Features
The A-Z of Acid
It's all about aciiiiiiiid
M Muzic Box
Legend has it that Chicago club Muzic Box, where a certain Ron Hardy was resident, was the first club to air an acid track. In fact, Hardy played Phuture's 'Acid Tracks' no less than three times the first night he was presented with the record. Essentially, then, this is acid's ground zero.
N Nude
Nude was the short lived but hugely influential night run by Hacienda resident Mike Pickering in the late 80s. It was all about acid house, and so was Manchester as soon as word got round.
O Once In A Lifetime
Jane Bussman's 1988 book Once In A Lifetime: The Crazy Days Of Acid House And Afterwards is an excellent and highly entertaining insight into the heady days of rave. The party animal turned comedy writer has credits for killer TV shows such as Brass Eye, South Park and The Fast Show, so when you're done with this list, go grab her tome and become fully immersed in the fine details of the acid house explosion.
P Phuture
Whether or not DJ Pierre, Spanky and Herb J were the first to introduce the acid sound into their work will never truly be known, but what we can be sure of is that they remained dedicated to the form for years. The group released a great number of acid tracks that remain stone-cold classics to this day.
Q Quest
You've probably heard the fantastic 'Mind Games' by Quest, but did you know they also excelled at a deep and subtle acid sound, as evidenced by their 1988 offering 'Look Into My Eyes'? Well, now you do.
R Roland TB-303
This is it: the box that defined a generation. Only around 10,000 were manufactured between 1982 and 1984, and it was originally designed and marketed as a bass guitar accompaniment for guitar players. As history tells us, though, it completely failed on that front and instead found favour with dance heads around the globe. TB stands for Transistor Bass, and the 303 has a singular oscillator that can be configured to produce either a sawtooth or square wave. Cloned and copied many times, nothing beats the sound of the original, which – fun fact – was first heard in the UK charts on boogie trio Imagination's 1982 hit, 'In The Heat of the Night'. It is worth noting, however, that many acid tracks exist that were made using tools other than the 303, such as Josh Wink's 'Higher State Of Consciousness'.
