Liberty City “Some Lovin’”

The birth of our underground brand Factory 93 not only brought on an adrenaline rush reminiscent of the renegade warehouse-era of raving—on which Insomniac was founded—but it also had us thinking back to all the people, places and parties that made this whole operation possible. And with that came a burning desire to crack open our collection and dust off the classic records we couldn’t live without. Through our From the Crate series, we’ll be breaking out both seminal and obscure cuts alike, imparting some knowledge in the process.

For all its sultry charms, Miami was never thought of as a house music hotbed in the genre’s early days. There certainly was a healthy club scene through the ‘80s—Latin music ruled the night, booty bass and hip-hop rocked the beats, and the city served as one of the freestyle sound’s world capitals. But the city’s so-thick-you-can-cut-it atmosphere somehow seemed more suited to sweaty syncopation than to the regimented four-to-the-floor rhythms that had already been packing dancefloors in the cooler climes of Chicago, New York and London. Outside of the gay clubs, house was a decidedly second-tier sound.

That began to change when Miami’s Ralph Falcón and Oscar Gaetan—the duo soon to be known as Murk, among a zillion other aliases—stepped into the fray. The childhood friends began to mess around with a MIDI setup in Falcón’s bedroom, with ‘91’s “Tricky Jazz” (a New York–style house cut released on Deep South Recordings) serving as something of a throat-clearing debut. A few elements of that track—notably, an unrelenting groove and a knack for hooky bursts of vocals—served as a hint of what was in store.

The breakthrough came the following year, when a series of groundbreaking tunes appeared on the pair’s own Murk Records, setting the template for a form of steamy house that was simultaneously carnal and unearthly, and sounded like nothing else out there. “U Got Me,” released under the Intruder moniker, was first, quickly followed by “Together,” with the duo billed as Interceptor. But the label’s third release was the one that sealed the deal for Gaetan and Falcón: Credited to Liberty City, “Some Lovin’” was the Murk track that saw everything fall into place.

With its hypnotic, slow-burn throb, “Some Lovin’” wasn’t a million miles away from the gut-punching wallop that Danny Tenaglia was developing at the same time. Tenaglia, a native New Yorker, actually lived in Miami from ‘85 through ‘90. Though we certainly weren’t privy to any conversations he might have had with Ralph Falcón and Oscar Gaetan—or could even say if they knew each other—one is tempted to think they were comparing notes as they worked on their signature sounds. Tenaglia’s version, ultimately, became techier and harder-edged; “Some Lovin’,” on the other hand, was the product of Murk’s sticky, swamp-funk vision of house, a unique sound that set the pair apart from their contemporaries.

Broken down, “Some Lovin’” is a simple track. There’s a thumping kick, a muted snare, and some sparse hand percussion; a deep, minimalist squelch of a bassline; and ghostly synths lurking in the background. But add them up, and it’s magic—especially with the addition of Bebe Dozier’s fierce, wounded-love vocals. The track’s defining hook is a loop of Dozier intoning “Get some lovin’/you want some/get some/get some lovin’/you need some/get some.” It’s a brilliant bit of editing, exemplifying the kind of hypnotic repetition Murk became known for.

There’s a druggy quality to “Some Lovin’” that no doubt stems from its stripped-down production and mesmerizing vibe. But that vaguely disorienting feel might have also been, in part, the result of a happy accident. “We had a bunch of issues during the recording of this track,” the duo recalled in a Miami New Times interview in 2012. “The tape machine we used wasn’t calibrated properly, and the reels were wobbling a bit, so it made the track sound warped. We came very close to not even releasing it because we weren’t happy with the final mix.” Gaetan and Falcón needn’t have worried. “A few months later, we saw Junior Vasquez play the track for 20 minutes at the legendary Sound Factory in NYC. He was the ultimate tastemaker at the time. We could not believe the crowd reaction. They sang along to every word.”

It wasn’t just the Sound Factory—this NYC-based writer can recall hearing “Some Lovin’” everywhere from alt-drag bars to the Palladium, and from sweaty basement parties to the Limelight. It’s one of those tracks that’s had multiple lives, and one that’s been released in multiple versions. Tenaglia himself released a batch of fine, lighter-touch remixes on Tribal America in ’93, and a stream of alternate versions have hit the shops in the years since. But for six-and-a-half minutes of pure voodoo-house pleasure, stick with the sensual original—there’s been little else like it, either before or since.