Dance was unlike anything other type of music back in the 80s. Except maybe ambient. Both were not based on song, not based upon melodic repetition. They were both there for different use.
Dance was for, well, dancing. The remix wasn’t there to extend the melody but to extend the rhythm so people could dance to it longer.
And drugs were there for a smilier reason: to kick the dancing into high gear. LSD and smoke were about what happened in your head, speed, amyl nitrate, were body music.
So look it this way: rock was more or less about the head, dance, absolutely about the body.
What happened in the 00s was, music moved into the head area. And it was a strange move. But right now, DFA and Trouble And Bass, are in the business of merging the two aspects.
That allows headers, like me, into dance. It opens the doors of perception closed because a) i wasn’t taking drugs when dance exploded and b) unlike my ex Nicki I didn’t spend my weekends moving my body to dance.
Over in Long Island in the late 90s, early 00s, Industrial House was beyond being simply an instrument to dance with: it was a blunt instrument to dance and drug with.
And industrial makes no sense out of a club. The bass thunders and shakes the floor, the patterns of pauses are attuned to a drug induced sound enhancement: it’s release through movement. Like a tribal dance.
Without the tribe and without the dance and without the drugs, what are you doing with it? On its own, dance is like plastic fruit when you’re hungry.