brock-blocking beats
if we are talking about the enshitenment of something that you loved and was as essential and vital to you as air or water....
the one tipping-into-shit moment i can precisely pinpoint (cos i wrote about it at the end of the year on my website) is the death - living death, rigor mortis but still in ghastly motion - of drum + bass
i was at a jungle event in New York, a V Records party, spring of 1998... i'd been gloomy for a while, but this was it, the pits.
i think it was a bunch of visiting Brit luminaries on the decks, so we were getting bang up to date stuff, plate after plate, and it was all such desperate stuff
DJ Trace was deejaying - and "Bambaataa", one of the few contenders for a Tune during that dismal era, came on for the fourth time that night and i found myself MCing - not on stage i hasten to add! - in the midst of the crowd, inaudible to everyone i'm sure, or at least i hope - MC-ing over the stiff as a stillborn kitten beat:
"Stagnant music! Stagnant music! Acrid Bassline, another Acrid Bassline!"
I did actually feel close to tears.
But - if you look at the comments under this tune on YouTube - for some people it's an Anthem, a transformative transfigurative experience
e.g. "The first time I became possessed on the dancefloor was because of this tune...I nearly died."
I nearly died of boredom and brock-blocked frustration.
Mind you, i actually know someone, a good friend who finally (despite years of me giving her tapes in hopes of converting) finally got into D&B in 1998 and became an absolute fanatic for it
luckily 2step was taking off so i had an alternative source of air and water