exposed Artists in House
| House music is uptempo music for dancing and has a comparatively narrow tempo range, generally falling between 118 beats per minute (bpm) and 135 bpm, with 127 bpm being about average since 1996.
Far and away the most important element of the house drumbeat is the (usually very strong, synthesized, and heavily equalized) kick drum pounding on every quarter note of the 4/4 bar, often having a "dropping" effect on the dancefloor. Commonly this is augmented by various kick fills and extended dropouts (aka breakdowns). Add to this basic kick pattern hihats on the eighth-note offbeats (though any number of sixteenth-note patterns are also very common) and a snare drum and/or clap on beats 2 and 4 of every bar, and you have the basic framework of the house drumbeat. This pattern is derived from so-called "four-on-the-floor" dance drumbeats of the 1960s and especially the 1970s disco drummers. Due to the way house music was developed by DJs mixing records together, producers commonly layer sampled drum sounds to achieve a larger-than-life sound, filling out the audio spectrum and tailoring the mix for large club sound systems. Techno and trance, the two primary dance music genres that developed alongside house music in the mid 1980s and early 1990s respectively, can share this basic beat infrastructure, but usually eschew house's live-music-influenced feel and black or Latin music influences in favor of more synthetic sound sources and approach. House music is a style of electronic dance music that was developed by dance club DJs in the Midwestern United States city of Chicago in the early to mid-1980s. House music is strongly influenced by some elements of the late 1970s soul- and funk-infused dance music style of disco. House music takes disco's use of a prominent bass drum on every beat and developed a new style by mixing in a heavy electronic synthesizer bassline, electronic drums, electronic effects, funk and pop samples, and reverb (or delay)-enhanced vocals. Origins of the name. The origins of the term "house music" are disputed. Some house music enthusiasts claim that the term is derived from the name of a club called "The Warehouse." In the late 1970s and early 1980s, "underground" warehouse parties became popular among the teenagers living in the Chicago area. One of these underground spots, attended primarily by gay black men 2, became known as "The Warehouse". The resident DJ at The Warehouse, Frankie Knuckles, mixed classic disco, European synthpop, new wave, industrial and punk recordings. Club regulars referred to his mixes as house music. Chip E.'s early recording "It's House" may also have helped to define this new form of electronic music. Chip E. claims the name came from methods of labelling records at the Imports Etc record store, where he worked at in the early 1980s. Music that DJ Knuckles played at the Warehouse nightclub was labelled "As Heard At The Warehouse", which was shortened to simply "The House". Larry Heard, aka "Mr. Fingers," claims that the term "house" reflected the fact that many early DJ's created music in their own homes, using synthesizers and drum machines, including the Roland TR-808, TR-909 and the TB 303 "Bassline". These machines became known as the "Acid Machines," and were used to create the "Acid House" sound. Precursors to house: 1970s to early 1980s. Fully electronic music tracks predated house. Early American Sci-Fi films and the BBC Soundtrack to popular television series Doctor Who helped to stimulate the development of space rock bands of the 1970s, such as Gong and Hawkwind, which had "spatial" and "floating" background sounds, mantra loops, electronic sequences, and futuristic effects, all over rock music song structures. The late 1970s saw disco utilize the (by then) somewhat developed electronic sound and a limited genre emerged, appealing mainly to gay and Black audiences. In 1977, disco music crossed over into the mainstream American culture, following the popularity of hit film Saturday Night Fever and its accompanying soundtrack. As disco clubs filled there was a move to larger venues. The Paradise Garage club opened in New York in 1978, featuring DJ Larry Levan, and Studio 54, another New York disco club, was popular. The clubs played Diana Ross, Chic, Gloria Gaynor, Kool & the Gang, Donna Summer, and Larry Levan's own hit, “I Got My Mind Made Up.” The disco boom was short-lived. There was a backlash from Middle America, epitomised in Chicago radio DJ Steve Dahl's "Disco Demolition Night" in 1979. Disco returned to the smaller clubs and warehouses in Chicago. During the Seventies there was a battle of the DJ's Opening in 1977, the Warehouse on Jefferson street in Chicago, was a key venue in the development of house music. The main DJ was Frankie Knuckles. At the other end of house was Ron Hardy, his sound was a more raw driving DJ sound as opposed to Frankie's smooth melodious Disco sound. Many of the club staples were a combination of New Wave and the old disco tunes but the limited number of records meant that the DJ had to be a creative force, introducing more deck work to revitalize old tunes. The new mixing skills also had local airplay with the Hot Mix 5 at WBMX. Development of House music. House music is the direct descendant of the 1970s dance style of Disco, which blended soul, R&B, funk, salsa, rock and pop with a progressive, pro-diversity message. House music also incorporated other influences, such as New Wave, Reggae, Euro-Synth Pop, Industrial and Punk as well as the emerging Rap and Hip-Hop styles. House music DJs experimented with new editing techniques and electronic instruments, such as "remixing," "sampling". House music was developed in the houses, garages and clubs of Chicago and Detroit, and it was produced for local club-goers in the "underground" club scenes, rather than for widespread commercial release. As a result, the recordings were much more conceptual, longer than the music usually played on commercial radio. House, techno, electro and hip-hop musicians used analog synthesizers and sequencers to create and arrange the electronic elements and samples on their tracks. House music "humanized" of the new electronic instruments by combining live traditional instruments and percussion and soulful vocals with preprogrammed electronic synthesizers and "beat-boxes". The chief source of this kind of records in Chicago was the record-store Importes Etc, where the term “house” was introduced as a shortening of "Warehouse". Despite the new skills, the music was still essentially disco until the early 1980s when the first stand-alone drum machines were invented. House tracks could now be given an edge with the use of a mixer and drum machine. This was an added boost to the prestige of the individual DJs. The Colonel Abrams track "Trapped" produced by Richard James Burgess in 1984 was a huge international club hit throughout 1985 and contains many of the elements that would become typical of house music - the four to the bar kick drum pattern, programmed bass-synth and driving sixteenth note hihat/snare part. Burgess and Jesse Saunders worked together in 1986 on a Geffen project. And these early collaborations brought New York and Chicago's house greats together for the first time. British producers Stock Aitken Waterman would exploit house by mixing it with bubblegum lyrics. In Britain, further experiments in the genre boosted its appeal. House and rave clubs like Lakota, Miss Moneypenny's and the original C.R.E.A.M. emerged across Britain, hosting house and dance scene events. The 'chilling out' concept developed in Britain with ambient house albums such as The KLF's Chill Out [2] and "Analogue BubbleBath" by Aphex Twin. Chill Out electronic music is often defined as a different genres, such as Ambient, or downtempo (later on) or New Age (older). The unifying feature of Chill Out electronica is long sustained tones and a smoother sound, rather than the noisy, percussive sound of other styles. At the same time, a new indie dance scene emerged, with groups such as Happy Mondays, The Shamen, New Order, Meat Beat Manifesto, Renegade Soundwave, EMF, The Grid and The Beloved. In New York, bands such as Deee-Lite furthered house music's international influence. Two distinctive tracks from this era were the Orb's "Little Fluffy Clouds" (with a distinctive vocal sample from Rickie Lee Jones) and the Happy Mondays' "Wrote for Luck" ("WFL") which was transformed into a dance hit by Paul Oakenfold. Back in the US some artists were finding it difficult to gain recognition. Another import into Europe of not only a style but also the creator himself was Joey Beltram. From Brooklyn his "Energy Flash" had proved rather too much for American House enthusiasts and he needed a move to find success. The American industry threw its weight behind DJs like Junior Vasquez, Armand van Helden or even Masters at Work who appeared to churn out endless remixes of Madonna, Kylie Minogue, U2, Britney Spears, the Spice Girls, Whitney Houston, Gloria Estefan, Janet Jackson, Mariah Carey. During this time many individuals and particularly corporations realized that house music could be extremely lucrative and much of the 1990s saw the rise of sponsorship deals and other industry practices common in other genres. To develop successful hit singles, some argued that the record industry developed "handbag house": throwaway pop songs with a retro disco beat. Underground house DJs were reluctant to play this style, so a new generation of DJs were created from record company staff, and new clubs like Miss Moneypenny's, Liverpool's Cream (as opposed to the original underground night, C.R.E.A.M.) and the Ministry of Sound were opened to provide a venue for more commercial sounds. By 1996 Pete Tong had a major role in the playlist of BBC Radio 1, and every record he released seemed to be guaranteed airplay. Major record companies began to open "superclubs" promoting their own acts, forcing many independent clubs and labels out of business. These superclubs entered into sponsorship deals initially with fast food, soft drinks, and clothing companies and later with banks and insurance brokers. Flyers in clubs in Ibiza often sported many corporate logos. Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, CA, Chicago and the West Coast were coming together to form a new sub-genre, Chicago Hard House. DJs such as Bad Boy Bill, DJ Lynnwood, DJ Irene, Richard "Humpty" Vission and DJ Enrie were comingling sounds, developing a new style of house music that took the nation by storm. With the release of DJ Mix Compilation CDs, these artists developed an international fan base and started touring their sound. These DJs, still active today, crossed house music over at Los Angeles radio and in the clubs, making it a staple for clubbers and ravers alike. substyles: 2Step Acid house Chicago house Deep house Disco French house Freestyle house Funky house Garage Ghetto house Hard house Hi-NRG Hip house Italo disco Italo house Minimal house/Microhouse Pumpin' house Progressive house/Tribal house Spacesynth Tech house taken from : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_music |
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