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Underground > Radio & Music >

Tell me about go go music

01:29 / 19.07.04

I am told there is a musical genre unique to D.C. called go-go. It involves intricate drum and bass beats.

I don't know much else.

Anyone up on this?

08:42 / 19.07.04

It's not drum and bass, it's more like percussive funk. Was big in the mid to late eighties, no idea if it's still going or not. Or why DC sustained this particular form of music. Big bands, lots of emphasis on drums and percussion. Used to get played - over here - alongside Hip Hop. The band par excellence would be Troublefunk, other names I can remember would be Chuck Dixon and the Soul Searchers and EU (Experience Unlimited). I saw Troublefunk in 86 - second gig I ever went to, and they were AWESOME. There's a great live LP of them from this time which often turns up secondhand. The most played non Troublefunk record would be "The Word" by The Junkyard Band on Def jam. Did see a book about Go Go last year but I never picked it up, you can probably track it down via google.

11:57 / 19.07.04

THE, and I do Mean THE, definitive figure in the history and practice of the music called Go-Go is Chuck Brown. His stuff is still available to order and he still performs in D.C. The rhytmic hook of the music is a funked up variation of interlocking latin beats, and then they throw some p-Funk style horns on top. You end up with an all night dance party. I think 'Doing tha Butt' (remeber, from Spike Lee's 'School Daze') is the closest go-go has come to mainstream success. You owe it to yourself to check out go-go further (I'm assuming that you're a nice person who deserves sweaty, funky dancemusic, otherwise disregard this run-on sentence.)

14:54 / 19.07.04

Fuck I had it wrong - Chuck Brown. I'll second that recommedation. He's also got a great live album, and a version of "Boogie On Reggae Woman" which kicks Stevie's ass.