The house music that was produced in Chicago in the early eighties is really unique. Sticking to a very limited set of sounds produced by an array of Roland drum machines and synths, a small group of producers created a completely unique style which still sounds remarkably fresh. A lot of the today's best hip hop production borrows heavily the Chicago house sound.
One of the main outlets for the music was a club called the Music Box where the DJ was Ron Hardy (pictured above). The song Donnie -- put together by Larry Heard, Robert Owens, and Chip E. (aka The It) -- came out in 1986 on DJ International Records. This version is the Ron Hardy mix.
This track blows my mind -- hopefully it gives a sense of how radical these guys were/are.
