sgn

Well-known member
Not sure if this is the right place to post this, but this shit is INSANE:

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sgn

Well-known member
Sounds more like Martyn pre-Ghost People to me...in fact the beat pattern sounds like it's been straight up lifted from an older Martyn track.
 

trza

Well-known member
The other side of the Bax 12", a track called "Done Me Wrong" has been stuck in my head for a couple months now.
 

Corpsey

bandz ahoy

I am biased cos he's my mate but I really like this tune. Saw him play last night, was playing a lot of that minimal 808 stuff which sometimes strikes me as being quite cold and vibeless when listening at home but on a club system its really much more immersive and propulsive than that... it certainly has a bit of a Hip-Hop vibe to it (Miami Bass, even!) but really it reminds me most of tech-y DNB, or perhaps just techno (of the chugging, hair-shirt Berghain variety). I sort of wonder if the time will come when popular taste will gravitate back towards dark, minimal, sparse stuff again, what with the current obsession with colourful (or atmospheric) synths, indie-style vocals and so on. Perhaps there isn't such a pendulum effect anymore in this post-internet/post-dubstep landscape (all niche), and it seems obvious that colourful/catchy synth-lines tend to rise to the top, popularity wise, because they transmit so quickly and clearly to the casual listener/drugged up raver. It's funny, I ended up sort of being against that stripped-back aesthetic at a certain point when dubstep became a bit sterile (the stuff Yunx was playing a few years ago, all ex-DNB producers making these quite stiff versions of what Loefah/Mala/Skream et al were doing in 2006/7)... And I still long for music like Juke - sample heavy, full of colour and variety to go with its aggressive bass and rhythms. But I definitely hear a lot of potential in this sound. I wonder (to return to a point thats been made a lot on this thread) is everything will coalesce at some point or if various strands of post-dubstep will just carry on getting further away from each other, pursued to a point which (in the case of some strands) will create more unified and potent sub-scenes?
 

sgn

Well-known member
That's just a really good tune.

But yeah, I think everyone's doing their own thing in their own little sub-scenes with little concern for what's going on outside it and it's been this way for a while now. You have Hotflush going more and more towards the poppy bass music side of things, Hyperdub concentrating on funky, Swamp 81 doing the 808 electro/ghetto house thing and Deep Medi, Box Clever etc sticking to the classic dubstep sound - all with little apparent regard for what the other is doing.

There've been artists that have switched over from one sound to another (Joy O, Jamie Vex'd & Scuba going in opposite directions from where they started), but those felt more like personal artistic choices rather than a reaction to what's going on in the scene...although you could argue that Joy O got done with the "Hyph Mango" sound after getting sick of hearing a new clone every day since its release.

I guess what I'm saying is that we already do have unified, if not exactly potent, sub scenes and I find it highly unlikely these separate strands will ever come together and be anything more than acquaintances. At the same time, I don't think any of these sub scenes will ever fully take over and become the de facto definition of "bass music" either. The 808 stuff has been around for a while now and been pushed by guys you could define as popular (Boddika, Jon Convex, Addison Groove), but unless Swamp 81 decides to release an EP every two weeks, I don't see it happening. It may reach a certain height that it hasn't reached yet, but eventually it'll plateau out very quickly like every other sub scene because, despite being enjoyable, there's nothing "new" about it.

Personally, I would love it if the darker, percussive shit takes over because I find most of the colourful, cut up rnb vocal stuff more cold and vibeless than *insert IDM artist* at its most clinical.... it all sounds so plastic and calculated to me despite (or maybe because of) trying so hard to be "emotional". But I'm in the minority here because not only do a lot of listeners love this, but so do critics...I thought of calling it "Pitchfork Approved Bass Music" but that's not only being reductive, but also inaccurate because RA and Fact and every other proper dance music publication usually eats this shit up as well. I guess it just comes down to taste, which is why I actually like the option of disparate sounds within one scene. It may not be good for the scene itself, but it gives listeners more options - like I'm not into the newer Hotflush stuff at all (I found the Sepalcure album unbearable and the newer Scuba stuff boring), but I can easily ignore it because I have so many other options within the same vaguely defined genre. But if Hotflush was the defining sound of bass music and everyone else sounded like them or used a similar template, I'd most likely gravitate away from the scene and look for something else. By being so splintered in terms of sound, this scene ends up having something for everybody.
 

SecondLine

Well-known member
All this 808 stuff is a particularly pronounced case I think of how things have gone...about a year and a half ago I thought the addison groove / boddika ting was going to just keep growing, with more and more people jumping on it, because the parameters seemed so well defined but with enough space for creativity. But it just hasn't really gone anywhere...I find most boddika really dull now and not many others are really pushing this sound (I think Addison Groove is working on an album..? Surefire way to make everybody think you've disappeared off the face of the earth).

It's like a situation where you expect scenius to take over but it didn't quite reach critical mass in terms of the number of producers/DJs/labels involved.
 

wise

bare BARE BONES
looks nasty!

I wish people would stop saying 'Bass Music'.
Every time I read the phrase I feel slightly nauseous.

I read this on some guys Mixcloud description:

'15 tracks from the early days (1996-2000) of what is now called bass music. Back then the genre was known as speed garage or 2 step. '


uurrggh
 

gremino

Moster Sirphine
i personally say i like 'bass music', and meaning 'nuum stuff and it's derivatives. but maybe the umbrella is too wide, as 'nuum and recent bass stuff isn't just the same... i agree that most "bass music" is cold and vibeless.
 
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