Desert Island Disco - July 2017

28th July

Today’s castaways Horse Meat Disco provide a disco-fuelled playlist for 6 Music’s Loud And Proud season, marking the 50th anniversary of The Sexual Offences Act 1967. Team Lauren recruited the DJs from the queer disco club night to curate this week’s Desert Island Disco.

Horse Meat Disco are DJs Luke Howard, James Hillard, Jim Stanton and Severino. They formed the amazing London based queer club night, Horse Meat Disco, specialising in all things disco. Horse Meat Disco started in 2003 at a basement bar in Soho with the aim of creating a safe queer space for people who love to listen and dance to disco. The club night is inspired by the heydays of New York’s disco nightlife with hotspots like Mancuso’s Loft and The Paradise Garage. The DJ quartet met at a Basement Jaxx party in Brixton, South London in 1999. 14 years on they have played in Berlin, Paris, had a residency at Output in New York, and they’ve just self-released their debut single Waiting For Your Call.

This weekend (28th- 30th July) 6 Music will be marking the 50th anniversary of The Sexual Offences Act 1967 with programmes celebrating gay culture and its journey from then until now with our season, 6 Music Loud & Proud.

As part of the celebrations, on Friday 28th July from 4pm, Tom Robinson joins Steve Lamacq to celebrate 40 years since his track “Glad To Be Gay”, followed by Beth Ditto at 7pm sitting in for Iggy Pop with a two hour show featuring tracks that have challenged mainstream stereotypes and championed ideas of gender and sexual orientation. On Saturday 29th July at 9pm Tom Robinson speaks to London singer-songwriter, musician and poet Labi Siffre about the changing attitudes towards LGBT+ communities in Britain through his life and music.

Early on Sunday 30th July at 2am American rapper, performance artist, poet and activist Mykki Blanco presents a special Loud and Proud Recommends. It’ll be an hour of Mykki’s favourite artists showcasing the breadth of creativity within the LGBT+ community. At 1pm on Sunday, Jon Savage, author of “England’s Dreaming" a history of the Sex Pistols and punk, presents Queer as Punk – an exploration of the frequently overlooked story of the effect of LGBT+ culture had on the early days of punk. At 4pm Amy Lamé, London's Night Czar and co-founder of queer arts company and club night Duckie, plays songs of liberation. 6 Music's Loud and Proud season closes at 7pm with a special Now Playing with Tom Robinson curating a playlist to celebrate coming out, being loud and proud. You can listen to our special Loud and Proud season on 6 Music this weekend (28th - 30th July).

Horse Meat (Desert Island) Disco
Carl Bean - I Was Born This Way
Diana Ross - I'm Coming Out
Donna Summer - Queen For A Day
Jean Carne - Was That All It Was
Sylvester - I Need Somebody To Love Tonight
Jackie Moore - This Time Baby
Inner Life - Aint No Mountain High Enough
The Emotions - I Don't W ant to Lose Your Love
Alton McClain & Destiny - It Must Be Love
Harold Melvin & The Blue Nites - The Love I Lost
Patti Labelle - Music Is My Way of Life
Candi Staton - When You Wake Up Tomorrow
Brainstorm - Loving Is Really My Game
Two Tons o' Fun - Just Us
Double Exposure - My Love Is Free
CJ & Co. - We Got Our Own Thing
Cheryl Lynn - To Be Real
Melba Moore - You Stepped Into My Life
Machine - There But For The Grace of God
Grace Jones - Am I Ever Gonna Fall In Love In New York City

21st July

Today's castaway Matt is heading off for a Desert Island Disco with a good time summer vibe. He's got your playlist for this summer's, and probably rainy, BBQ's with a soundtrack inspired by his teenage years, London days, and right through to his current favourite tunes. Matt's summer time Desert Island Disco has got a bit of everything from hip hop to rock to electronica, so you'll definitely be tapping your feet to all sorts of beats.

Elvis was King in my parent’s house when I was younger, my dad is a big fan of rock 'n' roll and that era of music certainly rubbed off on my sister and I at an early age. I wish I'd picked up a guitar at primary school, even just to mimic Presley's snake-hips, maybe I could have learnt as many chords as him. Instead I decided I was a listener rather than a performer. My sister and I would tape the top forty every Sunday, it was the late 80s, the rave scene and native tongues were in full effect, and we developed our own tastes.

In the ‘90s at secondary school my musical appreciation and tolerance extended even further, through friends I developed my love of hip-hop, as well as the musical genres it took its breaks from, funk & reggae, jazz & soul. As bonds established to my records, so they did with my school & college companions during the moodier, temperamental teenage years came grunge & the indie bands, the Judgement night soundtrack and an exploration of the darker side of music.

With employment came the opportunity to move away from house parties of leafy suburbia to the London clubs, where anything goes and it usually does. Fabric and Turnmills were regular haunts for a good decade along with Glastonbury and other festivals. My wife and I moved away from The South a few years ago to beautiful Derbyshire. I still get to a good many gigs and club nights that I can – either nearby or further afield.

My Desert Island Mix will be playing (when 6Music isn't) at Summer BBQs and gatherings. These tracks remind me of family & friends, the ups, the downs, the good times.

A Good Summer

The Clash – Guns of Brixton
A$AP Rocky Four Tet Mura Masa mix – Love$ick
Jo Ann Garratt - Walk on By
Ottawan - D.I.S.C.O (French version)
Phoenix - If I Ever Feel Better (I’d Go To The disco) Buffalo Bunch Mix
Faith No More – EPIC (UTAH SAINTS MIX)
801 – Tomorrow Never Knows
Bjork - Come To Me
Deodato - Also Sprach Zarathustra
Mbeat - Sweet Love
Nas & Damian Marley - As We Enter
Joey Bada$$ - Paper Trail$
ATCQ - Scenario
Alan Braxe & Fred Falke - Most Wanted
Womack & Womack - Teardrops
Van Morrison - I’ve Been Working (Alternate Version)
Elvis - If I Can Dream (Live'69)

Love the show, have a good summer

Thanks

Matt

14 July 17

Today's Desert Island Disco comes from author of the The Gender Games Juno Dawson. Ahead of our Loud and Proud season at the end of July, marking the 50th anniversary of the Sexual Offences Act, Juno has very kindly given shared the tracks that help her write, remind her of the times both good and bad, and tracks to make you move. Everything a Desert Island Disco should be:

“The tracks are a mixture of reliable go-to songs I deploy when I'm DJ-ing at Club Silencio, but mostly they're landmark tracks from key moments of my life. Each one reminds me of a time, a friend or a significant ex. In my book The Gender Games, I talk at length about how I had to 'learn' womanhood through my musical icons - Madonna, Debbie Harry, Shirley Manson, The Spice Girls. It's a strange way to learn gender, but those women, and so many more, feel like part of my DNA now.”

I'm Only Happy When It Rains - Garbage
Say My Name - Destiny's Child
Call The Shots - Girls Aloud
Human Nature - Madonna
Confide In Me - Kylie
Just A Girl - No Doubt
Celebrity Skin - Hole
Drop Dead Gorgeous - Republica
He's On The Phone - St Etienne
Say You'll Be There - Spice Girls
Then He Kissed Me - The Crystals
More Than A Woman - Aaliyah
No Scrubs - TLC
Lady Gaga - Telephone
XXXO - MIA
Hanging on the Telephone - Blondie
How Many Licks? - Lil Kim
Robyn and Royksopp - The Girl and the Robot

Friday 8 July

Underworld front man, 6 music presenter, friend of the show, and now playwright Karl Hyde is everywhere at the moment. So we thought that it was high time we caught up him to discuss everything he's up to at the Manchester International Festival, and to get him to share the perfect Desert Island Disco mix. And to be honest, he'll be playing with your eardrums moving from smooth reggae to head splitting techno via some loud guitars:

AC/DC - Back in Black

After seven weeks of rehearsing the same songs for our play FATHERLAND
I walked into the auditorium of the Manchester Royal Exchange where
it's playing to here our sound designer Ian Dickinson blasting this out on
the house sound system - my ears were in raptures!

Nolan Porter - If I Could Only Be Sure

Yep - another Ian Dickinson system sound-checker. The first time I heard it
I had to dance

Male Gaze - Keep Yr Kools

It arrived in the post - my ears loved it instantly so I couldn't argue

Fleet Foxes - Crack-up

From their latest album of the same name - another that arrived on the
door mat, jumped into my head and took up residency

Ø [Phase] - Submerged Metropolitan

I said, "Rick, what are you listening to? - And make it great!"
He laughed and sent me soul food for my feet

Afous d'Afous - Tarhanine Tegla

The music of North Africa is never far from my turn table.
In my bones since I was little. All my guitars are in tunings
that take me to the desert.

Adam Beyer & Dense & Pika - Future

A brilliant collaboration - Rick sent me last week - realising that I was
starved of groove - taking pity on my feet he packed this into an emergency
Red Cross parcel

Steely Dan - Rikki Don't Lose That Number

One of the many bands Rick and I never disagree about. Whenever they come on anywhere
in the world we both go "YESSS!" (this track always makes me think of him - kind've obvious yeah?)

Sly & The Family Stone - I Want to Take You Higher

From the second I saw them in the Woodstock movie when I was a kid at the local fleapit
they had me completely. This song will always bring me up

Dusky - Trough

He must have known how little my feet have been dancing lately,
because,
no sooner had they stopped,
Rick posted this storm of a track to send them wild again.

Toots & The Maytals - 54-46

Pick any Toots track & I go straight back to Cardiff where I first met Rick.
Guaranteed to make us both shut up & grin.

Black Uhuru - Whole World Is Africa

The best gig I've seen in my life was Black Uhuru at Cardiff Top Rank
in the 1970's - best live band ever!

Kendrick Lamar - Alright

A track that sets us back on-track
every time we get together in the studio

Booker T. & The M.G.'s - Green Onions

That scene from the film American Graffiti remains with me from the first time I saw it.
Two street rods racing on the edge of town at dawn. Steve Cropper (guitarist with Booker T)
lays down the simplest, horniest most cutting riff I've never been able to shake from my bones.

The Modern Lovers - Roadrunner

A club called 'Palms' or something - back in the 70's - Barry, South Wales.
The last dance - I went home alone again that night & with The Modern Lovers partying in my head
couldn't care.

John Martyn - May You Never

Massive John Martyn fan - always play him when I'm in my bus bunk on an Underworld tour.
This one goes out to Rick

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