Oscillations - Is Our Children Dancing?

i've been obsessing over Carly Simon's "Why?" for long enough now for it to reach MUST!SHARE! status in my book. miss Simon - yeap, she's single again mmm yummie nice GILF - has written a fair amount of great songs, everybody knows the absolutely brilliant hit "You're So Vain", but "Why?" is actually written by my (and probably your) favourite songwriting team: Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards. they began as The Boys which quickly changed its name to The Big Apple Band in the early 70's. which has nothing to do with Walter Murphy & The Big Apple Band, by the way. it was an unhappy coincidence and Walter Murphy, the poor schmuck, didn't even want the addition of a band's name to his, the record company merely reasoned his "A Fifth of Beethoven" would sell better that way. they found out about Nile and Bernard's The Big Apple Band two days after the release and since then dropped the name, settling for just Walter Murphy. i'm gonna drift off just a liiiiittle bit more and mention how Walter Murphy was a proto-Pilooski or Jacques Renault, along with other disco greats, naturally. because "A Fifth of Beethoven" is in fact an edit of uhm... Beethoven's Fifth. yeah, just playing Captain Obvious here. funny thing is, Soulwax made an edit of his edit. now we're talking meta-edits... mmm, love that shit. not the Soulwax meta-edit of "A Fifth of Beethoven" though, it feels sterile to me. the whole Soulwax-Ed Banger IN YOUR FUCKING FACE (for the producers amongst you aka Compression = Life or maybe Compression Macht Frei!) sound has repeated itself for too long now. Boys Noize is a fairly notable exception (that Sebastien Tellier remix was awesome) and i must admit Ed Banger did something completely unexpected with the release of Mickey Moonlight's wonderful interpretation of Sun Ra's "Interplanetary Music". oh, and of course Robin Dick "created" a version of "A Fifth of Beethoven" and raked in the cash. urgh, totally hate pop stars cashing in on earlier creativity and effectively raping and then murdering the song in the process.

but uhm YEAH! back to Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards. after they didn't really go places with The Big Apple Band they eventually formed Chic with drummer Tony Thompson and singer Norma Jean Wright. Chic needs no introduction and deserves more than just a mention in a blogpost, so i'll get back to them some other time. after a couple of years of Chic, Rodgers and Edwards began taking up production work for other artists. you better drop your jaws already. they worked with - or made the careers of - Sister Sledge, Diana Ross, Debbie Harry, David Bowie, Madonna, INXS, Duran Duran, Grace Jones and yes: Carly Simon. i think they only provided her with "Why?" which she wanted because she was going through a rough time personally and musically and sought refuge in the changing popular sound (crafted by Rodgers and Edwards, amongst others). it was written for the soundtrack of Soup for One, a 1982 film which i had never heard of until i looked up the origins of "Why?". the film fluked, so the song went down it. however, it resurfaced years later at the end of the 90's in UK charts due to its popularity in the Hacienda and ibiza and doing so, luckily never disappeared into merciless Time. you can most definitely expect it in my playlist saturday. oh yes, saturday mmm 's gonna be so yummie.

notice the difference in budget for video clips in the early 80's and now. no elaborate story, no special effects, nothing at all. only the music and some random silliness. gotta love that shit:




i sincerely recommend you listen to the mp3 or vinyl on a proper sound system or headphones so Rodgers and Edwards' production comes into its own.