ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, October 9, 1996 TAG: 9610090011
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MADELYN ROSENBERG STAFF WRITER
Somewhere along the line, people stopped moving.
Calvin Johnson, instigator of Dub Narcotic Sound System and K Records, isn't sure exactly when it happened. He just knows that he wants to reverse it, that he wants people - particularly the young people who listen to his minimalist dub/punk/funk music - to dance.
"The idea, I think, is that at least within the circles I'm in, in terms of music, dancing has become a lower priority at shows and things," he said in a low voice that makes you want to check the levels on your telephone. "So I definitely feel we need to get back to basics and get people moving. Because if you want to just be isolated and just be absorbing media or music or culture, you can do that watching TV."
People seem to feel inhibited about dancing in public, he said. "If you went to see music 30 years ago, that would be the natural response, to dance. But now, people seem to fear retribution when they move their bodies. That's silly."
Johnson does his part, using his bare-bones sound to create grooves that make the crowds do more than bob their heads. He leads by example, twisting, turning (even voguing) as he sings, making up some of the words as he goes along.
"People tell me, 'That's so great, you've got everyone moving,''' he said. "I'm glad people have that natural response, but to me, it just seems unnatural not to."
For the uninitiated, voguing is sort of moving like a runway model posing for the cameras. And dub music is a studio manipulated type of reggae that features a heavy hypnotic bass sound,
Johnson has been turning out music - first cassettes, then CDs and vinyl - since the early 1980s. For the most part, it's been a strictly do-it-yourself operation. Some of his tapes were as simple as an a cappella recording of a single human voice. Others were mixtures of drums and guitars, though hardly as polished as something you'd hear on anything but a college radio station.
In 1993, Johnson started Dub Narcotic Sound System, a band named after his own basement studio, which is stockpiled with "an eight-track reel-to-reel, and a lot of other obsolete boxes and doodads."
Before Dub Narcotic came Johnson's Beat Happening, which won cultish favor with the hipsters in Olympia, Wash., and then the rest of America. The band didn't have a bass guitar. It didn't need one. It had Johnson's voice.
And it kept things where Johnson wanted them: Do it yourself, and use only the bare essentials.
So what is hip?
"I haven't the vaguest idea," Johnson said. "I just do what I do. All I know is that if you try to be hip, you may as well give it up right there."
Dub Narcotic Sound System plays tonight in Virginia Tech's Old Dominion Ballroom. Opening bands are K's Wandering Lucy and Dischord Record's The Warmers.
Doors open at 7 p.m. and the show starts at 7:30 p.m. Admission is $4 with a Tech ID and $5 without one.
For more information, call 231-6906.
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