DFA

Various Artists
DFA Compilation #1
DFA, 2003

It would have been fun to be in New York in 2003. Bands like TV On The Radio were just taking off, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs were in full flight and the short-lived dance-punk trend was still, well... trendy. The basic formula for dance-punk seemed to be whiny vocals, dance beats and guitar riffs nabbed from late 1980s English post-punk groups like Wire and Gang Of Four. Cowbell and the occasional brass section didn't hurt either.

The dance-punk scene revolved around the DFA Records label, set up by the production team James Murphy (otherwise known as LCD Soundsystem) and Tim Goldsworthy with a mutual friend in 2001. Murphy and Goldsworthy produced most of the artists on their roster, including The Rapture and The Juan Maclean, and made imaginative remixes for other bands – including one for Le Tigre, where they turned the song 'Deceptacon' into a dance hit by slowing it down instead of speeding it up. The Rapture, LCD Soundsystem and !!! were the big names, and it was all greased with the adoration of Pitchfork's critics.

I wasn't in New York, however. I had just moved to Melbourne and was soaking up each new single at an indie club called Weekender, where my flatmate and I would float our Centrelink cheques on cheap beer and coins for the pool table and dance stupidly to old Madchester hits like The Stone Roses' 'Fool's Gold'. When !!!'s 'Me And Giuliani Down By The Schoolyard' hit the floor – dedicated to the New York mayor's introduction of dancing permits – it seemed like the late '90s had never existed and pop music had bypassed all that grunge bullshit and skipped straight from Madchester to dance-punk.

Once a week I'd skip whatever Arts lecture I was meant to be at and trek into the city to pick up the latest DFA 12" single from the record store Missing Link, and we'd dance to it at home on the balcony on weeknights. Our favourites were The Juan Maclean's 'Give Me Every Little Thing' and LCD Soundsystem's 'Yeah', which was a call-to-arms for bands to make better music that was released while the dance-punk trend was on its way out. Late that year, while I was out of town for Christmas, Weekender burned down.