DJ Alex Corton – Vinyl Reviews

Good Looking Records

Intense – Positive Notions / Careless

Minds

1996

It’s our next plate on Good Looking and we now feature an artist that we’ve spilled admiration toward on occasions during Creative Source and Earth, and now for that parent label, Good Looking. By 1996, the trio of Dan Duncan, Beau Thomas and Simon Vispi had given us some of the most memorable and finely produced pieces of music in the scene. With tracks on Great Asset, Underground Level, the mighty works of art on Rugged Vinyl and working with the label Tooz Up, they were already in a very well established position to create their first incredible release on GLR. This was always going to be a special plate, and Intense did not let us down one bit. 

   Charged had fully taken over the distribution of Good Looking and Public Art worked the main release design. We were also hitting the end of 1996 with this release. Let’s put a stick through the spinning spokes and dismount (or fly over the handle bars) for the main purpose of these reviews.  The music. I picked this up around the same time as ‘The Sax Lick / Morions’ on Way Out Records. Both sublime.

   Side A is ‘Positive Notions’ unleashing those high quality bongos and high hats from the intro. We also have a mix of soothing pads and then the sax from Molly Duncan who features with Intense on a number of their tunes. He was Dan Duncan’s dad from the group and such a key component of the live sound and performance. We sadly lost Molly in 2019 – R.I.P. His history in the music industry speaks for itself, having worked with many legendary artists such as Ben E King, Chaka Khan, Eric Clapton and Mark Knopfler’s, Dire Straits. 

   When you listen to tracks like this, you realize not only how sublime the music is but also how expertly produced, engineered and mastered Intense were. I know I’ve mentioned this before but having Beau & Simon working in the group just added to the expertise in sound engineering and working the levels. Dan went on to house music eventually, and his work with Pig & Dan is well worth checking out. I love ‘Saints & Sinners’ by them. 

   On Side AA is ‘Careless Minds’ taking you out into the constellations of the stars we have yet to receive the light from. The wind clips the tips of the sand dunes, sending the fragile clouds of particles across the musical landscape. This tune is one that I feel takes all the Intense blueprints and builds a steadfast structure of all their qualities. Molly’s saxophone carries gifts from the gods into the air and swirls between those feather-down pads, while the breaks trundle, the bass bubbles and we recline into the unrivaled wonders of Intense. Whatever label they were releasing on, you’d be a fool not to have bagged their work. 

Good Looking Records was not slowing down on the output of masterful music and if, like me, you felt that every step you took with this label was going to arouse and douse the senses and feelings with more impact than any other music at the time, you’d not hesitate on buying each release when it arrived. 

    I also saw recently that Beau & Dan had reunited recently via Instagram. Is this a sign of something brewing from the vaults or a new project? We are definitely watching that space for more details..

   More from Intense on GLR to follow at a later date.