Calvin Harris launching an acid house project is the biggest music news of all time

Calvin Harris launching an acid house project called Love Regenerator is the biggest music news of all time.

This is like One Direction relaunching as a thrash metal band. Or like The Beatles returning as a drum 'n' bass act. Or like Jive Bunny revealing that all the music was made by actual bunnies.

Last month's Love Regenerator 1 EP hit a million streams in just three days. It was apologetically clubby, summoning the spirit of acid pioneers Phuture and so much more. We're talking fat pianos, liquid breaks, choppy vocal samples and filter-tweakin' squelchy goodness. All the best of the underground 1980s and 1990s.

Like a worm with an embarrassing zit, acid house has remained defiantly underground. We've had Voodoo Ray, Josh Wink and S'Express, but all of this was a long time ago. Justin Bieber was still in Calvin Klein nappies when Higher State of Consciousness was released.

So when the biggest DJ in the universe (probably) goes acid house, this is big news. It could mean the first mainstream exposure of acid house for 25 years. Imagine the BBC News at Six being presented by a Tamagotchi. THAT'S how much of a revival this is.

In the words of A Guy Called Gerald's 1989 top 20 hit Voodoo Ray:

"Ooh-oo-hoo ah-ha ha yeah
He-hey-ya hey-yah ah-ha ooh hey-yah ah-ha ooh"

Exactly, Gezza. That's exactly how I feel.

Calvin Harris has a second Love Regenerator EP arriving later this week. I'm not sure we can cope with this. It's like the earth being struck with two dinosaur-destroying meteors rather than one. The shockwave of this second EP will be so ground-shaking, no-one else will make any music for months.

Harris has been previewing bits on his Instagram and I can declare that, in the parlance of modern youth, it is banging. Proper banging and no mistake, missus. I'm sorry if my street talk is alarming to you, but I am well cool.

Unless Def Leppard return as a KLF tribute act, Calvin Harris going acid house remains the biggest music news of all time.



Further Fats: I love acid and the acid loves me (2015)

Further Fats: "Acid house - it's not real music, is it" said the idiot (2019)

I'm too techno to be Brexit

I'm too mired in Belgian techno, German house and Liechtensteinian glitchstep to be anti-Europe. The stars of the European flag are my disco lights.

I grew up surrounded by people whose parents may well have been fairly new to the UK. And even then, my non-BME friends were geeks and weirdos who never quite fitted in. 'The other' was, in some way, the default of everyone I knew.

So I don't get any of this. People talk about taking back control, but that's hogwash. I've no doubt the Brexit wrecking ball was swung for nefarious reasons, whether it be blatant racism or a niggling distrust of 'the other'. The politics of pressure led to a terminal state of crapage.

That last sentence was constructed from Front 242 titles. They're from Aarschot in Flanders and they make music about the destruction of all that is good.

Yes, the European mainland gave us Aqua, DJ Otzi and Basshunter. And they will pay for this in the Great Pop Putsch of 2019. Dammit, I've said too much. But Europe also gave us... us. If we're not in union with ourselves, then we're little more than post-Zayn One Direction.

Today, little Britain got a little littler.



Further Fats: In the belly of the beast: a week in Tory politics (2009)

Further Fats: This is not an analysis of the EU Referendum (2016)

5 pop music predictions for 2014

JUSTIN BIEBER WILL NOT ONLY RETIRE, HE WILL GROW OLD AND DIE.

Justin Bieber will age before our eyes. He will bulk up some more before his muscles reduce to fat and then massive wrinkles. He will take up golf but it will wreck his feeble, wrinkled physique. He will have a reunion tour with himself but abandon it on doctor’s orders. He will die with Usher at his side.

THERE WILL BE A NUMBER ONE SINGLE SO EYE-WATERINGLY SEXIST, A PERMANENT SCHISM WILL DEVELOP BETWEEN CONFIDENT, SEXUALLY-ACTIVE YOUNG MEN AND REPRESSED, PAUNCHY LIBERALS.

The usual schism stuff. Arch looks at award ceremonies. Passive-aggressive lyric / Guardian article wars. Mud-wrestling. That kind of thing.

HARRY STYLES WILL SET UP HIS OWN CULT.

Harry Styles (pictured) will see Twitter feeds like Harry My Cat Died and Bad Harry Art. He will see an opportunity. After a series of top-level meetings with the Scientologists, which is a church and not a cult, he will buy the Scientology movement, which is a church and not a cult, and change the name of the Scientology movement, which is a church and not a cult, into The Styleologists. He will change it into a cult, because it is definitely a church, by changing absolutely nothing else whatsoever.

NEW APHEX TWIN ALBUM.

Ha ha. Only joking. In fact, what will happen is that Daft Punk will sell another million records with an Aphex Twin covers album. For the titles, they will take existing Aphex Twin titles and stick 'Get Lucky' on the end. For example, Donkey Rhubarb Get Lucky, Halibut Acid Get Lucky, and

N
∆Mᵢ⁻¹=−α ∑ Dᵢ[η][ ∑ Fjᵢ[η−1]+Fextᵢ [η⁻¹]]
η=1 j∈C{ᵢ}
Get Lucky.

The music will be produced with similar care and attention. It will feature the return of Basshunter, Robert Miles, DJ Caspar and two members of Fleetwood Mac.

COUNTRY AND WESTERN WILL GO DUBSTEP.

Country and western music will thereby obtain widespread respect and support in Europe for the first time ever. A broadsheet journalist will coin the term ‘Dubstep Country & Western’, while the NME journo who thought of ‘C**t-step’, complete with asterisks, but didn’t get it into print in time will be fired and then thrown into a skip.

What are your pop predictions for 2014? Why not write them on a piece of paper and show them to a child?

No more idle speculation: Aphex Twin to play Bloc 2011

Aphex Twin is back at the Bloc festival, as revealed in an announcement today that takes a sideswipe at the internet gossip that has surrounded the appearance.

"This is the kind of lineup that jumps out of the undergrowth bites the back of your head off, like a tiger or something," says an email from Bloc sent out this morning.

It goes on to say, "You'll see a lot of idle speculation online, but check out the first round of showcase announcements to find out who's very much 'in' for Bloc's landmark fifth birthday."

The idle speculation, of course, was started by Bloc when they released an anonymous teaser video featuring the artist. The date they appended, "12 march 2011" fed right into the chatter about a new Aphex LP that's been rife on the internet for some time.

I showed the video on this blog a week ago and liberally slapped my greasy cynicism over any thoughts that it may be a date for a new album, saying "it's an advert for his appearance at the 2011 Bloc Weekender festival. CRASH! That's the rollercoaster falling off the tracks and landing on the candy floss stall."

That roller coaster bit might need some explanation. Go and read the whole post here.

What we're left with is a jolly good line-up for Bloc, which takes place at Minehead Butlin's in the second weekend in March. Richard D Twin will join Four Tet, Venetian Snares, Floating Points, Joy Orbison, Mary Anne Hobbs, Untold, Speedy J, LFO, Daedelis, Beardyman, Moderat, Dopplereffekt, a bloke from Altern-8 and flip-loads more.

I do sometimes us internetters would speculate as much about releases by the likes of, for example, Joy Orbison. I'm as guilty as anyone for making it all Aphex, Aphex, Aphex. In fact, screw Aphex Twin: I've changed my allegiance. If One Direction aren't playing Bloc 2011, I'm not coming.