It took me too long to appreciate good funk music. Though I was born in 1984, my mother seemed to always have some kind of Parliament or James Brown tape on when I was a child. As much as I resisted her influence on me, like every kid seems to do, it was later in life, when I started DJing and playing to a live audience that I realized some songs just simply are better than what is out there today.
Golden Age
That is not to say modern dance songs can't carry a crowd. They can, I suppose. But something is missing. Call it the zeitgeist of the 70s or the sheer, un-ironic candor of the artists, there is no denying that some of the best songs released on labels like Staxx, West End, Philly World, Cotillion, SOLAR, and Emergency Records are in a class of their own. The producers of these labels seemed to have a preternatural ability to both sign emerging artists who would go on to define the genre and to maintain a standard of production that still remains unmatched. Slave, Sister Sledge, Chaka Khan, her little sister Taka Boom, Aurra, Cashmere, and Sylvester are just some of the many names that come to mind, but the fun part of digging through the archives is that once you find a record with a signature label on it, you can almost bet the songs are going to be hits, particularly on 12" releases.
Digging
With Youtube, torrents, and ITunes playing the great equalizer, the world has lost some of the mystery it held even a decade ago, when people still had to consciously think of what they were typing into a search engine, only to wait an eternity for their modem to beep and blink and finally deliver results. Now it's instant. You want a song? YouTube it. You're in a club and the DJ's not telling you what it is? Shazam to the rescue. I could go on, but you understand. While these are useful tools for finding obscure songs, I still encourage people of all ages, but particularly those born after the fall of the Soviet Union, to actually go to a local record store and spend a few hours digging through the crates.
Not only can you find albums that have not been uploaded to the internet - or poorly uploaded -but you get to interact with like minded individuals; there's nothing like running into your fellow DJs on their hands and knees, plowing through the stacks next to you, knowing you're gonna see them play those records in a packed club that week. It's old fashioned, but it's a matter of respect. Yes, I can send you a .zip file containing James Brown's entire discography. But will you listen to it? And if you do, will you care?
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