Corspey said no worries with house spam so a few Simon DK picks from 1994 while I have time to eat ..
Dubby house, at its worst, was full of incongruent and lazily sourced reggae and rocksteady samples. Think Garth of Wicked Sound System on a Sunday afternoon (no offence mate, constructive criticism). However, working as a pure dub, with the vocal minimised into short edits or chorused like MK smashed too often to list, my god it’s a format full of stars and that’s exactly what you find below - Ce Ce with a dub of the ages
Cue a track like ‘Tension’ by Ed the Red’s Sample-Minded imprint, a DK staple. It knows how to create and play with momentum as it pleases. A tune you’d find looping in your mind long after any excursion in the hills, possibly the perfect location in terms of greenery, rolling scenery and the polis turning a blind eye to any madness
Everyone knows Strafe but a late-era dub to illustrate how a life’s spring perennials can lead to a lifelong relationships with specific tracks and the people you discovered them with. I fuckin love it because the cunt made me work so hard trying to find a copy after initial epiphanies. Cue a mission to the capital to grip a copy, before losing it among someone else’s tunes in Twyford Woods, only for it to be returned sheepishly by a mate later in the week (gracias B!)
Serious grooves requires Serious Grooves, so a perfect bridging track between vocals to get your rush or plateau on
Vocal minimalism from Italy, all compressed bottom end designed for rigs that punch. It needs pitching up +2%/4% to allow the swing to open up but still bossing it 30 years later. Separate discussion for snare sounds beyond standardised configurations another time
And for 5am when everyone you know thinks they want it harder so instead the entire marquee gets zenned and achieves collective levitational take off transcendence. Vocal minimalism again and a mini-moog (?) harmonic steadying riff which offsets any doubters. Still get goosebumps from Klubhead’s work on this release and, as always with many listed here, the trick is to try and listen to outdoors at volume, or at least appreciate the relevance of setting. Btw, how easy would it have been to not push the production and leave the listener with a 4 or 5 minute “lite” equivalent? Too easy, just press play
Mental Breakdown brought the wild pitch sound of Pierre and juiced it right up. Bit tracky? Maybe but it still has a momentum where, if I ever have it outdoors again like this summer and MB comes on, I might pogo in a spiral of love cabbages. Bit more after hours, heroin house, smacky pills. Equally, a tune for “all back to x’s” getting in from a rampage across the south coast at 10pm Sunday only for someone to produce a full bottle of cognac - do you decline or engage finding yourself ringing so and so for more pills at 10am twelve hours later? Love the extinct world it conjures, cut up vocals used sparingly so it sits sweetly between any garidge or Jersey vocal mix. The quest, should you seek it, is/was to find just the right key as blend bridge
