Talk About Party Lights
In the dawn of the 80's the sound and culture of dance music shifted much as it had in the mid 70's. Just as disco grew out of funk, boogie morphed out of the disco sound. Boogie really was the perfect blend of the two genres. Much like disco it was more oriented towards the dancefloor and like funk it was a touch more raw and soulful. 1982 was the year it all gained cohesion, the pinnacle of dance music. This track is a prime example of Boogie's sublime evolution. 
The brainchild of producer/songwriter Donald "Dee Dee" Burnside, First Love were a 4 piece female vocal group formed in 1979. The group released their first single on Dakar in 1980 and switched over to the tiny CBS sub label Chycago International Music for 1981's excellent "It's a Mystery to Me". "Party Lights" would follow in '82 and prove to be the group's finest lazer soul entry. The reverb drenched vocals sit nicely over the gated snare hits, wicked synth lines and an out of order guitar break. I included an edit by Liquid Pegasus. Obviously he had a lot of strong material to work with, but he manages to make an edit thats pretty enjoyable to listen to on its own accord.
Posted by Magnum | 9 comments
Labels: boogie, Donald Burnside, First Love, Lazer Soul, Liquid Pegasus
October 10, 2008 at 6:28 AM
i think that Boogie it's not only the perfect blend between disco and funk, but it's also the perfect mix of acoustic/electric with electronic instrumentation.
And when we have a great track like this, it goes further: it's slow but not sleepy, happy but not silly, it's hook you up but it's not cheesy.
Best of both worlds in every aspect!
October 13, 2008 at 1:30 PM
Totally! I agree 100%. I failed to mention the technology aspect in this post, as innovations in gear and recording techniques proved to be pivotal to Boogie's evolution as well.
October 13, 2008 at 2:59 PM
you are right. and i think that once that this technology innovations became cheaper and accessible to everyone we've had the born of house and techno. And as a friend of mine once said to me, we'll only have another revolution in music when a new technology will born. i agree with him.
November 7, 2008 at 3:16 AM
new technology --> autotune.
the future will be autotuned vocals over boogie beats..
November 7, 2008 at 3:19 AM
This comment has been removed by the author.
November 7, 2008 at 4:11 AM
no, but fo real..
good point about the electric & acoustic combination feeling with boogie, it seemed like people were hooking synths & drum machines up to guitar amps instead of directly into mixing boards, or it seems, using those springy, sloppy reverb and more nat-u-ral sounds..
i like the sloppiness of boogie
November 8, 2008 at 9:39 PM
Thanks for this post, great track! Love hearing Donald Burnside's take on the boogie side of things. I don't have too much of his stuff, but I'm a huge fan of a disco single he was involved with by an act called Air Power (Be Youself/Welcome To The Disco). This track sounds like the perfect update of the sound/concept of the Air Power single.. Thanks again for this!
November 30, 2008 at 8:36 PM
wow! the liquid pegasus edit is AMAZING!
this is great!!
May 7, 2009 at 9:39 AM
Never heard this song until about two years ago. I used to listen to a lot of this kind of music from about 1981 until the early 90s. People who liked this kind of music in the early 80s called it funk, at least in the SoCal region. It was also very much maligned and hated by the majority who still referred to funk as disco. Songs like these were mostly played in nightclubs, not on radio. This music was also very much underground because it was so new, and hardly any radio stations played it except the black-owned ones or dance oriented stations. This is probably why I never heard this song. Unfortunately, I was never able to go to a nightclub in the early 80s because I was a preteen. By the time 1984 came around, I became disgusted with the music scene and at what funk had morphed into with the help of electronic overplay, and the oversimplification and constant, cheap media images of break dancing. Funk had lost its mystique by the end of 1983, yet a few of us were still hoping that it would get out of the rut that it got stuck in after 1983. Now with the help of YouTube, I can relive those exciting times when I would hear an exciting funk song for the first time. I still manage to hear early 80s funk songs that I've never heard before when they were first released, thanks to YouTube. I'm curious about this song's release or around which time it gained popularity. Was it in the earlier part of 1982 or toward the fall/winter of '82?