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1
I've Lost Control
Sleezy D
09:45
2
This Is Acid
Maurice Joshua, Hot Hands Hula
04:37
3
Your Only Friend
Phuture
04:46
4
Baby Wants To Ride
Frankie Knuckles
08:32
5
A Day in the Life (Club Mix)
Black Riot
05:35
6
The Sound of the Atom Splitting
Pet Shop Boys
05:13
7
Washing Machine
Mr. Fingers
04:32
8
Move Your Body
Marshall Jefferson, Solardo
03:16
9
Beat Dis - 12" Version
Bomb The Bass
05:57
10
Doctorin' the House (feat. Yazz & The Plastic Population)
Coldcut, Yazz & The Plastic Population
03:46
11
Someday
CeCe Rogers
03:50
12
Your Love (feat. Jamie Principle)
Frankie Knuckles, Jamie Principle
06:47
13
City Lights
William Pitt
03:44
14
Can You Feel It
Larry Heard
05:30
15
Promised Land
Joe Smooth
05:31
16
The Morning After - Sunrise Mix
Fallout
08:30
17
Talking With Myself - Frankie Knuckles Mix
Electribe 101
07:31
18
I'll House You
Jungle Brothers
04:57
19
Why - 12" Version
Carly Simon
08:13
20
Carino
T Coy
05:13
21
Right Back to You - Extended Version
Ten City
09:10
22
Strings Of Life
Rhythim Is Rhythim, Derrick May, Mayday
07:34
23
The Sound - Extended Mix
Reese & Santonio
06:48
24
Jack Your Body - 1986 Club Mix
Steve "Silk" Hurley
05:06
25
Wax The Van - Jon's Dub
Lola, Jon
08:26
26
Voodoo Ray
A Guy Called Gerald
04:27
27
Break for Love
Raze
03:21
28
Going Back to My Roots
Richie Havens
05:03
29
Fantasy Girl
Pierre's Pfantasy Club
06:58
30
Come Get My Lovin' - 7" Mix
Dionne
04:51

1988 Second Summer of Love

With its acid house and rave parties, 1988 was the year that Europe was introduced to the new hedonistic culture of electronic music and partying, already present in the USA. Clubbing would never be the same again. 

How great it was to be young at the end of the 1980s! Though, for every friend united by a love of rock, a schism was growing. On the one side were those who thought the genre had been chasing its tail for a while, so were opening up to the revolution of hip-hop and electronic music. On the other side, the hardcore fans of the electric guitar, for whom disco was a dirty word. Their delayed interest in the changing scene would only kick in once producer Andrew Weatherall gave Primal Scream some happy pills. The summer of 1988 rather passed them by therefore, as ungrateful rock was freed from its shackles by acid house. 

The madness of the New York disco scene and the fevered explosion of techno and house in Detroit were moving across the Atlantic, stopping off at the clubs in Ibiza. On holiday in the Balearic islands in the summer of ‘87, UK DJs like Danny Rampling, Paul Oakenfold, Nicky Holloway, and Johnny Walker brought it home in their suitcases. Marshall Jefferson, Frankie Knuckles, Steve ‘Silk’ Hurley, and DJ Pierre became the new heroes, as did projects by techno producers such as Rhythim Is Rhythim for Derrick May. A new party culture was invading UK shores, to be found as much in the clubs as in warehouses, where news of illegal raves was only communicated a few hours before the doors opened. 

The summer of 1988 was the summer when this phenomenon exploded in the UK, where producers such as Coldcut, Bomb The Bass, A Guy Called Gerald and Electribe 101, took over the genre, taking it into pop and thus the charts. The visionary Pet Shop Boys gave themselves over to the pleasure of house music. With its festive spirit summed up by the smiley face, the music quickly spread throughout Europe, where parties were a pretext for large-scale intermingling. The tracks contained the spirit of celebration, sharing, and freedom, reviving the first Summer of Love of 1967 where a counter-culture emerged from California in a great wave of opposition to the Vietnam War, advocating for peace, freedom, and pleasure – whether with one another, something more artificial, or perhaps even both at the same time.

More than twenty years later, the economic crisis is still pushing young people to look for ways out through partying and drugs, notably with ecstasy, a euphoric pill known as ‘the love pill’ because it inevitably makes you want to jump on your neighbour’s back. It remains inseparable from the movement because it allowed clubbers to last all night and intensified tenfold the hypnotic side of acid house. DJs triumphed in mixing classics, current hits, and new releases – as long as they fitted the hedonistic spirit of this magical summer. That could mean a funky groove, the wonderful piano of italo-disco, or a soaring ballad like Carly Simon's “Why” which she could have written in Ibiza. Bringing together metallic beats, smooth grooves, and songs to aid the comedown after a night of dancing, these were the promises made by the second Summer of Love - that actually lasted much longer than the summer of 1988 -, a great wave of optimism and bliss that hasn’t been seen since.

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