The House Sound of Chicago

Released in 1986, the year house music broke internationally, the seven releases from the fledgling Chicago house scene on this collection are now canonical, equivalent to the previous generation’s “Johnny B Goode,” “Tutti Frutti,” and “Hound Dog.” At the time, this music was genuinely revolutionary: futuristic tracks built from machine drum rhythms, synthetic basslines, and abstract sounds, all wrought from cheap electronics. There were singers on some of the songs, but many had no vocals, or if they did, they were sampled and chopped into snippets to be played back robotically from a keyboard. The sci-fi synth chords floating enigmatically in the background, metallic stabs and space-age melodies all somehow coalesced into this mysterious new, enigmatic machine music. 

The album demonstrated the different emerging strands within Chicago House: “Love Can’t Turn Around,” “Like This” and “Shadows of Your Love” were in the R’n’B/soul/funk/disco tradition, repositioning the gospel-derived soul song within this new futuristic frame. “Jack Your Body” and “Music is the Key” had no traditional song structure and were abstract, jacking, intense, beat-heavy synthesised, looping, repetitive ‘tracks’ as opposed to songs while “Mystery of Love” demonstrated the sophisticated, melodic, jazz-influenced ‘deep’ house sound. Appearing at a time when house music was virtually unknown outside of the cooler clubs in US cities, this album instantly made everything else sound outdated; it’s a great intro to Chicago House music and a slice of musical history too.