Love is the Message: Dance, Music and Counterculture

In this week's podcast Tim and Jeremy complete their three-parter on Brazil, looking at music in the country from 1968 - 1975. Against a backdrop of managed democracy, repression and censorship for musicians, we hear about a number of exciting artists who combined inventive experimental radicalism with a popular imagination to create electrifying music. Jeremy and Tim introduce Fusion groups like Azymuth and Aitro, totemic Brazilian singers like Astrud Gilberto, and the incredible output of Jorge Ben.

Tim and Jeremy also discuss varying psychedelic aesthetics in the country and internationally, including the contrast between indigenous practices and the classical countercultural LSD scene; spent time on the place of reissuing culture of contemporary labels like Mr Bongo; and disagree over how we should listen to music with explicitly religious lyrics. Plus, Pelé!

Pedros Santos - Água Viva

In this week's podcast Jeremy and Tim continue with the second of three episodes evaluating Brazilian music from 1965-1975 as they turn their attention to Tropicalia. We hear about the origins of Tropicalia, or Tropicalismo, set against the turbulent political climate and eventual military coup of the country in the mid-'60s. Via music from the Gilberto Gil, Tom Zé, Caetano Veloso and more, Tim and Jeremy show how the genre articulated an aesthetic of 'cannibalism' consonant with Brazil's multiplicity and cultural fluidity, but also how it leaned heavily on Anglophone psychedelic rock and vague trends and styles of the Counterculture for much of its inspiration.

Tim and Jeremy problematise the period of Tropicalia, asking questions of its political valiancy, discuss whether it was actually radical or should be understood instead as an expression of liberal modernity, and examine the movement's rejection of paternalism in keeping with other youth scenes internationally.

Produced and edited by Matt Huxley.  

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In this week's podcast Tim and Jeremy begin a multi-show examination of the music of Brazil in the Twentieth Century, starting in part one with the emergence of Samba in the late 1920s, Bossa Nova, and the first shoots of what would become Tropicalia. We hear about the complex and hybrid makeup of the nation, considering its Indigenous, African and European sources, and the role of slavery and colonialism on the vast nation.

Tim and Jeremy talk about how music, and especially Samba, was used to cohere a new idea of Brazilian-ness, mobilised to express and represent a new national identity. We learn about new instruments like the cuica and surdo, and end with the introduction of a titan of Brazilian music, Jorge Ben. 

Produced and edited by Matt Huxley.   

Tune in, Turn on, Get Down! 

Become a patron from as little as £3pcm by visiting www.patreon.com/LoveMessagePod

Tracklist:

Books:

This is an excerpt of a full length episode currently only available to patrons. To become a patron and support what we're doing from £3 per month, head to www.patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

Tim shares a number of new discoveries, including the riotous contemporary Ghanian gospel of Alotgté Oho and a deeply psychedelic dancefloor freakout from Nico Gomez. We end with the new release from our friends at Beauty and the Beat, a tried-and-tested remix from our friend Kay Suzuki of some fantastic Guadalupian Gwoka.  

This is an excerpt of a full length episode currently only available to patrons. To become a patron and support what we're doing from £3 per month, head to www.patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

In the final part of the essay, Tim shows how music from Africa, Latin America and Europe was a central component of what he calls 'Discotheque music' (ie records you would hear on the DJ-led dancefloors) which produced the original disco sound. With reference to SalSoul, Saturday Night Fever, Nigerian disco, contemporary reissue labels and more, Tim makes the case for these non-American, largely non-white musics to be included in an expanded edition of the disco archive. Lots of great musical examples are used in this show to illustrate the essay.

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In this week's podcast Jeremy and Tim turn their atteniton to the musical cultures of 1965-1975 on some of the smaller islands of the Caribbean: Trinidad, Guadalupe and Haiti. We hear about Trinidad's particular combination of Afro-diasporic and South Asian populations during Imperial rule, how Calypso mediated the island's relationship to the British Empire, the emergence of the steel pans on the island in the face of persecution, and how American Soul influences gave rise of Soca.

Tim and Jeremy also discuss the archipelago of Guadaloupe - not a country but a department of France - and it's two great Twentieth Century musics, Zouk and Gwaka. They discuss the history of Haiti, from its successful slave revolt to the many political pressures its suffered subsequently, and it's Compas music, along with the particularities of the spiritual practice of Voodoo on the island. Plus, cricket lovely cricket!

Tim Lawrence and Jeremy Gilbert are authors, academics, DJs and audiophile dance party organisers. They’ve been friends and collaborators since 1997, teaching together and running parties since 2003. With clubs closed and half their jobs lost to university cuts, they’re inevitably launching a podcast.

Produced and edited by Matt Huxley.  

Tune in, Turn on, Get Down!

Become a patron from as little as £3pcm by visiting www.patreon.com/LoveMessagePod

Tracklist:

You can find friend of the show Cedric Lassonde's compilation of Gwoka Moderne, Lèspri Ka: New Directions in Gwoka Music from Guadeloupe 1981-2010, here: https://timecapsulespace.bandcamp.com/album/l-spri-ka-new-directions-in-gwoka-music-from-guadeloupe-1981-2010

Books:

This is an excerpt of a full length episode currently only available to patrons. To become a patron and support what we're doing from £3 per month, head to www.patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

Tim continues to assert this radical creative potential of  the post-Fordist conjuncture in '70s music culture, and concludes by asking: what happened to the influence of music from the Global South on Disco; how did Disco go from the fringes of US culture to becoming a colonializing force itself; and how might we begin decolonialising Disco?

We've split the essay into two halves, with part two to follow in a fortnight.

Tune in, turn on, get down!

Tracklist:

Cristina - Disco Clone

Tim Lawrence - Love Saves The Day: A History of American Dance Culture, 1970-1979

This is an excerpt of a full length episode currently only available to patrons. To become a patron and support what we're doing from £3 per month, head to www.patreon.com/LoveMessagePod.

Later in the episode we consider the changing role of the producer in Dub and the ways in which this problematised authorship; contrast dub riddims with NYC remix culture, and finally ask whether dub and reggae can be thought of as truly psychedelic musics.

Produced and edited by Matt Huxley.

Tracklist:

In this week's episode Jeremy and Tim travel to New Years Day 1959 as Che Guevara's forces defeat Batista to complete the Cuban Revolution. We hear about the military embargo imposed by the USA on their island neighbour, its impact on life for musicians on both sides of the border, and is resonances with American foreign policy in Latin America more broadly.

Tim Lawrence and Jeremy Gilbert are authors, academics, DJs and audiophile dance party organisers. They’ve been friends and collaborators since 1997, teaching together and running parties since 2003. With clubs closed and half their jobs lost to university cuts, they’re inevitably launching a podcast.

Books:

In this week's episode we move away from Jamaica across the Caribbean Sea to Cuba. To explain the theological precursors to modern Cuba, Jeremy and Tim start with the history of slavery on the island and the influences of Congolese and Uruban religious and musical practices the trafficked people brought with them. We hear about pantheism, master drummers and a musical culture centered around danced devotional rituals where percussion was key.

Tim Lawrence and Jeremy Gilbert are authors, academics, DJs and audiophile dance party organisers. They’ve been friends and collaborators since 1997, teaching together and running parties since 2003. With clubs closed and half their jobs lost to university cuts, they’re inevitably launching a podcast.

Grupo Oba-Ilú - Oshún

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