Great 2 Step?
- Thread starter Woebot
- Start date
secretagentgel
Well-known member
what really got me into 2-step, and into producing it (i'd been mildly interested in what i was hearing for a while), was playing at electrowerkz in london with ardisson (seed records). the track Stop! floored me.
http://www.bleep.com/player.php?track=SEEDCD06_DM-02
warp-style, idm 2step or something. aphex or squarepusher does two step. etc. you get the idea. a classic, as far as i'm concerned.
corey
http://www.bleep.com/player.php?track=SEEDCD06_DM-02
warp-style, idm 2step or something. aphex or squarepusher does two step. etc. you get the idea. a classic, as far as i'm concerned.
corey
secretagentgel said:
Ardisson's first record, which I can't remember the name of, is even better imo.
I've got a 12 called "cum cakes" by Versatile and B-Live, on Honey Beat - is this the same track?
Looking at the label it says written by M. Jordan and R. Drysdale, I guess I've answered my own question! Good track tho.
MATT MAson
BROADSIDE
Shanks and Bigfoot did a tune with Byron Stingly called 'Was I So Wrong?', that as far as I know was shelved after an initial 500 on Clinical Records. It is one of the best pieces of the genre ever and should gone have napa-tastic and have been everywhere.
I think Ramsey & Fen did some great bits (even without MJ Cole) like their remix of M-flo's 'Come Back To Me' and a tune called 'In My Life (serious)'or something to that effect. If you don't know about their stuff with MJ, check for 'style', 'desire' and of course 'lovebug'.
To this day, one of the finest 2-step garage records ever made has to be 'Shattered' by Groove Chronicles, which I think was their first release. Amazing, even if it does sound slightly like the Doogie Howser MD theme music.
Skycap's 'Endorphin' and 'Baby Want's to Ride' were two of the most experimental records out there. As was Sunship's first release on Filter, 'City Life'. For a while a lot of 2-step DJs started dropping some Plump DJs bits like 'Electric Disco' and that Electronauts remix they did, which I thought was going to take the sound in an interesting direction.
I can't forget Sima's follow up to 'Give You Myself', 'Sexitivity'. Amazing vocal.
UK garage was so overlooked for the first few years of its life. Which was probably a good thing. But I think grime gets so much more press cos it's much easier for journos to wax lyrical about. Same reason rock/hip hop journos never gave disco/house/garage due props back in the day. But I digress...
Chris Mack's Plenty More on Confetti, plus all the earlier Confetti Dubs by Lady Penelope (aka Donna Dee) is well worth a look.
Towards the end of 1999 I thought 2-step was going to go somewhere really interesting and get more experimental. I think the money being thrown around then quashed a lot of the creativity and made people focus on scoring a hit. Had it happened, broken beat may have taken different turns and we might have something else out there now like dubstep, but with a little more music/vocals and a little less dub influence. But for a while I was really hoping Dem 2 etc would be the new Tom Tom Club.
I shall leave you with toughts of the break from the Dem 2 mix of SJ's 'I Feel Divine', which is one of the best breakbeats ever produced imho.
I think Ramsey & Fen did some great bits (even without MJ Cole) like their remix of M-flo's 'Come Back To Me' and a tune called 'In My Life (serious)'or something to that effect. If you don't know about their stuff with MJ, check for 'style', 'desire' and of course 'lovebug'.
To this day, one of the finest 2-step garage records ever made has to be 'Shattered' by Groove Chronicles, which I think was their first release. Amazing, even if it does sound slightly like the Doogie Howser MD theme music.
Skycap's 'Endorphin' and 'Baby Want's to Ride' were two of the most experimental records out there. As was Sunship's first release on Filter, 'City Life'. For a while a lot of 2-step DJs started dropping some Plump DJs bits like 'Electric Disco' and that Electronauts remix they did, which I thought was going to take the sound in an interesting direction.
I can't forget Sima's follow up to 'Give You Myself', 'Sexitivity'. Amazing vocal.
UK garage was so overlooked for the first few years of its life. Which was probably a good thing. But I think grime gets so much more press cos it's much easier for journos to wax lyrical about. Same reason rock/hip hop journos never gave disco/house/garage due props back in the day. But I digress...
Chris Mack's Plenty More on Confetti, plus all the earlier Confetti Dubs by Lady Penelope (aka Donna Dee) is well worth a look.
Towards the end of 1999 I thought 2-step was going to go somewhere really interesting and get more experimental. I think the money being thrown around then quashed a lot of the creativity and made people focus on scoring a hit. Had it happened, broken beat may have taken different turns and we might have something else out there now like dubstep, but with a little more music/vocals and a little less dub influence. But for a while I was really hoping Dem 2 etc would be the new Tom Tom Club.
I shall leave you with toughts of the break from the Dem 2 mix of SJ's 'I Feel Divine', which is one of the best breakbeats ever produced imho.
Grievous Angel
Beast of Burden
Bastard, beat me to it... though vinyl budgets much depleted after recent jungle / dubstep orgy.WOEBOT said:
DnD's Diamond Rings not that good IMO...
... that Lost in Farringdon / Tom's Diner tune was alright though...
Shit, there's a Groove Chronicles tune I don't have! (Probably loads...)
I completely agree about Dem 2, best beats ever. Yes, coulda / shoulda crossed over with broken beat.
Will re-up Abstract 2step mix later, let you know when it's there... Matt, PLEASE do a 2step mix! Your records are better than mine... or send me the AIFFs and I'll do one for you
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Grievous Angel
Beast of Burden
As requested, here is the Abstract 2Step mix:
http://www.grievousangel.net/Abstract 2 Step Mix.zip
Tracklisting:
Dem 2: Keep It Coming
Dem 2: Bad Funk (Big Time Scary Dub)
US Alliance: All I know (Dem 2 Dub)
El B: Digital
Leee John: Your Mind Your Body Your Soul (MJ Cole Mix) /
Wideboys Feat. Rusty: Somethings Got Me Started (Wideboys Breakbeat Dub)
MJ & Rob D: Cum Cakes!
El B: Urban Myth
Headtop: The Matrix
Dem 2: Baby You’re So Sexy (Dub)
Groove Chronicles: Black Puppet
Groove Chronicles: Holiday Da Vybe
M Dubs: For Real (Grievous Angel Twisted Dub)
Top Cat: Gal Dem Sugar
Lady Saw: Bump’n'Grind
ATFC Bad Habit (Grievous Angel Edit)
Artful Dodger / Robbie Craig / Craig David: Woman Trouble
Artful Dodger / Craig David: Drop the Funk
http://www.grievousangel.net/Abstract 2 Step Mix.zip
Tracklisting:
Dem 2: Keep It Coming
Dem 2: Bad Funk (Big Time Scary Dub)
US Alliance: All I know (Dem 2 Dub)
El B: Digital
Leee John: Your Mind Your Body Your Soul (MJ Cole Mix) /
Wideboys Feat. Rusty: Somethings Got Me Started (Wideboys Breakbeat Dub)
MJ & Rob D: Cum Cakes!
El B: Urban Myth
Headtop: The Matrix
Dem 2: Baby You’re So Sexy (Dub)
Groove Chronicles: Black Puppet
Groove Chronicles: Holiday Da Vybe
M Dubs: For Real (Grievous Angel Twisted Dub)
Top Cat: Gal Dem Sugar
Lady Saw: Bump’n'Grind
ATFC Bad Habit (Grievous Angel Edit)
Artful Dodger / Robbie Craig / Craig David: Woman Trouble
Artful Dodger / Craig David: Drop the Funk
Logan Sama
BestThereIsAtWhatIDo
DND's dub mix of Another Level's track whose name escapes me was fucking dutty
A few more random selections from the vault:
<b>DND - Pick it Up (DND Mix)</b>
One thing I love in 2-step is that thick percussive xylobass sound pushed right up into the treble, so you get this really odd sensation where what seems to be the bassline is actually really high-pitched and kinda carrying the melody. This was perhaps the best track I ever heard in this vein, I remember hearing it for the first time while at a club and just thinking "<i>what the fuck</i> is going on with that bassline?!?" From 2001, so you get this stiff, almost breakbeaty 2-step groove, and really crude but brilliant hooks - a sly sax riff and the yelpy squeal "pick me up! pick me up!" Before the layered low'n'high bassline comes in and demolishes everything in its path (see also: the Sovereign Remix of "Do You Really Like It?" and The Wideboys' "She's The One")
<b>Zoom & DBX - Coming Again</b>
A bit of a weeper this one, I'm afraid: stealing that sparkly little hook from Adam F's "Colours", adding a tearjerker bassline K Warren would be proud of, synth chords from the Artful Dodger's more ballad-ish tracks and an awesomely springloaded rhythm (with little amen snippets firing off like hidden landmines), it's at once homely and epic, a great end of the night sojourn into outright sentimentality.
<b>Rosie Gaines - I Want You (Bump & Flex Dub)</b>
As with his frankly brilliant Hardstep Dub mix of "Straight From The Heart", on this remix Bump & Flex goes darkside on an anthem tune, except this time I can hardly recognise the original at all apart from an occasional "ooh baby!". A thick, wobbling bassline, blocky live-sounding beats that handily achieve anything people might have wanted from breakbeat garage while retaining 2-step's signature syncopated swing, and a general enticingly viscuous underwater feel - this guy never let me down.
<b>TJ Cases - I Like To Cut, I Like To Play</b>
One of TJ Cases three classics. The others are the classy "Dedicated To Love", which everyone knows, and "One By One", which is one of my favourite 2-step tracks ever but I've talked about it heaps. This one is similar to "One By One", an enormous radioactive junglist bassline, hi-hats bustling overtime and a sassy to the max diva working herself into a fit. "Wanna play now/DJ don't ya stop now!" becomes something of a threat, the too-intense enthusiasm of the all night raver. I always loved these tracks where the massive sonic distance between vocal overground and bassline underground were bridged so audaciously in the one song, and Cases was something of a master at the craft.
<b>Young Offendaz - Flava</b>
There's this idea that goes about that in the year before grime coalesced 2-step got really tired or conservative or uninteresting. I don't have a sufficiently encyclopaedic knowledge of the scene to confirm or deny this categorically but in late 2001/2002 I did hear heaps and heaps of tunes that I loved, lots of them with a really warped and druggy vibe. My favourite was Babu Stormz's "Electricity", which came out around the same time as "I Luv U" and which I've never heard since, but this track from late 2001 is a handy substitute: rough and riffy, with these disconcerting eastern twangs and the James Brown tic from the Think break, cut-up female vox and a slightly unhinged dancehall DJ whose chatter phases in and out, stereopanning unnervingly.
<b>DND - Pick it Up (DND Mix)</b>
One thing I love in 2-step is that thick percussive xylobass sound pushed right up into the treble, so you get this really odd sensation where what seems to be the bassline is actually really high-pitched and kinda carrying the melody. This was perhaps the best track I ever heard in this vein, I remember hearing it for the first time while at a club and just thinking "<i>what the fuck</i> is going on with that bassline?!?" From 2001, so you get this stiff, almost breakbeaty 2-step groove, and really crude but brilliant hooks - a sly sax riff and the yelpy squeal "pick me up! pick me up!" Before the layered low'n'high bassline comes in and demolishes everything in its path (see also: the Sovereign Remix of "Do You Really Like It?" and The Wideboys' "She's The One")
<b>Zoom & DBX - Coming Again</b>
A bit of a weeper this one, I'm afraid: stealing that sparkly little hook from Adam F's "Colours", adding a tearjerker bassline K Warren would be proud of, synth chords from the Artful Dodger's more ballad-ish tracks and an awesomely springloaded rhythm (with little amen snippets firing off like hidden landmines), it's at once homely and epic, a great end of the night sojourn into outright sentimentality.
<b>Rosie Gaines - I Want You (Bump & Flex Dub)</b>
As with his frankly brilliant Hardstep Dub mix of "Straight From The Heart", on this remix Bump & Flex goes darkside on an anthem tune, except this time I can hardly recognise the original at all apart from an occasional "ooh baby!". A thick, wobbling bassline, blocky live-sounding beats that handily achieve anything people might have wanted from breakbeat garage while retaining 2-step's signature syncopated swing, and a general enticingly viscuous underwater feel - this guy never let me down.
<b>TJ Cases - I Like To Cut, I Like To Play</b>
One of TJ Cases three classics. The others are the classy "Dedicated To Love", which everyone knows, and "One By One", which is one of my favourite 2-step tracks ever but I've talked about it heaps. This one is similar to "One By One", an enormous radioactive junglist bassline, hi-hats bustling overtime and a sassy to the max diva working herself into a fit. "Wanna play now/DJ don't ya stop now!" becomes something of a threat, the too-intense enthusiasm of the all night raver. I always loved these tracks where the massive sonic distance between vocal overground and bassline underground were bridged so audaciously in the one song, and Cases was something of a master at the craft.
<b>Young Offendaz - Flava</b>
There's this idea that goes about that in the year before grime coalesced 2-step got really tired or conservative or uninteresting. I don't have a sufficiently encyclopaedic knowledge of the scene to confirm or deny this categorically but in late 2001/2002 I did hear heaps and heaps of tunes that I loved, lots of them with a really warped and druggy vibe. My favourite was Babu Stormz's "Electricity", which came out around the same time as "I Luv U" and which I've never heard since, but this track from late 2001 is a handy substitute: rough and riffy, with these disconcerting eastern twangs and the James Brown tic from the Think break, cut-up female vox and a slightly unhinged dancehall DJ whose chatter phases in and out, stereopanning unnervingly.
Not obscure in the slightest but the "G Force Jazz Mix" (I think) of Usher Pop Your Collar is one of my favourite 2 step tunes. I've also got a couple of foot of 2 step 12"s that are well overdue a dusting off / sticking on eBay so I think i'll make a mini-mega-mix over Christmas to sort the wheat from the chaff...
outraygeous
Well-known member
Logan Sama said:
im gona have a guess and go with the yellow one, sunshine i think
Matt if I remember correctly there were about a zillion garage mixes of "I Want You" (Tuff Jam and Booker T spring to mind). Pure Silk released a rerelease 12" (I think it might also be referred to as "I Want You 2000") with both a Bump & Flex vocal mix and a Bump & Flex "Bass Bin Killa Mix" - as I don't have that 12 inch I'm not sure if the latter is the same as the "Dub", which I have from a comp that Pure Silk put out called <i>Vocal Fusion II</i> from about 2000 (a pretty prescient comp, it had Ms Dynamite MCing live over the top of the tracks).
Woebot
Well-known member
a few more from me:
(breaking my own rules)
groove chronicles: "all nite ya"
new horizons feat donna cousins: "one night"
groove chronicles: "faith in you"
large joints : "thinkin"
david anthony: "friday night"
skyjoose feat skycap: "darksky ep"
let me be your fantasy remix
(breaking my own rules)
groove chronicles: "all nite ya"
new horizons feat donna cousins: "one night"
groove chronicles: "faith in you"
large joints : "thinkin"
david anthony: "friday night"
skyjoose feat skycap: "darksky ep"
let me be your fantasy remix
don't think you should rule out locked on stuff. there's too much good to be had there and not all of it was that popular or well-known. i know you're not keen on el-b matt (tho there's a case for saying that grime wouldn't have the sonics it does today without him), but you cannot fuck with buck and bury on ghost. tim is absolutely spot on with comin again by zoom and dbx, i've got a stack of stuff by them and all of it's good ranging to great. he's also on it when it comes to the dnd mix of pick me up. i remember buying this from pure groove: picked up a white label boot of destiny's child's independent women by god knows who with a fabulous dub on the b-side on the same trip - always used to drop an acapella of eazy e's nobody move, nobody get hurt over that when i dj'd. now for something REALLY obscure but brilliant: the chris mack mix of negativiti by mario cee feat. alexia on, of all labels, m.e.l.t 2000.
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It saddens me that I still haven't managed to hear so much New Horizons' stuff - like the Scrap Iron Dubs ep! "Find The Path" and "It's My House (Bashment Mix - although this mix was actually done by someone else wouldyabelieve)" are so close to being my favourite music ever it's not funny.