'Only when I'm dancing can I feel this free.'
As I write on here every day, and attempt as much as I can to write about the new, this requires a constant search for things I don't know about leading me to draw on a few key sources. There are the blogs listed down the right side of this page and particularly a helpful few who are embarked on a constant process of discovery which often directs me to a lot of great stuff which I might never chance upon otherwise.
Sometimes I spread the net a bit wider and the music pages of The Guardian are particularly useful in this respect. Every week they choose an album that stands out, usually written about by their lead writer Alex Petridis whose remit is surely to cover a broader range of music than the traditional guitar based stuff that I generally go back to here..
The album he's settled upon this week times by SG Lewis a young mixer and producer, is definitely worthy of exploration. It's a Dance, or possibly what we might have, at one time referred to as a Disco record. This is a euphoric, good times album in the best sense and clearly Lewis is very good at what he has chosen to do.
This is his debut and it's incredibly accomplished and versed. Versed most obviously in Niles Rogers and Chic who did this and in Rogers case still do it, pretty much better than anyone else has done. Rogers actually collaborates and features on one track here which must be a proper treat for Lewis.
I'm not an expert in this particular field but was reminded of other things. It made me want to listen to S Express for example who made some great records, back in the day. By which I mean the day when I might actually have been tempted out onto the dancefloor myself. These days are probably long gone, but times is certainly good enough that I might do a few steps in my living room listening to it. This is what this music is made for anyhow.
The problem for this most democratic form of music, is to maintain your interest right the way through the album form. Chic could do it, so could Earth, Wind & Fire, also Daft Punk, (another essential influence here), but very few others. In this respect times does have its flaws, it does become rather samey after five or six tracks, and you feel you want to sit down, or else change venues altogther. Perhaps true lovers of the form will persevere, I felt like turning in.
It's still a very good record, full of those great hedonistic moments that make you feel you're on a high without the need of drug intake. It's no wonder they open dance clubs called Heaven. Definite thumbs up from me on this one.
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