Where do you go online to download dance music classics? Launched exclusively on iTunes, the Dance Vault is full of treasures old and new and is updated monthly. It's the mission of RCA Music Vice President Hosh Gureli to insure that dancemusic will be discovered by a new generation of dance music lovers.
DJ Ron Slomowicz: Where did the idea for the Dance Vault come from?
Hosh Gureli: The idea came when I tried to look for Native New
Yorker on iTunes about a year and a half ago, and I didn't see it up
there. I started thinking about all the great songs like I'll Be
Your Friend and Turn the Beat Around and I didn't see any of that
up there. If I'm not going to get it up there, who is Especially
for the dance stuff like Qkumba Zoo, their song now used in the Sea
World commercial isn't even up there. I figured I needed to take an
initiative to put some of this classic dance stuff up there - if
people don't digitize this stuff and get this online, it's going to
get lost.
RS: All this great music will disappear..
Hosh Gureli: It will definitely disappear. It'll only be on certain
CDs. Rare CDs that you might find if you shop at the Virgin Megastore
in midtown New York, some obscure UK compilation that might have a
version of the song. I also wanted to expose an entirely new
generation to some great music that they probably don't have access
to.
RS: So who is choosing the songs that are in the Vault?
Hosh Gureli: Well, I choose the songs, but to me it's the dance
community's project so I'm taking ideas from everyone. The first two
months definitely have been a big learning lesson on how to do things.
A lot of stuff we don't have anymore. We have the album covers but we don't have the twelve inch or single sleeves digitized and don't know if they're even around anymore. So the art department has been photocopying my dirty old record sleeves that have paint on it and everything. We had to decide - do we put that up there or should we just put our logo up The majority of the Vault team felt that at least you're showing what a vault will look like with an old record.
RS: So far, what song have you been most excited about getting out there to a new generation?
Hosh Gureli: I felt very proud of Native New Yorker because I'm
really from New York and I've been back here for like thirteen years.
The most gratifying ones, from a DJ perspective, have to be I'll Be
Your Friend by Robert Owens and Where Love Lives by Alison
Limerick. Those are two records that really symbolized the early 90s.
RS: How has the response been?
Hosh Gureli: The response has been great. It has had an effect on
iTunes with the way they are now breaking down the dance store into
subgenres of techno, breakbeat, and house. I know they got that idea
from us – as a little store contained within the bigger store.
