Back2Roots: behind the most iconic surprising and interesting dance songs in recent years!
The Dance time machine is coming to a halt on Riton x Nightcrawlers – Friday (feat. Mufasa & Hypeman), a track that is definitely conquering the world rankings thanks to the original riff, the social virality of the attached videos and the remix of Riton and Dopamine that have colonized the synapses of all of us since its release on February 25, 2021, humming:
“It’s Friday again
It’s Saturday, Sunday, what? (We want that weekend)”
In the UK’s Official Singles Chart “Friday”, with 22360 sales units, it came in 10 at the date of publication, marking the first top ten for Riton, Mufasa and Hypeman and third for the Nightcrawlers, (the first since Surrender Your Love of 1995). The climbs in the rankings throughout Europe, especially in the east and north,the climbs are unstoppable and it have increased their sales units.
“Friday” music video, directed by Remi Laudat has as main protagonists two web stars Mufasa & Hyperman, the real mines of the new success of this track because Riton was able to trigger them by giving rhythm to the music that animated the gags of their video started in unsuspected times of 2019 from the now famous Tik Tok and spread virally on all social networks in the long boring hours of lockdown and in those of these weeks of slow restart.
On Mufasa’s YouTube channel called Cousinskeether there are many nice videos of him getting out of the moving car and engaging in all kinds of dances fomented by the cameraman Hyperman. One of the videos is just what we mentioned earlier in which a bored Musafa suddenly opens the door and sets off to dance and sing to the champion of the famous Push the Feeling On, the hit single from the 1992 Nightcrawlers showing a growing and contagious absurd euphoria with movements as crazy as the shirt he wears is colorful:
Musafa aka Jeff Obeng is an influencer who now lives in Virginia and enjoys thousands of new followers daily, one night out of a McDonalds he met CT Moody aka Hypeman who stylistically shocked all subsequent videos to the point of starting to work alongside brands like FootLocker and ASOS. His now iconic “Obang” dance move has been seen on NBA courts and a Super Bowl pitch and at the moment the two boys are part of the business that estimates the influencer economy at $ 9.7 billion for 2020. growing for 2021! The extra gear of the duo is the ability to influence people’s mood with simplicity, to the point of having been titled by the renowned international magazine FORBES “In these dark times at least we have Mufasa”
Before Riton arrived many VIPs imitated Mufasa & Hyperman, among the many I like to remember the unpredictable rising star of Formula 1 Lando Norris who tested the check in his McLaren during the Friday free practice of the Mugello Grand Prix last year. – radio with his engineer like this:
Let’s go back to Henry Smithson, better known as Riton, an English disc jockey and record producer from Newcastle. Henry has always been a skilled sampler very knowledgeable about Krautrock, as a remixer he has worked for Scissor Sisters, Human League, Soulwax and, above all, M.I.A. and Chromeo until 2010 when he founded the short-lived Carte Blanche project with the late DJ Mehdi, releasing two EPs on Ed Banger and earning the esteem of Mark Ronson with whom he toured the same year.
In 2016 he gained the limelight thanks to the song Rinse & Repeat in collaboration with the singer Kah-Lo, nominated for the best dance recording at the 2017 Grammy Awards. Then it was the turn in 2019 of the success of Turn Me On in featuring with Oliver Heldens and Vula (and since we are on BackToRoots know that it is a track based on a sample of Don’t Go by the British musical duo Yazoo, while the lyrics include an interpolation of Doctor Love by the American band First Choice, in short, always blessed 80s).
My Dolorean found the Friday sample way back in 1992 in Push the Feeling On of the Scottish musical project Nightcrawlers, led by composer John Reid, extracted as the first single from their debut album Let’s Push It in 1995.
This track has been a worldwide hit for years, the song’s signature electronic bass line influenced much of the 90’s house and underground production and not just so much that it was repeatedly sampled in chronological order in 2008 Bob Sinclar for his remix of the Rihanna’s hit Don’t Stop the Music; in 2009 the rapper Pitbull as the basis for his single Hotel Room Service; while the duo Waze & Odyssey for their bootleg of R. Kelly’s Bump n ‘Grind in 2014.
Among those who have put their hand to this track which boasts among other things 15 weeks of parking in the Billboard top 100, we cannot forget Marc Kinchen aka MK, an American producer, who essentially changed it completely. In fact, he decomposed it to edit the vocal samples, creating a track with an unusual sound. This new version, titled The Dub of Doom Mix, first became known in 1993 and, as such, was frequently played in the UK underground scene for two years, before reaching number 22 on the Official Singles Chart in October. of 1994 when it was officially marketed. In 1995, with new MK mixes, it was re-released for the third time, peaking third on the Official Singles Chart, becoming Reid’s biggest hit in his homeland. In the wake of this huge success, Redi and MK released four more singles, accompanied by their respective remixes. Surrender Your Love; Don’t Let The Feeling Go; Let’s Push It and Should I Ever (Fall in Love). In September 1995, the first studio album, Let’s Push It, was released, consisting of all the tracks produced up to that point by Reid and remixed with the usual Kinchen style. The following year the remix album The 12 “Mixes: An Album of the Very Best Club Remixes and Keep Pushing Our Love was released, with vocalist Alysha Warren, which hit number 30 and intended as a pilot track for a second LP. However, due to its poor sales, it was never released. From these anecdotes one can guess that the true soul of the Nightcrawlers was John Reid, a successful composer, author of Westlife (Unbreakable), When the Heartache Is Over by Tina Turner and also some songs by Rod Stewart Friend of Simon Cowell, co-writer for Kelly Clarkson and Leona Lewis.
How strange is time, how beautiful it is to move in its space through musi?!
The Nightcrawlers in Push The Feeling On sang of reckless nights, Riton plays Mufasa singing and dancing waiting for a Friday full of expectations!
In 1992 mobile phones existed for a few elites and were portable suitcases, today they are the containers of the life of all of us through data and contacts that can be dragged with a finger. In 1992 Mani Pulite and Tangentopoli broke out in Italy while today we run to vaccines to defend ourselves from a pandemic that our generation had never known. In 1992 there were paninari with a whimsical and glossy look who rode from one bar to another on their mopeds while today’s teen-agers follow influencers who imitate 90s fashion but drink spritzes in cool and renowned lounge bars that they reach in scooters. electric or pedal assisted bikes. In 1992 Wayne Rainey was MotoGP world champion and today we are preparing to follow a Valentino Rossi at sunset without heirs. In 1992, Luca Barbarossa won Sanremo with Take me to Dance (what a case) while the winners of 2021, the Maneskin, are competing to win Eurovision just as I am finalizing this article.
I could go on for lines and lines, you could go on maybe helped by the music while I load the headphones and the records on the Dolorean console, I will wait for you at the next Back2Roots carousel ride to discover the grooves dug by the roots of Electronic Dance Music.
Check the first episode with “Rasputin”!
“MUSIC IS THE ANSWER”
