I love to dance. I love the way the music electrifies my body. Good dance music makes me tingle all over, especially in my ass cheeks. It's also good exercise. Fun exercise. And it keeps my ass cheeks how I like them: strong but small.

But I don't like American dance music. Clubs in America make me nauseous with their never ending flow of top 40 bullshit and recycled, overplayed disco tunes from the 70's. In fact, the next time I hear "YMCA" at a dance club, and the pathetic, fake outbursts of glee by all the lame people there (as if they haven't heard the song in ages) I'll probably just leave.

The most innovative dance music produced these days is done in Europe.  European musicians aren't self-conscious about their music. They don't try to produce "hip" or "cool." They just have fun, and the result is often the most absolutely cheesy and absolutely rockin' dance tunes you'll hear. These songs will make you stand on a table and swig a bottle of Absolut, gyrating your hips, pumpin' your ass back and forth, watching the people scream in ecstasy below.

They make the kind of music that will help you build the ass cheeks you always dreamed of, firm and strong, yet small.

The kind of music that might put a little air into your honey's ass cheeks, which look like two deflated balloons half-filled with gravel.

Arling and Cameron, two DJ's from Amsterdam, have put together a record, "All In" that will never be played in any typical American clubs cuz it's far too good and original.  This is pure plastic dance from some other planet, and so groovy and catchy you'll be hummin the tunes in your cubicle at work the next morning. You want a revved up cartoon soundtrack with Hawaiian slide guitar? How 'bout some hard-core guitar riffs with a robotic "We love to Rock" voice overlay. How 'bout some little asian girls singing repeatedly, "We love dancing! --- yaaaah!" to one of the funkiest synth grooves in all of dance. The best song on the album, "What about the boys?" begins with a salsa tune for the girls, and then gets into ultra guitar revved salsa for the boys.

The best part about this record is the le internacionalism. The duo collaborated with some Japanese pop musicians, but pull in elements from seemingly every genre.  And it's not as if the electronic, hip-hop, salsa, rock, and groove elements are spread out over the record. They're combined on individual songs. 

Put this on at a party and people will go "What's this?" Then they'll start shaking their ass cheeks around, saying "This is good, man!" And you can just play it off, like you listen to cool music all the time, "Eh, it's just a record I picked up in Amsterdam. Or was it Tokyo?"

And with that you'll turn around and flex your ass cheeks, moving 'em left and right, up and down, all to the beat, your faith in dance music restored, usounds style.

Until next time, dance it long, dance it strong.

USOUNDS | 4.30.1999