Thinksmart

Indeed, I was thinking the same. It's not for the artist to say a song is 'Northern Soul' as it isn't a genre, it's a discovery or selection by its participants based on some features we all share (but even then there are outliers all the time). The media don't know what they are on about when writing about it and the artist while meaning well, is actually detracting from their chances of adoption by describing it as Northern Soul. Press it up on an old looking label for only a few copies and distirbute them to DJs and see how it goes is more likely than promoting yourself obviously that way. Adoption by 'the scene' can happen of course with more subtlety, remembering Diane Shaw for example. Of course no such issue exists in relation to such as Modern Soul as a related/parallel 'scene' but it does for some others such as Popcorn, you cannot just decide 'I'm Popcorn'...at least I don't think you can.

Headphones are to stop the noise in situations where it is not allowed. It can be either all listen to one DJ or a choice of channels. I have not seen one with everyone in their own individual choices.

There are events outside Manchester locally, so people don't travel into the city so much for Soul now which combine with the bigger national events Dobber mentions. Some of my work is around Chorley, Leyland, Clitheroe etc area and there's a healthy range of local events around there. Manchester has the next Ritz Revival at Easter: https://soulvation.company.site/MANCHESTER-RITZ-50th-ANNIVERSARY-April-20th-2025-ticket-£20-£1-booking-fee-p511094547

I have been to work events with everyone on headphones connected to DJ playing the same music, not of their own choice. Without headphones it is a quiet room of shuffling people. It looks and sounds very odd that way. I am not a fan anyway, I like the music coming from the speakers. There is no shared aspect to it. I just went outside.

I was going off Discogs for Cavaliers which shows it as 66, which must be wrong then. My recollection on Hesitations was in relation to the album release rather than b-side which was a year out. I don't have my Dave Rimmer or Keith Rylatt Detroit books anymore to check there. However, the link is the Pied Piper team and Joe Hunter specifically I hope I was right in saying. Presumably he took his arrangement written for Hesitations and adapted it for Cavaliers session then? Others here may know the detail.

Cavaliers came first in 66, Hesitations a year later. Joe Hunter is the connection, arranged the Cavaliers and co-wrote the Hesitations. I don't have the sleeve notes to hand from Kent Pied Piper CD releases, but they likely explain in more detail. As that production and writing team span both releases. https://acerecords.co.uk/various-artists-pied-piper

Yes I went to early days of Venus there as an underground House club. From about 85-86 outside the Mod scene I left, I was running out of places to hear Soul locally and many had tiny attendances by much older people. I was still too young to get entry to Rock City or Palais nights which were much more age enforced then. House music clubs were easier to get in for a while. By about 87-88 there was little NS, only slick 80s Soul I did not enjoy at the time or House music, which had a similar tempo and underground feel. For a long time I assumed The Dungeon was where Monastery and The Bomb were underground on Bridlesmith Gate. That really did feel like a dungeon. An invite-only tiny Soul night under The Salutation down the many steps in the caves was my most literal Dungeon style event.

I had friends older who went to all the early Midlands and North venues. Lots of memories here from some: https://dungeonmods.wordpress.com/ One friend who was a Wheel, Mojo, Dungeon, Cats go-er loaned me a big series of tapes to copy with the pre 73 Soul and related plays from his collection before his first retirement from the scene (many in that 65-72 era saw Wigan as the end, not the start), which were highly influential to me back in early 90s. I was on the then quite small scene scene but only hearing select oldies and the ace newies of the time. Things were coming back and I used to be an extensive tape swapper (remember that era?), but a lot of early Northern Soul was not being heard outside collections in those retired from going out. Most of these on the tapes my friend loaned me were long gone, very Soulful classics not being played out anymore and yet to be compiled on CD or online later in the decade. These are obvious later such as Bang Bang Man, Mr Soul, Willie Tee, Yum Yum Tree, Bobbi Lynn, Soul Serenade, Bobby Bland etc but felt like a route back to the source back then. I worked out 90% of them over the years but the tapes perished in a storm that damaged our roof so I never found out the rest. The Kent series Cellar of Soul covers it well. Amboy Dukes are intriguing as not the USA band of the same name unless preceded by the word American. The USA named band were Ted Nugent's hard psych-rock band (see 'Journey to the Center if the Mind' as their main song if you do not know it).

Looks to of been a top Mod venue from reading and reports heard later. I know people from here in Notts went.

Lots of wonderful music, In The Basement, Go Go Power, Slip In Mules, Do I Make Myself Clear in addition to Soulful Dress from our early days. A great comp to enjoy: https://www.acerecords.co.uk/go-go-power-the-complete-chess-singles-1961-66 plus more on Brunswick, Galaxy etc. Here You Come Running is a pick from me. RIP and thank you

It is also on the Outta Sight The Northern Soul of VJ CD if anyone wants to hear or obtain it that way.

Dylan still wrote those songs. I'm not against adding to music. I've experimented with music technologies, but it was ultimately me doing it. I've released dance and ambient music, I know the value of the technology. I've also been bored in a studio trying to record a band who cannot get it together. I made ambient music using various AI incarnations with such as Koan and others and while it is 'fine', it lacks. Nobody listens to it. It's hard to put a finger on. "You can get plenty of human connection in other ways than from records" - But I already get it from music and all that comes with it. "Nope - it was about young black Americans having fun making music and trying to make a buck, and (in our case) mostly young white Brits dancing to it and collecting the records. " - but it also expressed those things and so much more, even if it was out for a buck. Shoestring labels paid orchestral sections for the love of getting the music perfect as they heard it. "I love the McKinney Magnetics. They didn't make very many records. If AI can hypothesise as to what else they might have made if they'd had the direction I'm all in. As long as I know it's AI, who loses?" - it might be interesting as novelty, but will you keep listening to it? Who knows, it is inevitable. New albums by the Beatles ...or Darrell Banks? Less than a decade away technically to be any good, it will be interesting to see at what point the public doesn't care about the roots. Artifice and pretend is one thing, artificial is another. Somehow there's a difference to me in Juan Atkins making a futuristic track on basic machinery called Techno Music in 1985 in his bedroom and inspiring a genre along with others and an algorithm needing no interaction to churn out replicant techno endlessly. Will this also cause music to plateau in terms of its evolution? Eventually, who or what pushes it onwards? Anyway, as I envisaged, it seems it is just me and others are comfortable with it. I cannot quite articulate the sense of loss I have impending. It feels odd feeling somehow curious for defending the wonder of what we already have. Surely nobody can think of the artificial copies as equal in quality, but perhaps that doesn't matter to others. I'm not making a judgement, I'm just somewhat surprised at how readily people are in on AI music. Enjoy it I suppose. I'll leave the topic again now, I just wanted to say that not everyone feels the same. I can see it now.... "All AI songs must on original vinyl only" Best wishes all

Frankly this thread has me pretty down, but to add another view point I'll give a contrary range of thoughts. If you're comfortable with AI and Soul music or see it as inevitable, then feel free to scroll past this message entirely. There is loads of new Soul music released that most people at the forum ignore, yet for the articifical clone of the sixty year old sound - AI is starting to be accepted. It seems that so long as it sounds Northern Soul to some, well that's enough. It's not for me. I use AI in my work, I understand it well as a tool. But when we get to the point mentioned above, of AI replicating old Soul and it being good enough to accept, or dance to - well, then I will be completely out. Wasn't Soul music about us as humans finding connection with each other and the music as one? Was it ever really about SOUL for many people, or just stuff to dance to? What's the point of listening to purely AI music? How does it enrich your life or provide comfort? Human connection is the deepest thing we have and at the end, all we were left with. AI techno for dancing, sure - there's a logic there. But music where the warmth of humans writing, playing, creating, orchestrating and producing together is what made it, then for me, AI has no purpose. So what if it sounds like a Roy Hamilton song? It simply isn't. There are musicians and singers all over waiting to engage, to perform. But as is often the case, it will be the easiest route that will lead to an intangible but profound loss we only see later on. It's a machine, it's not just a slippery slope, it's far more. Soon that stuff will become part of the reference engine it is creating from. It'll give you what you want, but be careful what you ask for. Too much (musicial) sugar will rot the teeth. I wouldn't bother too much with the Poll results, people like me just will not engage with it. It's all gone a bit quick towards acceptance for me. Sorry if I sound a curmudgeon, but Soul music is a respite from artificiality and yet here it is in the forum and the thread. The 'it's here, so we need to accept it' line is heinous, of course we don't. We don't accept other things about technology and the online world just because they are inevitably possible. "Good Music will always be the winner, wether it’s humans or Robots who make it" Not for me. What's being ignored here is feel, passion, sweat, groove, connection, talent, craft, skill, care, fury, loss, regret, interaction, synchonicity, dedication, ambition, love - those are feelings and states we need to prize and remember that matter. That are embedded into the music. Think forward, where does this take Northern / Modern Soul or indeed any music like this in ten years time? 'ChatGPT create me a song about society today using The Impressions 'Keep On Pushing'... coming soon What I think doesn't matter, it is going to happen anyway, but it just won't be for me.

I think a little bit of interest is talked up continually way beyond its actual size. If they are happy, that's great but it often feels like hype in the way others report it.

As I have grown older and my Soul music reach has expanded along with other genres, I've come to appreciate Quincy Jones increasingly. Sad to see his passing, but it looks to of been as good as they ever can be.