Red Alerts were sirening off all over the west of the country as Storm Darragh battered the bruised country into further submission. Luckily humans are hardy and the first event for our new organisation east Devon Soul went off. It was great to see such a lovely eclectic bunch of people enjoying Grammy nominated Acantha Lang at the Marine Theatre, a last minute change from the embattled Seaton Gateway. It was a beautiful night and we at East Devon Soul will be running many more events over the next few years. We see soul music as all music that comes from the soul. So it will be hip hop, funk, latin, jazz, pop, rock, jungle, electronic dance and of course soul. We are also planning a big event in July 2026 so news will be passed around when details have been defined through the first part of next year.
We are really looking forward to developing music in and around East Devon, providing high quality music for all.
I have been on a journey writing my second book for what has probably been about a year now. Everyday I get up at 6am and write for an hour, letting my unconscious lead me, a time where the troubled mind has yet to arrive, a pure blank canvas. Today the sign of prosperity and hope arrived:
I try to ignore milestones, just write and then later edit, allowing the flow to take control. These are the words as I passed 88888
Dancing is a way of staying fit without the conscious effort. In fact I sometimes go to a dance fit class at my local gym, where I am the only bloke. It’s a tough class that makes me laugh. Some people have been attending for years, creating their own mini scenius, joy unbound. Dancing with friends to great mixes, DJ’s who are really taking the group on a journey that resonates, reinforcing your connection to your friends, the feeling that you are in the best place in the world, the only space that matters at that time. You rely on the DJ and dancing, remembering those special moments when DJ and audience combined in rapturous harmony. DJ Rod Davies at the New Milton Town Hall in 1981 spinning early Depeche Mode or Heaven 17; the Unity St club in Bristol, 1986, water dripping from the ceiling to the deep dark underworld of the Dug Out; the Whirl-y-Gig at Womad festival, connecting world and electronic music in the open air; the Blue Note, Hoxton of course, a tunnel of love; Planet Shroom or Megadog, adding a large dose of psychedelics; to DJ Woodies mix at tiny, personal GrassRoots festival, a cohesive and reaffirming experience, taking you on a journey through pop, country, soul, hip hop, grime and dubstep with a drum and bass base. Dancing outside has a liberating and fresh feel. It feels right and celebratory of the earth rather than being surrounded by man-made objects. Everyones feet resonating with the ground and the earth coming back with its reflective vibrations. Dancing with stars flying over a Cornish sky, meteorites flashing occasional trails through the milky way. A unique feeling of connection with the world which the warmth of the English summer or paddling on a Thai beach can create. The collaborative flow between people who might have just met, each with their own small groups of mates sharing the love, all coming together, right now, over me. The rave, protest march, tube train on the first day back at work, the football crowd celebrating a last minute winner for the home team, watching a film at the cinema where the audience all gasp at the plot twist, a simultaneous flow., like traffic in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam, interconnecting mopeds, each with individual lives and experiences circling around each other. They never seem to touch, let alone crash, in a whirlwind of impossibility millions of bikes head off in their individual directions for a common goal. Everyone going somewhere, existing, milling around.
Musicologist Sophie Zehetmayer explores elements of music that resonate with the world. The social rhythm which we all undertake in our own unique ways, like the moped riders of Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam, out on their own journeys without ever intersecting with each other, kept apart by constantly blaring horns. Social rhythm connects to our working hours, economic laws, and daily scheduling. Affect and political power, representation, the body. Hate, fear, shame, disgust or happiness perhaps, aligning to affect and rhythm as theorised by Sarah Ahmed. From the Body to being embodied. SENSATION. The name of a life changing exhibition of Young British Artist’s work at the Royal Academy in London. A shark cut in half and preserved in formaldehyde. An artist can be a sensation, coming through the ranks to be a star, but also it is about how the work resonates, its sensory connections to our thoughts and feelings. Bodies replicate, take the shape of the movement, of the collective over time, morphing, changing due to feedback, resolution, and through repetition. I see this as connecting to the knobs and sliders of an electronic synthesiser, a machine which originally was trying to replicate traditional sounds but became its own instrument, with variances between makes and models due to the filters and routing of sound, the materials and the way they have been used. ADSR – attack, sustain, delay and release. Something which sounds like an operational delivery for a war machine but also to cybernetic concepts of organism. The five steps of operation in cybernetic systems: goal activation, action selection, action, outcome interpretation, goal comparison. A manmade instrument and social system in perfect harmony. Standing over a synthesiser, patching cables between the various sections so you can create your own unique sonic: oscillators vibrating, generating the raw triangular or square sound waves, which can be mixed and then filtered through cut off and resonance before being shaped by the ADSR. Synthesisers, like samplers and AI, were meant to ruin music, take away the role of the true musician but have become essential tools that vibrate with the intensity of society. The use of synths in modern dance music highlights the deep emotions they generate, where filter sweeps can take resonant sounds into the bodies of masses, vibrating core frequencies of ecstasy. In these moments we are connected, at one with the world and those around us, the tribe dancing to the same beat. Simplicity, repetition and movement. Forgetting the troubles of the world around us but just connecting on the same level. The social sonic.
Just before the onset of those traditional festivities where families argue or try and flick an After Eight from forehead to mouth without using fingers, I am speaking about connections between punk and jungle music genres at the wonderful Punk Scholars Network conference.………
Punk is timeless and extends beyond the year zero late 1970s definition and identification in which it is commonly held. In connecting to other time points and genres I interpret jungle as a genre which combines many of the same elements, reflecting on the wider connotations of punk, stepping into the Hardcore Continuum identified by music journalist Simon Reynolds which led through techno, jungle, drum and bass, dubstep, and grime.
Key elements of punk and jungle show equivalence:DIY, creative emancipation, postmodern eclecticism of genres, dole and squatting, technological shifts, subcultures, resetting the music landscape, minimalism, anyone can be a musician, pirate radio, delivering an original sonic difference. Visual arts also played a key role as jungle initially connected with graffiti whereas punk defined new fashion, emerging from Dada and art inspired spaces. Punk and jungle resonated sonically, music that is dynamic, danceable, and fluttered speaker membranes.
Every scene, or scenius (the genius of certain scenes – thanks Brian Eno), cooperative genius needs a key instigator to push it forward so within punk, managers Bernie Rhodes and Malcolm McLaren forged the scene whereas jungle was led by its musicians, specifically Goldie or Roni Size in London and Bristol respectively. Community spaces including key venues, rehearsal and recording studios also supported and defined both scenii (scenius in plural), from the Roxy to the Blue Note.
Acknowledging the punk continuum in preceding genres such as jungle, reduces retrospection and highlights future punk infused possibilities for popular music scenes related to inner city modern life.
Come along, its the most fun you can have in any conference anywhere ever!
