from the 12” single, The Summer Records, 1986
GUILTY PLEASURE ALERT Seriously people, I recognize that some of the stuff I post on here must give you pause… like, “is this cat for real?!” Yup, he sure is. I can’t help it that a lot of the music which filled South Florida airwaves in the 1980s would have been considered heresy in many other parts of the country, as that was all I knew at the time, embossing itself upon some of my happiest memories; this upbeat number is precisely one of those cuts! Not your average freestyle track, thanks largely to that pulsing 4x4 beat underneath all those luscious synths and synth-claps, this song was recorded in Hialeah (right outside Miami, ghetto) by producer Ish Ledesma; having become such a sensation at clubs & on local radio, it wound up getting national distribution through Atlantic records and became a #1 hit on Billboard’s Dance chart the year after its release.
from the 12” single, Thrust Records, 1986
Okay, this song was everywhere in South Florida when it dropped, a big hit on the radio down there, so I apologize if those memories overly bias my opinion on the ultimate worth of this track, but dude…there’s no worth in denying that I still love this shit. Miami freestyle cuts like this one were notorious for packing an unfathomable amount of effects into the mix, as if the producers never met a hi-hat or synth-clap they didn’t passionately love, but that’s part of the appeal for me, because those sounds capture a specific (yet nuanced) portion of the mid – late ‘80s that I fondly remember. The one oddity surrounding this crew, essentially the work of radio DJ & producer Bob Rosenberg (with the help of some hired voices), is their choice of moniker---while most freestyle crews went by their own names or simplistic abbreviations thereof (i.e. Stevie B, Debbie Deb, Lisa Lisa, etc…), these guys decided to call themselves “Will to Power” after Nietzsche’s theory regarding human nature and our eternal pursuit of success…?!? I guess it’s fitting enough, having dropped in the middle of the most consumer-driven decade ever, but it never fails to make me wrinkle my nose.
from the LP Information Society, Tommy Boy Records, 1988
Sometimes you gotta know when to cut your losses, a truth which is rarely easy to swallow, but is nonetheless vital for a human’s ability to genuinely relax. One of the more valuable lessons given to me by my folks is: pick your battles in life carefully, because a mêlée in the mind (or of the body) can be a deeply draining and debilitating endeavor, so it should be worth it; they also implied that those battles will likely change over time, so don’t get too comfortable hanging on to one fight or another. This song is about a girl, presumably, but the lyrics are broad enough to enable the listener to imagine anything from their past/present which required walking away; the group, Minneapolis’ own Information Society, were one of the more investigational synth crews in the ‘80s, giving their pop-friendly tunes healthy doses of techno, industrial, & freestyle elements. To be perfectly honest, I always thought these guys were from Florida as a kid, because (I believed) that would be the only place where white people could get away with making music that drew inspiration from freestyle beats the way this song does.
from the 12” single, CBS Records, 1984
Even though rap music, with beats & an MC, has certainly triumphed far beyond any plausible measure of success, I would argue that it was hip-hop’s cyborg cousin, electro, which has wound up influencing a much broader range of musical subcultures in its wake: breaks, techno, Miami bass, and freestyle all used pieces of the electro template for varying portions of each scene’s particular blueprints. One of the first, and probably most successful & remembered, freestyle acts was Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam, produced and assembled by the famous NYC crew Full Force; although they are most remembered for their #1 hits “Head to Toe” and “Lost in Emotion”, it’s this debut single which has never let me go, eternal favorite to the pop-n-lock set and all around explosion of bump. Puerto Rican power baby!
from the LP Party Your Body, BCM Records, 1988
The farmer’s market in this area is already in full swing, and we walked out of there yesterday with a veritable feast of goodies---we’ve learned that you have to get there early if you want some farm-fresh eggs, as they are the first to go, and for good reason! If you like eggs, there is really no going back once you’ve tasted the thick, school-bus orange orb of awesomeness that is the over-easy yolk of one of those farm-fresh eggs. The majority of the produce on sale just came out of the ground the day before and is organic, so it’s as unsullied & tasty as it gets, but there is so much more on offer when you dig around: figgy olive tapenade, fresh honeyed yoghurt, local mead, apple cider, homemade soaps, baked breads, banana empanadas, even all-natural rib-eyes from a nearby ranch of Scottish Highlanders that are some of the tastiest steaks I’ve ever had outside of restaurants. Spring time is fantastic for walking around outside in the mornings, the warm sun kept firmly in check by a persistent cool breeze, the aroma of lilacs and irises teasing your nose, and dreadlocks everywhere… well, in this area anyways. Stevie B was basically unopposed as king of the freestyle beats, considering the whole genre was dominated by, um, women; frankly, it was a wise move on his part (the Jheri-curl mullet he’s rocking on the cover notwithstanding), and he had a string of dance hits in the late ‘80s as the scene was winding down. No matter how far away life takes me from Florida, I will never loose my love for that Miami bass sound. Word.
from the 12” single, Epic Records, 1988
Okay, confessional time for a second here, I thought this track was the joint for a hot second back in the day---for real, you couldn’t go anywhere without hearing this pumping from speakers up & down the beach: from bars, clubs, car stereos, radio stations, you name it. For the longest time I had no clue who had sung it, until the wonders of the internet solved everything for music obsessives like myself, and it wasn’t surprising to find out that the singer, one Nicole McCloud, had actually been earning her stripes in the dance music underground for a few years before this single dropped. I still can’t put my finger on exactly what I like about this track; I mean, it’s a pretty basic beat, but that sub-bass really rolls hard, and all the flashy effects which normally dry out new jack swing cuts work together flawlessly here for some reason. Plus, you can’t fuck with the fierce turquoise, bull fighting-ish outfit that she’s rocking on the cover!
from the 12” single, Jam Packed Records, 1984Radio stations come and go, but the truly magnificent ones will always linger on in the collective memory, and if you happened to grow up around southwest Florida in the ‘80s, from Ft. Myers to Naples, Lazer 93.5 is just that kind of cherished artifact; among the many memories I have attached to this station, their weekly spinning of this song right as work & school would let out on Fridays, as a declaration of ‘TGIF’, has stuck with me more than any other. Unfortunately, the story behind the singer of this track is not a terribly happy one: being overweight and only 16 years old at the time of this release, Debbie Deb was taken advantage of by producer ‘Pretty’ Tony Butler, receiving no royalties on the cut and being replaced by a thinner imposter for touring purposes back in the ‘80s; however, she tours today with freestyle reunion shows, and she has been oft-quoted as saying that it was completely worth getting ripped off, for sake of being put on wax at all---go figure.
from the 12” single, Emergency Records, 1984
While she’s only remembered by the masses for her biggest hit “Let the Music Play”, singer Shannon (born Brenda Shannon Greene) actually unleashed a string of 12” singles in the mid ‘80s, all of which received lots of play in dance clubs at that time. Her booming vocals commanded your attention, and Chris Barbosa’s production behind the scenes laid the foundation for what became known as freestyle; it’s damn near impossible to resist those stuttered Casio-beats and gnarly synthscapes! The influence her tunes had over the rave-based breaks scene in Florida cannot be overstated---crews such as K5 and Rabbit in the Moon owe this style a heaping debt of gratitude. Now that I have an actual mini-beach in my backyard I don’t have to pine for the sand between my toes when I hear this stuff…woo-HOO!
from the 12” single, Cutting Records, 1986
A synthesis of electro beats, Miami-bass, and sugary-sweet pop melodies, “freestyle” was a genre of dance music which lasted only a short time in the mid – late ‘80s, but if you happened to lived in NYC or where I grew up in southern Florida, it was the hottest shit pumping out of the radio back then (r.i.p. Lazer 93.5)! In fact, to this day, I am totally convinced the reason why Florida rave kids were always so obsessed with big phatty breaks more than any other genre of beats was due to us all being fully saturated with this stuff. I have to admit, some of the studio effects haven’t aged terribly well, but that Miami-bass still puts the thump in your trunk, both literally and figuratively; listening to this now, I can almost taste the saltwater in the air at the beach…
from the 12” single, The Summer Records, 1986
