Zapp (and Roger)

[Brand New Guy]

I've been working my way through various Zapp (and Roger) records and they are an enormous amount of fun. Also, I absolutely adore the Talkbox antics. I've no idea what that machine is or does but it's magic in their hands. Obviously, it's the most distinctive element of their sound but there are a large number of slightly unusual extended funk jams in their repertoire.

If you like harmonising vocoders and Prince's stripped down 'Housequake'-style bombs, there is a lot to love about Zapp (and Roger). My favourite song is probably a solo joint by Roger Troutman from his 1991 new-jack swing/contemporary R&B-influenced record. It's called 'Emotions'.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnqM4YsADjY

However, more typical of the Zapp sound is 'Dance Floor', a monster P-funk groove and prime example of the gorgeous liquid metal Talkbox melodies.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvdzaKqwC3Y

There's nothing else to say about Zapp (or Roger), I just wanted to remind you/alert you of/to their existence.

[QtheRaider]

http://youtu.be/_FXzDgJGQX8

Heres a good documentary on Zapp

it's in 4 parts

[doppelkorn]

I love love love Zapp. Love 'em.

Here's a song by the artist Zapp:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1It4rNbOCM

It is called Doo Wa Ditty (Blow That Thing)

[Gradual Decline]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuCloea96Mg

[Brand New Guy]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuCloea96Mg

Indeed. The one that got me to start listening to Roger (and Zapp). One of my favourite pieces of music in years. Deep haunting shit.

Incidentally, if anyone has the Chuck Person RSD release, what's it like?

[Squink]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuCloea96Mg

This is a true headfuck if you're as high as I am now. Jeeezus.

This seems like the appropriate thread to ask if anyone has read this and whether it's any good?

[momatt]

No, but I've read a lot of Dave Tompkins writing in the Wax Poetics magazine.  I can't stand his style - he has an overly flowery and meandering way of writing that barely makes any sense at all.  I can't decide if it's pretension or ineptitude, but I imagine reading a whole book of his would be absolute agony.

Example (talking about the Dynamic Three): "I may have publicly cogitated on this matter on occasion, but I just saw a forklift flatten a stop sign and leave it for dead while hauling a megalithic frond in a hot tub potter. And the cross breeze just tried to take my squiggly air plant to the prom. So, as Milk D once said, apparently for the hell of it: What. The heck."
http://www.egotripland.com/author/dave-tompkins/

[doppelkorn]

Pretension. I think it's somewhere between LOLrandom and pretension there.

It's the kind of stuff I used to read as a teenager and think "wow, this must be genius, I don't understand a word" but which I now know to be bollocks.

[momatt]

Thansk Doppel, it's a relief that someone out there knows what I'm on about.
At first I didn't like his writing because I assumed that I was too stupid to understand it.  I soon came to the conclusion that it was all his fault for writing like a dick.  Make you wonder how he gets all these jobs.

A small blip in the otherwise perfect Wax Poetics publication[nb]don't buy it anymore though[/nb].