NIGHT MOVES' "TransDance" re-entered the DJ charts once again in the new millenium!!! The track's dark synthetic basslines accompanied by haunting vocals of Adam Ant's ex wife made it a dance floor classic. This record is a must for every hi-energy collector & all the new romos and clashers.MP3INTRVIEW BY HANOBEN: Tell us something about the start of Night Moves, when did the project start, was it your first project together? Was Night Moves some kind of "friends doing their thing" project? In fact: who was Night Moves?Night Moves was created after Michael Guihen saw Gary Numan on Top of the Pops in the spring of 1979, performing Are Friends Electric. The droning driving sound of the opening notes took his attention and inspired him to make electronic music.
Not having any classical music training except for a few piano lessons at school he placed an advert in a well known music magazine for anyone who had an interest in forming a synth based band. After seeing a few people he chose a couple (John and Leona not the John who ended up in Nightmoves) in the 1st few months of 1980 & they seemed to share the same passion for the same music.
They named themselves Oblong Mauve and set about writing progressive electronic tracks which they wrote and recorded at John and Leona's small bed sit in West London. Michael started doing vocals as no one else wanted to.
Six months after they started writing together the relationship between the three became stressed and Michael left to form Night Moves. He wanted a more commercial sound that people could relate to and was introduced to Denis Haines in late 1980 who at the time was working with Gary Numan on Telekon as his keyboard player. Michael played Denis some of the tracks that hed written with Oblong Mauve and one track stood out which was TransDance.
Denis and Michael worked closely for a few months and together wrote a number of backing tracks. One of these was the now famous farewell song from Gary Numan to his band Tubeway Army, Love needs no disguise. In return for keeping all rights to the Numan track, Denis gave Michael some studio time to develop TransDance.
The first version of TransDance was recorded at Ridge Farm studio in Surrey and within the week Michael had a record deal with GC Recordings. This mix of TransDance was pressed onto a white label, the extraordinarily rare cat.no GC1.
Six months later in mid '81 at an underground dive bar in South London which many of his musical & stylistic contemporaries such as Boy George, Steve Strange, Rusty Egan & Phillip Sallon frequented, Michael met John Davis (or as he was known then, John Darc).
You both seemed to be very young when you did Night Moves, [so tell us also something about your personal background back then.]1. Mick was 19, John 17. It was so long ago
What have you been into back then? Any influences?2. When they met Mick was immersed in the punk & new romantic crowd while John was more interested by Electro & the New York Hip Hop scene, although both shared an interest in Numan. All these influences were apparent in their future work.
Was Night Moves a London based (club-) project?3. Nightmoves were based in South London.
What did you do before Night Moves?4. Before they formed John was still attending school (!) & Mick was a life guard.
[You mentioned once, that you knew some of the people hanging out with Gary Numan (if i remember it right), was Night Moves anyhow involved with that scene (Shock, Tik + Tok, etc), did you had contact to other musicians of that period? If so with whom?] see intro Coming to that wonderful song, you are famous for: who wrote transdance, [what is the story behind this song?]Mick wrote TransDance. He's forgotten what it was about J
Was it thought of as an dancefloorsmash (like visage, etc)?5. The original mix of Trans Dance was not so dance orientated but more a piece of aspirational post punk electronic mood music. We had no idea it would go where it went.
Who did the female backing vocals;) ?6. Oh that was Eve: when the 2nd mix was recorded @ Matrix studios in Spring 1982 it was produced by Chris Payne & again released by GC records on 12" vinyl. With this mix (often referred to as the pink label mix) John's more transatlantic dancier influence could be heard in the new bassline. The backing vocals were sung by Eve Goddard, Adam Ant's former wife (although Mr Ant was never lucky enough to meet Nightmoves). We can't remember how Eve got involved in the project. Probably ligging or freeloading J
did any of you guys had something going on with her???Don't be obscene ;)
What kind of instruments did you use?7. Only the best! There were a handful of Prophets, and an ARP Odyssey. The rhythm was, of course, the TR808, with some live drums, plus two handclap machines were used on the later mixes.
Have you been kinda synth-nerds back then? [What do you think about the development of electronic gear from then on, do you still prefer the old analogue ones?]8 While we were both synth fanatics John was more interested in the internal workings & technical details of the many keyboards they used & even built his own synth in his bedroom. We were more enthusiasts than nerds, thank you. J
Did you have any chart entry?7. The aforementioned pink label mix of TransDance was doubled up with the New York mix & reached No.24 on the US Billboard dance charts in March 1983 & No.6 in the London Gay charts @ the same time.
Did you ever appear on stage? Tell us about it!8. On November 1st 1984 Nightmoves performed in front of 2000 people @ the London Hippodrome & did a record company showcase @ the Valbonne nightclub the previous May.
What other songs/records have you published under the name of Night Moves?9. Aside from TransDance, Nightmoves released Take My Love, Beat This & NightDrive as The Robot Rock EP. We wrote many more.
Have you (any of you) been involved in other projects apart from Night Moves?10. After Trans Dance both we both went onto further musical projects. Mick is now one half of dance production duo Sugarpussy who have internationally released a string of hard funky house tracks as well as remixing artists such as Boy George & the Human League (see www.voodoovinyl.com for details & soundfiles of their tracks). John worked with a number of bands giving technical support (e.g. recording assistance) as well as the occasional bit of keyboards. He was the keyboard player for a post-punk guitar band Doll's House, and also recorded a wealth of solo efforts. John also helped Billy Steel, some of Lord David Steel, to record some songs (Mick helped a bit in the early days on that project). Website coming soon
There seemes to be a big mystery going on concerning transdance. From the mid 80s on, nobody exactly knew about the project behind it and it (the record) was hard to find - even back then, though it had (in my opinion) the potential to get really BIG, so what can you tell us about that? did your record company make mistakes not promoting it well, have you been handled kinda one-hit wonder by them?11. TransDance gained far greater notoriety after Nightmoves disbanded & it was only with the advent of the Internet that Mick & John discovered that their 1st single was a much sought after cult classic now exchanging hands for vastly inflated sums. MCA's lacklustre promotion of TransDance never matched the musical potential of the track & its future notoriety was based almost entirely on airplay & word of mouth.
Why are there so many releases from that song (I know of 4)? It seemes to me that after it came out (first), the song had to "grow" to get his full potential seen by everybody, and later on, the record company tried it again (in 1986), am I right?12. In total there were 4 12" mixes of Trans Dance (on 3 vinyls) & 1 7" version (backed with Night Drive). The 3rd of these, the aforementioned New York /Pink label release, was the most successful. There is one unreleased 7" version. The single was re-released as you say in 1986 but we had no idea about it (and got no money!). We also never got anything for the 12" version that appears on "Hardest Hits 3".
The record company kept wanting it remixed so we could bring it up to date.
Tell us something about the New York Mix, how came the connection to the red bus studio (if I remember it right, it was the studio hosting the likes of famous garage dj Larry Levan, doing also the fantastic Imagination-remix lp)? Was this the connection to the states?13. The New York mix was influenced by the sound of the Arthur Baker especially the Freez classic IOU which he produced. He was originally lined up to do the New York mix but unfortunately had to fly to England to produce Temptation, the follow up to New Order's Blue Monday. Mick flew to the States to oversee the production which was eventually executed by Mr Bakers 2nd in command Jay Burnett. When Mick returned to the UK with 4 reels of said work on _ inch master tape, he & John disapeared into Utopia cutting rooms in central London & eventually emerged with the final seminal edit. Interestingly enough when Mick released his 1st track as Sugarpussy 15 years later, he returned to Utopia to master their debut MK1.
The Red Bus studio is in London, and was used to remix the Robot Rock version, which was to appear on our final release along with the new material we had recorded.
[The Mid 80s, when transdance really got big in the clubs, were a period of change, the so called new wave scene slowly disappeared, giving birth to the more open dancefloor genres which would soon follow (house, acid, techno). Transdance soon became one of the ultimate dancefloorfillers, in U.S. too, being played by the early house djs at paradise garage, as well as early Chicago-house pioneers like Ron Hardy or the technoguys in Detroit, while at the same time it remained one of THE all time new wave disco hits - to this day. Have you ever been aware of this, back then, are you now? what were your feelings about it all then (in the 80s)?] why/when did you stop doing music (as night moves)?To be honest, it's hard to remember! We got back together to record a cover of a song, and we've remained friends to this day, getting together every couple of months. We take a great interest in each other's musical output (although John's been remarkably quiet lately)
What do you think about the price of the record going almost every time up to at least 100 dollars, on ebay?14. We're amazed & bemused by the inflated amounts NightMoves vinyls are now changing hands for & are equally surprised by the continuing interest & fascination with this 2 decade old track, especially in mainland Europe.
[What do you think about the upcoming interest in your song now? Any comments on the general backlash of 80s clubmusic/fashion, which is happening at the moment? Do you like, have you heard about the nu wave of this music (so called "electroclash", "romo" - scene etc)?] Do you know about actual djs, like Morgan Geist from U.S., famous electro dj I-f from Holland and others (including us!) still playing transdance? What do you think about that?It's fabulous! Keep it up! J It's great seeing some of the things people have said about us on the 'net.
So, are you guys planning to re-release transdance in any form (as there are so many rumours of it being bootlegged by others)? Do you have problems about being bootlegged, anyway?15. Aside from the legion bootlegs already available there are no plans to remix or re release TransDance. Although John may get into supplying bootleg CDs sometime soon, with those elusive mixes
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