1990s Britpop - An American Who Doesn't Get The Hype

[Mascodagama]

One place you can hear the influence of DnB is in a lot of the work of Euro Jazzers, such as est & Bugge Wesseltoft. Magnus Öström starts to incorporate DnB rhythms on est records from the late 90s onwards.

One certainly felt it with Wesseltoft's album New Conceptions of Jazz. I didn't find in any of his later works (that I have sampled, which is far from all of them) anything I liked as much.

[Trane]

Trane:

One place you can hear the influence of DnB is in a lot of the work of Euro Jazzers, such as est & Bugge Wesseltoft. Magnus Öström starts to incorporate DnB rhythms on est records from the late 90s onwards.

I think what the London scene jazzers have added to the DnB/dance rhythms & sensibility of the early 90s is the influence of Afrobeat.

you might be right about the Scandic jazz scene, I didn't keep up with that at the time.

As far as The Kinks go, remember they had a second wind in the US. They had big hit albums in the 70s and 80s on Arista, where they were basically yesterday's men over here. There was only one big UK hit single in that whole period- 'Come Dancing'.

Yeah, surprisingly so, they resurfaced at the tail-end of the decade and Low Budget was quite a hit in Canada (both the song and album).
It might've even started with Misfits, but I totally missed out that one, but the next two Give the people and Confusion (along with the double live) were fairly present in the forefront too. In some bizarre way, they surfed on the punk wave
Then they +/- disappeared again around 83 or so.

TBH at the time in 77/8, I thought they'd disbanded in the early 70's , because they'd gone below the surface.
I don't remember ever seeing their mid70's rock-opera albums featured on the record shop walls

[MudShark22]

Being a tad younger + Low Budget and Give The People.... were my intro to the Kinks and I effin love those records.



Death inspires me like a dog inspires a rabbit.

[veteranof1000psychicwars]

I remember the 'resurfacing' of The Kinks in the late 70s here in the US but l don't remember that they did any kind of breakout sales numbers. Superman and Father Christmas got a decent amount of airplay, but l couldn't tell you where, or even if, they charted...or if it gave them any kind of huge boost in album sales.
In any case no albums they made in that period are ever spoken of with glowing praise decades after. Speaking strictly of the US.

[veteranof1000psychicwars]

Well l had to look since l got curious. I forgot about Sleepwalker, that album charted at #21. Misfits at #40, and Low Budget at #11, their highest chart placing in the US ever which surprised me. Also over 60 years, 24 studio albums, and 6 live albums they have sold only 50 million records worldwide which is shockingly low. So low that l wonder if that is even correct.
Also on the Wiki page it says "Britpop bands Blur and Oasis both cite them as an influence," which l guess was my original point about them anyway ☺

[JJ88]

^There was also a double live album which also sold well in the US. And all the early 80s Arista albums were just outside the US Top 10. That's a pretty good run.

Remarkably, their last non-compilation album to chart in the UK was in 1968!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Ki...#Studio_albums

I think the 80s bands like The Cure and Depeche Mode made more impact in the US than any of the later Britpop bands did.

[Progbear]

I remember the 'resurfacing' of The Kinks in the late 70s here in the US but l don't remember that they did any kind of breakout sales numbers. Superman and Father Christmas got a decent amount of airplay, but l couldn't tell you where, or even if, they charted...or if it gave them any kind of huge boost in album sales.
In any case no albums they made in that period are ever spoken of with glowing praise decades after. Speaking strictly of the US.

"Sleepwalker" (#48) and "Superman" (#41) were the only singles to chart from this period. As you can see they were "almost" hits. It seems likely that they were FM radio staples that couldn't cross over to the Top 40 stations in any kind of major way. "Father Christmas" only ever got airplay on the Dr. Demento show, so it's fair to say it wasn't a hit.

We really ought to spin this discussion off into another thread. The Davies Bros. & Co. deserve better than being second billed below the likes of Oasis.

[MudShark22]

We really ought to spin this discussion off into another thread. The Davies Bros. & Co. deserve better than being second billed below the likes of Oasis.

True dat.

Destroyer reached #11 on the rock charts but barely cracked the Hot 100. Deserved better

Also Rock n Roll Fantasy reached #30.


Death inspires me like a dog inspires a rabbit.