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Photo above: The dance floor at All Our Friends, Giant Steps, London, 2018.
Resistor Mag: Your books include numerous voices, perspectives and contributions. They make one think of a party where many characters, elements and factors come together to create a harmonious whole. How has your knowledge of dance floors influenced your writing?
Tim Lawrence: “Maybe the energy that infuses the writing comes from the dance floor, but I don’t pretend that my writing in some way replicates the aesthetics of DJing, as other writers occasionally claim for their own work. Instead, I’d say that the dance floor has inspired me to want to write about music and to pursue certain lines of enquiry. Clearly I’ve been drawn to a New York sensibility and this has led me to write a somewhat obsessional 1,500 pages on a relatively slim 14-year period. If that seems excessive to some, my own feeling is that I’ve written these histories in quite an economical way. I’ve also wanted to give voice to the hundreds, if not thousands of people who’ve made these dance floors and music scenes happen and, through interviewing them relentlessly, convey the energy of their work. The powerful influence their contributions have had on me has motivated me to highlight the importance of these previously hidden, marginalised histories.
“Academic writing can be dense and theoretical, and I’ve learnt more from books written in this way than more obviously accessible books. But back at Newsnight I’d decided I wanted to be outward-facing writer, with Edward Said, a Columbia-based Palestinian activist and author of the best-selling Culture and Imperialism, my role model. Along the way Love Saves the Day accidentally became my doctorate, because it wasn’t possible to write that book and a PhD. Ken Wissoker then picked up on some of the inaccessible sections that were a requirement for a doctoral thesis and asked me if I wanted the people I was interviewing to be able to read the eventual book. It felt like a breakthrough question and from that point on I’ve tried to hone a style that strikes a balance between colour, dynamism and analysis, combining complexity and accessibility. I’ve encouraged the protagonists of my books, many of them advanced thinkers as well as practitioners, to deliver the analysis. I’ve also aimed for a style that integrates multiple voices and registers. As with the dance floor, flow is everything.”
Tim Lawrence is the author of Love Saves the Day: A History of American Dance Music Culture, 1970-1979, Hold on to Your Dreams: Arthur Russell and the Downtown Music Scene, 1973-92, and Life & Death on the New York Dance Floor, 1980-1983. He is the founding host of All Our Friends, co-hosts the Love Is the Message podcast, available on Apple podcasts, Spotify and Patreon.
Love Saves the Day: A History of American Dance Music Culture, 1970-1979
Hold on to Your Dreams: Arthur Russell and the Downtown Music Scene, 1973-92