The Bristol Sound

C

Chris

fractured oscillations
elgato said:
another little intersection with another thread on here at the moment (although one i haven't read yet) is what i saw as another major side of the 'bristol sound', that being big banging dirty ravey squat music... when i lived there that (along with dnb in the clubs) was pretty much the vibe that dominated the city's raves... gabba, acid techno, breakcore, hard techstep, yardcore, electro, all that kind of stuff. it occurred to me just the other day how this always seems to get slightly left out of the history books as it were.
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interesting to know... I can say as an American that the Bristol sound as an export always seemed associated with this heady, moody, jazzy, rainy-day vibe, from Trip Hop to Full Cycle.

I've always been kind of intrigued by Bristol, wondering if it feels that way. Like how gangsta rap and country rock and Beck feel like L.A., or Detroit rock and Techno feel like Detroit... etc. Of course the answer's subjective but...
 
M

michael

Bring out the vacuum
baboon2004 said:
n*nj* t*nes and m* w*x are two of the most cuntish rcord labels I've ever had the misfortune to come across. And Coldcut did some great stuff, especially the Eric B & Rakim, remix. What on earth possessed them to turn over to the dark side?
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I still like bits and pieces of the Mo Wax catalogue a lot. I didn't like lots at the time, and have sold off still more that hasn't stood up over time, but I reckon there are some superb bits in there that certainly sound like something other than just "funky" or "jazzy" (or any of those other danger signs) music. Assuming that's what you're hating about it..?

Mind you, if I'm being honest, I did at least check out a lot of Ninja Tunes stuff and pick up a bunch of the compilations mid-90s... Weird. Went cold on it all very quickly - wonder if I was just sucked in by their press?
 
E

elgato

I just dont know
Chris said:
interesting to know... I can say as an American that the Bristol sound as an export always seemed associated with this heady, moody, jazzy, rainy-day vibe, from Trip Hop to Full Cycle.

I've always been kind of intrigued by Bristol, wondering if it feels that way. Like how gangsta rap and country rock and Beck feel like L.A., or Detroit rock and Techno feel like Detroit... etc. Of course the answer's subjective but...
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yeh i think that in many ways the city can reflect that feeling, obviously with many exceptions and qualifications. it does indeed rain a lot, and it is a pretty sleepy place during the days. its also i think quite a dislocated place in some sense, although probably less so (or maybe in different ways) the further you get from the centre. but there are also a lot of very large and wild raves... i think you could say that the city has quite a distinct character between day and night

its worth emphasising in the context of this thread that as far as i know the 'scene' i mentioned was not of locally-based artists, but rather bristol-based soundsystems and collectives playing tunes and getting djs in from lots of other places. although i think breakcore and hard techstep had a fair few locally based producers and labels, and one of the biggest internet record stores for it was based there
 
S

Spender

Member
baboon2004 said:
n*nj* t*nes and m* w*x are two of the most cuntish rcord labels I've ever had the misfortune to come across. And Coldcut did some great stuff, especially the Eric B & Rakim, remix. What on earth possessed them to turn over to the dark side?
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Hmm, bunching MoWax in with Morcheeba's lazy trip-hop is just, well, a bit lazy. The label seems to come in for alot of hate, possibly due more to peoples' dislike of James Lavelle or maybe a retrospective dislike of what eventually became labelled 'trip-hop'. I'm not suggesting this is your reason, just in my experience.

Check the back catalogue. It's hardly 'coffee-table'. And mostly not what might be labelled 'trip-hop'. OK, you might now put Attica Blues into the above category but they were still leagues ahead of the shoe-shop soundtracking dross that Morcheeba and Zero 7 were churning out at the time. Some mighty fine artwork too...

Liquid Liquid / David Axelrod / Sam Sever / Carl Craig/Innerzone Orchestra
Money Mark / Andrea Parker / Divine Styler / Q-Bert / Peshay / The Psyconaughts
DJ Shadow / Ils & Solo / Major Force / DJ Krush / / Patrick Pulsinger / Quannum/Blackalicious / Kool Keith/Dr Octagon / Kirk Degorgio/As one / DJ Assault / Magic Mike / Luke Vibert / Urban Tribe

In both sound and attitude, I think MoWax at it's best was pretty much in tune (sonically and through it's spirit of experimentation) with the whole Bristol thing. Massive Attack and Portishead also had close links with the label during it's heyday through remixing and artwork alike. And I'm pretty sure 3D still does the artwork for UNKLE.

Anyway, slightly off-topic rant over.
 
M

mms

sometimes
Spender said:
Hmm, bunching MoWax in with Morcheeba's lazy trip-hop is just, well, a bit lazy. The label seems to come in for alot of hate, possibly due more to peoples' dislike of James Lavelle or maybe a retrospective dislike of what eventually became labelled 'trip-hop'. I'm not suggesting this is your reason, just in my experience.

Check the back catalogue. It's hardly 'coffee-table'. And mostly not what might be labelled 'trip-hop'. OK, you might now put Attica Blues into the above category but they were still leagues ahead of the shoe-shop soundtracking dross that Morcheeba and Zero 7 were churning out at the time. Some mighty fine artwork too...

Liquid Liquid / David Axelrod / Sam Sever / Carl Craig/Innerzone Orchestra
Money Mark / Andrea Parker / Divine Styler / Q-Bert / Peshay / The Psyconaughts
DJ Shadow / Ils & Solo / Major Force / DJ Krush / / Patrick Pulsinger / Quannum/Blackalicious / Kool Keith/Dr Octagon / Kirk Degorgio/As one / DJ Assault / Magic Mike / Luke Vibert / Urban Tribe

In both sound and attitude, I think MoWax at it's best was pretty much in tune (sonically and through it's spirit of experimentation) with the whole Bristol thing. Massive Attack and Portishead also had close links with the label during it's heyday through remixing and artwork alike. And I'm pretty sure 3D still does the artwork for UNKLE.

Anyway, slightly off-topic rant over.
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yep divine styler and urban tribe can be added to that as well, they had some good stuff on the label, a few good crossover points with drum and bass also, also palmskins production, very good.
Alot of half assed toss as well, but every label has it's fair share if it puts out tons of records all the time like they did, james lavelles unkle stuff was particulary bad.

Stuff i enjoyed most on ninja was vadim, the rest of it, not for me at all, but vadim had something else going on.
 
T

ThinKing

Well-known member
elgato said:
its worth emphasising in the context of this thread that as far as i know the 'scene' i mentioned was not of locally-based artists, but rather bristol-based soundsystems and collectives playing tunes and getting djs in from lots of other places. although i think breakcore and hard techstep had a fair few locally based producers and labels, and one of the biggest internet record stores for it was based there
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I was going to pipe up & say a similar thing - whilst there used to be a very strong free/squat party scene in Bristol, I think that was fairly removed from what most people (myself included) would even loosely class as part of the 'Bristol Sound'. It was simply a scene/broad selection of music that was popular with residents, not necessarily a Bristol product or export.


Someone mentioned Hundred Strong, and I think the Ben Dubuisson / Scott Hendy axis, taking in Purple Penguin, Cup Of Tea, and later Hombre Records deserves a mention. One of my favourite hiphop LPs, and one of the most underrated UKHH albums in general, is Ad Infinitum by Numskullz on Hombre. The MC might not be the most inspired at times, but the beats are brilliant and unmistakeably Bristolian imo.

http://www.discogs.com/Numskullz-Ad-Infinitum/release/231262


Going back further, 3 PM were pretty big in Bristol back in the day, featuring MC Kelz who worked with Smith & Mighty quite a lot, and who is still pretty active today. Their released work was quite thin on the ground but they still get people in the know all misty-eyed.

http://www.discogs.com/artist/3+PM
 
E

elgato

I just dont know
ThinKing said:
I was going to pipe up & say a similar thing - whilst there used to be a very strong free/squat party scene in Bristol, I think that was fairly removed from what most people (myself included) would even loosely class as part of the 'Bristol Sound'. It was simply a scene/broad selection of music that was popular with residents, not necessarily a Bristol product or export.
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yeh you're definitely right, in the context of this thread (the 'Bristol Sound' meaning its homegrown exports rather than musical backdrop) i should have been more clear, apologies.

guess its more just that i think it may seem from the outside that Bristol is entirely a chilled out spot full of ppl smoking dope buying second hand soul records and going to nights in the Malcolm X Centre, omitting the fact that i think a massive amount of Bristol nightlife and culture, for a certain time anyway (and still from what i gather) was incredibly hard and ravey, and there is a really strong squat scene in both free party terms and more broadly. but this is where i guess fragmentation and subjective experience comes in, people living different lives quite insulated from others

but detached from the question of musical influence or the context of this thread, i think its a really interesting characteristic of the city that isn't mentioned very much at all, its a real outpost of a specific lifestyle and culture that i don't think is represented so strongly in many other places from what i can gather
 
D

DJ PIMP

Well-known member
Spender said:
Liquid Liquid / David Axelrod / Sam Sever / Carl Craig/Innerzone Orchestra
Money Mark / Andrea Parker / Divine Styler / Q-Bert / Peshay / The Psyconaughts
DJ Shadow / Ils & Solo / Major Force / DJ Krush / / Patrick Pulsinger / Quannum/Blackalicious / Kool Keith/Dr Octagon / Kirk Degorgio/As one / DJ Assault / Magic Mike / Luke Vibert / Urban Tribe
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kind of think this is part of why MW gets hated on. nothing wrong with the artists but for a label that's an almost hopelessly hip collection of eclectroniqua. looking at that list... what did MW stand for? everything and nothing. there's nothing there that, in hindsight at least, is anything but safe.
 
V

viktorvaughn

Well-known member
mms said:
yep divine styler and urban tribe can be added to that as well, they had some good stuff on the label, a few good crossover points with drum and bass also, also palmskins production, very good.
Alot of half assed toss as well, but every label has it's fair share if it puts out tons of records all the time like they did, james lavelles unkle stuff was particulary bad.

Stuff i enjoyed most on ninja was vadim, the rest of it, not for me at all, but vadim had something else going on.
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Wordpower2 by Divine Styler is on mo wax i think? That is quality album. i like the quite harsh/robotic sound mixed in with the islamic rhetoric and muezzin at the beginning.
 
M

mms

sometimes
viktorvaughn said:
Wordpower2 by Divine Styler is on mo wax i think? That is quality album. i like the quite harsh/robotic sound mixed in with the islamic rhetoric and muezzin at the beginning.
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yep directrix - yes it's a brilliant record. also they did a weird but good comp of mainly lenky instrumentals - dunno why it was just instrumentals but good anyway.
 
synapticat

synapticat

Mynd
I think its interesting how the 'sounds' have always been ascribed to cities. I guess thats where music happens. I must say I don't know much about Bristol's musical history, but on a more general note, i guess the internet has changed they way 'sounds' are made and understood. For example the affinity of sound between Bristol and Berlin in 2008 dubstep.
 
M

mms

sometimes
synapticat said:
I think its interesting how the 'sounds' have always been ascribed to cities. I guess thats where music happens. I must say I don't know much about Bristol's musical history, but on a more general note, i guess the internet has changed they way 'sounds' are made and understood. For example the affinity of sound between Bristol and Berlin in 2008 dubstep.
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similar demographic, similar pace of life and they're all influenced by a kind of dub, basic channel i guess.
 
B

baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
This proabbly deserved a re-up anyway for consideration of how the sound of Joker/Guido/Gemmy/Hyetal etc does or doesn't reflect earlier Bristol sounds in trip-hop and jungle...
 
hint

hint

party record with a siren
The instrumental to the Fresh 4 track - "Smoke Filled Thoughts" formed the basis for the drums on Metalheadz Terminator, didn't it?
 
hint

hint

party record with a siren
Cheers!

I was just listening to a bunch of my V Recordings, Dope Dragon & Full Cycle stuff. I'll hopefully get round to doing a mix at some point.

That's some of my favourite music - very distinctive sound choices. Their drums always seemed to be a bit more clipped and "funky" (for want of a more Dissensus-friendly word) than other d'n'b.

Obviously came a bit later than the Bristol music being discussed here.
 
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