http://www.djhistory.com/booksection/chapter1/firstchapter.html
Despite his pivotal role, to this day the established forums of music criticism remain almost completely ignorant of who the DJ is, what he does and why he has become so important. If this book aims to do anything, it is to show the rock historians that the DJ is an absolutely integral part of their story. As they find space on their shelves for another ten books about the Beatles, perhaps they can spare the time to read this one.
It is probably the fault of our Eurocentricism that dance music's importance has been downplayed for so long. Just as copyright laws protect the western ideals of melody and lyric but largely ignore the significance of rhythm and bassline, musical histories have avoided taking dance music seriously for fear of its lack of words, its physical rather than cerebral nature (hip hop, with its verbal emphasis, and techno, with its obsessive theorizing, are the rule-proving exceptions). And surprisingly, most writers who have explored dance music have written about it as if nobody went to a club to dance before about 1987.
Because of all this, the narrative you are about to read has long existed only as an oral history, passed down among the protagonists, discussed and mythologized by the participants, but rarely set in type, and never before with this kind of scope or rigor.
The desire to dance is innate; it has exerted a constant influence on music. Consequently, the disc jockey has never been far from the very center of modern popular music. From his origins as a wide-boy on-air salesman to his current resting place as king of globalized pop, the DJ has been the person who takes music further.
The devil seems to be continually busy, inventing new ways to entice young people and adults into all forms of immorality and sin. He has used various forms of dancing very successfully, during the 20th Century. Each decade sees a change in this fad, but it seems that the change never gets better, but invariably gets worse. Various names have been given to the different forms of dancing in this century. We have all heard of the square dance, the round dance, the rock dance and now we hear much about the disco dance. None of these can be recommended for Christians to participate in.
jahsonic@yahoo.com
