Preface

I am assuming that the reader has

some prior knowledge in dance or
house music. The bibliography is a
mere reference and shows some
evidence of this movement in music.
Without consent of my colleagues
this essay would not have been
possible, so I thank all contributions.

© Stewart Essence 2006

 His-Story, My-Story My-House
Dance Music and beyond.

“The story of dance music resides in the people who made it. Or at least played
it.” 1 I feel I am fortunate enough to have been motivated by music at the instant
when punk had departed the front line. My story is no different than any other
apart from it is my special journey - discovering dance music from 1984 until
present. Although the title suggests that I am into house music, there are many
genres of dance music that led me to the house of today, my house, and all its
influences. I shall dig deeper to enlighten the reader of the origins of disco to
house and start in the seventies, finishing today (2006). Although it is important
to mention many of the artists who made the massive floor fillers in house, this
voyage is a deeper look at the underground seen. I shall use my colleagues and
myself as the primary source as we experienced this phenomenon in
underground dance music and its culture. This journey will also show the DJ as a
recognised artist and not someone who can just mix two records.

I began listening to music in the car on family holidays to Devon and Cornwall,
nothing too special except I remember The Beatles, Elton John, Elvis, The
Carpenters and so on…I do remember buying my first record – I Only Wanna be
with you, The Tourists, after that who knows…. I was hooked. I am not sure why
music captured me accept I remember it being enable to push me to
communicate with my mum. My father was always disciplining me, so music not
until my teens was never on his gender. And still is not there with him now.

I was essentially a Soul-new wave Boy, then Ska, 2Tone - The Specials, The
Beat, Japan, The Human League, Soft Cell and so on… nevertheless, at the age
of 12 or so I discovered Hip Hop. Then as the beats grew faster I discovered the
house music that is still here today. I didn’t really listen to disco until the eighties,
but when I did I bought all the records I could with my pocket money (back

1
Biill Brewster and Frank Broughton, Last night a DJ Saved my Life, Headline
Book Publishing (1999). P2. Preface.
catalogue) as well. At the age of 15 I bought my first set of Technics SL1200 and
began spinning the above disco and funk in my bedroom. So, what has house
got to do with disco? It may be the case that it is a metamorphosis disco; it has
the same 4/4 beat and locked rhythms. House was a stripped-down version of
disco that certainly emerged in the underground seen. House music origins
arguably finds from American soul in the late seventies. Cities like New York and
Chicago were at the forefront of this revolution in music. We shall embark on the
other genres of dance music later hip-hop, reggae, garage and Drum ‘n’ Bass,
these genres were the forerunners with Detroit and its Techno later….

In my hometown London, American disco music controlled my life with the likes
of Blondie, Sylvester, Shalamar, Gwen Guthrie, Donna Summer, and Ten City.
Larry Levan, a US DJ establish him self as the front man of a new club called
The Paradise Garage, a huge warehouse-like space that had been converted
from a garage into a membership only club on 84 th King Street in New York.
Larry's landmark work in the studio led to the first whole album concept where
the DJ gets top billing over the original artist. His first ventures were for Salsoul
records, for which Larry did many remixes. Larry moved to productions with NYC
Gwen Guthrie in the early eighties. He also was known as the re-mixer, many
were recorded, he some remixed them live never to be heard again besides the
tapes that were recorded. Some of his live re-mixes include Talking Heads,
Eddie Grant, The Clash, EGS’s Moody. He also used vocalists to sing live over
his mixing, Gwen Guthrie, Chaka Khan, Jocelyn Brown and Pattie Labelle are to
name a few. Also, Leven used instrumental records (B-side’s) and dropped
acapellas vocals over the top, crowds were certainly sent into frenzies with this
new style or the third record as known in the industry.

We must also remember that this huge disco is the depths of Manhattan was a
club that sold no alcohol. Hence, the majority were high on MDMA and LSD. In
my opinion and through the evidence I have found Coke was too expensive for
these predominantly young cultured clients. Not to say this was a male only club
it was very mixed, which allowed all cultures and sexualities to mix, this wasn’t
the norm of gang the warfare at the time on the streets of NYC.

Whilst disco and then garage in the seventies was happening in NYC in
Chicago house began to form. House music takes its name from an old Chicago
nightclub called The Warehouse, (Ron Hardy) where the resident DJ, Frankie
Knuckles, mixed old disco classics, new Eurobeat pop and synthesised beats
into a frantic high- energy amalgamation of second-hand soul. Frankie perhaps is
more than a DJ, he's an engineer of clatter or amalgamated sounds, who has
taken the art of mixing to new heights. Regulars at the Warehouse remember it
as the most atmospheric place in Chicago, the pioneering nerve-centre of a
thriving dance music scene where old Philadelphian classics by Harold Melvin,
Billy Paul and The O'Jays were mixed with upfront disco hits like Martin Circus'
‘Disco Circus’ and imported European pop music by synthesiser groups like
Kraftwerk.

This has continued to be the foundation of dance music today as it has a non-
aggressive happy feeling that it clear in my mind. According to Frankie Knuckles,
“House is not a break with the cultured music of the past, but an extreme re-
invention of the dance music of yesterday”. 2 Thus, he sees House music with a
very clear tradition, a kind of two-way love affair with the city of New York and the
sound of disco. Frankie Knuckles, who, ten years after releasing his first House
record, became the first producer to receive a Grammy Award for Re-mixer Of
The Year, in 1997. This surely shows that house is a rcognised genre of music
that is still with us today.

Many other DJ’s moved into the faster beats of disco and house, Knuckles also
upped the pace, re-mixing some old classics with the likes of Giorgio Moroder.
Often using the early drum machines to ‘beef up’ his sets. He added the kick
drum that would probably be known to us as house music…. House Music all

2
Ibid. P. 22
Night Long, was on of Knuckles well-known re-mixes (1990) (original artist
Dershon Jackson, otherwise known as the Chicago Bad Boy). Jamie Principle’s
Your Love was also magnificently produced and re-mixed which went on to sell
over 100,000 copies.

Once again like Levan Knuckles undoubtedly was a headliner of his time and
beyond. Not only in the clubs with his live mixing, but putting records together
and adding some beautiful rifts and piano work. Alision Limericks ‘Where
Love Lies’, and Robert Owens ‘Tears’ are prime examples.

Ragga or Reggae but really dub gripped me for a while too. I ran away from
home (I think I was about 13 or 14, anyway I ended up in St. Paul’s Bristol.
Here I discovered Blues parties, and girls, (I was already drinking). Then I
started to frequent Blues in Notting Hill, the carnival and so on… I didn’t really
know any of the artists that played but I do remember funk and soul being
played as well. I was often the only white face in the place; this gave me a lot
of respect amongst the cultured community….

Hip Hop was probably the first dance music I played out and started doing mix-
tapes. I hated the aggressive side to it so I usually listened and played the likes
of… Whodini’s-Monsters House of Rap, Salt ‘n’ Pepper and especially liked what
Todd Terry did again dropping American soul acappelas over hip hop beats. Hip
hop was made simple by Terry, it was ‘nice’ happy music and always well put
together. During its commercialism with the likes of Grandmaster Flash and
Afrika Bambaataa I moved into playing Acid House. However, before we venture
into this territory, I shall explain why I didn’t do hardcore.

Hardcore as the name suggests was too ‘hard’ sped up vocals and break beats
didn’t capture my imagination. We were going to see Sensor and Spiral Tribe,
Tonka Parties in warehouses in Rotherhithe (South London my home). Some of
it was hard but we hung out in the back rooms or smaller fields listening to the
bands. I do remember going to Enstone in Oxfordshire. The organisers used a
disused airfield, well they thought it was disused until 7 AM in the morning when
amateur light aircraft tried to land. The police arrived and mayhem broke lose. It
was hilarious watching ravers as pilots were trying to land aircraft. The police
shouting through their halos ‘please clear the area this is the police’ the roars of
laughter from the crowd only deafened the attempts to clear the area further. As
you can see I am not dismissing hardcore as a unrcognised movement in music
but there were just too many kids running around chewing their faces of and
interrupting my shyness. Besides, I was already hard at work in the industry and
didn’t want these kids as my punters. So, when acid house of the eighties was
brought into the nineties with techno I was so much happier.

In America Larry Sherman’s Trax Records emerged in the mid eighties and
gave bedroom producers and jocks an outlet to release their tunes. Most
weren’t even worried about getting paid if they heard their tunes in the clubs.
Trax also pressed up many Acid House tunes. Acid house may take its name
from The Music Box Chicago where acid punch was offered to each clubber as
they entered the club. What we do know that it is a squelching sometimes
piercing type sound that needles the ear. There were many producers who were
buying equipment and trying to learn how to make tracks. Machines like the 303,
505, 707,808, - by Roland were widely used. DJ Pierre, who started out playing
Italian imports at roller discos in the Chicago suburbs, and who had joined Lil
Louis for his notorious parties. "Phuture was me and two other guys, Spanky and
Herbert, we had this Roland 303, which was a bassline machine, and we were
trying to figure out how to use it. When we switched it on, that acid sound was
already in it and we liked the sound of it so we decided to add some drums and
make a track with it. We gave it to Ron Hardy who started playing it straight
away. In fact, the first time he played it, he played it four times in one night! The
first-time people were like, 'what the fuck is this?' but by the fourth they loved it.
Then I started to hear that Ron was playing some new thing they were calling
'Ron Hardy's Acid Trax', and everybody thought it was something he'd made
himself. Eventually we found out that it was our track so we called it 'Acid Trax'. I
think we may have made it as early as 1985, but Ron was playing it for a long
time before it came out.” 3

Marshall Jefferson must be brought into this discourse as he produced many

tracks ‘Free Yourself’, I have lost Control’, are early examples, and he was one of
the early named big DJ’s. He still does the odd gig in London too. He was also
playing out of Chicago; tunes like Farley Jackmaster Funk’s Love Can’t Turn
around which was massive, and Jefferson hammered it to the hilt. Jefferson
says, “The single most important thing was that non-musicians could produce
4
this house music and that appealed to me, so I did the same”.

Many of the alleged Chicago’s house tracks emerged out of Detroit. Kevin
Saunderson’s ‘Big Fun’ was one and still is a classic, and the one to drop if you
want to lift a party. Derek May’s strings of Life is a classic much later late
eighties. Juan Atkins started producing in his teens; ‘Alleys of your Mind’ was a
fusion of synth pop and a simple drum machine. Techno certainly in its early
days evolved from recording synth sounds and running them through sequencer
perhaps an Atari computer to produce the techno noise we know today. It is
credible to say that both Chicago and Detroit complemented each other, or at
least the DJ’s and producers did.

We used to go to ‘Open’ and DJ at the Ministry, this was one of the only techno
nights around 1992. Or it was the only decent one anyway. We new Jenny on the
door so we were always on the guest list, we were not prepared to stand in line.
So, we used to smuggle booze in our records boxes for DJ’s we had befriended.
Jim Masters, Harvey, Mr. C and Marbo to name a few were always grateful. So,
many got drunk in this non-alcoholic environment and had some fun too. I think
my favorite band I saw there were ‘Boing’. They played techno live with real

3
Sean Bidder, Pump up the Volume extract taken from Channel 4 Series
part 1 2001. Book published by Channel 4 Books for PanMacmillan Ltd.
4
Ibid. P 30.
instruments; they knew how to raise the roof. We also used to go and listen to
garage on a Saturday them. Tony Humphries, Todd Terry, Lil Louis, C&C Music
Factory, India, Masters at Work and many more all played to roadblock parties.

Harvey’s Moist parties was held at The Gardening Club in Covent Garden in the
beginning. However, it was moved near Kings Cross was where he would play
for 6-8 hours well into Sunday mornings. The music was policy was wide-
ranging. It would be impossible to pigeonhole it. Loosely, it would probably, in the
modern age, be described as ‘cosmic disco’, but at that time it would have
probably fallen into the garage category, sort of Balearic garage. I think what
would define it was that it was indefinable in many respects. It was dance music
in the purest respect, in the purest form. Fundamentally it was different from
music in the charts and that it what attracted me.

The term garage was first used in the USA to portray records in the late 70s and
early 80s that formed the eclectic play list of the ‘Paradise Garage’. But the
garage we heard then is defined as the rumbling of the baseline or reverb this
gives its name to the modern garage of the early nineties. That is US garage, but
also the name garage certainly came from ‘The Paradise Garage’. Over time, the
term in the US came to mainly describe the more soulful, gospel-inspired styles
of disco and house music first made popular by the above DJ’s and producers.
The development of house music in the UK in the early and mid 1990’s led to the
term being applied to a new form of music also known as speed garage or UK
Garage. This style is now frequently combined with other forms of music like hip-
hop, rap and R&B, all generally filed under the description urban music.

Again, although I realize that R’ n’ B and speed garage – two-step were popular
forms of dance music I was never inspired. Due to the people it attracted,
gangster kids and the natural aggressing that is still their today. At a gig one we
were double booked the manager wasn’t there so a knife was produced when I
refused to get of the decks. I quickly had to befriend the other party involved. I
was certainly scared for the first time in the music industry. I am not ignorant but
have witnessed this type of behavior on many occasions. I want no part of it.
Twice as Nice’ is a prime example with shooting being reported at several of their
events.

Drum ‘n’ Bass or Jungle’s roots lie in Jamaica, “You could equally make the case
that jungle is a rave up digitalized version of Jamaican reggae…a sort of
postmodern dub on steroids”.5 Drum ‘n’ Bass or Jungle neither captured me nor
inspired me too. Again it was moody until the like of Roni Size brought melody’s
into his tracks the album Represent is a well known example. Goldie’ Timeless
was love by many, Inner City Life is well documented.

So, what is my part in this clear revolution in music? I was lucky enough to be
given a gig by someone who had kept the key to a space after it had closed. It
was 1985 and the height of disco and funcked up house. I took my hand built rig
and set it up at the back of the dance floor. Freezers were filled with booze,
doormen were hired and we did the flyers. I played a mixed bag of soul funk,
acid, jacking house… the crowd loved it. It was a total non-druggy affair, people
were happy and I filled the dance floor from start til end, 5 hours. It was a
roadblock. They managed to shut the place down with ease. As the people who
organised they sat counting the cash takings from the door and bar they all
grinned and decided to do another the next Friday, once again the queue in the
street scared as it brought attention to their misdemeanors. Nonetheless again it
went without fault. The third night was the best. Saturday the police raided and
the ring leaders were fished out. The Head of Thames Valley Police was awoken
from his bed. As they agued the case with the coppers we all demanded that we
hadn’t been paid and were very unhappy. Naivety was a great thing or so the
cops thought. How the crew held their nerves with a few grand shoved down
their Y-fronts, I still don’t know how they blagged it, but they did. I kept my rig,
they kept the cash and even better the cops took me home as I had not been
paid, we were stuck in the middle of and industrial estate.

5
Simon Reynolds, Energy Flash, Picador 1998, P. 245
After this I was asked by many west end clubs and promoters to ‘do nights’ I said
that I wanted to stick to non-commercial events and was in some ways outlawed
from that seen. I continued to do the odd outdoor events, or ware-house style
party. I was never one to chase the dollar.

I used to watch Dj’s mixing and take their skills to my decks, Andrew Weatherall,
Mr. C, Todd Terry, Matt Silver (Weird Beats) Marbo, Harvey (Tonka) are to name
a few. I never used to copy them but just learn how they blended two or even
three records together. I knew I could mix but also one must have a taste in
choice of records. I felt I had that, and I suppose that’s why I still get paid to do
the hobby that I perused.

In the early nineties, I did attend a few ‘Raves’ the usual driving round at night
until you found a load of crusties a generator and a 50k rig. Bleeps and
Hardcore, bands like The Prodigy, Underworld and Primal Scream, were
unknown headliners. However, as I have explained this really wasn’t my bag.
The only clubs we went to were The Minisrty and Charlie Hall's Drum Club. This
is where I met many of the big names in DJing and production, some are still
close friends today.

I also met the general manager of THE END. We began doing squat parties in
London before THE END opened. We had almost instant success, probably due
to our knowledge of the industry and his experience in the restaurant business.
Again, we had the rig, other DJ contacts and had another mate known as Pete
the Meat who was an artist in breaking into empty houses, wiring up the electric
and so on. I suppose I was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time.
Our parties were always well planned, we always knew our roles trusted each
other and had an amazing time. Sometimes we even did some work. The
headliners of today charge a fortune to what we were paid, but we always looked
after everyone. Attention to detail was the key.

We all new the ‘Sugar Lump’ sound system Ollie and Graham, they had a great
10K rig. We hired them on many occasions and always had a good time. Ollie
had the ability to bring 30 or so records along and still play for 10 hours. He used
to play techno records at minus 6 and house records at plus 4 hence, making his
techno sounds like funky tech house and his house records sounded like techno.
It worked all the time and he was clearly a modern-day artist. I have never seen it
reproduced today.

Also, up in the midlands DIY Nottingham’s finest emerged in the early nineties
putting on free parties. Money was always made by setting up a bar, (people still
had rent to pay). I have had the pleasure of working with them on numerous
occasions and have had great fun as well as done some hard work over the
years. They were involved in Spiral Tribe’s Castlemorton in 1991 and 1992. I
can’t give first hand account of this but there were at least 40,000 punters going
mad all weekend in June of 1991. This was finally shut down in May 1992 and a
huge case was brought before the courts. They all walked…. A friend of who
wishes to remain anonymous had a rig there, which was later confiscated by the
police. He recounts… “Spring 1992 a group of degenerate squatters brought
close by proximity (We all lived in New Cross), a shared common purpose (to
party hard) and the naive optimism engendered by the great festivals and
copious amounts of acid/ecstasy consumed by them and not me in the
previous years.

The sound system that had been collectively cobbled together over the past 2
years had been loaded into our newly purchased dodge 50 van, all black and
big enough for a sound system and crew of 6. The equipment was to be
added to the “Spiral tribes” sound system – all we had to do was get it there.

It was a good journey, the van performed well and there were no police
roadblocks. Arriving at the Castle Morton site mid-afternoon Friday it was
sunny and we ecstatic that we’d made it. However, our elation was
somewhat marred by the fact that as we left the main track slowly driving
through the sprawl of vans, cars, buses tents and revellers we drove straight
into a ditch. The Spirals were only 100 metres away but it took us 4 hours
before the van had been towed out and the sounds system set up, night had
fallen and the party had begun.

It was the sheer enormity of the site that was impressive. There was about 20
sound systems, a few small stalls and a couple of small stages. Lots of wild
guesses postulated to the size of the crowd but it was generally agreed that
there was something in the region of 30 - 40,000 people.

The atmosphere on the Friday evening was electric and got wilder as the
weekend progressed. The festival was living up to our high expectations, the
weather was perfect and the mix of older travellers, younger ravers and
everyone in between were partying like there was no tomorrow.

Over the four days that we were there we were very aware that we were
being observed by police on the perimeter and in helicopters. There was a
collection of houses within eye and presumably earshot but we hoped the
people in the houses were bearing the noise aggravation gracefully.

By the 10:00pm Sunday night most punters had gone home, leaving behind
stragglers, organisers and travellers. There was a small party still going on at
the Wango Riley stage so me and a couple of mates went to check it out.
The atmosphere there was slightly moody and none too friendly, mostly older
travellers some of whom were none too keen on the new generation of ‘Party
Anarchists’ that were changing their festivals. One sign read “Do us a favour
kill a Raver”; this was for me he first signs of a schism that was soon to split
the two previously sympathetic groups. We retired early to avoid an inevitable
beating or battle of words.
Monday morning was spent trying to devise tactics for retreat. The Police had
blocked all exits and the traveller fraternity were being unhelpful, we knew we
were going to be stopped so we tried to stash as much sound equipment in
friend’s cars as possible. However, the bulkier stuff like speakers, cables and
lights still had to put in the van. When we finally left that afternoon, it was with
an impending feeling of dread. As we sped towards the exit in a convoy of 3
other vehicles somebody started to hum the theme from The Great Escape-
but this slight glimmer of hope and wit was quickly dashed as we reached the
exit gate and were immediately flagged down by a Rozzer.

All our equipment was seized (reclaimed 3 years later) and we were caught
bang to rights; fortunately, they only wanted to know about the driver of the
van so everybody else thereafter was reasonably relaxed. As they took the
driver’s details one of the crew started to cook some breakfast, surrounded by
coppers and TV cameras. We need it as we were hungry and partied out.
The festival was over, the cops let us go but we felt we’d accomplished
something great, and the fact that I’m writing about it 12 years later makes me
chuckle”.

Leading up to this we all used to love ‘The Fordum Park’ festival in New Cross,
again a freebee. When the Criminal Justice Bill was introduced in the fall of 1994,
we got to play. Out the back of my Ford Escort we set up the decks, generator
and a 2K rig, we had so much fun, the sun shined old men danced with crusties
and kids sang along. After the ‘Bill’ we all started our ‘professional careers’ in the
music industry. We either did that or got arrested.

I now earn a modest living from production and DJing across the globe. At that
moment, I was involved in Mr. C’s and Layo Paskins ENDCLUB, I DJ their over
nine years a resident DJ. This is one of the only clubs on the planet that does
what a club should do. It is non-corporate, but friendly club for workers and
punters alike. (Now sadly shutdown 2009)
I have not mentioned certain genres or movements in dance music, like R&B or
the Northern Soul of Manchester, Ibiza and Aya napa. (I frequented Ibiza in the
late eighties long before the tourists arrived. It is now seriously damaged as a
place to be). Though credit must be given…. This journey is not over for me, as I
will continue to move ‘house’ forward. Now I play and produce a mixture of;
funky, tech tinged and sometimes when the sun shines handbag music for a
certain discerning crowd. House has embraced all genres of music from classical
to pop, therefore house music is an integral part of my life.

Bibliography
Bill Brewster, Frank Broughton, Last Night a DJ Saved My Life
Headline Book Publishing Ltd 1999.

Simon Reynolds Generation Ecstasy, Routeledge 1999,

Simon Reynolds, Energy Flash, Picador 1998.

Sean Bidder, Pump up the Volume part 1 2001, Channel 4 Books for
PanMacmillan Ltd.

Stewart Essence, Elusivewax.