Album of the decade: FPU - Traxxdata

Today is the last day of the 00s, and of the albums from this decade that I have heard, FPU's "Traxxdata" from 2003 was definitely the one that I enjoyed the most. Wonderful harmonies and synths, an extremely consistent electro album with 80s disco influences. The floating cover version of "Crockett's Theme" (from the Miami Vice soundtrack) was the track that first grabbed me, so I post it here (though the sound quality on YouTube is very bad), but it's not even the best track on the album - I listened more to "You Don't Pay My Bills" and "Racer Car", and my favourite was the disco-driven "Waiting For Snow" (with Emmon on guest vocals). Thanks to Alexander Robotnick who played FPU in his DJ sets, without that I would probably have missed it.

Nanna - Buster

"Buster" was the name of a Danish TV series from the 80s about a boy who learned to practice magic. It was shown in Sweden and Norway too and I watched it as a child. I loved the intro song to it so much that my mum helped me to record it onto a tape directly from the TV. (I still have that tape, in the beginning you can hear my mum telling my little brother to be silent.) Anyway, the tape helped me to remember the track into today, and thanks to the fantastic invention known as the Internet, I was able to identify the artist as Nanna and watch her sing it on YouTube. Then I bought the full-length version of the track from iTunes. The song is still extremely beautiful for me and extra kudos go out to the songwriter(s) for the unexpected turn it takes at about 1:30.

Jocks

"Jocks" is an italo disco movie from 1984, it seems to be a bit like Flashdance or Saturday Night Fever but from Italy. Legendary italo disco vocalist Tom Hooker (who sometimes provided the vocals for Den Harrow as well as releasing some stuff under his own name) is mentioned in the opening credits, he seems to be playing one of the main characters. You can watch the first four minutes on YouTube and I'd actually pay a lot to be able to see the whole film!



Speaking of Tom Hooker, there's an interview with him here and it's actually the most interesting interview with an italo disco artist that I've read, because he's very honest, saying things like:

"It was a lot of fun, I made money, I had cars and girls. I knew all the famous people in Italy at the time. I am so much happier now, though. I am married and incognito in California. I finally understand the value of "true" things in life. I really love my wife today. Then, like many people who don't even admit it, I was in love with myself. Like many famous people, I had a huge ego."

Sandra - Johnny Wanna Live

A beautiful song by Sandra from the early 90s, with an all-too-relevant animal rights message.

Modern Talking - You're My Heart, You're My Soul

Music videos could be pretty basic and uninteresting in the 80s. This is still worth watching, for the way Thomas looks into the camera on the "tsssch"s in "You're My Heart, tsssch" (at 2:18 for example).

Video - Somebody

There are a lot of weird italo disco playback clips from old European TV shows on YouTube, but this one, from Dutch TV 1984, is almost surrealistic. The track itself is probably most known for having appeared on Italo Boot Mix Vol. 2.



Rock the italo grandmas!

Leo Garcia - Electricistas

Leo Garcia hails from Argentine and is apparently most known for his track "Morrissey" which was played by Morrissey himself as pause music during his concerts. The lead track to Leo's new EP is more disco, produced by Mario Pak, and has a chorus that I can't stop listening to. One of my favourite tracks from the latest few months.

Lip-synching to the sa-sa-sampler

One thing that surprised me when I started to watch old 80s disco videos on YouTube was that the singers during the playback performances on TV shows often lip-synched to sampled voices or their own voice "megamixed". Like in this TV appearance of Fun Fun "Happy Station" (watch the part at 2:20)



It looks ridiculous but somehow it goes pretty well along with the cheap italo disco aesthetic. So I was more surprised when I saw the same thing happening in this 1984 playback perfomance of Pet Shop Boys "West End Girls" (the original version produced by Bobby O). I mean Neil Tennant is a British intellectual. (Watch the part at 3:36 onwards.) But then it seems to have been their first TV performance.