Soulsides

(Quote from Wikipedia) Popcorn (sometimes Belgian popcorn or oldies popcorn) is a style of music and dancing first established in Belgium in the 1970s and 1980s. The style includes a wide variety of mostly American and British recordings of R&B and pop music made between the late 1950s and mid 1960s, often relatively obscure, and characterised by a slow or medium, rather than fast, tempo. The style has been described by musician and writer Bob Stanley as "possibly the last truly underground music scene in Europe". Also, according to Bob Stanley, "the purity of Belgian Popcorn is its very impurity. R&B, Broadway numbers, tangos, Phil Spector-esque girl groups and loungey instrumentals, they are all constituent parts of a rare, and still largely undiscovered scene". Examples of highly prized popcorn records include "Sweetheart" by Peggy Lee, "Image" by Hank Levine,"Now I Lay Me Down to Weep" by Simone Dina, "The Tingle" by Jackie Weaver, "Who's Got the Action" by Phil Colbert,"Heartless Lover" by Dick Baker, "La Tanya" by Jay Abbott, "Carmelita" by Jeff Lane, "I'm Crying in the Rain" by Major Lance, "You Beat Me to the Punch" by Mary Wells,"Comin' Home Baby" by Mel Tormé, and "Twine Time" by Alvin Cash.

Pink Floyd 8-8-1988 @ Main Road Manchester A spectacular combination of both sound and visuals and hands down the best concert I've ever witnessed. Also seen live shows by Hugh Masekela In 1994 and Gil Scot Heron around 1991 which were both absolutely outstanding. I used to go and watch a lot of Punk bands back in the early 80's but the vast majority of those groups were pretty forgetful live, The Dead Kennedys in 1983 however were something else .. both brutally and uncompromisingly brilliant.

That's pure Soul fire ! ^^^Now this is the main reason why I love this forum. The collective knowledge and experience of the members on the this site is worth its weight in sonic gold every which way you turn.

This thread .. I think we should have a Soul Source poll to decide which one of these versions of 'Don't Make Promises' is the most 'Northern' coupled with a nice friendly non partisan debate in the comments.....hmm, but then again on second thoughts it's a debate that could rage out of control and run forever.. with both disagreement and heartfelt belief, passionate alliances forged and then broken ! Until the next original test pressing of a Frank Wilson 'Do I Love You ' 45 turns up that is.. Pre-Edit Disclaimer: This post was meant to be taken as a joke in content @ the Soul Source community by the way...

Thanks for that info mate, you had my immediate interest there as soon as I saw the marvellous worlds of Mod and Psyche grouped together ! Will have to check that one out..

Seems pretty popular all round this one . Bobby Darin had a shot at it in 66 and Scott McKenzie recorded his version in 67. There's also a cut of the track by 3 Dog Night Lock the thread hehe...

There's this version too by Gary Puckett & The Union Gap.

The Stitch In Tyme New Dawn c/w Don't Make Promises https://www.discogs.com/Stitch-In-Tyme-New-Dawn-Dont-Make-Promises/release/4831977

For me personally The Crow is a good example of a bunch of great sounding musicians with some fine 'chops' from a technical standpoint but 'Your Autumn Of Tomorrow' is a very average sounding track at best in my opinion, whichever genre you want to lump it in with. Definitely more Psyche Rock/Funk than 'Northern' Soul. It's not one that does it for me i'm afraid.

Most inappropriate request to a DJ ? "Can I request that you get off those bloody decks...you're f**king useless mate"...

Yeah sorry I meant Pete Waterman. I was introduced to Pete and the manager of Kylie (whos name escapes me) by a mutual friend who worked on the Top Of The Pops telly program around the time when the Stock,Aitken & Waterman records were selling massively. It was only a brief chat as I mentioned cause they were all on the way to some Italian restaurant in Soho..I did get invited along but I was on my way to meet a girl and couldn't cancel unfortunately. It would have been cool to have chatted some more with him about music production as he came across as a pretty decent down to earth bloke in the admittedly short time I spent in his company.

I once had a brief conversation in the 1990's in a West London boozer with Pete Watermelon and a bloke who was Kylie Minogue's manager about the correct placement of bass and percussion triplets in dance music in order to make the rhythm track groove properly. Interesting chap I thought.

Oh,that looks like my cup of tea for sure.Im always on the lookout for these types of cd's but i've not seen this before...i'll have to check this one out, thanks for posting Russell !

This arrived at the weekend. Its Sir Coxsone's Outernational Sound System presents 'Shock Of The Century' featuring Super Cat, Eek-A-Mouse, Nitty Gritty,Nicodemus and others. It's a pretty cool cd if you're a fan of Jamaican Sound System stuff and definitely one I'd recommend if so. I also got these highly amusing 'Sample Hamsters' from Japan which arrived in the post at the same time (hence the photo) and that repeat the sounds they hear when you press a button on their bellies. I've been.. ahem.. 'teaching' them to swear at the dog and drive it insane much to the wife's annoyance, hehehe.

Agreed. It would actually be somewhat ironic if the track managed to pick up lots of interest through radio play etcetera and became a hit record. Some sort of 'final justification' perhaps after all is said and done ?

Hehe- I was only jesting ..not actually being serious. I quite like the hipsters tbh , it makes me smile when I see those kids buying their vinyl reissues of Bat Out Of Hell or Appetite For Destruction in Tesco's.. I personally hope they actually do go out and buy the Frank Wilson reissue too. Now, where is my cafe latte ?..

Hipsters with their big trendy beards,flat as a pancake 'kung fu' shoes and skinny denim jeans... probably.

This genuinely made me laugh out loud and almost spill my coffee all over my phones screen you bast**d,Pete ! Lololol..

My pleasure,Rick ! Hehe ..I don't need much encouraging to be drawn into a conversation regarding sampling to be honest, it's been a long time fixture in the type of music I like to both make and listen to. I do play several other musical instruments too but my samplers to me are as equally important if not more so than (my for want of a better word) 'real' instruments Here's a great example of how a sampler can be used to it's true creative potential in my opinion. This track was made with just an Akai MPC 60 sampler an eight channel multitrack recorder and a handfull of processing effects. The chopped up drums were made from the intro. drumbreak to Frankie Seay And The Soul Riders 'Soul Food' track. Another one by The Cinematic Orchestra, a band of live Jazz musicians who sample themselves during performances and then chop,rearrange and replay the edited samples to use as the building blocks of their tracks. Also, a collaboration by The Cinematic Orchestra with Fontella Bass whichi I really liked. How the sampler should be used in Hip Hop by the greatest Hip Hop artists of all time in my humble estimation. This was the group that made me aware of how the sampler really could be used in the studio to create something new and spectacular..the Mandrill track 'Two Sisters Of Mystery' is used to great effect in this.

Great thread ! Ok, heres my two cents worth. As a long term beatmaker and producer I sample from records constantly, its also very rare for me to go more than a couple of days without switching my equipment on and working on some music in some form or other. I'll be heading into the studio after the weekend is over for example to put the finishing touches to a 25 minute long composition I've been working on almost every day for the last 4 months and I'm looking forward to hearing the finished results very much. I'm a massive admirer of sample based music and there's some very creative people making some great music this way There's also a lot of garbage being made too i'll be the first to admit. The problem is that the majority of producers who make sample based recordings (both professional and amateur ones) is they are lazy when it comes to 'flipping' and manipulating the samples they use. The fact is sampling, in its most basic of forms is pretty easy to adapt to in terms of it's simplicity and ease of use but the art of 'sample manipulation' is something only very few have truly mastered in my opinion. Anyone can sample a four bar James Brown drum beat and loop it to eternity but not everyone can take those sounds and create a totally new groove with them which is where the true art form lies for myself personally. For a good comparison I like to think of how artists like Public Enemy or DJ Shadow's early output revolutionised Hip Hop with their ground breaking and unconventional approach to sampling and then look at someone like Fatboy Slim looping up a section of 'Sliced Tomatoes' and adding literally nothing to the creative process whatsoever with the samples that they take. Daft Punk are another lazy act who spring to mind ..just go to the Who Sampled.com website and listen to the artists who's work they've sampled ..I can remember hearing those original tracks and thinking, oh, they've not actually gone and done anything special here,which was a major disapointment to say the least. The most important factor is the samples themselves and too many people just use the same dusty old school Soul and Funk samples over and over again that every other producer has used, things like the 'Funky Drummer' and the Skull Snaps 'Its A New Day' break really have been totally done to death and people really ought to be over that shit by now but yet again it seems to come down to laziness and an unwillingness to try and push the boundaries of the art form. I spend a lot of time digging and like to look far and wide and use obscure stuff for my own sample sources because i'm also trying as a producer to develop a 'signature sound' which I think is massively important and not follow the herd of lo-fi beatmakers who have a tendency to sound very alike to one another which is why I don't use obvious loops myself and prefer to build my own custom loops from single 'one shots' and isolated instruments. So yeah, I absolutely love sample based music but its also the same as every other musical genre where there's the really outstanding stuff and a heck of a lot of complete and utter dross also.

harmonica solo@ 07.30

As Steve has stated,what a truly lovely sentiment. That's a beautiful thing you've said there,Pete.

My old next door neighbour Baz was a big fan of Soul , proper R&B etc and was always banging out cool and interesting music ..we would frequently have a beer and a spliff together at weekends, play records and make tapes for each other and stuff. He was a top bloke too but then his missus started seeing another geezer behind his back (one of his so called mates no less) and they split up and Baz moved away and I lost touch with him which was a shame as I liked him,he was a good man who deserved better than that. We've moved house since then and my next door neighbour is a nice enough fella but the polar opposite with terrible taste in music, Queen and Led Zeppelin, Def Leppard, Bon Jovi etcetera..horrible shit basically. He's also a complete piss tank who doesn't work and lives on a diet of those evil black cans of Kestrel super lager and Pot Noodles, hehe. He once played Bohemian Rhapsody 14 times in a row while inebriated on a sunday afternoon which was then followed by Meat Loaf's greatest hits 3 times on repeat .. When I questioned him about it the next day he had absolutely no recollection whatsoever of doing so ! Lololol. So in response to the OP's question. erm, yes and no..

Hehe. The only reason why anyone should allow themselves get in a car with that idiot would be if he was tied up and gagged in the boot...

EDIT . Oops ! Double post !