I need loud music to keep quiet
Uncool Tournament Golden Beats compilation, pt. 2
This is the second of two installments of my Uncool Golden Beats mix. If you’re not sure what “Uncool” or “Golden Beats” are, check out the intro in the first installment. Otherwise, enjoy! (The playlist below includes both installments in one place.)
UNCOOL MIX 2: I NEED LOUD MUSIC TO KEEP QUIET
1. Soft Machine: Soft Space (1978)
Nominated by Centuries of Sound (centuriesofsound.bsky.social)
This was the first song that I was certain needed to lead off a mix, and that’s because not despite the fact that it’s an 8-minute instrumental. Same immersive quality as Moroder, but where Moroder sails off to new vistas, you’re acutely aware that Soft Machine have no idea where the fuck they’re going. Everyone goes for sublime, but not everyone can also pull off seasick.
This was a wonderful recommendation from Centuries of Sound. If you haven’t checked out any of their mixes—an ambitious project to document every year of recorded sound since 1856—do yourself a favor and explore those a bit.
Centuries of Sound: For a few years prog, folk and jazz fusion acts bought synths and tried their hands at space disco. This is obviously Moroder-inspired but still my favourite of this microgenre. That Spanish guitar! Nothing like it out there
2. Cosa Rosa: Millionemal (1984)
Nominated by Jonathan Bogart (jonathanbogart.net)
The third and final Jonathan Bogart pick (he had the most picks across the two mixes, only one of which I knew was him when I set it aside). Will once again defer to his write-up.
So who were Cosa Rosa? They were Rosemarie Precht, a pianist and singer from Berlin, and Reinhold Heil, a keyboardist trained in jazz who played in a series of Neue Deutsche Welle bands. Their collaboration split the difference between pleasant jazz-funk à la Shakatak or RAH Band and surging electronic dance-pop à la Madonna, essentially lending shiny pop a more expansive harmonic sense than usual. That, combined with Rosa’s gorgeous airy tones, made me fall in love the moment I heard it, and it’s stuck with me even as my musical priorities have consolidated around US, Latin, and Afro-diasporic forms of pop.
Apparently “Millionenmal” did not chart even in Germany, but it got enough airplay to be one of their most recognizable hits after the wordless dance track “Rosa auf Hawaii”. The lyrics, according to in-browser translation, are about how although some women want men with muscles, money, or morals, she loves you (who has none) times a million. But honestly, any of their eight singles could have made this list; this is just the one I know best.
3. Jan Hammer Group: Don’t You Know (1977)
Nominated by Mathew Kumar (mathewkumar.bsky.social)
I know Jan Hammer more for his TV themes than the rest of his musical output, but this convinces me I’ve been seriously missing out — it even has good vocals, can you imagine!
Kumar: Incredible futuristic bassline, beats and vibes that I want to go on forever. The hidden gem of the 70s, and yet timeless.
4. Azymuth: Jazz Carnival (1979)
Nominated by Mystery Pop (baseten.bsky.social)
Upbeat funk instrumental from a Brazilian jazz-funk trio (not to be confused with the similarly spelled British jazz-not-funk trio Azimuth) whose name rings a bell but whose music I don’t think I’ve ever knowingly heard. They seem much more interested in the funk than jazz side of their undeniable chops, without the result scanning as fusion per se.
5. Vanessa Paradis: Be My Baby (1992)
Nominated by Jon Bounds (bounder.info)
It’s particularly bold to name your song after the Ronettes and then roar out of the gate with a neo-Motown arrangement that begs what can only be a diminished comparison to it, but Paradis, a paper-thin presence who nonetheless produces just enough signal to beguile, immediately undercuts it by slithering underneath the music instead of riding on top of it like Ronnie Spector would. Wasn’t aware of Lenny Kravitz ever producing anything like this, but he’s not really the star of the show here, is he.
Bounds: Never understood why this wasn’t a much bigger hit. (Made number 2 in Belgium tho’). Best thing Lenny Kravitz has ever been involved with.
6. Rachid Taha: Ya Rayah (1997)
Nominated by Martonnax at 99.8% Restoration (rakshasa.bsky.social)
Won’t claim to know very much (read: literally anything) about Algerian chaabi music, but whatever the tradition calls for musically, what really works is Taha’s delivery. He has a certain resting punk-rock sneer that draws me in with its threat to push me out — whatever the lyrics actually say (something about desert travelers and regret), I still hear “two’s a crowd.”
Martonnax: Soulful Algerian Chaabi rhythm. A wanderer's look back over their shoulder. Beautiful.
7. António Variações: Estou Além (1982)
Nominated by Charlotte Allen (lotty.bsky.social)
Interesting how much another language will help me re-frame a sound that bugs me in English — which is another way of saying this one sounds like Sparks. From the little I’ve read, Variações is a major musical figure in Portugal, but this is an early point in his career, and I like the song’s new wave scrappiness.
Allen: Synth pop with underwater keyboards, fado flourishes, handclaps, and two sax solos from a Portuguese music icon.
8. Juan Luis Guerra 4.40: Rosalía (1991)
Nominated by Graham Meikle (meikle.bsky.social)
Here’s one that I singled out for how little it sounded like the median Uncool track, a bright bachata that seems much smaller in my headphones than its impact likely was at the time, according to its recommender.
Meikle: I love records that start POW! The ‘Bachata Rosa’ LP was just everywhere when I was in South America in 1992. JLG's Quito show is still my only gig where there were tanks in the stadium, just in case.
9. Capercaillie: Coisich a' ruin (1992)
Nominated by Weaver (weaversweek.bsky.social)
I associate most Celtic music with the sort of torturous 90s new age that always made me felt like I’d taken a tranquilizer but my body refused to fall asleep. This works, though, or maybe I’ve just aged into new age. Despite this being a modern arrangement of an ancient song, this Scottish world/folk group treats it like an obvious earworm for pop radio in ‘92, and apparently succeeded.
Weaver: The time when they got a 400-year-old waulking song into the national top 40. Celtic music had its brief moment in fashion; it may be back in my lifetime.
10. Amina: Le Dernier Qui a Parlé (1991)
Nominated by Henrik Alsterbo (78alster.bsky.social)
Fell hard for Amina in the most random way possible — stumbling on her debut single surfing Discogs by chance and intuition for my 1985 mix — and have only now actually heard the Eurovision ballad that she is famous for, robbed of her tie for first place on an infuriating technicality. Was it worth the wait? Yes. Is it, as its recommender asserts, the greatest song ever to compete in Eurovision? I’d entertain the argument. Is it better than “Sheherezade”? No.
Alsterbo: This just has to be the greatest song to ever compete in the Eurovision Song Contest? Northern African wailing, continental France cool and Caribbean swagger in one package.
11. Shut Up and Dance: The Green Man (1992)
Nominated by Steve Mannion (ghostfoodpro.bsky.social)
The start of a brief one-two techno section that I felt fit the indulgent global vibe of this mix better than the other one’s short and spiky feel. I think this song is particularly justified for inclusion because of its regal strings nicked from Ryuichi Sakamoto (ha, I called them “regal” before I saw they’re from his Last Emperor soundtrack! I know I have seen that movie but I was in high school and likely fell asleep during it). I always wind up stepping on a rake trying to accurately identify dance subgenres, so will just say it’s a fun one and I enjoyed following the footnotes on Whosampled.
Mannion: PJ! Smiley! Gladys! Ryuichi! Orchestral Ardkore excellence from Hackney's daring duo tho again just missing the UK Top 40.
12. Technohead: I Wanna Be a Hippy (1996)
Nominated by Thomas Evans (thewrittentevs.bsky.social)
I’m not really aware of much cheerfully caustic hippy-punching past Frank Zappa—and the source of the vocal sample is from a David Peel piss-take that dates back to ‘68. Technohead seem ambivalent about whether you should get stoned or make fun of the people saying they’re getting stoned, suggesting that it is no contradiction whatsoever to do both simultaneously, as was the style at the time.
Evans: Much of the 90s was spent recreating the 60s, and there isn’t a more 90s engagement with the 60s than this. Let it stand as the culmination of many of the trends of its day. At least it isn’t the Smurfs parody.
13. Ray Barretto: Pastime Paradise (1981)
Nominated by milo (notthatmilo.bsky.social)
Incredible cover of Stevie Wonder’s “Pastime Paradise” from renowned Latin music bandleader and go-to for Tito Puente and Fania All-Stars. It manages to simultaneously highlight the way Wonder’s words can really pile up on themselves without the right finesse, while also insisting that the groove underneath is hardy enough to go on for-fucking-ever.
14. Defunkt: Razor’s Edge (1982)
Nominated by ally (dustysevens.bsky.social)
Hard funk with a gnarly guitar solo at the halfway point that somehow shreds even harder still. Ten minutes to spare on the mix so why not let these folks really sprawl out for the finale?
***
That’s it! Until next time, remember these songs are only uncool if you let them be.
—Dave Moore (the other one)
Title from Defunkt’s “Razor’s Edge”