As part of EMI Music’s ongoing Electrospective campaign designed to celebrate the history of electronic music, Mojo magazine recently convened a roundtable discussion of the genre featuring, among others, synthpop pioneers such as Mute Records founder Daniel Miller, Martyn Ware of Heaven 17 and OMD singer Andy McCluskey — and you can now watch an 8-minute excerpt of that discussion.
The discussion, also featuring more contemporary writers and DJs, touches on the early days of electronic music, the impact of DJs and whether Depeche Mode changed the perception of electronic music in the United States, the latter of which features interesting insight from Miller, although he’s a bit off on his recollection of when the infamous Wherehouse riot occurred.
UGH! This is such a tease. I want the whole thing not 8 minutes of it.
I agree this is a tease and I would love to watch the whole panel.
That being said, I wanted to comment about Andy’s comment “intellectuals and faggots.” It’s obvious how he means it and that everyone in that room has been called some iteration of these names for years or even decades. Still, I found it a little jarring to hear him perpetuate the use of a term that is no less ugly than it ever was. As a lifelong OMD fan, it causes me some concern.
Finally, Daniel hedges a bit when asked what album was being promoted when the DM riot happened. He’s absolutely right that DM became huge without the help of top 40 radio but the riot happened for the release of Violator when DM were already big stars, after “Personal Jesus” had already made its mark and “Enjoy the Silence” was on the ascent.
Daniel Miller said here the riot album was Music For The Masses no it wasnt it was the Violator album i know because i was there when it all went down
yeah,how did Daniel Miller forget it was VIOLATOR and not MFTM?
and regarding the “faggot” comment: while I don’t like the term either and thankfully its use has greatly deteriorated, he was just using it in the context of the discussion and the times they were reminiscing about. There of course is also the cultural distinction to consider…..