Every Sunday, during the mid-’80s, Stu Allan spun house music for England via the North-West airwaves on Piccadilly Radio (whose show played a vital role in spreading the gospel of house music). As the story goes, when introducing Gerald Simpson, Allan said the track was by a “Guy Called Gerald from Hulme”.
A Guy Called Gerald is an embodiment of what occurs when black history is whitewashed, both in the historical archiving of house music and also in the world. We have seen in real-time how often our voices and stories are muted when aspects of our culture go mainstream. (In other words, diluted enough to become consumed by white people). Those who tell the story can, and often, fail to understand the full lineage, fail to understand how separate cultures mold onto one another, as time progresses. They destroy roots and shame an entire race of people, allowing the connection between past and present to become muddy.
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But one thing is true. House music started in the nightclubs of Chicago and Detroit, off the sweat and jubilation emanated from queer black people. Simpson was there when it crossed the pond to inspire a generation of black English people to add a special twist. Quickly, thriving house scenes at legendary black Manchester clubs, like The Reno and Legends, were established.
The dance floor, initially, moved in a way that was authentic to the black experience. The music was created for, and dictated, by the mesmeric rhythm and footwork found in their bodies. What was popular before, something more akin to the jazz-funk era from the late 70s, could not keep up with this new musical expression, in turn, requiring a few legends to take charge and deliver, to the people, a new way to dance.
The Foot Patrol and The Foot Machine were two crews who famously captured the ever-present connection between sound and body movement. They had absorbed what they’d seen in neighboring cities and funneled it back to the Moss Side and Hulme. The video below is like a fossil, accurately telling the whole story. (Featuring The Foot Patrol, whose link to rave dancing is massively under-appreciated).
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Simpson’s connection to the dance floor led to a brief stint in dance school, where he studied contemporary dance. When that dream died, another began. Following a series of collaborations between like-minded DJs and performers, he formed the short-lived Scratch Beatmasters crew. Calling back to his rich, Jamaican heritage, they played hip-hop and challenged other crews with ear-numbing sound systems. The first seeds in an illustrious career were planted, as his experimentations with tape-editing and sampling only furthered his curiosity.
One particular collaboration with Graham Massey and Martin Price led to their first 12” single, “Wax On The Melt”. Massey and Price, of course, were white DJs influenced by the black clubs they performed at. With Simpson, they formed 808 State: one of the most influential electronic groups to exist. Their collective genius sparked innovation, becoming U.K. legends overnight.
Simpson was a member and driving force for the acclaimed first album, Newbuild. Pitchfork referred to it as the Nevermind of dance music, whose 808-laden synths and ass-shaking drum patterns single-handedly inspired an influx of artists yet to arrive. (Aphex Twin called it more “cold and human” than the acid house coming from the states).
In between recording sessions with 808 State, Simpson snuck out to work on his own music. A culmination of influences, all of which were black, led to a genre-defining/U.K. anthem, “Voodoo Ray”. The tune can proudly claim the title of being the first acid house track produced in the U.K, an achievement that ripped open the doors of the underground and asked a disgruntled generation of people to join the rave.
It is important to note that the masterful dancing crew, The Foot Machine, (I could not find a photo of them), were visual inspirations during the recording “Voodoo Ray”, and not the Hacienda, where the tune took off like wildfire. The several samples came from a Derek and Clive Bo Duddley sketch, (at 7:09 and 7:33!). We can hear a brief view into the near future of Simpson’s creativity, where his influences managed to balance each other and push cyber-sound in new, exciting directions. Music that lies on the wicked line between our subconscious and our ears. Perhaps it was a combination of skill and luck, seeing how a lack of memory on his recording equipment morphed the words, voodoo rage, into the mesmeric voodoo ray we hear throbbing throughout. Funny coincidences like that usually sprout magic.
Music, sex, drugs, and culture collided on the dancefloor afterward. A cultural boom was born, making space for weirdos, black and white, to free themselves from the shackles of the Thatcher era. Simpson had provided the dance floor with the perfect answer, gift-wrapped between three minutes and forty seconds of black joy personified.
Cultures converge onto one another, making space for the once unfathomable. As different races came together, all with the goal of dancing the night away, history was made. This notion was quickly forgotten, perhaps never fully acknowledged, as Ecstasy, a magical drug, engulfed the house scene shortly after “Voodoo Ray” became a Hacienda anthem.
The pill sparked the seismic shift which separated the black people who created the music, the scene, and the dancing, from those who came after. As the cameras began to streamline in, shedding light on this new scene, they did so with a skewed lens. The difference, as always, was in the style of dance, in the telling of the growing history of house music in the U.K. The connection was there in broad daylight, but no one seemed to care.
White people gallivanted into the scene, ignorant, moving like drugged-out robots; depicted in the many rave clips available across the internet. Gone was the vivid imagination expressed through the feet, replaced by cutting shapes in the air. (Which I also love! but it pales in comparison to what came before).
Mike Pickering, a pioneering DJ at the Hacienda, captured the loss of blackness during the onset of the rave era.
“I regretted the fact that once you’d come down off the E everything was pure House…I could tell even in 1989 that that wasn’t a good thing and that what we were doing before was much more precious, because we were playing a wider range of music. By 1989 we were slaves to the beat.”
*After the success of “Voodoo Ray”, Simpson released Automanikk, before founding record label Juice Box Records. The name, from a sound system he used, was yet another nod to his Jamaican heritage. Black British music pushed forward. This time, mixing the bass-filled sound system era with the rawness of the growing rave scene and break-beats found in hip-hop, to create a new musical expression: Jungle.
The record label laid the groundwork for jungle to take over, serving as the starting point for some of the U.K’s finest 90’s acts (Goldie and Finley Quaye to name a few). A collection of early releases were compiled into 1992’s 28 Gun Bad Boy, the first full-length jungle album, an exceptional standard in the sub-genre.
Jungle, like dub, funk, or hip-hop, was the next logical step in Afro-futuristic music. It could be argued that Simpson, during this era, was the man carrying the flag into uncharted territory. As Sun Ra and Miles Davis had done before, Simpson kept his eyes peeled towards the future, searching for fresh sounds, flipping the construction of a song on its head, wondering what would happen if the shuddering sounds of the jungle could be transmitted into our ears.
In the opening moments of “Nazinji-Zaka”, a 1994 release, the opening sample proclaims: “the first rhythms came from Africa.” Increasingly, the truth was in the foundation of his music: hard-hitting breakbeats, otherworldly rhythm, and throbbing sub-bass mastered to maintain its human element. The truth was in the melody, asking you to dance, the truth was in the gritty, soulful vocals and samples that could express messages he couldn’t articulate otherwise.
By 1995, Simpson was a refined artist at the peak of his creativity. The link between his Jamaican roots, the overlapping cultural phenomenons of the 90s, and an intuitive search for inner-peace led to his best work: 1995’s Black Street Technology. (Kindly head over to Bandcamp, buy the album, and play it from start to finish.)
Named after a government mind-control program, the greatest Jungle album to exist does so with a precise force. By the end of my first full-listen, I had found myself a mere follower to his melodic, hair-raising soundscape. If music could move forward, into the 21st century, this was one magnificent effort.
Black Street Technology, more than its famed counterpart Timeless, managed to refine the hard-hitting, repetitive nature of jungle music he started into a refined weapon. Simpson’s ability to manufacture polyrhythms that captured the expansive nature of his musical expertise was best displayed on two tracks: “Finley’s Rainbow” calls back to crooning vocals found in reggae, with Finley Quaye’s yearning pleasantly staying in the background, layered between sounds that maintain a non-human quality; and “The Reno'', my favorite track, cathartic and bizarre, featuring a morphed sample undulating between the ears, packed with a slick break-beat that is without a doubt the most dance-worthy track on the album.
The seeds that sprouted drum & bass are glaringly present throughout BST. But no one has come close to emulating its authenticity.
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Juice Box Records closed shop in 1998, as Simpson’s manager flew too close to the sun, doling out more money than was readily available, signing new artists who lacked the fervor Simpson displayed in his time at the helm. Simpson jumped ship, landing in Brooklyn, home to innovative artists and budding scenes that have always managed to be historic in real-time. The result of self-reflection and gratitude led to his most personal work: Essence.
Released in 2000, the album pushes his rich musicality in a new, therapeutic direction. He had established himself as a legend in electronic/dance music, looking towards the cosmos for inspiration. Lush poly-rhythms create a stable foundation for multiple layers of cyber-sound, simultaneously in the present and future. In comparison to his previous work, Simpson manages to express grim feelings about a world losing its control to rapid commercialism and invasive technology.
Masterfully so, meshing an innate human quality with new devices and experiences, Simpson stayed true to himself at a time when other artists were coming into the fold as mere carbon copies. In an interview with URB Magazine, Simpson candidly relays his complaints about the state of electronic music.
"It's like they're spitting out clones.
And that's easy to do if you've got a computer and a skeleton beat. You just fill the flesh of the melody around it.
And then you can keep the same skeleton and put another thing around it and put that out.”
The drug-fueled rave scene had progressively turned sour as well, deeming Simpson as an outsider. But who cares about being accepted, as long as you’re enjoying your creation.
Envisioning each track as a separate entity, with a mind of its own, “The Universe”, the opening rant, stands out for its foreshadowing about human purpose, asking the listener to look within. Jennifer Neal, the soothing voice featured, speaks candidly:
If we were to look closely at an individual human being
We would find that the body is made up of a massive resonating particles and is in itself a universe
All information exists here and now within our own consciousness
There are places we can go within our consciousness that unite our being with the cosmos
We need to align our minds with the cosmic mind
If we are going to find any of the purposes of our existence
Or to find answers to some of the unexplained problems
Especially as we are heading towards one of the most important increments in the history of our time here
My first full-listen came during the worst moments of the pandemic when I felt miserably hopeless about the future and myself. As I moved across the landscape of Essence, I realized how vital music was in saving me from self-harm. Each word, each phrase, mattered. The soulful-jungle gave way to sounds I desperately needed.
There’s much to say about this. I believe our purpose extends beyond that of material wealth, beyond what we’ve deemed to be possible, and acceptable, for the human race. As I continue to seek a connection to my spirit in these increasingly unnerving times, I’ve found that time and time again, music manages to speak clearly to me, where I’m absolved of my problems for a few moments.
To recognize that you’re not alone is a gentle reminder we all should embrace more often. It is the music that connects us, ultimately. And, for me, Gerald Simpson is just one of many artists who has left an indelible mark on my mind and spirit. His music holds a glimmer of truth about the world we live in, showing what is possible amidst chaos. This universal language connects us to the past and provides an example for a better future. A future free from judgment, rich in movement and love.
So much talent...depth in your words
You should really consider writing a manuscript for some music biopic