Acid house

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For the 1994 novel by Irvine Welsh, see The Acid House.
Acid House
Stylistic originsHouse
Cultural origins1980s, United States, United Kingdom
Typical instrumentsSynthesizer - Drum machine - Sequencer - Keyboard - Sampler

(complete list)
Other topics
Styles of house music
The Roland TB-303 bass synthesizer provided the electronic "squelch" sounds often heard in acid house tracks.
A yellow smiley face is considered the emblem of acid house.
File:BTBbeatdis.jpg
Beat Dis by Bomb the Bass (1988) features the "bloodied" version of the popular smiley icon.
File:Watchmen 1.jpg
Watchmen Issue #1 (1987) by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. Moore asserts that this is the origin of the "bloodied" smiley.

Acid house is an electronic music-oriented subgenre of house music, which emphasizes a repetitive, hypnotic and trance-like style, with samples or spoken lines usually used rather than sung lyrics. Acid house's core electronic "squelch" sounds were developed by mid-1980s DJs from Chicago who experimented with the Roland TB-303 electronic synthesizer-sequencer. Acid house spread to the United Kingdom, Australia and continental Europe where it was played by DJs in the early rave scene. By the late 1980s, copycat tracks and acid house remixes brought the style into the mainstream, where it had some influence on pop and dance styles.

The sound of acieeed, a nickname for acid house,[citation needed]was different than the emerging styles of deep house or vocal house in that it was starkly minimal, being very light or absent of instrumentation and generally harder or trancier sounding than these. This bifurcation marked an early separation in house music that directly correlated to the origin of hard dance and trance and which developed in conjunction with the more underground and specialized rave scene. The starkness of the style sprang from 1.) the discovery of the strange sounds that the Roland 303 bass line synthesizer produced when tweaked and 2.) the straight 4|4 rhythm which though shared by much of house and techno music was programmed into much harder and more pounding rhythms than pop or electro. Both of these elements are present in most of the tracks considered core to the sound of acid house. Roland's other famous sound, the Roland TR-909 drum machine is nearly as common. Acid house's influence on dance music is tangible considering the sheer number of electronic music tracks referencing acid house through the use of its sounds, including trance, psytrance, breakbeat, big beat, techno, and house.[1]


The First Wave of Acid House - 1985 to 1989

The first acid house records were produced in Chicago, Illinois. Phuture, a group founded by Nathan "DJ Pierre" Jones, Earl "Spanky" Smith Jr., and Herbert "Herb J" Jackson, is credited with having been the first to use the 303 in dance music.[citation needed] The group's 11 minute "Acid Tracks" was recorded to tape and was played by DJ Ron Hardy at the Music Box, where Hardy was resident DJ. Hardy played it four times over the course of one night until the crowd responded favorably.

Chicago's house music scene was suffering a massive crack down of parties and events by the police, and sales of records in Chicago were dwindling. But this was just the beginning as house music began a massive surge in popularity in Britain. House records were selling more in Britain than in Chicago at this point.[citation needed]

London's club Shoom, circa 1987, was one of the first clubs to introduce acid house to the clubbing public of England. It was opened by Danny Rampling and his wife. The club was extremely exclusive and featured thick fog, lots of drugs and acid house.[citation needed] This period began what some call the Second Summer of Love in which peace, love, drugs and music began to effect real social change. Instead of fights, football fans were listening to music, taking ecstasy and joining the other club attendees in a peaceful movement compared to the revolution of the 1960's.[citation needed]

Next came the club called Trip in 1988.[citation needed] This club was opened by Nick Holloway and was geared directly towards the acid house music scene. However, the UK's anti-club laws started to make it increasingly difficult to offer events in the conventional club atmosphere. Most of the acid house scene retreated to the underground with moving parties thrown by unlicensed clubs, the most recognized being shut down.[citation needed]

In September 1989, Sunrise held the largest Acid House rave ever, just outside Reigate in Surrey.[citation needed] In the fields adjacent to the school playing fields at Hartswood (between Woodhatch and Sidlow Bridge), the rave took place and lasted from 10pm on a Saturday night until late into Sunday night. It was estimated that nearly 20,000 attended during the weekend and car queues stretched from the top of Reigate Hill all the way to the field in question (4 miles).[citation needed]

Within just a few years, acid house had gained a considerable fan base, and the trance-like dancing associated with acid house continued into after-hours. Considered illegal in London during the late 80s, after-hour clubbing was against the law.[citation needed] However, this did not stop the club-goers from continuing after-hours dancing to acid house. Police would raid the after-hour parties, so the groups began to assemble inside warehouses and other inconspicous venues in secret, hence also marking the first developments of the rave.[citation needed]

UK acid house and rave fans use the yellow smiley face symbol as the emblem of the music and scene, a "vapid, anonymous smile" which portrayed the "simplest and gentlest of the Eighties’ youth manifestations" that was non-aggressive, "except in terms of decibels" at the high-volume DJ parties[2] Some acid house fans used a smiley face with a blood streak on it, which Watchmen comics creator Alan Moore asserts was based on Dave Gibbons' artwork for the series.[3]

As acid house developed in the U.S, it soon began influencing UK pop music, emerging in a somewhat sanitized form in songs like Bananarama's "Tripping on Your Love" (1991) and Samantha Fox's "Love House" (1989). Acid house influences also appear in the 1988 hit by S'Express, "Theme from S'Express", and in remixes of pop songs on 12" singles by various mainstream acts.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, news media and tabloids devoted an increasing amount of coverage to the hedonistic acid house/rave scene, focusing on its association with psychedelic drugs and club drugs. The sensationalistic nature coverage may have contributed to the banning of acid house, during its heyday, from radio, television, and retail outlets in the United Kingdom. The moral panic of the press began in 1988, when the UK tabloid The Sun, which only weeks earlier had promoted Acid House as "cool and groovy" while running an offer on "Acid Smiley Face T-Shirts," abruptly turned on the scene. On October 19th, the tabloid ran with the headline "Evils of Ecstasy," linking the Acid House scene with the new and relatively unknown drug. The resultant panic incited by the tabloids eventually led to a crackdown on clubs and venues that played Acid House and had a profound negative impact on the scene.[4]

Musically, acid house eventually moved away from its almost nearly complete reliance on the TB-303, but continued to use repeated sound sequences that were shifted and warped by electronic modulation.

Post-1980s acid house

Acid house remained after the first wave and has experienced ebbs of popularity. The style underwent a major revival in in the early 2000s. As computer programs such as Reason and VSTi or Virtual Studio Technology Instrument versions of the essential Roland 303 were developed, the sound also began to appear in many different styles of music. Acid house tracks have been produced continuously from the discovery of the sound and continue to be produced, DJ'd and listened to currently. DJ's and producers using tracks and sounds from acid house that have performed in the 1990s and 2000s include Chris Liberator, 808 State, Pierre, Chemical Brothers, Fatboy Slim, Terry Mullen, and many others.

Etymology

There are conflicting accounts about how the term "acid" came to be used to describe this style of house music. British performer and musician Genesis P-Orridge from the experimental music collective Psychic TV has claimed that he invented the term "acid house".[citation needed] However, this claim is disputed by another member of Psychic TV.[5] Even P-Orridge himself has given a different account of his introduction to the genre: In an interview in the 1999 documentary Better Living Through Circuitry, he states that when he asked a Chicago record store clerk for the weirdest records on hand, he was pointed to the "acid house" section. P-Orridge claims that he merely listened to them to try to figure out what made them psychedelic, and concluded that the tempo was the key element.

The reference to "acid" may also be a celebratory reference to psychedelic drugs in general, such as Ecstasy (MDMA), a popular mid-1980s club drug.[citation needed]

Other accounts of the etymology of the term are not based on the LSD or psychedelic connotations. One such account is that before DJ Pierre's "Acid Trax" (an early example of the genre and credited to his group Phuture) was given a title for commercial release, it was played at a nightclub by DJ Ron Hardy, where it was called "Ron Hardy's Acid Track" (or "Ron Hardy's Acid Trax"). After the release of Phuture's song, and the term Acid House came into common parlance.[6] Philippe Renaud, a journalist for La Presse in Montreal, states that the term "Acid house" was "Coined in Chicago in 1987 to describe the sound of the Roland 303 bass machine." Renaud states that acid house music "made its first significant recording appearance on Phuture's Acid Trax (DJ Pierre) in that year."[7]

The theory that "acid" was a derogatory reference towards the use of samples in acid house music was repeated in the press and in the British House of Commons.[8] In this theory, the term "acid" came from the slang term "acid burning", which the Oxford Dictionary of New Words calls "a term for stealing." Since acid house makes substantial use of sampling, this can be deemed "stealing from other tracks"[9][10] One of the problems with this theory is that although early house music producers did use samples, most acid house music was fully original compositions made using sequencers and synthesizers.

In 1991, UK Libertarian advocate Paul Staines claimed that he made up the non-drug oriented explanation (equating "acid burning" with stealing) to discourage the government from adopting anti-rave party legislation. Staines stated that he spread this misinformation because he believed that the British public would deem the use of drugs at rave parties to be unacceptable, and would therefore support legislation against rave parties.[11][12]

Once the term acid house became more widely used, participants at acid house-themed events in the UK and Ibiza made the psychedelic drug connotations a reality by using club drugs such as ecstasy.[13][14][15] This coincided with an increasing level of scrutiny and sensationalism in the mainstream press,[16] although conflicting accounts about the degree of connection between acid house music and drugs continued to surface.[17]

Notable acid house artists

  • Phuture—Chicago-based group of acid-house pioneers, formed in 1985 and best known for its classic 1987 single "Acid Tracks," which is considered to be the 12-inch single that gave birth to the acid house movement.
  • DJ Pierre, a member of Phuture, released various solo acid house tracks and remixes
  • Armando—Chicago acid house musician, for "Land of Confusion" and many other seminal tracks
  • Mr. Lee - another Chicago house musician who released several acid house tracks in 1988
  • Fast Eddie - another Chicago house musician, for "Acid Thunder"
  • Adonis - another Chicago house musician, for "We're Rockin Down The House"
  • Bam Bam - another Chicago house musician, for "Where Is Your Child" and "Give It To Me"
  • Lil Louis - another Chicago house musician, for "Frequency"
  • 808 State - a Manchester, UK-based group of house/techno musicians, formed in 1988. Their first album, Newbuild, was acid house, and occasional acid house influences appear in later tracks.
  • A Guy Called Gerald - 808 State cofounder, for the single "Voodoo Ray"
  • The KLF - for "What Time Is Love?" and their self-described "stadium house" sound, which mixes acid house with hip-hop, pop, and stadium rock/chant influences
  • The Shamen - Psychedelic techno act formed as a rock band in Aberdeen, Scotland in 1986. One of the first groups to bring acid house and techno into the pop mainstream.
  • Psychic TV, released early albums of acid house music in 1988 as fake compilations.
  • S'Express - Brought acid house to number one in the United Kingdom
  • Baby Ford - UK-based band, formed in 1988. Their first single, Oochy Koochy and first album, Fordtrax was influenced by acid house.
  • D Mob - Best known for 1988 UK #3 hit "We Call It Acieed"
  • Guru Josh - for the 1989 single "Infinity (1990s... Time For The Guru)"

See also

External links

References

  1. ^ Shapiro, Peter (2000). Modulations: A History of Electronic Music. Caipirinha Productions, Inc. pp. 76–77. ISBN 0819564982.
  2. ^ The Independent, March 3, 1990: ‘Acid House, whose emblem is a vapid, anonymous smile, is the simplest and gentlest of the Eighties’ youth manifestations … non-aggressive (except in terms of decibels)’.
  3. ^ Dave Walsh (2003). "The Alan Moore interview". Blather. Retrieved 2007-07-09. There were big coincidences happening around the work [sic] and then all of a sudden the central image of it has been nicked on all these acid house t-shirts everywhere. {{cite web}}: External link in |publisher= (help)
  4. ^ "Rave's relationship to the Media". Fantazia Rave Archive. Retrieved 2007-10-23.
  5. ^ Giannelli, Fred., in an interview (archived from http://fopi.net/inter/fred.htm in July 2007) for the Family Ov Psychick Individuals (FOPI) Psychic TV fan club in June 2000.
  6. ^ Cheeseman, Phil. "The History Of House".
  7. ^ http://www.socan.ca/jsp/en/resources/sound_advice/Renaud.jsp
  8. ^ Quoted in the British House of Commons Hansard, 9 March 1990, column 1111 — the term 'acid house party' derives from Chicago slang describing the theft and subsequent mixing of recording tracks played at warehouse parties. But because of its association with drug LSD or 'acid', the promoters prefer to use descriptions such as all-night party..."
  9. ^ Rushkoff, Douglas (1994, 2nd ed. 2002). Cyberia: Life in the Trenches of Cyberspace. ISBN 1-903083-24-9. — House DJs would sample pieces of music that were called bites" so (others spell it "bytes," to indicate that these are digital samples that can be measured in terms of RAM size). Especially evocative bites were called acid bites." Thus, music of the house, made up of these acid bites, became known as "acid house." When
  10. ^ The Oxford Dictionary of New Words (Knowles, Elizabeth [ed], Elliott, Elizabeth [ed]). Second Edition, Oxford University Press, 1997. ISBN 0-19-863152-9. — The word acid here is probably taken from the record Acid Trax by Phuture (in Chicago slang, acid burning is a term for stealing and this type of music relies heavily on sampling, or stealing from other tracks); a popular theory that it is a reference to the drug LSD is denied by its followers (but compare acid rock, a sixties psychedelic rock craze, which certainly was).
  11. ^ Staines, Paul (1991). "Acid House Parties Against the Lifestyle Police and the Safety Nazis" article in Political Notes (ISSN 0267-7059), issue 55 (ISBN 1-85637-039-9). Also quoted in Saunders, Nicholas with Doblin, Rick (July 1, 1996). Ecstasy: Dance, Trance & Transformation, Quick American Publishing Company. ISBN 0-932551-20-3.
  12. ^ Garratt, Sheryl (May 6, 1999). Adventures in Wonderland: Decade of Club Culture. Headline Book Publishing Ltd. (UK). ISBN 0-7472-5846-5.
  13. ^ DeRogatis, Jim (December 1, 2003). Turn on Your Mind: Four Decades of Great Psychedelic Rock, 436. Google Print. ISBN 0-634-05548-8 (accessed June 9, 2005). Also available in print from Hal Leonard.
  14. ^ Donnally, Trish. (October 17, 1988). Article published in the San Francisco Chronicle and distributed via the Los Angeles Times Syndicate to other newspapers and published under various headlines. — British youths, mostly younger than 20, are flocking to members-only nightclubs, taking a cheap tab of LSD ($5) or the much more expensive designer drug Ecstasy ($30) and then dancing all night long, sometimes - with the aid of amyl nitrate poppers — until 10 the next morning.
  15. ^ Foderaro, Lisa. (December 18, 1988). New York Times News Service article, published in various US newspapers under different headlines. "acid house "is a stripped-down, highly percussive disco sound -- punctuated by television jingles, spoken non sequiturs and high-pitched beeps — whose overall effect is psychedelic.
  16. ^ Takiff, Jonathan. (December 14, 1988). Philadelphia Daily News. — BBC banned all records that mentioned acid
  17. ^ Leary, Mike. (November 24, 1988). Philadelphia Inquirer.
Additional references
  • Collin, Matthew; Godfrey, John. (1st edition, April 1997; 2nd edition, November 15, 1998). Altered State: The Story of Ecstasy Culture and Acid House. Serpent's Tail. ISBN 1-85242-377-3 (1st edition); ISBN 1-85242-604-7 (2nd edition).
  • Bussmann, Jane. (1998) Once in a Lifetime: The Crazy Days of Acid House and Afterwards. London: Virgin. ISBN 0-7535-0260-7.
  • Shapiro, Peter (ed.), et al. (October 15, 2000). Modulations: A History of Electronic Music: Throbbing Words on Sound. Charles Rivers Publishing Co. ISBN 1-891024-06-X.
  • A bibliography of acid house references in 1988–1989 periodicals
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