The meaning of "funky house"

tryptych

waiting for a time
When martin blackdown first mentioned funky house on dissensus a while back, people seemed to think it referred to bland, MOR house played in bars in the west end.

The stuff that Geeneus etc are dropping now seems a long way from that - are they two separate genres, or have they met in the middle?
 

zhao

there are no accidents
When martin blackdown first mentioned funky house on dissensus a while back, people seemed to think it referred to bland, MOR house played in bars in the west end.

The stuff that Geeneus etc are dropping now seems a long way from that - are they two separate genres, or have they met in the middle?

or maybe artists split from the same "return to the dance", initial impulse --- some doing more housey ethereal, some (re) infusing it with the menace.

volumes is indeed serious bizniss... into the future is massive. some of his production, like Make Me and Yellowtail, reminds me, not necessarily in form, but in feeling, a little bit of the early photek productions. the cleanliness, the tightness, the minimalist pallette, the "dryer" style of composition: like things turning round and round in a dryer, with no beginning or end.
but was it my sleep deprived self having a first listen or is the mix CD kinda rubbish? seems like he put it together in one go, while drunk, sloppily slapping tunes on top of eachother...
 

Blackdown

nexKeysound
When martin blackdown first mentioned funky house on dissensus a while back, people seemed to think it referred to bland, MOR house played in bars in the west end.

The stuff that Geeneus etc are dropping now seems a long way from that - are they two separate genres, or have they met in the middle?

kinda.

funky house = 4x4 descendent of disco. now mostly generic dance music. see Defected, Ibiza etc

funky = recent offshoot of this by the UK garage demographic, often with rawer sounds and varied percussion, thoughs still lots of the housier vocal elements too.
 

elgato

I just dont know
to complicate the discussion a bit, i don't think its that simple though. i think there is a degree to which people previously underestimated what was going on within commercial house... for example, the fact that Kode 9 is playing a DJ Gregory tune off Defected from 2006 speaks volumes in my opinion (not about the worth of DJ Gregory but the underestimation of that stuff and the u-turns taking place). true that tune is more 'deep' house maybe but i do think that the characterisation of everything on those big labels or from that world being bland tasteful bollocks was and is a generalisation, even if it holds broadly. i hold my hands up though as i was previously wholehearted in my rejection of it

there is also no denying that many uk producers and djs are very much into and still play the US stuff off those big labels, i think they still have a very big role in the way the uk sound is developing
 

tryptych

waiting for a time
to complicate the discussion a bit, i don't think its that simple though. i think there is a degree to which people previously underestimated what was going on within commercial house... for example, the fact that Kode 9 is playing a DJ Gregory tune off Defected from 2006 speaks volumes in my opinion (not about the worth of DJ Gregory but the underestimation of that stuff and the u-turns taking place). true that tune is more 'deep' house maybe but i do think that the characterisation of everything on those big labels or from that world being bland tasteful bollocks was and is a generalisation, even if it holds broadly. i hold my hands up though as i was previously wholehearted in my rejection of it

there is also no denying that many uk producers and djs are very much into and still play the US stuff off those big labels, i think they still have a very big role in the way the uk sound is developing

That's exactly what I'm talking about - I've never paid much attention to the whole Defected/Hed Kandi etc type house, but it's interesting if people are playing and/or influenced by it still.
 

boomnoise

♫
At the funky night i was at on sunday the ratio of uk tracks to non uk tracks was about 5:1 And that one record was often a DJ Gregory bit or something on defected. Before the uk sound came about I’m assuming funky nights were made up entirely of that sound, possibly bordering on the bar music stereotypes. And I’m guessing this was a certain generation’s introduction to house music, post ukg and grime. So producers took it and tried to put their own stamp on it.

I see uk funky as sort of a product of producers aspirations in reaction to the relative commercial failures of grime, hip hop and rnb in the uk. A lot of producers show a lot of reverence to house but it’s certainly not the prepackaged bar music variety. It's unclear to see how deep the reference points go into house history. But you can see the appeal in relation to the other forums which have dominated London raves. The slick and polished production of house and its solid and independent commercial backbone I think has made it something worthy of further exploration. There is far more production kudos attached to making house than there is grime or electro even. Interestingly Lil Silva was saying on Cameo’s show last night that he tried the grime ting, the ukg thing but those scenes weren’t going anywhere so he got on house.

Relating that to the convergence of trad funky house and uk funky house I think the meeting point is London and the rave. Yet again its cultural mix injecting the essential ingredients, drawing on producers’ African and Caribbean heritages in combination with the history of London urban music over the past 15 or so years.

And i have to agree Elgato. Its taken London to get hold of it to warrant attention for a lot of people. Do you think it's possible to pinpoint a time when defected style house became uncool? Or moreover a time when it became a victim of snobbery in this context? Surely for a lot of people, including me, it ran tangentially with uk garage gaining popularity? It's certainly very interesting how house is reintegrating itself back into london urban music in a second (third?) reappropriation.

Sorry for the muddled thoughts – bashing this out at work. ALTTAB bizness.
 

Elijah

Butterz
Must be confusing for the general consumer, they think of Bodyrox and Fedde Le Grande when they think of Funky house, hard to imagine how that has a similar name to Emotions or Yellowtail. The Geeneus, Soulja and Supa D Interview cleared a lot of stuff up for me.

When i talk about it with people I just call the uk stuff funky, and the 'real' stuff house.

I think that is the way to go so people dont get confused init.
 

hint

party record with a siren
Its taken London to get hold of it to warrant attention for a lot of people. Do you think it's possible to pinpoint a time when defected style house became uncool? Or moreover a time when it became a victim of snobbery in this context?

It's that knee-jerk reaction to 4x4 that you find amongst fans of rave / jungle / hip hop. Beat snobbery.

"Modern House = 4x4 = Boring"

Meanwhile, the likes of Defected and Strictly Rhythm have been putting out a wide variety of House styles for years, and the idea that such labels have been ahead of the curve becomes a hard pill to swallow for some.
 

UFO over easy

online mahjong
It's that knee-jerk reaction to 4x4 that you find amongst fans of rave / jungle / hip hop. Beat snobbery.

"Modern House = 4x4 = Boring"

that was me until only six months ago or so as well, i would've been keen to distance the raw uk stuff from the rest, out of embarrassment more than anything else... but the more i hear the more it seems as though even though yellowtail etc is sonically dissimilar to a lot of that kind of output it still couldn't exist without it

turning point for me was hearing how completely next some strictly/maw etc records were in the early 90s, it made it easier to approach newer stuff on those labels without the preconceptions i had before. could probably pinpoint it, if i had to, to d1 playing bass tone at the last house party rave. i do feel slightly foolish basically writing off something so huge i gotta say
 
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boomnoise

♫
me too.

is there a support group?

is this it?

:p

i think another question is what exactly is 'funky' in the context of uk house and the none uk house that is getting played in sets.

house is a quagmire of genre nuances and i dont want to march through that swamp so much as quickly think about the sonic signifiers; i mean, it's more than bongos, right? both the terms uk funky and uk house are getting thrown about. where is and what is the funk now london has got hold of it?
 

gremino

Moster Sirphine
We should start a "Don't fear the cheese-movement" :cool:

I think house as it's strongest is just pure vibe, pure athmosphere, where the beats becomes secondary, and it's all about the big picture.

It's like house's attitude is about long varying tracks, combined with percussive dj-tools. I'm not an expert about house, but for me this sounds ideal. Though there's alot different house genres, so this sounds more deep house.

I think when making dubstep/jungle/dnb in that kind of house-attitude, is not about 4x4 beats or general laidback-vibe, but about long varying tracks with strong vibe. And when djing, percussive dj-tools to make build-ups, for accapellas etc. would be part of that house-attitude.
 

gyto

Active member
that was me until only six months ago or so as well, i would've been keen to distance the raw uk stuff from the rest, out of embarrassment more than anything else... but the more i hear the more it seems as though even though yellowtail etc is sonically dissimilar to a lot of that kind of output it still couldn't exist without it

turning point for me was hearing how completely next some strictly/maw etc records were in the early 90s, it made it easier to approach newer stuff on those labels without the preconceptions i had before. could probably pinpoint it, if i had to, to d1 playing bass tone at the last house party rave. i do feel slightly foolish basically writing off something so huge i gotta say

x2
 

Blackdown

nexKeysound
I see uk funky as sort of a product of producers aspirations in reaction to the relative commercial failures of grime...

i think you need to be careful about what you mean here. sure grime raves = failure, there's no money in them for all the different reasons we've covered before (hello Trident). but grime artists = increasingly in better health than ever right now.

to me funky is a product of grime's failure to be danceable and to cater for elements of its audience that dont want something so sonically hardcore. i'm not sure that's commercial failure, explicitly.


Interestingly Lil Silva was saying on Cameo’s show last night that he tried the grime ting, the ukg thing but those scenes weren’t going anywhere so he got on house.

or, if you ask certain other insiders, they failed in grime and ukg so moved to funky.

i'd also defend the crit of commercial house tho. being on a board like Dissensus and reading blogs a lot i think you could be easily mistaken for thinking dubstep or grime are larger than they are. but one look at the vast spralling commercial dance industries up north/in ibiza etc gives you a sense of the scale and medocrity around.
 

mms

sometimes
house is much more than 4 4 dance music, you know like dubstep is more than wobble.
I have never understood why people have been against house perse, but i can see how some people might think all house is shit cos some of it is.

this is house

to me anyway
 
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Krasner

Well-known member
i'd also defend the crit of commercial house tho. being on a board like Dissensus and reading blogs a lot i think you could be easily mistaken for thinking dubstep or grime are larger than they are. but one look at the vast spralling commercial dance industries up north/in ibiza etc gives you a sense of the scale and medocrity around.

Sure, a lot of the Strictly Rhythm/'Ibiza' style house is exceedingly mediocre dancefloor filler. But I think the problem is that there is a reasonable amount of good music in that scene that has been written off by association.

If you’d asked me six months ago what I thought about this particular strain of House I would’ve probably dismissed out of hand. But the emergence of Funky has made me revaluate my opinions. The new urban context has really brought how interesting and, perhaps more importantly, rough some of that stuff can be. For instance Marcus Nasty dropping US house tunes like Conan Liquid ‘One Time for Your Mind’ has been a revelation.
 

boomnoise

♫
i think you need to be careful about what you mean here. sure grime raves = failure, there's no money in them for all the different reasons we've covered before (hello Trident). but grime artists = increasingly in better health than ever right now.

to me funky is a product of grime's failure to be danceable and to cater for elements of its audience that dont want something so sonically hardcore. i'm not sure that's commercial failure, explicitly.




or, if you ask certain other insiders, they failed in grime and ukg so moved to funky.

i'd also defend the crit of commercial house tho. being on a board like Dissensus and reading blogs a lot i think you could be easily mistaken for thinking dubstep or grime are larger than they are. but one look at the vast spralling commercial dance industries up north/in ibiza etc gives you a sense of the scale and medocrity around.

yeah, there are certainly supply and demand issues here. and i'm not trying to say anything against grime. I can just pick out a few funky producers who were particularly not feeling the vibe grime brought post ukg and saw house as something more deserving of their time and talents. perhaps they failed at it, who's to know. it's all totally loaded with preferences and value judgements obviously but i was just trying to communicate that i think for a handful of producers, house is seen as being more prestigious.

i dont think anyone is trying to deny the sheer about of wankhouse out there :p
 

Blackdown

nexKeysound
house is much more than 4 4 dance music, you know like dubstep is more than wobble.

sorry, i think i've been permanently damaged in one ear by working at Ministry (mag) and in the other by dribbling deep house purists who act like Naked Music is the pinacle of sound.

i'm not saying all house = bad, i love my Trax, Theo Parrish, Romanthony and Moodyman records to the core, but by volume (and house sure has volume) surely i'm allowed to say vast swathes of it is generic, dull or commercial? Put a donk in it?!
 
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