Dystopian Dance Party

Tag: midnight star

  • Jheri Curl June: Ian Isiah’s “Princess Pouty”

    Jheri Curl June: Ian Isiah’s “Princess Pouty”

    Our final song for Jheri Curl June 2K23 ties together all of our themes from this year. Brooklyn-born Ian Isiah grew up singing in gospel groups; he has collaborated with Blood Orange, and also supported him on tour; and this track, 2020’s “Princess Pouty,” was produced by Chromeo.

    If Blood Orange’s “You’re Not Good Enough” was the more understated funk of early J.C.M., than this song is what I was referring to when I wrote about “big glossy synthesized horns and harder beats.” As an exemplar of Jheri Curl Music, “Princess Pouty” is in the same category as the funky maximalism of Midnight Star’s 1986 album Headlines.

    So that’s it; another Jheri Curl June in the rearview mirror. I know we haven’t been overly consistent these last few years, but next June is JCJ’s aluminum anniversary (yes, I just looked that up), so that pretty much obligates us to do something special. We’ll see you then; in the meantime, enjoy the playlists!

  • Jheri Curl June: Midnight Star’s “Headlines”

    Over the years, we’ve talked a lot about how Jheri Curl Music evolved over the decade: taking on associated sounds like electro and freestyle, before finally being subsumed by the emergence of New Jack Swing. On the other hand, there’s Midnight Star, who continued to plow more or less the same furrow throughout the whole Jheri Curl era: from their breakthrough in 1983 until the departure of creative nucleus, brothers Reggie and Vincent Calloway, three years later. Listen to 1983’s No Parking on the Dance Floor back to back with 1986’s Headlines and you’d be forgiven for thinking they were recorded during the same sessions: pretty much the only thing that changed, in fact, were the group’s actual J.C.’s, which had blossomed from the relatively modest coiffures of the former to the baroque salon lookbook lineup of the latter.

    But hey, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it; and the title track of Headlines shows that, if nothing else, Midnight Star’s signature sound was still good for a decent groove. If we’ve heard these tricks before–right down to Vincent’s Vocodered rap, which sounds copied and pasted from the No Parking club hit “Freak-A-Zoid“–it’s only because they proved so effective the first time around. Just one word of advice: while “Headlines” hardly necessitates a 12″ mix–the damn album track is already almost eight and a half minutes long–it’s still my preferred version, if only because it contains the hilarious breakdown where singer Melvin Gentry demands we “take a memo” and then spends the next 45 seconds rapping the words “type” and “backspace.” Also, Reggie plays a flute solo. Who knew journalism could be so funky?

    We’ll be back tomorrow with more latter-day Jheri Jams. Meanwhile, check out our growing playlists below!

  • Jheri Curl June: Atlantic Starr’s “Love Me Down”

    In the first six years of Jheri Curl June, we’ve had occasion to cover two of what I like to call the “Three Stars” of Jheri Curl Music: Midnight Star and Starpoint. So, now that we’re on year seven, I think it’s past time that we gave Star #3, a.k.a. Atlantic Starr, their due.

    I’ll admit, there’s a reason why it took us so long. Atlantic Starr is my least favorite of the “Three Stars” by some margin; their music, particularly during the peak of their late-’80s crossover success, tended to be softer and more ballad-heavy, verging on adult-contemporary, compared to their similarly-named peers. And yet, as any true Jheri curl connoisseur knows, there’s a time and a place for soft (and wet!). And “Love Me Down” (not to be confused with Ready for the World‘s previously-featured “Love You Down“), from the group’s 1982 album Brilliance, is the perfect companion for those moments when you just want to let your hair down–as much as a Jheri curl will allow, anyway–and unwind. The groove is smooth but still funky, with Sharon Bryant’s sultry vocals mellowing Wayne Lewis’ bass-synth and David Lewis’ rhythm guitar like ice in a glass of cognac. So, Atlantic Starr, welcome to the party; we’re sorry it took us so long to let you in, but it’s a whole lot more chill now that you’re here.

    We’ll be back tomorrow–in the meantime, as always, check out the Spotify and YouTube playlists below!

  • Podcast: Jheri Curl June 2K18

    This year marks our fifth annual Jheri Curl June, and we’re going to make it a thing or die trying. Join us as we define the Jheri Curl Music genre and share our picks for the most essential tracks; then, starting Monday, we’ll formally kick off the month-long celebration of wet, silky ’80s R&B. Oh, and listen all the way to the end, because we also announce the winners of our two free copies of Dystopian Dance Party Issue 1!

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  • Jheri Curl June: Bootsy’s Rubber Band’s “Body Slam”

    When it comes to jheri curl music, Bootsy Collins probably isn’t the first name that comes to anyone’s mind. In fact, he and the rest of the Parliament–Funkadelic cohort were practically the antithesis of the Jheri-Curl ethos: their aesthetic was gritty, not glossy; psychedelic posters and underground comix, not neon and Patrick Nagel; weed and acid, not champagne and cocaine; unapologetically nappy, not permed and activated. But by the early 1980s, Bootsy saw the winds were changing, and gamely incorporated icy synths and sequencers into his trunk-rattling P-Funk sound.

    And, for the most part, the results were as awkward as might be expected. Bootsy’s 1982 album The One Giveth, the Count Taketh Away had its moments, but it wasn’t up to the standards of his work with the Rubber Band in the late ’70s; its use of polished, “modern”-sounding ’80s R&B markers–like the members of Midnight Star, who contributed backing vocals–felt more than a little shoehorned into Bootsy’s raw, “uncut” brand of funk. But have no dear, my fear: Bootsy had at least one bona fide jheri-curl classic up his sleeve in 1982, in the form of the 12″-only release “Body Slam.”

    What’s most remarkable about “Body Slam” is that it’s effectively an extended de/reconstruction of one of The One Giveth‘s weakest tracks: the manic, tiresome, yet mercifully short “Countracula (This One’s for You).” Bootsy salvages it by taking out the shrill call-and-response vocals from Godmama (sorry, ladies) and axing the whole “Countracula” conceit, giving the groove room to breathe and stretching out with some clean, yet indelibly funky bass solos and a muted chicken-scratch guitar riff straight out of Prince‘s Controversy album. If “Countracula” is the sound of an elder statesman of the funk taking a moment to play in the young upstarts’ toybox and not quite grasping how the parts fit together, then “Body Slam” is the sound of that same master coming back, getting his chops up, and showing them all how it’s done.

    Not surprisingly, “Body Slam” was a highlight of Bootsy’s shows on the 1983 Atomic Dog Tour with his longtime mentor and bandleader George Clinton. The sound quality isn’t great, but check out the video below for an extended jam on the song from their Washington, D.C. gig, featuring some generation-spanning synth work by the incredible Bernie Worrell.

    And of course, check below the jump for this and other tracks on our growing Spotify and YouTube playlists. I’m taking the rest of the week off to focus on my other blog; Callie will be back tomorrow and Friday for more Jheri Curl June.

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  • Jheri Curl June: Imaginary Genres – Jheri Curl Music

    It’s finally here! In case you weren’t aware, Jheri Curl June is our most sacred holiday season here at Dystopian Dance Party, and we wanted to do something special for its third annual observance (“Jh3ri Curl Jun3”). So, instead of resurrecting the same hoary old introductory post from 2014, we thought we’d offer a concise introduction to the genre we call Jheri Curl Music in the form of a short video. Please enjoy; transcript and video/audio credits are past the jump. And come back tomorrow for some more traditional Jheri Curl June fare!

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  • Jheri Curl June: Klymaxx’s “Meeting in the Ladies Room”

    What would Ladies’ Week be without a tribute to Klymaxx: one of the few all-female, self-formed groups in pop music history? Meeting in the Ladies Room, Klymaxx’s fourth studio album, was co-produced by Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis and went platinum with four successful singles, one of which was the title track.

    The song–written by another trio of Jheri Curl June veterans, Reggie and Vincent Calloway and Boaz Watson of Midnight Star (hence the “stealth” “Freak-a-zoid” reference)–opens with Klymaxx singer/drummer Bernadette Cooper muttering about the behavior of the other women in the club who are eyeing her man, while dropping a few subtle hints at her financial status: “I had to leave my condo to come to this / Well, I’m back, but this time I’m with my man / And these women are putting their hands all over his / Yamamoto Kansai sweater that I bought.”

    Granted, the rest of the song is about dolling yourself up in the bathroom to look better than those other women, who are apparently succeeding at rubbing up on your boyfriend. These themes of female competition, beauty as a source of power, and uncontrollable male sexuality do somewhat downplay the concept of a successful woman who can buy her man designer clothes. But can we all agree that it’s pretty progressive just to have a group of women who could play their own instruments, weren’t put together by a Svengali to fit a caricatured male fantasy, and recorded songs about topics relevant to women?

    (P.S. I think it’s worth noting that the pop-arty video above was not only directed by Devo co-founder Gerald Casale, but also featured a young Vivica A. Fox as one of the “BW”s in the club. The more you know.)

    Playlist below the jump; see you next week!

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  • Jheri Curl June: Midnight Star’s “No Parking on the Dance Floor”

    Today’s Jheri Curl June entry is the title track from Midnight Star’s 1983 album No Parking on the Dance Floor. It has all the necessary ingredients of a classic jheri-curl track: a squealing synth line, bass that pops like crazy, and a camp-as-hell introduction that threatens, “if you don’t get a move on that body, I’ll be forced to give you a ticket–so get…WITH IT!” Plus, impossible as it might sound, the video is even better:

    It’s one of those great ’80s videos that take the concept of the song and make it blissfully, absurdly literal. So a traffic jam turns into an impromptu dance party, with the nine members of Midnight Star–whose own spectrum of jheri-curl lengths and shapes is right up there with that of Jesse Johnson’s Revue–serving as funky pied pipers, leading frustrated drivers to step out of their cars and join the fun. Then, at 1:35…is that…is that Prince? Well, no, of course not, though they sure took pains to make it look that way. But this is one party that doesn’t even need a random breakdancing Prince-alike to make it awesome. Midnight Star, I’ll get stuck in traffic with you any time.

    Check out the Jheri Curl June Spotify playlist after the jump!

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