Evolution of Dance Music scene in Ireland

TheCardHolder

Hi guys,

I'm a final year student currently writing a thesis on the evolution of dance music in Ireland. Hope you don't mind me posting this.

I'm looking at how the scene has changed over the past 20 years. I've already got a lot of information on the current scene in terms of the big promoters/current underground parties going on.

What I'm lacking is information on the beginnings of Dance Music in Ireland, particularly when the first raves kicked off. I'll really appreciate if anyone on this forum has any information on this or stories/information on a particular era of the Dublin dance scene they were participants in or links to articles about anything relevant to this research. As well as that, I'd love some opinions on the current scene in Dublin today.

The research I've got so far is really interesting and once I'm finished I'll gladly share the finished document with anyone interested.


Thanks in advance.

jonnny68

TheCardHolder wrote: »

Hi guys,

I'm a final year student currently writing a thesis on the evolution of dance music in Ireland. Hope you don't mind me posting this.

I'm looking at how the scene has changed over the past 20 years. I've already got a lot of information on the current scene in terms of the big promoters/current underground parties going on.

What I'm lacking is information on the beginnings of Dance Music in Ireland, particularly when the first raves kicked off. I'll really appreciate if anyone on this forum has any information on this or stories/information on a particular era of the Dublin dance scene they were participants in or links to articles about anything relevant to this research. As well as that, I'd love some opinions on the current scene in Dublin today.

The research I've got so far is really interesting and once I'm finished I'll gladly share the finished document with anyone interested.


Thanks in advance.

If you ask in the old skool thread there are many of us who have been around since the beginning of the scene in Ireland.

EarlERizer

Here's something for your viewing pleasure .....flyers from all over the country from bitd

http://picasaweb.google.com/dublinclubflyers

The spring from which the scene evolved would be Sides I'd imagine,while there was always dance clubs/nightclubs Sides would have been the front runner in bringing the Detroit & Chicago sounds to Dublin in the mid to late 80's

To use the term 'dance music' is too general a term as there are several branches to that tree, you'd need to chart the evolution of the genres and follow their paths & timelines to get anything close to accurate.

You'd fare better to talk to some of the pioneers of the scene, Francois (of UFO fame) is a regular on the oldskool thread, theres also Jay Carey (Asylum legend) who visits from time to time amongst others....or you could hunt them down on Farcebook,they're all on there as well as a lot of us burnouts,casualties & geriatrics

For myself I was only a teenybooper in the late 80's so my first taste of "dance music" was in places like The Apartments (teenager club with charty dance music of the time) or Apple Annies over on the quays (anyone who remembers that place will recall the narrow doorway & the wide bouncers lol...and them fookin stairs!)
........ then around 1990 it was 'La Mirage' on Sackville place which closed down for a short time before opening again as the now legendary 'Asylum' .....it was during or around the time of 'La Mirages' hiatus that I went to The Olympic ballroom for my first 'rave' experience.....and from there it was everywhere & anywhere that was playing this 'new' music.

The Mansion house, G1 up in Phibsboro (a proper warehouse rave feel if ever we had it),another place over the northside that a guy called Latin Wolff played in and Christian Coates....there was also Gravity @ Sides, the UFO nights,the SFX,the Tivoli and then other lesser known underground spots dotted about the place placing host to every style or genre

Once the law of the land cottoned on to what was going on n came down hard on places with licences been revoked, refused or denied the scene transitioned into a more sterile affair,while still bringing the music but with an almost nightclub like policy of neat dress code & an emphasis on selling alcohol (an almost foreign substance in the listed above) The Temple Theatre,The Ormond,The Kitchen,The System,Red Box off the top of my head......meanwhile the more "regular" nightclubs were becoming more 'dance music' orientated in order to attract the punters but still only playing the more commercial or chart type stuff!.

that's enough from me for now

see also http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=268391 & http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056438508 .....

SEANYBOY1

Excellent post by Earlyriser above. My introduction to the scenen was the Olympic Ballroom on Pleasant Street which has since been turned into apartments. A large hall with seating around the dance floor and a balcony sorrounding the whole dance floor. With a capacity of about 1,500 this venue was truely amazing with its legendary lazer light system and excellent sound system, 1992-1994 was its peak. A new generation was born into this brand new sub culture. I have never since experienced anything like it since

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-zaDCZT3PE

Is mise le key

Few of us have ever had the experience of a truly euphoric state, where our mind shifts up a gear & a new realm of existence is suddenly visible. Your mind is spinning so fast that you rise up, above everyday life, and suddenly everything you are embroiled in day to day & passes you by is laid out below you in crystal clarity. But such moments are all too brief & hard to come by & are truly a privilege to the person to have ever been so lucky to have had conditions around create such a perception changing state come their way. Then we fall back into chaos again being fed & inundated with images & messages of what we want, what we like, what we feel, and you are hungry for those brief moments of clarity to remove you from the attempted brainwashing that is more than prevalent everyday. It seems as if there are two realms of existence, one grounded in our ordinary consumer driven, image conscious, self absorbed lives, and another high above in an upper dimension of omnipotence & omniscience. This state of perception altering existence is what the bottom floor of the ASYLUM created & is something that will remain with me forever.

ianuss

Did you just pick words randomly out of a dictionary?

Is mise le key

You wouldnt understand Kemosabe

im invisible

something for your mind, your body, and your soul,

it's the power to arouse curiousity,
the Purpose
the goal which one acts on,
a journey of force, hot like the sun and wet like the rain,
rhythmatic movements in unison with others
prolong an act of sensation with no limits or boundaries.

eternity is past

Wrong is right

it's the point of greatest intensity
pleasures of the highest sense,
feelings of warmth and security,
willing and unwilling sensations of the mind,

a condition

the ultimate seduction...

....The Realm

EarlERizer

Something to arouse & indulge
for those who indentify ourselves as 'them',
to want,just to want more,
observe,witness the begining of the end,
a clear line of known beats in time,
a right to be wrong,
storming impulses take you to a fusion of marvelous pleasure,
hard excitement engages inner curiousity,
lost in thought,submission to an aura of emotional lust,
dominating powers entice the realms of reason,
tied & bound only to to fulfill self enfused pleasure,
without control.

Help us!

We are just Slaves to the Rave!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igkvjU-MBbw

ThirdMan

SEANYBOY1 wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-zaDCZT3PE

Raging I wasn't around in the 90's.

Is mise le key wrote: »

Few of us have ever had the experience of a truly euphoric state, where our mind shifts up a gear & a new realm of existence is suddenly visible. Your mind is spinning so fast that you rise up, above everyday life, and suddenly everything you are embroiled in day to day & passes you by is laid out below you in crystal clarity. But such moments are all too brief & hard to come by & are truly a privilege to the person to have ever been so lucky to have had conditions around create such a perception changing state come their way. Then we fall back into chaos again being fed & inundated with images & messages of what we want, what we like, what we feel, and you are hungry for those brief moments of clarity to remove you from the attempted brainwashing that is more than prevalent everyday. It seems as if there are two realms of existence, one grounded in our ordinary consumer driven, image conscious, self absorbed lives, and another high above in an upper dimension of omnipotence & omniscience. This state of perception altering existence is what the bottom floor of the ASYLUM created & is something that will remain with me forever.

Delighted I wasn't around in the 90's.

Is mise le key

ThirdMan wrote: »

Delighted I wasn't around in the 90's.

Im delighted you wernt around in the 90's also

ThirdMan

Is mise le key wrote: »

Im delighted you wernt around in the 90's also

I deserved that. :P

Ah no, I get what you're saying. I'm a little bit younger than you, but I feel the same about my own 'coming of age.' My first experiences would have been at festivals. So things were a bit commercial, and maybe a little impersonal at times. But walking into the Bugged Out! Arena in Creamfields at 16 years of age was an incredible experience. And then later that Summer at Witnness. The dance tent packed to the roof. Pounding house and techno. All sorts of people going crazy. Young girls in hot pants. Middle aged guys in suits. And me in the middle of it. I didn't know what had hit me. I still don't.

tricky D

Started big time in 1988 carrying over from what was going on in London during the acid house explosion that summer. Sides was around for a while before that, but 88 was when it started getting legs. Thought there are many versions of the history.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=63455431&postcount=8134
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=67312181&postcount=104

and elsewhere in those threads

blues guitar man

Started for me around 97/98??was giving out to me brother for a long time about this thumping music,and the stuff they took that went hand in hand with it,i was a long haired rocker at the time,then for some unknown reason,i headed out with the to see tony de vit in the ormund..armed with 3 emails in my pocket..what happened was life changing...it blew me away...i then sold me guitar,bought 1210s,and got me hair cut...lol...to many savage nights to name them all,but bot homelands were out of this world,greenvelvet at creamfields when he played live and not a dj set,and every time ive seen carl cox..which i think is around 15 times,mind blowing...esp when he had his ultimate base night over at the temple theatre..jim masters backed him up..green velvet was also meant to back him up but something happened velvets gear,so instead he just done MC over carl cox set...savage...oh and to think we seen richie hawtin in a small room in mosney...lol...all fantastic years,some major experiances..ive went to a few gigs lately,and they just dont give out the same vibe..or maybe im getting old...lol...

barneysplash

Here's a great 40 minute long audio documentary from RTE called "House" :

http://player.fm/series/documentary-on-one-rte-documentaries/house

From the website:

"In the early 1990's, dance music in Ireland was a strictly word-of-mouth
thing with virtually no 'rave' music played on the radio. It was a scene based
on insider knowledge of clubs and music. This story looks at the birth of the
rave culture in Ireland"

Would be very interested to read your finished thesis.

Good luck with your studies

I8A4RE

Check out the Sir henrys documentary on youtube. It may help you with ur thesis.

Is mise le key

blues guitar man wrote: »

...oh and to think we seen richie hawtin in a small room in mosney...lol......

Was in a small room in mosney during homeland meself & it was banging, hadnt a notion who was playing, could very well have been the same room, couldnt tell you the time, i would guess between 5 & 8 sometime i would have been in there, spent most of my time up on the ledge in front of the speakers as you entered the lush tent, that was one amazing rave in that tent, half the light rigging came down from the ceiling due to people climbing on it at one stage into the crowd which wasnt great but the rave went on.

If i remember correctly (used to remember vividly), the final tune played in the Lush tent was Papau New Guinea, what a feeling of pure ecstasy rushed through me i cant explain, it was quite a while since i had felt like that & marked homelands for me as one of the greatest big raves that was ever held, the entire buzz was completley de-void of any commercialisation, beautiful.

zoid

sounds like an interesting project.

i got into electronic music when I was 15 in 1994. Decal and D1 were big influences. First rave i went to was at The Octagon in Wicklow around 1995. One of the first times I went clubbing I saw Sven Vath playing at the The System on South Anne Street. That was around 97 when he played incredible techno and electro. me and my mates taped his BBC essential mix from that time and listened to it probably 100s of times. i listened to it the other day, still sounds great! there's loads of Roman Flugel tracks, Alter Ego, Acid Jesus, Soylent Green.

from 96 onwards me and my mates used to go to raves in Co Clare, often organised by Liam O'Brien who turned them into Leechrum festival years later, and then Sliabh an Iarainn Music and Arts Festival.

My friend Alan Dobbyn played some of the best DJ sets i ever heard at one of the dodgiest clubs ever, The 13th Floor on O'Connell St, and then at The Kitchen's tuesday night club Genius.

I went to The Funnel club a lot in 98, 99. Played my first live sets there at D1's Model One night and then Decal's night Phunk City. Heard many incredible sets there, some that come to mind are Cosmic Commando, Cylob, Autechre, Speedy J, Anodyne. Alan O'Boyle's DJ sets.

was a great time for electronic music in Dublin.

zoid

http://www.johnbraine.com/music/words/history-of-dublin-clubbing.html


very short but interesting article there.

blues guitar man

I8A4RE wrote: »

Check out the Sir henrys documentary on youtube. It may help you with ur thesis.

crazy...what a place...some fantastic nights in that club..sad to say and i used to run folk down for saying this,but its no where near the same anymore when ya go clubbing..as i say my first dip into the scene was tony de vit in the ormund,although i didnt get into the "hardhouse" sound in any big way that was some night,that place was nuts..and when i look back i was glad to have heard him..but some gigs in the redbox were also mind blowing...theres just so many good nights..ah maybe its just old age now...lol...or them nights are catching up..but the whole scene sucked me in,i lived for dance music,every week pete tongs essential mix was a must,tape deck on the ready to record..oh and aslo,.for anyone that wants to catch a great set check dave clarkes set from euro dance 1997,im near sure djs were beamed to each club??david holmes was in dublin,carl cox in liverpool,and dave clarke in fuse club..dave carkes set was fantastic,and easy to track down...here it is.....set hold some class memorys for me

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2v_Fdz0J3c

Is mise le key

zoid wrote: »

My friend Alan Dobbyn played some of the best DJ sets i ever heard at one of the dodgiest clubs ever, The 13th Floor on O'Connell St.

Two old friend of mine played in there, dave mooney & anto hoey, never went in meself as i was devoted to the Asylum, Sides, Waterfront & Ormond which by the time they had all run there course the 13th floor was also done.

Used to go back to a converted long shed in the early hours mind you that dave & anto would be back playing in, all painted walls & white sheets hanging from roof, strobe light & plenty of strong narcotics.

Would play into the middle of the next day in the middle of a housing estate, was great times, have a few recordings somewhere, first time i heard this track was in that shed spun by dave about 95,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYD2meGdj-c

Thanks to aceberg for giving me the ID on it a good while back.

spitfireIRL

Great idea for a thesis OP, I'd love to read that also when you're finished!

zoid

Is mise le key wrote: »

Two old friend of mine played in there, dave mooney & anto hoey, never went in meself as i was devoted to the Asylum, Sides, Waterfront & Ormond which by the time they had all run there course the 13th floor was also done.

Used to go back to a converted long shed in the early hours mind you that dave & anto would be back playing in, all painted walls & white sheets hanging from roof, strobe light & plenty of strong narcotics.

Would play into the middle of the next day in the middle of a housing estate, was great times, have a few recordings somewhere, first time i heard this track was in that shed spun by dave about 95,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYD2meGdj-c

Thanks to aceberg for giving me the ID on it a good while back.

that shed sounds wicked!

is that the Dave Mooney who runs the Funky Seomra night now?

darced

This post has been deleted.

a148pro

ThirdMan wrote: »

Ah no, I get what you're saying. I'm a little bit younger than you, but I feel the same about my own 'coming of age.' My first experiences would have been at festivals. So things were a bit commercial, and maybe a little impersonal at times. But walking into the Bugged Out! Arena in Creamfields at 16 years of age was an incredible experience. And then later that Summer at Witnness. The dance tent packed to the roof. Pounding house and techno. All sorts of people going crazy. Young girls in hot pants. Middle aged guys in suits. And me in the middle of it. I didn't know what had hit me. I still don't.

You see you'll get everyone saying 'ah it was much better back in the early 90's, clubs are crap now etc etc' but in reality everyone's initiation is as good as the previous one. Maybe in the very early days the fact that you were in a club with so many people who were just experiencing something completely different for the first time would have upped the intensity but for the most part it'd be as good for everyone. The music is also a lot better now and Bugged out wouldn't have been a bad place to start.