rolling back to the future garage/post-dubstep/alt-funkstep/intelli-2step etc thread

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gumdrops

Well-known member
black sun was cool when it was just a snippet from beyond on youtube but when the proper full thing came out it turned out to be a bit weedy.

dont understand the craving for ultra darkcore funky. thats sort of like dissensus fully embracing type lol. not to say i love vocal tunes, i still think 90% of them are forgettable/rushed and if im honest, my own interest in funky isnt what it was, but like most ppl here, my fave funky is the instrumental tracky tunes, theres been all sorts of great instrumental stuff from apple to lil silva. its a real range you have. and for it to all end up like early grime or something i think would be a shame. funky does dark but its on its own terms. same as how you had dark garage tunes but they were still garage. what makes it good is that its still club/dance/party music and fun with that dark energy still there, but not overpowering anything. that balance is what made early grime so good too. if youre waiting for it to turn into early grime or dubstep, you might be in for a bit of a wait. i dont see what the rush is anyway. unless well, you dont actually much like funky.
 
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eltsac

Member
I don't reckon 'Black Sun' is a dark funky track, more warped and hazy then dark. My perception could be skewed though as I don't like Kode's output that much (and don't like Black Sun much either)... The detuned synth sound is usually pretty shite and is compensating for something.

Funky shouldn't really be dark anyways, funk is party music.. I'd see dark funky as being a purely 'heads' thing.

Maybe I just don't like funky...especially the name... Gimme George Clinton and Pfunk anyday!
 
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Blackdown

nexKeysound
gumdrops said:
funky does dark but its on its own terms. same as how you had dark garage tunes but they were still garage. what makes it good is that its still club/dance/party music and fun with that dark energy still there, but not overpowering anything. that balance is what made early grime so good too.
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this is on the money i think. seany b's klambu refix, which i'm mildly obsessed with, especially for mixing, is that balance between funky... grimey... a little touch of dark, but not. balance is key in so many styles and scenes, often balancing contradictions or at least opposing forces.
 
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muser

Well-known member
Dont see how people are describing "black sun" as if was some kind of outside dark funky track, it doesnt sound dark or anything like funky really. its more like heavily medicated/lobotomized grime.
 
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Phaedo

Well-known member
I would like to see the balance tipped a bit more towards darkness as well with Funky. Night Hunter or After The Night by Martin Kemp show how well that darker (not just raw) funky sound can work. Kind of similar to the garage/dubstep crossover period where you still had the swung funky garage beats but then dark, urban, claustrophobic atmospherics and production.


After the Night for anyone who hasnt heard it.
 
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Damien

Well-known member
I have absolutely no wish for dark funky

the whole point of Funky was to get away from that aggro male rage thing wunnit?
 
Tentative Andy

Tentative Andy

I'm in the Meal Deal
I can totally understand the people saying that the strong element of fun and joy and danceability is a big part of what makes funky appealing and makes it distinct from other styles, and obviously I would never want to lose those elements. But at the same time I sometimes feel that people are being a bit overprotective about things. It's healthy for funky to develop, genres always change over time and a change in vibes can be part of that. A key point to me is that 'dark' doesn't have to just mean head-nod tunes (and it doesn't have to just mean ott hammer-horror hardcore tunes either).
And yeah I can see how Martin Kemp's stuff could fit with what people are talking about here. I tend to have mixed reactions to his tunes, some of them seem a bit drab but some of the I reckon are really cool and atmospheric. Like Aztec from that 12" a lot.

Edit: what blackdown and gumdrops said about 'balance is important' would have been a shorter version of this whole post, lol.
 
Corpsey

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Sometimes when a producer attempts to make a 'funky (but dark)' tune, it just ends up feeling like a suppression and enervation of funky, with all the fun and party energy sucked out of it and replaced with a sense of 'seriousness' (/lugubriousness). But then, perhaps thats just because I see it in terms of how a tune isn't living up to its influences, rather than recognising how its using those influences for a completely different purpose.

As I have already written in this thread, I think funky is all about a release of energy and animation (Ill Blu/Funkystepz, for example, make tunes which fizz and spark all over the place), whereas dubstep was more about a controlled and restrained energy. Even the more animated proto-wobble tunes in 2006 (e.g. Coki - Tortured) had a certain onerous/plodding quality to them. There seems to be a fundamental contradiction in attempting to make 'dark funky', or at least there is one for those who look at things from the point of view of funky, as it were, rather than from the point of view of dubstep.
 
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continuum

smugpolice
remembering back it was funky that pricked certain peoples ears when it seemed that the crowd that grime wanted to attract were instead spending money partying in high street bars. pretty sure it was more hed kandi / soul avengers (?) style stuff that was being played before the grime and then dubstep lot turned there hand to it. for ages i've been hoping it will get really dark - it'll be fucking brilliant! All the girly soulful stuff is great but its the ultra dark stuff that really hits the spot. No one was doing it in house before grime and dubstep got involved.
 
Corpsey

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
Please can you give some examples of ultra-dark funky tunes? Do you mean producers like Champion, Lil Silva etc.?
 
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continuum

smugpolice
some of the stuff i've heard Marcus Nasty and Ill-Blu play off the top of my head. Don't know the names of any of them but the minimal dark sounding stuff they play. Often sounds unfinished and no doubt needs an MC over it. Except it doesn't.
 
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Phaedo

Well-known member
Its all in the rhythms really isn't it? Does a darker sounding tune really make a difference to someones enjoyment if the beat is spot on and the track works as a coherent piece.

There definitely seems to be a divide between the more original Funky heads and the people from other scenes. Maybe their is just a bit of a lack of open-mindedness. At the end of the day it is just a beat pattern more than anything though (what else really defines Funky?), good on you if you interpret it in a different way to what it originally was made for.
 
Benny Bunter

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
lol, this is a typically unfocused dissensian discussion innit? We need Tim F to come on here and tie things together a bit don't we?

I liked what he wrote on his blog ages ago about Devine Collective, where he notes how they will sing a daft line like "We like to play our bongos, cos there's nothing that we can't handle" but in a totally straightfaced, non-ironic and serious way. Thats the real UK Funky vibe summed up right there for me. That sense of total conviction, deadly serious yet fun at the same time. It constantly amazes me how the best producers and MCs often try the cheesiest things ever and yet still pull it off somehow.

Sorry, I'm not helping to focus this discussion any more am I? Especially as its in the wrong thread anyway.
 
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alex

Do not read this.
that devine collective one (well i don't know if it is) that top one, fuck..me....!!!
 
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Benny Bunter

Benny Bunter

Well-known member
alex said:
that devine collective one (well i don't know if it is) that top one, fuck..me....!!!

(its def not house girls, thats the one coming in init)
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aah, that clips from that classic petchy set from last year isn't it. I tried IDing it on here at the time but noone knew what it was. I've only ever heard it on a couple of Petchy sets, nowhere else. What makes him think its a version of house girls though? I suppose Mad One is a strong candidiate. I'd LOVE to get my hands on this track but an even just an ID would make me happy for now.
 
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