Today, 21st June, is the summer solstice, the midpoint of the year and the time at which it's lighter longer and later than at any other point- something worth celebrating. It therefore also has to be noted that we start crawling back after tonight, we can't have one without the other. Something Rich Lane noted on his chuggy, slow mo Balearic classic from 2020 titled Solstice.
According to the Christian church midsummer is officially 24th June, six months before/ after Christmas, but given that any midsummer celebration almost certainly pre- dates Christianity let's go with today.
In 1990 Saint Etienne's glorious second single, their shuffly indie- dance cover of The Field Mice's Kiss And Make Up was remixed twice by Pete Heller, the Midsummer Madness and Midsummer Dubness versions, both versions arguably superior to the original single. They didn't release the remixes until October 1990 which seems a missed opportunity. Both are full of the spirit of the times, that joyous sense of freedom and possibility that the period had- although maybe that's partly because I was just twenty and everything was in front of me. The world was changing though. Thatcher gone, people power across the eastern Europe contributing to the fall of the Eastern Bloc, Nelson Mandela's release. Let's kiss and make up.
Kiss And Make Up (Midsummer Madness Mix)
Kiss And Make Up (Midsummer Dubness Mix)
Room for one more? This is Midsummer's Dream by DJ and producer Massimiliano Pagliara, southern Italian by birth but resident of Berlin. This track, seven minutes of thumping drums and trancey synths and acid toplines, came out last year and sounds much more Berlin than Lecce.
4 comments:
Great stuff Adam. Still love the Et, even though their last album didn't do much for me. But having tunes like that in the back catalogue more than makes up for it.
I loved the last St Et album, in fact I went back to it recently and was intending to write about it again.
Go on then...if you write about it I promise to revisit it the same day with fresh ears and an open mind!
Happy Solstice, SA. I've just been out in the garden absorbing the last minutes of daylight, moths buzzing about, blackbirds still singing and the scent of honeysuckle heady enough to make me feel slightly drunk...Definitely feels very pagan.
Perfect songs here to soundtrack Midsummer.
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