Beyonce’s new album, Renaissance, is consciously ingrained in the history of dance music, with decades of samples such as 1970s Donna Summer and Chic disco, Jamaican dance halls, and Internet-speed hyperpop. The sound is skillfully incorporated. She chose collaborators, references, and even specific keyboard sounds to pay tribute to Clubland’s memories, while making her own statement in her 21st century. Here are some of the sources she celebrates and a quest for their importance.
The second and third tracks of the album, “comfortable” When “Alien Superstar” Screenplay and producer by Chicago-born house music DJ and producer Honey Dijon. “Cozy” also includes the copyright of Curtis Alan Jones, known as Cajmere or Green Velvet, one of Chicago’s largest producers of house music.
That locale is important here. Chicago is the birthplace of house music, and the Chicago house in particular often moves with very clear swings, accentuated by the staccato bass pattern of octave jumps.A regular example is Adonis’s “No Way Back” Since 1986, and baseline “comfortable” Plays like a flip of it. This song is almost memorable as an early Chicago house, without just sounding like a homage.
upon “Alien Superstar” Hook’s rhythm (“I’m too classy for this world / forever I’m that girl”) is due to the interpolation of Right Said Fred’s dance floor novelty smash. “I’m too sexy.” Taylor Swift borrowed the same part (including credits) on the 2017 track “Look What You Made Me Do” and Drake on the 2021 “Way to Sexy” 1992 song. Was sampled.
I have another direct callback “Cuffit”: The baseline is immediately recognizable as a descendant of Bernard Edwards’ monster riff. Chic “Good Times” Recorded the number one hit in 1979, Chic Edwards partner Nile Rodgers is honored for writing and playing the guitar here. (About bass and drums: Raphael Saadiq.) As Ken Burns pointed out in the liner notes, “Disco Years Vol. 4: Lost in Music,” Rhino Records editing, and Chic rewriting were especially early hip-hop. Through hip-hop and post-disco R & B, it became a kind of national entertainment in the early 1980s.Of this version 1, 2, 3 (remaining) Thank you for rewriting as many “Good Times” as the original Sugarhill Gang “Rapper’s Delight” And Bourne Mason “Bounce, rock, skate, roll” for example.
“energy” Featuring writing and production from EDM festival superstar Skrillex to the early 2010s, known for his drops (a dramatic accumulation of fresh beats), he’s mainly staged since his heyday. I work behind the scenes. (See Justin Bieber’s 2015 Smash “Where are you now,” He made it with Diplo. ) “Energy” seems to work with wires. A tense minimalism with a supple layer of sub-bass tones.
The song also includes composition credits for Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo, a duo of Neptunes’ songwriting and production known for working with a wide range of singers and rappers since the 1990s. On Thursday, prior to the release of “Renaissance,” singer-songwriter Kelis said on social media that these credits were for one sample of her song (in the 2003 “Milk Shake” interpolation). It turned out to be), and she did not permit its use. Kelis wasn’t a credited writer or producer on most of her early albums in The Neptunes, and didn’t even have a “milkshake” credit.and 2020 Interview with Guardian She said she signed a contract with the duo when she was “too young and stupid to reaffirm.”
A similar situation occurred with the lead single on the album. “Break My Soul” This is due to the central Korg motif of Robin S.’s pop house hit “Show Me Love”. However, it was initially unclear if her 1992 remix was sampled, and credits shifted in the first week of song release. (In the latest version, Beyonce’s song says “Show Me Love” “contains elements.”) The post-mortem world of Robin S.’s song is solid. The riff appeared in 2019 by Brooklyn producer AceMo. “Where are they?” Featuring John FM, an important underground dance national anthem before and during the pandemic, and in recent releases Charli XCX When Daddy Yankee..
Another key to “Break My Soul” is the scream of recommendation by New Orleans bounce artist Big Freedia, previously sampled by Beyonce in “Formation” (2016). !”)is. Bounce is a dance music style raised in New Orleans that is dazzlingly fast, bass-focused, and emphasizes call and response. Twerking appeared accordingly.
Beyonce looks back on the late 90’s “Plastic Off the Sofa.” Most of the songs are lush digital ballads, but the coder has moments that may have come from “glitch” experimental electronica. There, the tail of the vocal run is heavily overdubbed and deliberately audible edits are made. It’s jarring, but almost humorous — it exposes one aspect of listener-sounding winks, a high-tech production of modern pop. (See Oval’s album for an example from the 90’s. “94diskont,Or edit “Click + cut” Released in 2000. )
Classic disco claims itself at the midpoint of the album. “Virgo’s Groove” It features undulating percussion, synthesizer, and bass layers that update Quincy Jones’ work with Michael Jackson. This is a type of Daft Punk companion work. “Get lucky.” “Move,” The next track contains Grace Jones features. For those who wonder where Beyonce came from, it’s the disco royal family.
Just as notable in “Move”, and even more prominently in “America Has a Problem”, it’s a swarming low-end known as “wreath-based” in the dance world. This term is a reference to the 1988 record. Reese’s “Just Want Another Chance”One of the many aliases used by Kevin Saunderson, one of the first producers identified in Detroit techno in the mid-1980s.
Just as “Chicago House” refers not only to style and its birthplace, but also to the swaying octave hopping sound, “Detroit techno” tends to represent an aura of attention to detail and restless invention. The dense foggy low end of “Just Want Another Chance” was often reused by London bass music styles such as jungle, drum’n’bass, UK garage, and dubstep. This is what writer Simon Reynolds calls the “Hardcore Continuum” of the Black British musical. Urban style rooted in London pirate radio.
Beyonce’s use of heavy, wavy wreath bass on “Move” and “America Hasa Problem” further puts the album in a continuum of black dance music. The “problem” also begins with orchestral puncture wounds, Afrika Bambaata, and Soulsonic Force’s groundbreaking electronic rap track. “Planet Rock” — Or Janet Jackson’s “Rhythm Nation”, given the title and lyrical theme more appropriately.
“heating” Beyonce takes the form of a neo-dancehall on a heavy groove in a sexy wood block. At the end of the song, he mentions tapping the MPC, an instrument designed by Roger Linn, who arrived in 1988. Akai’s MPC is not a keyboard, but a square. A grid of pads that trigger a variety of sounds, making it a wide range of composition and performance tools.
“chic” The sub-genre’s inflated bass and variable tempo sound like something that would have been across the dubstep dance floor for the days before Skrillex, which was primarily the state of British producers.Sure enough, the credits for writing and producing songs include artists influenced by those musicians: Chaunsey Hollis Jr., also known as Hit-Boy, produced. Hits influenced by dubstep About Jay-Z and Kanye West’s “Watch the Throne” (2011).
The sound of clay for statues “chic” Segue synthesized heavier “Everything in my heart” Co-produced by the London label and the flagship AG Cook behind art collective PC music, it appeared in the mid-2010s with a stylish exaggerated sound. Deliberately squeak. (Producer Sophie, known for his exhilarating hyperpop, who died in 2021, came from this camp.) “All Up” is a futurist robot pop that snorkels under the speaker rather than emanating from it. It looks like it is.
“Pure / Honey” Next to the end is another subbus monster. The first part is a surprising approximation of the most steel, or perhaps the most “pure” techno, propelled by a nasty kick drum. “Honey” will appear with a 2:11 mark. This is a bulbous neo-disco groove with feather-like horns, which I remember early on. SylvesterThe track runs partially from a sample of Kevin Aviance’s song with subtitles “That feeling” — One of the key recordings of the queer house substyle known as the “Bitch Track”.
The last song of the album, “Summer Renaissance” It features Beyonce singing “Very good, very good, very good, very good” on a very familiar pinball riff — yes, the finale interpolates Donna Summer. “I feel love” The 1977 disco was a hit with an all-synthesist background and pulsating rhythm that predicted the future sound of dance music. However, the main melodic phrase of “I Feel Love” sounds like it’s being played on the Korg keyboard that holds “Break My Soul” in place, subtly linking the two eras to the third era.
