From ebh@usl.com Tue Jul 20 07:41:52 1993 Received: from wookumz.gnu.ai.mit.edu by soda.berkeley.edu (5.65/KAOS-1) id AA11915; Tue, 20 Jul 93 07:41:51 -0700 Received: from usl.usl.com by wookumz.gnu.ai.mit.edu (5.65/4.0) with SMTP id ; Tue, 20 Jul 93 10:28:52 -0400 Message-Id: <9307201428.AA23898@wookumz.gnu.ai.mit.edu> From: ebh@usl.com Subject: From New York magazine, 7/19/93 To: ne-raves@gnu.ai.mit.edu Date: Tue, 20 Jul 1993 10:26:03 -0400 (EDT) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL21] Received: from usl by usl.com; Tue, 20 Jul 1993 10:22 EDT Content-Type: text Content-Length: 3099 Status: ORr Reprinted without permission (so sue me): TECHNOCRACY IN AMERICA by Mark Schone A waif named Heather Heart sits behind a six-foot-high counter, chain smoking and playing techno records -- bone-crunching instrumental dance music made up of metallic beats that clock in at about 135 beats per minute. Every time Heather takes a record off the turntable, she opens a casual bidding process -- "Really weird, huh? Anybody?" -- and more often than not, someone in the small crowd raises a hand. This seems at first a most unlikely spot for a techno scene -- on Avenue U, deep in the fastness of Bensonhurst, mere steps from Michaelangelo Pizzeria. But here at Groove Records, Heather, Frankie Bones, Adam X, and assorted confederates preside over a flourishing bazaar, making and marketing their own records and importing some of the noisiest and most aggressive music from Germany and Belgium. The store has to have the records the day they're released, because for D.J.'s -- who make up most of Groove's clientele -- timing is everything. [Inset: Picture of Heather, Adam and Frank, with caption "In the Groove: Adam X, Heather, Frankie."] Groove's walls are lined with fliers for the huge dance parties called raves and with the twelve-inch techno records that are available in few other places. Ravers buy tickets at Groove, or meet there before the dance; D.J.'s come by to kibbitz and buy the latest imports. And it's all vinyl: In a time where more and more young people don't even have turntables, Groove's employees, says owner Frankie Bones, are "committed vinyl junkies." Bones (born Frank Mitchell) started the store in 1990 after his single "Dangerous on the Dance Floor" hit big on London's house scene. "I took my first check and went back underground," he boasts. "I knew that a new music was coming; I just didn't know it was going to be techno." The 26-year-old Bones, who still tries to drop into the store at least once a day, says that Groove pays its bills and little more. Like his brother Adam X, Jimmy Crash, and Heather, who also publishes a techno fanzine, Bones makes his money D.J.-ing at raves up and down the East Coast and overseas. "I go to Europe about six or eight times a year," he estimates. "London, Germany, France, Italy. Canada, too, and all over America, the littlest towns." Stormrave, Groove's party-throwing arm, has drawn as many as 5,000 people to its raves, the biggest on the East Coast, in such sites as the dilapidated warehouses along the Williamsburg waterfront where Bones used to write graffiti. "I'm not going to say there are no drugs involved," says Bones, "but there is no violence. I've known kids in gangs that won't fight with kids in other gangs once they're inside." While the Groove D.J.'s continue to organize smaller, unofficial events, Stormrave is wanting to throw a bigger party. "I want to do one for over 10,000 people," asserts Bones. And, embracing the ethos of a music he cheerfully admits is "disposable," he adds, "I don't want to throw a 1992 party in 1993. We've got to take it to the next level."