User blog:KrikIDDQD/Links with the history of the "Eurobeat" term

Eurobeat (original sense)

 * https://80shinrgeurobeat.com - Giant jamiej80sdisco blog about Hi-NRG charts from the 80s. These two articles are particularly noteworthy:
 * https://80shinrgeurobeat.com/2021/12/17/january-june-1985-hi-nrg-goes-euro/
 * https://80shinrgeurobeat.com/2022/04/25/1985-a-melting-pot-of-hi-nrg-pop-rock-italo-disco-euro-disco-turns-into-eurobeat/
 * Magazine: "Record Mirror - Dec 14, 1985" - The very first issue of the British magazine Record Mirror with "Eurobeat" chart (the chart would later be renamed back to "Hi-NRG" in mid-1987). Apparently this is the very first public use of the term "Eurobeat", which replaced "Hi-NRG", for which a replacement had previously been sought because it no longer reflected the music that was played in British gay-clubs. Page 54: "EUROBEAT is the new name by which gay club DJs are calling the now outmoded and not strictly accurate Hi-NRG, although the criteria behind this chart remain the same."
 * https://www.flickr.com/photos/57779449@N02/51803707751/in/album-72177720295770612/
 * https://www.discogs.com/label/21968-Eurobeat-Records - one of Bobby Orlando's countless labels specifically for Eurobeat (P.S. He released Eurobeat not only on it).
 * Magazine: "BLITZ - March 1987 No.51" - Used several times on page 27 during a review of the new Dead or Alive album and roundup of new dance releases.
 * Magazine: "Dance Music Report Vol. 13 - Issue 19, Oct 7-25, 1990" - "HiNRG/EUROBEAT" section. It's also noteworthy that the section is divided into "American HiNRG", "British HiNRG", "German HiNRG" and "Italian HiNRG" releases.
 * Magazine: "The Wire - Issue 112, June 1993" - "underworlds" article about gay community and the roots of House music in America and Britain: "So what did House bring to the British gay scene? "Look, House in Britain was never a gay thing; it was a straight white thing. It was the Pete Tongs of this world who broke it here, and it quickly became very straight macho thing to be into House music." Having dismissed the trendy soulboy brigade, he pauses. "By this time (1987 - a mere six months after it started), the music had forgotten where it came from.". But this isn’t quite the truth — or it's only a very selective part of it. "The truth is", one long-time white scene member told me, "the gay scene up until about five years ago was racist, very racist. If anyone tells you that House wasn’t gay, they mean it wasn’t big with the white middle class clones who were into the Eurobeat stuff that Ian Levine was playing.""
 * Book: "The Last Post - Music After Modernism" (1993) - a section introductory paragraph, listing the various forms of Hi-NRG. It is also very noteworthy that among the listed genres, in addition to “Eurobeat” (which is clearly used in the original meaning), there is also “Italobeat”, although it is not clear what is meant by this, except that this is some of the Hi-NRG subgenres. Page 115: "Before looking at the specifics of gay disco music, some definition of the genre must be made. Gay disco music, as a discrete analysable unit, is rather difficult to pin down. However, there are certain types of disco music which are aimed at the gay market and which are particularly popular, and as such these are particularly relevant for this essay. These types come under the generic heading of High Energy (usually shortened to Hi-Energy or Hi-NRG) and they include Boystown, Italobeat, Balearic beat, Eurobeat among others. In this essay I shall be using the generic term Hi-NRG to describe, albeit rather simplistically, all these various forms."
 * Magazine: "The Boston Phoenix - Jan 10-16, 1997" - use of the term in the USA in the late 90s (that is, shortly before the release of Initial D), where the term Eurobeat was by then used in relation to Eurohouse and Eurodance (apparently on approximately the same principle as the term Euro-NRG, originally from the term used for late Eurodisco, came to be used in relation to Eurodance, since one genre evolved into another).
 * Book: "Energy Flash: A Journey through Rave Music and Dance Culture", Simon Reynolds (1998) - The quote is in the context of the development of House music in British clubs of the 80s: "House music seemed to be a fad that had been and gone, at least as far as London clubland was concerned. ‘House never kicked off the way we thought,’ remembers Mark Moore, one of the few DJs who played Chicago and Detroit tracks. ‘I remember spinning Derrick May’s “Strings of Life” at the Mud Club and clearing the entire floor.’ House did have a toe-hold in the gay scene, at clubs like Jungle and Pyramid, where Moore spun alongside other house crusaders like Colin Faver and Eddie Richards. But most gay clubbers still preferred Eurobeat and Hi-NRG, - says Moore, and reckoned the arty Pyramid crowd were ‘weirdos’.". Essentially repeats the same thing as the article in The Wire, it's talking about the same thing.
 * YouTube: "Eastbound Expressway - You're A Beat" - personal Ian Levine YouTube channel (the man for whose music de facto this term was coined): "...Jump forward seven years to 1986. I had just left Record Shack, and I wanted another anthem. High Energy had been the anthem to High Energy music, and the name of the music was changing to Eurobeat. Well we couldn't very well call a song "Eurobeat", now could we ?? Oh yes we could... Eur...... A..... Beat, that equals "You're A Beat", and so we did it, a story which my friend Damon Rochefort still tells at dinner parties, while creasing up into paroxysms of laughter."
 * Internet article: "Do Ya Wanna Funk? Paul Flynn On Hi-NRG", Paul Flynn (12.07.2021) - Big article about Hi-NRG. Hidden behind the paywall, but if you really want to, you can read it by Ctrl+A>Ctrl+C>Ctrl+V: "These records, even airing from a tinny wireless, directly evoked the leathery scent of gay nightclubs long before I’d stepped into one. They get a fond nod from Rupert Everett in his memoir, when he first discovers the Coleherne on Old Brompton Road, the favourite boozer of the capital's clones. First as Boystown disco, later Eurobeat, hi-NRG has escaped any revisionist hour in the sun, despite its clear influence on so many 21st century dance classics, including tentpole club classics, Lindstrom’s 'I Feel Space' and Hercules and Love Affair’s 'Blind'."
 * Article: "Re-appraising Hi-Nrg, the queer soundtrack to the 1980s", David Carroll - "Linguistically, the term Eurobeat was coined to describe Hi-Nrg style records which began to emanate from the English club scene, courtesy of producers such as Ian Levine. Levine’s output, producing tracks such as So Many Men, So Little Time, his 1982 produced hit, fronted by Evelyn Thomas, would use the genre’s name as its title, High Energy."

The Japanese use of the term actually reflects the original state:

 * https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/ユーロビート
 * http://www.nrgexpress.com/whats/history.htm
 * http://kayokyokuplus.blogspot.com/2013/12/marcos-vs-80s-playlist-eurobeat-edition.html

British Eurobeat
"'Ackchyually, SAW is Eurobeat' (c) standard Eurobeat-community meme"Here are collected examples of the use of the term Eurobeat exclusively in the meaning of British Eurobeat or in relation to it without a firm possibility of determining what is meant by this - Eurobeat in the original sense or only British Eurobeat.
 * "Sachlexikon Popularmusik", Wieland Ziegenrücker and Peter Wicke (1989) - German dictionary from 1989 with musical terms. Calls Eurobeat exclusively British Eurobeat and says that this is an American term. Let's leave it on their conscience, lol. Page 458: "Eurobeat: 1986 in der amerikanischen Musikpresse aufgekommene Bezeichnung für die in der Tradition des Synthi-Pop stehende Linie der britischen Popmusikentwicklung, die sich hauptsächlich mit den Namen des Autoren- und Produzententeams Mike Stock (geb. 1952), Matt Aitken (geb. 1958) und Pete Waterman (geb. 1951) sowie Gruppen und Interpreten wie Mel & Kim, Bananarama, Princess, Rick Astley (geb. 1965), Erasure und Pet Shop Boys verbindet."
 * Magazine: "Sound on Sound - February 2009" - "Classic Tracks: Rick Astley 'Never Gonna Give You Up'", Richard Buskin. The mention of Eurobeat occurs more in the context of the original meaning, since "Never Gonna Give You Up" is opposed to it, but nevertheless.
 * Book: "Cambridge Introductions to Music - Music Technology", Julio d'Escriván (2012) - "Stock, Aitken and Waterman: Songwriters and prodcers of a veritable hit factory. A technique used by Peter Waterman to increase perceived loudness of their songs on radio and fool the limiting devices was to carefully roll off bass frequencies in the final mix. Their work epitomises the classic Eurobeat/Hi-NRG sound and the British Synthpop of the late 1980s"
 * Internet article: "VIEWS: The Magic of Stock Aitken Waterman" (23.12.2023) - "1987 was also the year of “I Heard A Rumour”, “Love In The First Degree” (can you tell I’m a big Bananarama fan?!), the aforementioned “Toy Boy” (SAW’s answer to “I Wanna Dance With Somebody”) and a tea boy from Newton Le Willows, who took on the world with his debut single “Never Gonna Give You Up” in the late Summer and early Autumn of that year. Stock Aitken Waterman were becoming a ‘hit factory’ that people all over were taking notice of, their catchy Euro-beat pop and dance anthems together with their unique hand and dance moves were becoming addictive to those of us of an impressionable age. Their response to the critics and all those non-believers was “take or leave us, only please believe us, we ain’t ever gonna be respectable”. Touche. Another number one and the record sales, along with the Gold and Platinum discs were piling up."
 * Magazine: "Future Music - issue 385, 28 June 2022" - "The beginner's guide to: Italo disco" article: "3 genres inspired by Italo disco: 1. '80s UK pop - Sometimes known as Eurobeat, the dominant UK pop sound of the late ’80s was heavily influenced by Italo disco. Powerhouse production trio Stock Aitken Waterman achieved over 100 UK top 40 hit singles with sounds inspired by Italo. You can hear hints of Italo all over SAW productions such as Mel & Kim’s Showing Out (Get Fresh At The Weekend), Bananarama’s Venus and even Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up."