Disco Nouveau is Here and it's Time to Party

Disco fever is back

Sequins, satin, sparkle and glitter balls. Disco nouveau is here and it's time to party

This year will be remembered as the point when it all went a bit wrong, frankly. So it’s odd that for most of the year, the club scene has been dominated by the fingers-in-the-ears, hands-in-the-air decadence of disco.

After years of being relegated to the office party and hen nights, disco has shimmied her way back up to the top of the cool kids’ party playlist. Blanketed in glitzy memories of Studio 54, disco provides the perfect antidote to the all-pervading grimness of the life ahead. “When times are good, you could argue that people get turned on by darker, edgier music, such as drum’n’bass or electro,” says Jim Stanton, who started the iconic Horse Meat Disco in Vauxhall, south London. “As soon as life gets harder, people look for something more uplifting, which is where disco comes in — it’s an escape. The first big-haired disco moments happened in America during the 1970s, when there was a depression caused by an oil crisis.”

Many of the tunes played are comfortingly familiar from the first time around, which makes the trend much more accessible. Whereas “cool” music scenes are often the preserve of kids taking drugs in dark corners, disco is camp and bright and sparkly and opportunist. Anyone can shake a tail feather to the anti-ageist, happy-go-luckiness of a disco tune.

The revival started at Glastonbury, with Horse Meat Disco’s NYC Downlow bar in the Trash City field. The tent, which from the outside looked like a 1970s back-alley dive, had transvestites hanging out of the second-storey windows and commanded a three-hour queue to get in. Once inside, to a soundtrack of sparkly, hip-bumping disco, a giant mirror ball twirled as men, women, boys, girls and everybody in between channelled the spirit of the disco divas of old. Then a truly “Oh, my” moment, as the crowds parted and six trannies — in heels, in the mud — broke into a formation dance known as the electric slide. You don’t get that at your average German techno night.

Horse Meat Disco’s Glasto moment was proof that the glittery disco bandwagon is back in town. Fashion agreed, as the trends stomping down the A/W 2008 and S/S 2009 catwalks proved. Sequins, satin and sparkle, jump suits and hair you could hatch a mirror ball out of — they’re all there. As for the girls in the new Gucci perfume ad — these, ladies, are your dancefloor inspiration. Wear the look at Disco Bloodbath, in London, or Disco Friction, in Manchester, and you’re there.

While we’re all familiar with the works of Abba and the Village People, DJs Todd Hart, of Dalston Oxfam Shop, and Dan Beaumont, of Disco Bloodbath, are digging a little deeper in the record box. “People want something a bit more challenging, to be exposed to music they would never normally hear,” Beaumont says. “That electro sound that seemed so fresh at clubs such as Nag Nag Nag has now moved so far into the mainstream, a lot of people are looking for an alternative.” Enter the sounds of “disco nouveau”.

“Bands such as Glass Candy, Chromatics and Fan Death are seeing a surge in popularity,” Stanton says. “Their sound combines elements of pop and elements of disco — they are uber-cool and appeal to the masses.”

Fan Death are the Canadians Marta Jaciubek-McKeever and Dandilion Wind Opaine. With their music reworked by the producer and DJ Erol Alkan, they are styling it at the front of the disco-nouveau pack. Their debut single, Veronica’s Veil at Chanel’s S/S catwalk show in Paris.

As for the “everybody gets it” appeal of the sound, Andy Butler, from Hercules and Love Affair, the poster band for disco nouveau, explains: “Disco often flirts with other musical styles, so no matter what genre you’re into, there’s a disco song for you. If you rock, there is rock. If you like rap, you’ll find a disco rap track. If you like it a little bit Latin, there are some Latin monsters. And,” he concludes thoughtfully, “the best thing about all disco is that it makes you want to boogie.”

There’s the rub. Or should that be the bump? Despite the doom and gloom, the solution is out there in a nightclub near you this new year. Do a little dance, make a little love and get down tonight.

THE BEST DISCOS TO BRING IN THE NEW YEAR

London

- Horse Meat Disco at Cargo. Jonny Woo guests. cargo-london.com

- Good Times Live at the Forum. With disco-nouveau pioneers Crazy P. normanjay.com

- Wig Out! at the Royal Court. Cabaret with DJ Boogaloo Stu. royalcourttheatre.com

- Elton John at the O2 — 17,000 join Elt for this one-off. theo2.co.uk

Brighton

- Murderdisco at the Hope. Tiny venue, bumping and grinding obligatory. myspace.com/murderdisco

Manchester

- Disco Friction at Joshua Brooks. A disco DJ-off. joshuabrooks.co.uk

Liverpool

- Chibuku at the Barfly. Fancy dress and 1980s disco. chibuku.com

Nottingham

- Basement Boogaloo at the Canal House. Disco jock extraordinaire Greg Wilson graces this shindig. myspace.com/ basementboogaloo

[TimesOnline]

14-year old Entrepeneurs Set up Vinyl Business in UK

Budding young entrepreneurs from the Grove School have set up their own business, Retro Records, sourcing and selling vinyl records.

The team, headed by 14-year-old William Baxter, are taking part in the heats of the national competition which encourages young people to get involved in setting up and running their own businesses.

Guided by advice and support from staff at the school and a host of local business people, the team is looking to win the regional heats before having a crack at the national finals which are held later in the year.

The team has been working hard to set up their business and make it a success - opening a bank account, registering for VAT and taking part in a Dragons' Den event at Azur restaurant.

Now, along with other students from the Grove, the group are holding a stall in Priory Meadow tomorrow (Saturday November 29).

They have large stocks of vinyl records for sale at reasonable prices and also offer a finders service where they will track down copies of your favourite hits for a small fee.

They can be contacted by email at retro-records-wb@hotmail.co.uk or by phone on 07969 653623 (if dialing from the US: 011-44-79-6965-3623).

Their is also a website available showing all their current stock at www.retro-records.eu

[Rye & Battle Observer]

Records Make a Sound Investment

Here's a story about a former customer of mine.

Vinyl finally dead? That'll be the day... MP3 players may be all the rage but records make a sound investment

Who said that records were finished? If you have a pile of old LPs gathering dust in the loft, you could be in the money. The most collectible records fetch thousands of pounds.

Jean-Paul Cuesta-Vayon, 42, who runs the Vinyl Junkies shop in Soho, central London, says: 'You can't beat records - they are not just more tactile with far better art work than CDs, they also boast far superior sound quality. When CDs and then MP3 music formats came along they offered more convenience and seemed an exciting alternative. But as time has gone by many music lovers have come back to the more lasting appeal of vinyl.'

Jean-Paul says this attraction goes right across the music market -- from jazz to rock 'n' roll, hip hop and rhythm and blues. But though the appeal attracts all age groups, the nostalgia of those brought up on vinyl is also a key driving force. The blue-chip investments are the bands with international appeal that have stood the test of time.

Turning a profit: Vinyl Junkies shop owner Jean-Paul Cuesta-Vayon

At the head of the list is The Beatles. Other highly collectible groups include The Rolling Stones, Pink Floyd, The Who, Queen and The Smiths.

Among the individual performers, Elvis Presley, David Bowie, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Cliff Richard, Elton John and Marc Bolan are the most sought after.

Industry magazine The Record Collector puts the first ten numbered copies of The Beatles' White Album - released 40 years ago this weekend - as top of the pops for rarity value. It puts a conservative estimate of between £5,000 and £7,000 for one of the first ten copies, though investors might pay twice that amount.

Other rarities include a swearing Marc Bolan on a recording of Hard On Love plus a silk-padded sleeve of The Rolling Stones album, Their Satanic Majesties Request, both valued at £2,000. Collectors will pay about £3,000 for the mono version of Unfinished Music No 1: Two Virgins, an experimental 1968 album by John Lennon & Yoko Ono with the couple nude on the cover, rarity rather than musical appeal pushing up the price. Perhaps the most expensive record is the 7 inch single of That'll Be The Day, recorded by The Quarrymen in 1958 before three of them went on to form The Beatles. Sir Paul McCartney owns the only known copy, which is valued conservatively at £100,000.

Stephen Maycock, the rock 'n' roll memorabilia consultant for auction house Bonhams, says: 'It wasn't until the Eighties that vinyl really started to be viewed as collectible, when the supply dried up as the musical format was switched to CDs.'

First pressings are usually the most valuable, as they were often produced in relatively small numbers before the record became a hit. Early demos and limited exports are also sought after among die-hard collectors.

Cant's be beat: Jean-Paul among his wares

The record company and issue code on the disc and sleeve can help reveal the identity. Other considerations include whether it was a commercial release or promotional, recorded in stereo or mono, contained any freebies or has a picture sleeve.

As with all collectible items, Maycock says condition is vital. An LP in mint condition is worth twice a 'very good' example that has a few minor scuffs and surface scratches. Anything less is not usually considered as collectible - a badly scratched copy could fetch less than a tenth of the value.

Although Jean-Paul admits that recordings by the big names in music have accounted for some of the most impressive price rises in recent years, there is also a growing market for more obscure artists where cut-price gems can still be discovered.

'I have an early Seventies jazz record, The Latin Taste by Romano Mussolini, the youngest son of the wartime Italian dictator,' he says. 'It could be picked up for a few pounds a few years ago, but is now worth £600. Another rarity is Charlie Parker's In Sweden 1950 album, which is worth £1,000 because it's extremely rare.'

Bonhams has put a £600 estimate on a disc recorded in the late Sixties by Reg Dwight before he changed his name to Elton John. An early U2: Three 12in single from 1981 and signed by Bono has a valuation of £3,000.

While internet trading has transformed the market, for many vinyl investors there is no substitute for the fun of rummaging through racks at specialist record shops or trade fairs.

Befriending the dealer at a secondhand record store can also prove invaluable. But traders will typically offer half the price you could get on eBay.

An excellent source of information with details of shops and fairs is the Record Collector. The magazine publishes the industry bible, Rare Record Price Guide 2010. For American releases, investors should check out the books, Goldmine Record Album Price Guide and Goldmine Price Guide To 45RPM Records.

[Daily Mail]

Vinyl Revolution: In a Digital Age

Vinyl Revolution: In a Digital Age, The LP Record Makes a Comeback

A group of 20-something tourists from Istanbul are wandering along London's Portobello Road when one of them, Surhan Gebologlu, walks into Intoxica, a bamboo-covered record shop with an inviting array of LPs displayed on its walls -- everything from Sly and the Family Stone's "A Whole New Thing" to "Scientist at the Controls of Dub."

"I just got a record player," he says, inspecting a mint-condition copy of "The Queen Is Dead" by the Smiths. "My girlfriend bought it for me and I want to use it."

He's not alone. The 12-inch vinyl LP record -- in decline for the past two decades, clung to only by DJs, audiophile nerds and collectors -- is back. Sales of new LPs are on the rise -- the only segment of the market for physical-format recorded music (CDs, tapes and records) to expand during the digital revolution -- and more groups are releasing albums on vinyl, often creatively packaged in combination with digital formats. For young people just discovering vinyl and older listeners indulging in a bit of sonic nostalgia, a record player is suddenly a trendy new piece of audio equipment. Sales of turntables increased more than 80% from 2006 to 2007 and are continuing to rise this year, according to the Consumer Electronics Association.

While LPs remain a niche product -- the sales figures are minuscule compared with the amount of music sold digitally -- their resurgence is notable. World-wide sales of LP records doubled in 2007 (from three million to six million units) after hitting an all-time low in 2006, according to figures from IFPI, the international recording industry trade association. Global sales of CDs dropped 12% in the same period, after having fallen 10% the previous year. In the U.S., sales of vinyl records increased 36% from 2006-2007 while CD sales dropped nearly 18%. Those figures are just for new purchases; they don't include the vast secondary market for LPs online and in used record shops.

"Last year and this year have been our busiest ever," says Kris Jones of London's Sounds of the Universe record shop, which sells more music on vinyl than on CD. "It's really crazy."

Ilpo Musto
Sounds of the Universe record shop in London's SoHo

Why the sudden interest in a bulky, old-fashioned format that costs more than downloading and requires equipment most people banished to the basement long ago? Some of it is due to increased visibility in a changing marketplace. Record companies are looking for innovative ways to make people pay for music -- often music they already have in another format -- rather than get it free or at a reduced price over the Internet. Vinyl is one way to attract buyers with something more tangible than a computer file.

"There's a reaction against the commoditization of music" that downloading represents, says Mike Allen, a music-industry consultant and former vice president of international marketing for record company EMI Group. "With vinyl there's something that has innate value -- a physical object."

LPs hitting the market in recent months have run the gamut from major acts like Coldplay and Madonna to hip new groups like Black Kids and the Hold Steady and even to indie bands who press a few thousand LPs and sell them at gigs. There's also a boom in vinyl editions of old albums. U2 just rereleased deluxe remastered LP versions of its classics "War" and "October." Earlier this year, Michael Jackson's 25th anniversary edition of "Thriller" hit the shelves in a vinyl edition with extra tracks.

Some artists are even rewarding buyers of their new LPs with digital versions of the music, effectively selling them the best of both worlds for one price. Major acts like Beck, Tom Petty and Wilco -- as well as newer indie sensations like Fleet Foxes -- have recently released albums on vinyl with free CDs or MP3 downloads included.

Radiohead's release late last year of "In Rainbows" was a watershed for the new sales strategy of value-added vinyl. The band made its new album available online and asked people to pay whatever they wanted to for it. But they also released the music in a £40 "discbox" edition, with two vinyl records, two CDs and a thick souvenir booklet. (Like the five LPs in the special edition of Metallica's new album, "Death Magnetic," the "In Rainbows" records are made to play at 45 rpm rather than 33 1/3, allowing for higher-quality sound.) Even with the music available digitally for free, Radiohead has sold more than 60,000 discboxes.

"People want to hold something," says Mr. Jones. "They like the pictures, the artwork."

So do older listeners, who remember the days when buying a new record was something special. "You forget how gigantic the artwork was, how much more interesting the albums are than CDs or downloads," says Mr. Allen. "It's a bit of a lost joy."

Sound quality also plays a role. Vinyl fanatics have always maintained that LPs sound warmer and richer than digital formats. "There has been a resurgence of vinyl among people who believe that with CDs and downloads the sound quality is not there," says IFPI's Francine Cunningham.

That was especially the case in the early days of CDs, when methods of transferring master tapes to digital formats failed to satisfy audiophiles. CD sound quality has improved greatly since then, says Mr. Allen, but there have always been people "who found digital music harsh and cold." The same is true with MP3s, which typically are saved onto players as compressed files, much smaller than the data on CDs, that sacrifice some audio quality.

There's also a novelty aspect. To a young buyer, a record is something unusual -- even something you listen to from start to finish as an artistic whole rather than on shuffle play. "People have gotten tired of downloading all of a sudden," says Chris Summers, manager of London's Rough Trade Records. "Young listeners crave something new. To them, vinyl is new."

London's Best Vinyl

The Internet has made it easy to find almost any record anywhere. Amazon's U.S. and U.K. sites have beefed up their vinyl sections in response to increasing demand (recent top sellers include the new Metallica and classics like Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon"). EBay and the online Gemm network have created a huge virtual market for vinyl records by allowing small shops around the world to sell to anyone. Retail giants such as Best Buy, HMV and Britain's Fopp! have vinyl sections.

But the most rewarding way to shop for LPs is by flipping through the racks in a great record store, perhaps one specializing in your favorite kind of music. Plenty of small record shops have closed in recent years, but most cities still have a few. Collectors and experts favor places like Croc-o-Disc in Paris, Hard Wax in Berlin, Second Life Music in Amsterdam and Runtrunt in Stockholm.

For the best shopping, though, they head to London, where around 20 record stores are still in business, concentrated mainly in two areas, Soho and Notting Hill. Collectors go crazy in these shops, which cater to every taste from acid jazz and soulful house to punk to Afro-beat. But even casual buyers can while away hours looking through the racks.

For a continuation of this article and a list of the hottest London record shops, check out Wall Street Journal

Queen Elizabeth II to air Christmas message on YouTube

Queen Elizabeth II will use YouTube to send out her 50th televised annual Christmas message, a British Sunday newspaper reported.

Buckingham Palace plans on posting archive footage on the video sharing Web site, including her maiden Christmas Day television speech sent out to Britain and its former colonies in 1957, The Sunday Times reported.

The palace plans to post the first of the archive footage on the queen's royal YouTube "channel" on Sunday, the report said.

"The royal channel is a way of bringing the queen's Christmas message to more people of all ages across the world and keeping up with technological innovation as the queen has always done," the newspaper quoted a royal spokeswoman as saying.

Source [CNN]

The Christmas Broadcast or 'Queen's Speech' for 2007 will appear on this channel at approximately 3pm GMT on Christmas Day.

The YouTube Royal Channel: http://www.youtube.com/TheRoyalChannel

If you would like to read transcripts of past Christmas Broadcasts, visit http://www.royal.gov.uk/output/page3949.asp