Month: July 2015

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco throws an 80s soul weekender

One of the great things about the UK music scene in the 80s was the diversity of styles and genres enjoyed by the party going generation.

Rising from the northern soul sub-culture with its all-nighters, was the funk, disco and jazz inspired soul music scene in predominantly southern UK clubs and, from those, all-nighters and weekender soul festivals, the brainchild of a couple of prominent soul club DJs.

Remembering the heady days of endless soul partying amongst hundreds, even thousands of like-minded ‘funkateers’, Hong Kong Beat presents part of 1 of 80s soul weekender for Funky Friday.

80s soul and funk by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Kong Kong Beat mobile disco sweats off the extra party pounds with a Latin house zumba set

Got to work of some of the excesses of the past four days of partying up to my birthday 🙂

So, what better way than a 30 minute zumba workout to some Latin house, samba house, salsa and reggaeton beats for Thumping Thursday.

Sweat is fat crying, but the blood and tears, that’s me…

Pumping with latin house zumba beats for Thumping Thursday by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco puts on its loons and tie-die with 60s classic rock

If you ever played a record (“eh? What’s that then grandad?”) on one of those turntables below, almost certainly you were born in the 50s and brought up in the 60s, you little Baby Boomer you.

This was a time of hippies, rockers, mods, screaming female fans, free rock festivals, Carnaby Street fashions, Twiggy, Bardot, Hockney, Warhol, Mao’s Red Book, Black Panthers, riots in the Sorbonne, war, anti-war protests, and the birth of some of the most influential bands and music of the contemporary popular music era.

Wild Wednesday jumps back and go-gos to the sound of my formative pre-teen and early teen years with some classic rockers.

Yeh baby, light my fire.

Classic 60s rock for Wild Wednesday by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco celebrates summer birthdays with chilled funk, jazz and soul

If, like me, you have a summer birthday, it was often a bummer when you were a kid – school’s out, friends are maybe away on holidays, ice cream melts too quickly and dribbles all over the floor…

But the one thing that makes summer birthday’s better than any those at any other time of the year is when you are at a ‘real’ party age – there are so many great tunes to party or chill-out to 🙂

So, as it’s my birthday on Tuesday Chill-out today, I offer an extended selection of some of my favourite summer chill out songs.

Funk and soul summer chill-out tunes by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco exploring loneliness with dance and soul tunes for Monday Moods

Moving dance and soul set about being alone, for Monday Moods this week.

Dance and soul tunes about being alone for Monday Moods by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco grilling on the BBQ with a little country music

I can’t say I was a fan of country music ‘back then’, but modern country does hit a note with me, more of a rock and blues edge to the music, little more soul in the lyrics that resonate with kicking back and chilling out or kicking off and having fun, or just letting off about the ups and downs of life.

So, here’s a selection of contemporary country artists to boot scoot along to while getting the BBQ grill warm for Sunday Selection this week.

Getting a little country for Sunday Selection this week by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco with contemporary soul sisters for Soulful Saturday

The nice thing about soul music is that it’s a gift that keeps on giving. One generation influences the next, and in turn builds on the last.

Presenting contemporary soul sisters who grew up listening to the likes of the great classic soul sisters: Aretha, Etta, Dionne, Martha, Diana, Whitney, Gladys… But who have brought their own thing to the party, with great voices tuned to classic licks infused with funk, swing and hip-hop.

It doesn’t get much more soulful than these ladies.

Contemporary soul sisters for Soulful Saturday by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco is firmly in the groove with 70s and 80s jazz funk

Last week’s offering of jazz funk looked across the decades from back in the 70s up until today.

This week for Funky Friday, Hong Kong Beat mobile disco is firmly back in the groove with the 70s and 80s masters of jazz funk, with one particularly funky surprise inclusion!

Blow that horn.

Firmly in the groove with 70s and 80s jazz funk for this Funky Friday by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco gets the handbags on the floor for 90s dance pop

So, you’re at a club, the music is banging and you want to dance, but what do you do with the handbags?

Not a problem for fellas, but for the ladies it’s always been the answer to just stick them on the floor in the middle of the group of girls, and dance around them, curiously usually to a particular kind of very poppy dance music, often involving boy bands and girl groups.

The 90s were a prime time for the music style, so Hong Kong Beat mobile disco presents 90s handbag pop for Thumping Thursday 😀

Bacardi coke for me please Sharon!

90s Handbag pop for Thumping Thursday by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud

Hong Kong Beat mobile disco pogoing to German punk and new wave – Neue Deutsche Welle (NDW) – for Wild Wednesday

At the time of the punk music movement growing in UK in the late 70s, Germany was still divided ideologically and physically by politics and a wall.

Not so with rock music as West, and especially East, German rock bands took to the anti-establishment rawness of punk and new-wave, spawning their own blend of punk, new-wave, euro-rock and traditional German hard rock, to be known by the movement as Neue Deutsche Welle –  German New Wave – and abbreviated by anybody with trouble pronouncing it to NDW 🙂

Starting out as an underground music movement, as the 80s rolled in it became more influenced by electronic rock and mainstream as record labels jumped on the bandwagon, producing factory-made one-hit wonders. By the mid 80s it had been abandoned by its proponents, but its influence can still be felt in later waves of punk rock and in dance-punk.

Wild Wednesday presents a little selection of some avant garde and commercial and tracks from the movement.

Pogoing to Neue Deutsche Welle – or NDW for english speakers – on Wild Wednesday by Hong Kong Beat on Mixcloud