Jefferson produced the demented ‘I’ve Lost Control’ with Sleezy D, and Phuture sent Music Box clubbers into wild, jacking spasms with ‘Acid Tracks’. These hallucinatory experiments by Pierre and co. on a Roland bass synthesizer (TB-303) crystallized the phenomena of ‘acid house’ and helped put Trax Records — the label synonymous with house music — on the musical map. Trax churned out perennial classics from all the major players, including Larry Heard, Adonis, Virgo and K-Alexi. Acid house was exported and embraced by the UK’s club underground, and reached popular heights in 1988. The sound was copied and some examples of UK acid house were ‘Voodoo Ray’ by A Guy Called Gerald and ‘Oochy Koochy’ by Baby Ford. Lil Louis, from Chicago, scored a huge hit in the UK and the rest of the world with ‘French Kiss’.
INFLUENTIAL LABELS
Larry Sherman’s Trax Records is legendary in the sphere of house music, yet there were an abundance of smaller labels based in the South Side that bolstered the genre’s reputation: DJ International (hugely prolific and responsible for releasing classics such as Frankie Knuckles’ house music debut ‘You Can’t Hide’, co-produced by highly influential radio DJ and producer, Chip E, Joe Smooth’s ‘Promised Land’, and hip-house pioneer Fast Eddie’s ‘Acid Thunder’); Warehouse Records (owned by the late, great acid house pioneer, Armando, which released the essential Armando cut ‘Land of Confusion’ and Ron Trent’s classic, ‘Altered States’); Westbrook (started by Chris ‘Bam Bam’ Westbrook, who produced the nightmarish acid classics, ‘Where’s Your Child?’ and ‘Give It To Me’, also the timeless ‘Magic Feet’ by Mike Dunn); Larry Heard’s Alleviated Records; Gherkin Records (released two definitive Larry Heard EPs under his Gherkin Jerks guise, ‘1990’ and ‘Stomp the Beat’); and Muzique Records (another label founded by Armando, responsible for releasing Steve Poindexter’s early ghetto classic, ‘Work That Mutha Fucker’, alongside early singles by Terry Hunter and Mike Dearborn).
Raymond Barney, the main distributor of house music in Chicago (via Barney’s Records), was sold a label called Dance Mania by Jesse Saunders in 1986. Like Trax, Dance Mania became one of the most prolific and important house music labels. The music released tended to be rawer and harder. Some examples of these early, ‘trackier’ releases on the label were ‘Video Clash’ and ‘Wargames’, by Lil Louis, and ‘Circus Bells’ and ‘Ambulance’ by Robert Armani. The label also had successes releasing more classic-sounding house records, such as ‘7 Ways’ by Hercules (aka Marshall Jefferson) and ‘House Nation’ by House Master Boyz. By the early ‘90s, Dance Mania started pushing the harder, more explicit sub-genre of ‘ghetto house’, and x-rated classics by the likes of DJ Funk (who took over the label in 2005), Paris Mitchell, DJ Deeon (who quoted the genre as being the “stepchild of Chicago house” and whose classic ‘House-O-Matic’ tune paid homage to mentionable Chicago dance crew legends of the same name) and DJ Slugo. Ghetto house has recently revelled in new interest, finding its way into the DJ sets of Diplo; and Paris Mitchell’s super-rare ‘All Night Long’ was recently reissued on Ukrainian label, Wicked Bass, with new remixes from UK-based DJ and producer, Bok Bok. In 2013, Barney and Paris Mitchell plan to press unreleased and overlooked tracks from the vaults, as well as new material from the label’s roster.
Through the ‘90s, the tempo of ghetto house got faster and evolved into Chicago juke, splitting off into a hyper-energetic dance and music style called footwork. “Juke and footwork came out of ghetto house,” Chicago DJ and producer Chrissy Murderbot comments. “[They are] basically just raw, stripped-down, low budget, local house music [styles] here in Chicago. It kept getting faster and faster to keep up with the dancers, and eventually the beats started getting a little more sideways, which pushed the dancers to be a little more creative, and a feedback loop developed that led away from four-on-the-floor rhythms and toward today’s footwork sound.”
Considered the pioneer of footwork, RP Boo took juke’s 4/4 rhythm in the early ‘00s and mutated it to fit this frenetic dance style — bending clipped R&B/hip-hop samples (notably the Godzilla intro of Pharoahe Monch’s ‘Simon Says’) into wildly syncopated footwork rhythms. Most of the footwork producers, including Boo, came from a dancing background so, naturally, their productions would follow the rabid dance patterns.
CAJMERE
The roots of ghetto house have a lineage back to another of house music’s most enigmatic outsiders: Cajmere. Originally released on local label, Clubhouse, the warped ‘Coffee Pot (Percolator Mix)’ caused a stir, and when it was re-released on his label, Cajual, as ‘Percolator’, it immediately became the proto-ghetto house standard. Its mantra, “time for the percolator”, still to this day guarantee a favourable dancefloor reaction. By the time Cajual launched in 1992, the buzz of acid house had waned considerably. Hip-hop was becoming the preferred music choice over house, but Cajmere was determined to push a second wave of Chicago producers whose early releases and demos he had heard. Enter the likes of Glenn Underground (who debuted on Dance Mania), DJ Sneak, Boo Williams and Derrick Carter (whose ‘Many Shades of Cajual’ mix remains a classic today) into the house music history book. Cajmere had further success on Cajual with ‘Brighter Days’, a vocal house tune sung by Karen Gordon aka Dajae. A year after the birth of Cajual, he launched the label’s subsidiary, Relief, releasing harder, trackier house music from some of the familiar Cajual names and some new producers, such as Gene Farris and Gemini. Some of Dance Mania’s roster — DJ Rush, Tim Harper and Paul Johnson — also started to appear on the label. Relief also unveiled Cajmere’s schizoid alter-ego, Green Velvet, and under this guise, the club hits ‘Flash’ and ‘The Preacher Man’ were produced. A lot of the artists who recorded for Relief enjoyed more success in Europe than in their native Chicago; quite a few recorded for Dutch techno stalwart, Djax-Up Beats, and Paul Johnson’s album debut was released on the UK label, Peacefrog. Both labels, Cajual and Relief, still release consistently to this day.
During the mid-’90s, DJ and producer Ron Trent steered his Prescription label (with the aid of Detroit’s Chez Damier) into deeper, more spiritual Chicago house territory, drawing in the more soulful house sounds that were emerging from New York. These releases still retain an edge, especially those under the collaborative Chez N Trent name; tracks like ‘Morning Factory’, ‘Hip To Be Disillusioned’ and ‘The Choice’ are still hugely revered. Another local producer/DJ, Terry
Hunter, who started making records for labels Muzique and House Jam, introduced his own label, Vibe, in 1993. As well as releasing some soulful house cuts from key acid house producer and Chicago DJ, Maurice Joshua (his classic ‘This Is Acid’ tune was released in 1988, and he was also part of Da Posse which spun off members Hula and K. Fingers, who had immense chart success as hip-house crew, The Outhere Brothers), most other Vibe releases mirrored more of what was happening on the East Coast, inspired by the soulful ‘garage’ sound of New Jersey. Another label, Guidance Records, also started in the mid-’90s, but dealt more with extending its reach around the global house community, releasing music from artists based in Italy, the UK, Finland and Canada.
REVIVAL
Old school Chicago house music has been enjoying a renaissance over the past few years, and labels such as Muzique (under the new A&R guidance of Steve Poindexter) started releasing again from the mid- 2000s. Another local producer/DJ, Jamal Moss, aka Hieroglyphic Being, also promoted his avant-garde house music style through his Mathematics label. Influenced heavily by Ron Hardy and the culture of the Music Box, Moss has released an astonishing amount of material, including collaborations with Steve Poindexter and Adonis. Another Chicago label, established in 2006, Let’s Pet Puppies, released previously unheard material from Armando and Ron Hardy remixes of tracks by Chicago’s Marcus Mixx. The elusive Marcus Mixx has released very rare records, considered the “holy grail” of Chicago house music by collectors. These incredibly rare late ‘80s/early ‘90s releases on Missing Records can fetch prices of $500 plus. Dutch label, Clone, and UK-based label, Unknown to the Unknown, have since released new Marcus Mixx material.
So what’s the scene like in Chicago, 2013? “The current scene is bumping and on the come-up once again! The underground scene is back! A tonne of smaller places [are] rocking great house music, with tonnes of young up-and-coming talent,” declares Gene Farris. Chrissy Murderbot agrees. “Currently, there is a lot going on in Chicago. There seems to be a real revival in deep house and the loft/house/underground party scene, which is most exciting to me right now.” Frankie Knuckles is equally enthusiastic about the current scene in Chicago. “The scene is pretty healthy in Chicago right now. At the forefront I would say ‘The Chosen Few’ DJs, who produce the legendary ‘Old School Picnic’, are the big dogs, with their annual summer House Music Festival on the South Side of Chicago, going strong for 25 years. Plus, Chicago is also home to Terry Hunter, Mike Dunn, CZBoogie (founder of 5Magazine) and SmartBar, Chicago’s longest-running dance club. I opened this place with my friend, Joe Shanahan back in 1982. Chicago is glowing!” Add to this the second year of the Wavefront Music Festival, with its House is Home stage, and you have a focus point for Chicago’s incredible house heritage. In the era of EDM though, there’s still a long way to go before the true innovators are household names. As Ralphi Rosario notes, “The majority of electronic dance in Chicago has no concept of our history here. This is where it all began.“
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