In today’s adventures in Japanese television, I’m watching what I think is a Behind The Music type program about some horrible trauma that a celebrity Japanese fitness instructor went through. I think. It’s just cut together scenes of this woman dancing, then answering the phone, and then crying uncontrollably. But yo, her abs look great.

Tokyo life has been treating me very well for those who are wondering. I have decided to re-work my other site, Mostly-Retro, into a more personal blog that will focus on my life in Japan, so if you’re interested in that part of my life/Japan in general, I would suggest you bookmark that site.

If you like really rad dance tunes, then I suggest you keep reading this site right now.

Dinosaur
Kiss Me Again (Edit)
Kiss Me Again
Dinosaur was one of the many aliases of Arthur Russell, a prolific musician who was involved with the new wave/punk/minimalist/classical/disco scenes in NYC during the late 70s and early 80s. And in case you couldn’t tell from that exceptionally-hyphenated description, he was one multi-talented mofo.

While he didn’t release much during his life (Russell sadly died from AIDS-related compilations in the early 90s) he’s amassed quite the cult following in the years following his death, with several posthumous albums seeing release in the early 2000s.

Strangely enough, however, none of them seem to have either versions of this song, one of the first tracks that Russell commercially released. If they do, they’re long out of print, because I can’t find it anywhere outside of the 12″ single I bought a few years back. Damn shame too, because it’s a magnificent disco tune, a funky upbeat groovy jam that incorporates the best of leftfield disco and the late-70s dance sound that would eventually evolve into 80s house music. It even has a few elements of minimalism and new wave with its repetitive and hypnotic rhythms. I really dig it, a lot more than some of the other stuff by him I’ve sought out. You might want to check out the “Edit” version first though, as the 13-minute extended cut is a lot to take in.

The Fever
Ladyfingers (Krushed Glass Remix)
Glamorous Life
Glamorous Life (Fake Fur Remix)
Glamorous Life (Deepwood Remix)
Also ran NYC post-punk revival act who tried to re-invent themselves with an ambitious second album and failed. Not a bad group though, and they have a few decent songs. Of all the tracks of theirs I’ve heard, however, I love their cover of “Glamorous Life” the most because Shelia E. is the bomb. Expect a repost of remixes of the original version in a few days/weeks.

Kinky Go
Gimme The Love (Vocal Version)
Gimme The Love (Radio Version)
Gimme The Love (Instrumental)
You probably have no idea who Kinky Go is, and yo I’m right there with you. I love his falsetto on this track though. This is totally the best Erasure track Erasure never recorded. Italian disco at its finest (I think he’s Italian, even if he’s not I stand by that claim).

This entry was posted on Friday, January 17th, 2014 at 8:30 am and is filed under Arthur Russell, B-sides, Kinky Go, remixes, The Fever. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.