Jungle

[dilbert1]

It was atrocious. Some memphis rap as well. The tempo was everywhere. A mish mash of every subaltern music. Ironically quite oppressive

 

[other_life]

my musicological justification for being a 'jungle purist' is that what draws me into a jungle tune are

1) flickers and rolls in the drum track
2) 'audible joins' in the samples
3) a certain gestalt of how tracks sit together in the mixdown, especially how the drum machines/individual drum samples undergird/'bear along' the breakbeats.. the bassline should give other things breathing room even if its the harmonic centre, &c

whereas 'drum and bass' (even if originally not socially distinct from jungle) seems to incrementally drop out those flickering, rolling parts of the drums and zones in on the musicality + filter-work of the bass at the expense of other harmonic parts

 

[other_life]

and obviously audible joins after a point were probably seen as gauche, betraying a lack of mastery with ones equipment. whereas - this is a generational thing - audible joins are what vaporwave turns on as a sampling aesthetic + an important part of the effect that footwork has

 

[luka]

This mix is also shower-on-toast-pie

WRONG LINK will upload later

J rolla @ clockwork (no t/l, sorry)

this is how all the dubstep forum people talked when they first turned up on dissensus

 

[thirdform]

It sounds too much like they’re showing off their keyboard collection, I’m just not into the synth:sample ratio for one. Tim Reaper has been pushing this bubbly pad arp stuff quite a lot. It might be nice here or there in a set or home chilling, but ultimately leaves me cold

ruffskool chillwave continuum


smoovskool chillwave continuum


Eliminate your bohemian tendancies and embrace the sophisticated!

 

[thirdform]

my musicological justification for being a 'jungle purist' is that what draws me into a jungle tune are

1) flickers and rolls in the drum track
2) 'audible joins' in the samples
3) a certain gestalt of how tracks sit together in the mixdown, especially how the drum machines/individual drum samples undergird/'bear along' the breakbeats.. the bassline should give other things breathing room even if its the harmonic centre, &c

whereas 'drum and bass' (even if originally not socially distinct from jungle) seems to incrementally drop out those flickering, rolling parts of the drums and zones in on the musicality + filter-work of the bass at the expense of other harmonic parts

yep I agree with all of this.

I think I posted a quote from discogs about this and it pays to repost it again

There were a lot of reasons for the simplification of beats that started with hard/tech step in mid 95. The most important being the evolution of the bassline and the new synth and sampler technology that came in the later 90's. You have to remember that initially almost all Jungle was made on the Akai S950 sampler, which was the basis of almost everyones studios from 1991-199X. Producers who had the money would have one or two other synths, but they usually just sampled the sounds in to the Akai. The Akai had almost no synthesis structure, just basic non-resonant lp filter, and simple envelopes, but it had a test tone feature that generated a pure sine wave, which was the most common bass sound used on all the jungle tracks before the detuned saw waves, (reese bass) took over. Anyway, as more and more affordable analog modeling synths came out in the later 90's and the E-MU samplers with their extra morphing filters became used more and more, the complexity of the bass sounds and morphing, moving basslines became possible, it was necessary to make room in the mix for the more complex sounds. Crushing Amens sound best when they are the focal point of the mix, they are best complimented sonically with a simple bass tone under them. When you try to mix complex drum patterns and complex moving basslines with mid range sounds as well as low end, the music turns to mush really quickly. The style evolved to a simpler drum pattern so the bass and melody could become more complex and prominent in the tracks. Hence the 2 step beat's popularity among producers all starting with Pulp Fiction, which was Alex Reese using the detuned saw wav, Reese bassline (not named after Alex Reese ironically, but instead named for it's originator, Kevin Reese Saunderson).

 

[thirdform]

this is a great example of drawing that technical line. You can say it's not jungle, if you go by the 2step criterion, and if you go by that definition, I agree. Reason? the bassline is moving and far too complex to be put against frantic choppage.

 

[dilbert1]

Is that even really a reese on Pulp Fiction though? You could have always just sampled the Saunderson into your 950 (which many did), sounded great and no complex synthesis necessary

 

[thirdform]

and obviously audible joins after a point were probably seen as gauche, betraying a lack of mastery with ones equipment. whereas - this is a generational thing - audible joins are what vaporwave turns on as a sampling aesthetic + an important part of the effect that footwork has

Succinctly put. In the 90s youth culture evolved so fast that things would be seen as dated in a matter of weeks and months. The pace of evolution in the 2010s and 20s especially is far slower, which is why the 'jungle revival' or whatever actually had the ability to germinate.

 

[thirdform]

Is that even really a reese on Pulp Fiction though? You could have always just sampled the Saunderson into your 950 (which many did), sounded great and no complex synthesis necessary

Recreated I believe. It is substantively the same as the reese bass.

At the time, Reece was working with Ron Wells/Jack Smooth, who was a studio/synth guy. if you listen to a lot of the tunes on basement records in 93-94 you can hear his work all over them.

 

[other_life]

wasn't it common practice at one point for jungle producers to bring tracks made at home on pc/hardware sampler-sequencer into professional studios for session guys to fill in synth parts? where did i read that?

 

[thirdform]

wasn't it common practice at one point for jungle producers to bring tracks made at home on pc/hardware sampler-sequencer into professional studios for session guys to fill in synth parts? where did i read that?

I think i said it on here. That definitely was the case. basically a dj would have some ideas, bring a rough outline of the track (tbf sometimes not even that) and get it polished/created in a studio. Jungle, like rnb is also the music of back room technicians.

 

[thirdform]

whilst i wouldn't recommend enjoying or being interested in the music based on its trends of fashion, imo its essential to understand its historical context and evolution. Clubbing is about trends and fashion, for better or worse.

the other way of viewing it, as a multifaceted art which deteriorates, whilst a very valid view, is fundamentally rockist and doesn't get to just why it did go down the shitter.

ideas of detournment, whilst completely valid and welcome, can have the tendancy in some circles to (over)intellectualise the music.

Popular musical forms in capitalism tend to standardisation as a rule cf. Adorno. Where he was wrong was to see this standardisation as being combatted by serialism.

In reality the problem is not standardisation inherently but the way in which standardisation saturates our daily life.

 

[0bleak]

yep I agree with all of this.

I think I posted a quote from discogs about this and it pays to repost it again

"When you try to mix complex drum patterns and complex moving basslines with mid range sounds as well as low end, the music turns to mush really quickly."

I was just listening to Dom & Roland's Deckards Theme and it made me think of a good exception.

 

[0bleak]

Thinking about it more again, I'm just not sure about that theory. For example, ragga jungle also wouldn't work because the vocals and snares also occupy roughly the same mids.
It was probably just people deciding to focus on a different, more synthetic sound palette.

 

[thirdform]

Thinking about it more again, I'm just not sure about that theory. For example, ragga jungle also wouldn't work because the vocals and snares also occupy roughly the same mids.
It was probably just people deciding to focus on a different, more synthetic sound palette.

I mean, the basslines in ragga jungle are either detuned 808 samples or sine wave bass tones for the most part. Even when the dred/reese bass starts to come in, the drum patterns do get more compacted, they swing much more than 93/early 94.

 

[thirdform]

you can also see this in the tempo acceleration.

 

[0bleak]

I thought the point though was that basslines and synths being in the mids are what made it muddy.
If midrange vocals in ragga jungle aren't making the soundfield muddy with all of the midrange snares, then it doesn't make sense to me that midrange synths would do it either (and probably less than vocals).

 

[0bleak]

Another reason I don't buy it:

 

[thirdform]

I thought the point though was that basslines and synths being in the mids are what made it muddy.
If midrange vocals in ragga jungle aren't making the soundfield muddy with all of the midrange snares, then it doesn't make sense to me that midrange synths would do it either (and probably less than vocals).

if you start filtering and applying fx to the bassline, like you tweak the 303, then a more simple 2step pattern or a fairly simple chop of the break makes it sound better. The bassline in this isn't filtered, it's melodic but it's left pretty clean

The point is the synthesis of basslines rather than the basslines themselves, if that makes sense.