Avant-funk

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Avant-funk (also called mutant disco in the early 1980s[2]) is a music style in which artists combine funk or disco rhythms with an avant-garde or art rock mentality.[4] Its most prominent era occurred in the late 1970s and 1980s among post-punk and no wave acts who embraced black dance music.[5]

Characteristics

Artists described as "avant-funk" or "mutant disco" have blended elements from styles such as

found voices."[4] According to critic Simon Reynolds, the movement was animated by the notion that "rock's hopes of enjoying a future beyond mere antiquarianism depends on assimilating the latest rhythmic innovations from black dance music."[1]

Musicologist Simon Frith described avant-funk as an application of progressive rock mentality to rhythm rather than melody and harmony.[4] Reynolds described avant-funk as "difficult dance music" and a kind of psychedelia in which "oblivion was to be attained not through rising above the body, rather through immersion in the physical, self loss through animalism."[4]

History

Talking Heads combined funk with elements of punk and art rock.

Early acts who have retrospectively been described with the term include German

James "Blood" Ulmer, who performed with Coleman in the 1970s, was described by The New Yorker as "one of avant-funk's masters."[11]

According to Reynolds, a pioneering wave of avant-funk artists came in the late 1970s, when

Paste.[14] The New York label ZE Records released the influential compilation Mutant Disco: A Subtle Dislocation of the Norm in 1981, coining a new label for this style of hybridized dance music blending punk and disco.[15]

Later groups such as

rave music and jungle scenes of the early 1990s to a "reactivation" of avant-funk, calling it "a populist vanguard, a lumpen bohemia that weirdly mashed together the bad-trippy sounds of art school funk-mutation with a plebeian pill-gobbling rapacity.[1] Avant-funk would go on to influence 1990s drum and bass producers such as 4hero and A Guy Called Gerald.[16]

See also

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Reynolds, Simon (2001). "Dancing on the Edge". Index.
  2. ^ a b c d Reynolds, Simon (1995). "Review: James White And The Blacks - Off White (Infinite Zero/American) / James Chance & The Contortions - Lost Chance (ROIR)". Mojo.
  3. ^ . Retrieved 6 March 2017.
  4. ^ a b c d e Reynolds, Simon (February 13, 1987). "End of the Track". New Statesman.
  5. ^ . avant-funk sly stone.
  6. ^ Reynolds, Simon (1995). "Krautrock Reissues". Melody Maker. Retrieved 5 March 2017.
  7. Billboard
    . No. 116. Nielsen. Retrieved 5 March 2017.
  8. ^ Gluckin, Tzvi. "Forgotten Heroes: Pete Cosey". Premier Guitar. Retrieved 27 April 2017.
  9. ^ Jarnow, Jesse. "Herbie Hancock: Cafe Curiosity". Paste. Archived from the original on 10 June 2021. Retrieved 1 August 2020.
  10. ^ Russonello, Gionvanni (17 July 2017). "Ornette Coleman's Innovations Are Celebrated at Lincoln Center". The New York Times. Retrieved 26 August 2020.
  11. ^ Brody, Richard. "Ornette Coleman's Revolution". The New Yorker. Retrieved 26 August 2020.
  12. ^ . Retrieved 5 March 2017.
  13. ^ Greenman, Ben. "Living with Music: A Playlist by Ben Greenman". The New York Times. Retrieved 17 January 2021.
  14. ^ Jackson, Josh; et al. (21 June 2021). "The Best Albums of 1981". Paste. Retrieved 24 December 2021.
  15. ^ Thomas H Green, "Mutant disco from planet ZE", Daily Telegraph, 13 August 2009
  16. ^ Staff (February 1995). "Return Of The Gerald". Mixmag. No. 45.