Tonight (Friday 10th January) we return to our favourite Bristol boozer, The Plough in Easton, for another Bedmo Disco Eastside session. Free entry, choice beverages, great sound, and ace tunes supplied by Awon, Sell By Dave, Five-Stylez and Darren Oh!
Join us from 9.30 – you know it makes sense!
Bored of dry afternoons and evenings with your relatives? Keen to get out of the house to have a few cheeky drinks and a bit of a dance? If the answer to both of those is a resounding “YES, SAVE ME FROM THIS FESTIVE HELL” (or even just “yes, I fancy that”) then head down to Big Chill Bristol tonight (Saturday 28th December) from 9pm for the BEDMO DISCO FESTIVE FREAK-OUT!
You know what to expect: high grade underground disco, boogie, soul, funk, Italo and related goodness, with the Bedmo Disco crew joined for the first time by fellow Bristol-based disco DJs MAGIC GARY and JAMES DYER. They’re two of the main protagonists behind the always excellent TURBODISCO night at Dojo.
Oh, and as usual entrance is free throughout. Get involved, it should be another Christmas cracker! It’s got to be better than dreary festive TV and three day old sprouts!
As we inch closer to Christmas, it’s traditional for the party season to ramp up a few notches. There’s tons of goodness coming up over the next couple of weeks in Bristol, starting tonight, Friday 13th December, with the small matter of Hot Buttered Soul’s Non-stop Yuletide Disco.
Those of you in Bristol with a passion for good quality underground disco, electrofunk and boogie (not to mention funk and soul) will no doubt have come across the Hot Buttered Soul crew. We like to think of them as kindred spirits, as, like us, they have a passion for great disco, soul, funk and boogie, record collecting, beard growing and, of course, throwing great parties for like-minded souls. They play many of the same venues as us, with regular parties at Big Chill Bristol, but also do things at the Gallimaufrey on Gloucester Road and at the soon-to-shut (to be replaced by a bar owned by the people behind Team Love and Futureboogie) Bank of Stokes Croft. The HBS crew includes former record shop owner and all round top guy Mike Shawe, Alex Seal and extended Bedmo Disco family member Jimmy The Twin, who continues to make a name for himself in the edits scene (justifiably so, we think).
Tonight sees the now annual Hot Buttered Soul Christmas party take place at the Bank of Stokes Croft. Our own Sell By Dave will be joining ressies Mike and Jimmy, plus the night’s other guest, Good Vibrations and Roasted sort Ben Daley, behind the decks. Given the collective knowledge and love of disco, boogie, funk and soul on show – not to mention something like 75 years of combined DJing experience, give or take the odd decade – it promises to be a hell of a party. These days, the Bank of Stokes Croft is much more like a club than a pub – thanks mainly to the fat soundsystem they’ve installed for their last fling before refurbishment – so it should be a good excuse to lose yourself in the music.
Come down, dance like it’s Christmas morning and you’ve just been given the gift of your dreams, by the person of your dreams, and have a good time – we will be!
If you want more info, check out the event page on Facebook here.
This weekend one of our favourite parties in Bristol, Sean McCabe and Ben Daley’s Southport Weekender-affiliated Good Vibrations event, celebrates its first birthday. Since they specialise in all-dayers, Saturday’s 1st birthday bash is another afternoon-till-the-early-hours affair at their regular home, The White Bear on St Michael’s Hill.
The line-up is, as usual, tasty. Having previously brought all manner of big names to the boozer (Kenny Dope, Groove Assassin etc), this time round they’ve gone for two scene veterans whose contribution to deep and soulful house music can’t be questioned: Phil Asher and Atjazz. Then there’s the boogie bar, where ourselves and Deli-G will be holding it down from 6pm onwards.
Our experience of Good Vibrations parties is that they get a crowd who know their music, are fiercely committed to the soulful side of dance music and treat each all-dayer as an excuse to have a great time from mid afternoon onwards. It promises to be a special event. We’re looking forward to digging deep into the collections and showcasing some gems… as well as some of our favourite disco and boogie party jams.
To celebrate Good Vibrations’ first birthday, and to provide something of a warm-up, our own Sell By Dave has provided a guest mix for the GV blog. You can check it out on the embedded Soundcloud player below.
Should you need more details of the party (flier above), check out their website.
We’re rather excited about our forthcoming “versus” hoedown with fellow Bristol-based disco-centric party-starters People Like Us at The Looking Glass this Friday (16th August). So excited, in fact, that Sell By Dave has laid down a spontaneous “warm-up mix”.
The party promises disco, boogie, sleaze, Italo, house and “more cowbell”, and that’s exactly what you can expect from Sell By’s party-starting throw down. Tracklist and Soundcloud player (plus download link) below…
PEOPLE LIKE US v BEDMO DISCO WARM-UP MIX by SELL BY DAVE
1. Peech Boys – Life Is Special [Bedmo Disco Dub – previously unheard]
2. Sharon Brown – I Specialize In Love [Vocal]
3. Tiger & Woods/Kers – Bash at Jack/Back at Ya [Sell By Dave Blend – previously unheard]
4. Starvue – Body Fusion [Anthony Mansfield Edit]
5. Charanga 76 – No Nos Pararan (Ain’t No Stopping Us Now)
6. OTP Party Breaks – No Mistake [Kon’s 2079 Mix]
7. The Globe – Adventure Party [Sell By Dave Edit – previously unheard]
8. Koto – Visitors [Lee Douglas Re-Edit]
9. Popular People’s Front – Love Itch
10. Jarle Brathen – Italiano Fantastico
11. Mitchbal & Larry Williams – Do Dat Stuff [Dance Mix]
12. Solution – Feels So Right [Victor Simonelli Mix]
13. Candido – Jingo
14. Debbie Jacobs – High on Your Love [C.O.M.B.I Edit]
We’re delighted to finally be able to announce our next party in Bristol… a hook-up with the notorious party-starters behind the always excellent People Like Us events at the Looking Glass on Friday, August 16.
People Like Us started life as a night in London, where the residents – led by the lovely Ranks Skinna – would regularly wow various venues across East London. So strong are their ties to the capital that they still regularly do guest spots at roadblocked parties. Since moving to Bristol they’ve proved a hit at their new home, The Looking Glass on High Street (near the top of Corn St). We’ve been down to a few of their parties and they’re always sweaty, upbeat affairs. They get a mixed crowd (men, women, gay, straight), people always dance like mad, and the sounds are spot on. We can’t wait to take to the decks alongside Ranks and the rest and make it a night to remember!
For those who’ve not been to The Looking Glass, it’s a great spot. It has a small capacity, an intimate vibe, a top quality soundsystem and, for this party at least, a 4am licence. It’s the perfect venue for a sweaty little party. You can expect to hear disco sleaze, filthy bass, pulsating Italo, cowbells aplenty, cheeky boogie belters and proper house.
For more info head to the Facebook event page. It will be free to get in before 11.30, and £4 after. Bargain!
This week, we’re heading out to Croatia for Soundwave 2013, the latest instalment of our favourite Adriatic festival. We’ve been heading out there for the last four years, and this will be the third time we’ve played at the event. As way of a warm-up (asides from Awon’s brilliant set at Alfresco Disco on Saturday), we’ve decided to drop a clutch of new mixes inspired by the Adriatic sunshine.
We’ve called it the “BedmoCast Summer Special Series” (snappy, eh?) and the mixes cover a range of sounds and styles. The one thing that draws them all together is their inspiration: a Croatian summer. At present, there are three mixes in the series, all of which can be found on the Bedmo Disco Soundcloud page (we’ve also posted the set below):
Volume 1 – Awon’s Boogie Jam
A fantastic summer-friendly all-boogie, disco and electrofunk excursion from Awon, featuring some of his own tracks (and a couple of other Bedmo Disco-related jams), plus cuts from the likes of Melba Moore, West Phillips, Evelyn ‘Champagne’ King, Status IV, I Level and more. Want to listen? Click here!
Volume 2 – Sell By Dave presents Tisno at Dusk
Sell By reaches into his collection of Balearic gems for a laidback excursion through downtempo beats, dubwise treats, forgotten gems, well-known belters and much more besides. Think head-nodders and feet-shufflers for that moment when the sun begins to dip beyond the horizon. Oh, and old Andrew Weatherall remixes. Want to listen? Click here!
Volume 2 – Dancing Under The Stars
Another mix from Sell By Dave, this one ups the tempo for an all-night session dancing under the stars, either at the festival site or Barbarella’s Discotheque. Disco, afrobeat, house, broken beat, electrofunk… and lots more besides. Want to listen? Click here!
In other words, plenty of fodder for your MP3 player/phone/iPod/iPad (etc) as you make your way out to the sunshine, whether you’re heading to Soundwave or not. Enjoy!
Yep – a week on Saturday (18th May) we’re starting what we hope will be a series of regular shindigs at our favourite boozer, the excellent Plough Inn in Easton. It’s owned by some good friends of ours, and we couldn’t think of anywhere better to have a party.
It ticks all the boxes – great crowd of locals, nice soundsystem, decent back yard, and a love of a good party. What more could you want? It also marks our debut “eastside”, far away from our Bedminster roots. How times have changed, eh?
We’ll post more about this one next week, but the basics are on the poster. Come down – entry is free, booze is relatively cheap and the sounds will, of course, be righteous. Oh, and Deli G will be joining us again, playing on his “home patch” for the first time in ages. Bring it on!
PS – Check the dates page for updated news of forthcoming parties and appearances!
It’s not often we get to host genuine New York disco/boogie royalty. You can imagine our excitement, then, about our party at the Big Chill Bristol this Friday (26th April), which features none other than NYC remix/edit king JOHN MORALES of ‘M+M Mix’ fame. Yes, really!
To say we’re excited about it is an understatement. Disco/boogie heads have long held John in high esteem for his many great mixes throughout the late 1970s and ‘80s. Recently, his career has been reignited by a series of deserved retrospective compilations on BBE (The M+M Mixes, volume 3 of which is due out anytime now). These are, we reckon, nigh on essential, not least because they feature many of John’s previously unreleased “session mixes” (those completed for his DJ sets after the official mix had been finished) and unheard demos of classic tracks such as the Universal Robot Band’s “Barely Breaking Even”. Volume one (released a couple of weeks back) also includes John’s brilliant, 17-minute version of Inner Life’s “Ain’t No Mountain High Enough” – the epitome of shirts-off disco, and a delightfully uplifting epic.
It’s a bit of a coup to get John (pictured above in his early 1980s heyday) down to our fair city, as his trips over the UK are relatively infrequent. On this trip, he’s doing just two other UK dates, and one’s at Horse MEeat Disco on Sunday. We’re certainly have secured his services.
Even those who aren’t disco and boogie crate-diggers are likely to own some of his productions or remixes. Basically, if you own any disco, boogie, electrofunk or pop records from the late ‘70s and 1980s, it’s likely you’ll have come across John Morales’ work. Alongside longtime studio partner Sergio Munzibai (who sadly passed away in 1991), Morales was responsible for hundreds of remixes of acts as diverse as Inner Life, Odyssey, Jocelyn Brown, The Rolling Stones, Axel F, Miami Sound Machine, The Thompson Twins, Candi Staton and Hall & Oates. Check the labels of those dusty old 12” singles you have tucked away at the back of your collection; chances are, many will feature M+M Mixes.
Born into a hard-working Puerto Rican household in the Bronx in the 1950s, Morales first made his name as a teenage DJ in New York. By the mid 1970s he’d made his first tentative steps into the studio, creating his own medleys and remixes to play in his disco sets. He taught himself to edit on a reel-to-reel machine and never looked back. His now infamous ‘Deadly Medleys’ and ‘Sunshine Acetate Medleys’ brought him to the attention of New York disco producers Greg Carmichael and Patrick Adams who were impressed by the hunger and desire of the self-taught engineer. “My first credited mix was Inner Life’s ‘Caught Up (In A One Night Love Affair)’, though I had worked on a few other records before that, but I hadn’t been credited, for acts like the Universal Robot Band and Musique’s ‘In The Bush’,” he recently told BBE.
Morales continued to work as a session engineer, first for Adams and Carmichael and later Bob Blank (at the renowned Blank Tapes studio) until he had a chance meeting with Cuban-born ‘musical director’ Sergio Munzibai at local radio station WBLS in 1982. They hit it off immediately, and decided to do a remix of Mikki’s ‘Itching For Love’. It was the first of over 650 M+M Mixes during the 1980s and early 90s. Such was their prolific work rate that throughout the decade they would often remix 10 different records a month, often offering up both vocal and dub versions.
Morales’ own remixes, and those produced with his studio partner Muznabi, are once again being reappraised thanks to the popular ‘M+M Mixes’ series on BBE. Two volumes of the series, which features both released and previously unreleased reworks, have already been released, with a third – “The M+M Mixes Volume 3” – hitting stores very soon.
If you’d like to get a taste of his DJ skills, he contributed a fantastic guest mix to Deli G’s show, The Touch, on BCFM last weekend. You can have a listen by clicking here and selecting the second part of the two-hour show.
Speaking of Deli, he’ll be joining is behind the decks at the Big Chill on Friday night, playing in the last hour after John has done his stuff. Deli isn’t just a big fan of John’s productions, but has also been friends with him for a few years.
As for the rest of the night, it’s Bedmo Disco in control in both rooms. Awon and Five-Stylez will be bringing a flavour of the former’s fast-rising hip-hop night, Watch Out! (monthly at The Plough in Easton) to The Study (that’s the smaller room upstairs) from 11pm-2am, while warm-up duties downstairs will be handled by Sell By Dave (with, we suspect, some input from messers Awon and Five-Stylez).
All of this, for free. Yes, free. Not bad, eh? Seriously, though, we’re expecting John to play a fantastic set, the kind of which we rarely get to hear in Bristol. Join us – it should be a wicked party.
Bedmo Disco presents John Morales
Friday 26th April at The Big Chill Bristol
DJs: JOHN MORALES (M+M MIX NYC/BBE), BEDMO DISCO
In The Study: INNOFader presents WATCH OUT’s HIP-HOP JAM with AWON, FIVE-STYLEZ and guests
9pm-3am. FREE ENTRY
Phew, what a scorcher! Apologies for coming across all tabloid, but that single, silly phrase pretty much sums up our feelings about Saturday’s night’s GIRAFFE BOOGIE party at Start The Bus.
We were hoping for a good ‘un, but nothing could have prepared us for what was one of our most memorable parties for a while. The dancefloor began to fill up at 10.30, and it just got better and better from there. What was most memorable – apart from the ace sets from the Kelly Twins (pictured above) and Legendary Tone – was the all-round good-natured vibe of the crowd, their appreciation for the music and the amount of positivity on display. It was also nice to meet a few new faces (a party from the well-loved Boogie Cartel night in London, some chap who asked us to platy some krautrock, a woman who claimed we were ‘bringing back the spirit of Fruity Antics’ – that’s a near legendary Bristol house night for those from outside of our fair city) and welcome back some old ones (Al Dare, Jimmy The Twin etc). So all in all, a great night – thanks to all those who came down and made it special.
With Easter fast approaching, it’s a busy time here at North Street Sound (that’s Bedmo Disco HQ to newcomers). Because of that. we have a load of things to tell you about. We’ll try and keep it brief, and have used handy subheadings for ease of browsing/because it looks nicer.
MELODICA RADIO SHOW BRISTOL SPECIAL
A couple of weeks back legendary DJ, producer, journalist and musician Chris Coco headed down to Bristol to play at Big Chill Bristol. While there, he recorded a special edition of his popular Melodica Radio Show. The show features interviews with a bunch of Bristol bods – including our pals Suisse Tony, Ben Dubisson (A Hundred Strong) and Chris Farrell from Idle Hands – with accompanying music. It begins with Chris having a chat with our own bearded disco grinch, Sell By Dave, about Bedmo Disco Records.
It’s a very entertaining show, which you can listen to on Chris Coco’s Mixcloud profile
BEDMO DISCO EASTER SPECIAL AT BIG CHILL BRISTOL
Yes, we’re back at Big Chill Bristol for another smashing Bedmo Disco bash on Good Friday (29th March). We begin at 9pm and go on until 3am. Entry is free, the whole crew will be representing, and hot Bristol house producer (and all round top man) GramRCY will be playing upstairs In The Study. Poster below.
GOOD VIBRATIONS AT THE WHITE BEAR
Yep, there’s a second dose of Bedmo Disco DJ action this Easter weekend, as we head to The White Bear on St Michael’s Hill to host the Boogie Bar at Sean McCabe and Ben Daley’s Good Vibrations party. We’re stoked to have been asked along, especially as it’s an old-fashioned all-dayer (starting at 3pm, no less) in one of Bristol’s best boozers. Flyer below – more to come later in the week. Tickets are £10 in advance (a bargain since it’s an all-dayer and the main room guests come from Local Talk Records and Southport Weekender), and have been selling well. If you want to come along, don’t sleep!
Phew! That’s all for now – we’re off for a lie down. Remember, you can read our news first on Twitter and Facebook, so follow or like us. We don’t bite!
BEDMO DISCO 