After a small hiatus we are back with another episode of the People and Dancefloors podcast!
Delighted to be joined by Harold Heath, a DJ with a career spanning the full history of electronic dance music, whose book I devoured over a staycation. The book is called ‘Long Relationships: my incredible journey from unknown DJ to small time DJ’, a collection of heart-warming anecdotes full of discreet wisdom – highly recommended!
On the podcast, we chat about the title of the book, long relationships, as the perfect framing to encapsulate many relationships: to DJing, to music itself, to friends and connections made along the way, to drugs both internally produced and externally consumed, and to the electronic dance music industry.
We discuss what pulls people in and keeps people coming back to the dance floor. We agree that it is about community and belonging, but Harold adds another layer when discussing how the silly, hedonistic music and clubbing pursuits in his youth brought him an education in hindsight, in black and gay histories, in group struggles and cohesion reshaping British culture.
We touch upon the lack of cultural recognition awarded to clubs compared to the operas and ballets, discussing whether this is impacted upon by the expectation that clubs must belong to youth culture alone, and not be part of “grown up culture”.
Finally, we talk about drugs (of course), and how it is such a difficult terrain to navigate at the level of both individual experience and policy – though Harold agrees that harm reduction is the way forward ?
Follow Harold on social media at @HaroldHeathDJ
Get a copy of his book here https://velocitypress.uk/product/long-relationships-book/ Visit his website https://haroldheath.contently.com/
