K and the inter-'nuum transition point

[muser]

Were they the ones doing the upstairs room at the last generator? If so that's a terrific rig. Not as good as the one I heard last wekend though, although they're mates so I'm biased .

Yea thats the one

feeling fairly ambivalent towards dubstep myself recently but I have to disagree, with the way blackdown seems to imply that we should embrace funky because it could have the potential to be good, because it shares a similar root structure to earlier forms of dance music.

shouldn't the question be is it good?

not is it good yet...

too much LOOKING social, when LISTENING is what matters.

Ive tried to keep an open mind about Funky but it strikes me a being hugely unremarkable..

Yea I dont understand this whole funky thing I think the term is used waaay too loosely for a start, to the point where it doesn't really have any real meaning. I also can't really say that to my taste I have ever heard something literally 'funky' in electronic music that hasn't sounded saccharine sweet, pedestrian and dull.

Funk is syncopated breakbeat rhythms and choppy guitar, soul style singing, pentatonic melodies with pitch bends etc. So what exactly are you saying musically you want to hear in dubstep when you say you want it to be more funky?

As for laptop dj's verses vinyl dj's (and I mix vinyl btw) I think from artists perspective laptop djing is actually much more healthy, its not about dubplates, whose got the next big tune that may never see a release or wont be for a while, laptop djs don't need that to draw people in and make them individual because they've got more freedom to innovate. Dubplate vinyl culture in dance music I think also results in tunes that are standardized into a format of effective throw away 'floor killers' that all follow a very similar format and sound. Thats whats killing/killed the core of the dubstep sound, people trying to make club bangers based on previous successes as opposed to innovating within the what should be a very broad genre that is dubstep.

And I agree K is a shitty drug in the party scene.

 

[Immryr]

Nice bit of ignorant anti-raver bias coming to the fore here :slanted:

i think there is a definite distinction to be drawn between 'ravers' and 'crusties'.

 

[straight]

ive been to enough 'raves' of this sort to know im sick of the moodyness/crap drugs/inevitable influx of criminal thugs at 6am

 

[UFO over easy]

Nice bit of ignorant anti-raver bias coming to the fore here :slanted:

it's more anti-crap, lumpen, lifeless, bland, irritating music from my perspective I'm sure the people who run the systems are lovely, and of course I'm generalising.. but I don't get anything but bad vibes from the endless psytrance, comedy breakcore and macho dubstep/dnb that seems to reign over free parties across the country.

the inevitable influx of criminal thugs

lol, that's a bit of a silly thing to say isn't it?

 

[Grievous Angel]

Funk reference points relevant to dubstep:

Parliament: P-Funk (Wants to get funked up)
Tom Brown: Funkin for Jamaica
George Clinton: Tweekin / Loopzilla
Prince: Alphabet Street / Sine / Gett Off
=======================

Dance music derivations of funk:
Jedi Knights: One for MAW
Trick or Treat, almost anything on Public Demand, 2 step in general
=======================

Compare and contrast with dubstep reference points:

Loefah: It's yours / Disko Wrekka / 28 Grams / actually anything - anything at all - by Loefah - after jungle inflitrator. Keep it on (off!) the one!
Mala: Lean Forward (or indeed almost anything by Mala except for the new very spacious dubs)
Benga: any of the new stuff that Yunx has been dropping for the last few months
Pinch: Qawalli (deep, slow motion, spacious p-funk)
Coki: Mood Dub (ditto)

And so on and so forth. Even to the degree of:

Caspa: Well Ard
Distance: V
The Others: Africa

All are magnificently funky.

I think the funk is immanent within and expressed by dubstep. However, one of the definitions of funk given above would disqualify vast swathes of George Clinton's electronic stuff that are utterly canonical.

And as Ben UFO says above, there may well be seemingly-post-K attempts at dubstep that are, well, not. I don't hear much of it - but I can do without any more Spongebob impersonators, OK?

 

[Alfons]

Coming back to London recently and hearing Dubstep again up close it certainly feels like there is more of a techy mechanical feel to some of the sounds especially coming from many of the foreign producers from places like Holland (the home of Gabba, no?) This is of course with the exception of Burial, in who I hear the echoes of old Horsepower/2-step and the stuff I heard back in the day at fwd etc. But the shift back to the dancing/soul/girl stuff sounds like its being catered for by funky. It seems the pendulum is in mid-swing.

the dutch producers are the excact opposite to me... Martyn and 2562 at least, techy but only in the detroit/minimal sense, got swing and are sexy, not techy in a techstep/neurofunk kind of way (Vex'd and distance would be representing that angle in dubstep imo)

On another note does anyone see dubstep doing the opposite of what's discussed in the blackdown interview, i.e. being pitched up not down? I can imagine some exciting things going on from 138-158, dubstep, old jungle, the slower dnb stuff Naphta has been talking about... DJ sets spanning wider bpm margins and so on.

 

[elgato]

really strange anti squatter thing going on.

so so standard, pisses me off. did you guys ever happen across the discussion on dubstepforum re ketamine and dubstep... madness. ridiculous narrow-mindedness

but back to the main issue at hand I agree with those arguing for a more multi-faceted conception of dubstep, both musically and socially... an interesting counter-example would be

as well as the general vibe i get off Chef & LD and D1

btw if someone can tell me how to resize those pictures ill gladly do it

 

[straight]

lol, that's a bit of a silly thing to say isn't it?

i dont think so, the last few of these large crusty run hard techno/d+b raves i went to would always have a load of nasty villains turning up late then robbing and attacking loads of innocent(ish) bystanders. it became so predictable that it would turn into a battle with either cops or scallys that all the fun evaporated

once more, turbo LOLs on that flyer

 

[elgato]

On another note does anyone see dubstep doing the opposite of what's discussed in the blackdown interview, i.e. being pitched up not down? I can imagine some exciting things going on from 138-158

yeh a lot of people do this. a few of Kode9's tunes are at 140-145 or something too i think. definitely something big to come from that direction i think

 

[UFO over easy]

so so standard, pisses me off. did you guys ever happen across the discussion on dubstepforum re ketamine and dubstep... madness. ridiculous narrow-mindedness

just want to reiterate I don't have a problem with either the drugs or the people who put on the raves... just the music that tends to be associated with both.

 

[elgato]

just want to reiterate I don't have a problem with either the drugs or the people who put on the raves... just the music that tends to be associated with both.

yeh don't worry man i certainly gleaned that

although i would say that as with all generalisations there is only limited truth...

 

[nomadologist]

Yea thats the one


Yea I dont understand this whole funky thing I think the term is used waaay too loosely for a start, to the point where it doesn't really have any real meaning. I also can't really say that to my taste I have ever heard something literally 'funky' in electronic music that hasn't sounded saccharine sweet, pedestrian and dull.

Funk is syncopated breakbeat rhythms and choppy guitar, soul style singing, pentatonic melodies with pitch bends etc. So what exactly are you saying musically you want to hear in dubstep when you say you want it to be more funky?

Exactly. I can't help but feel that trying so hard to bend "funky" until it meets dubstep somewhere is a sort of desperate bid for authenticity that renders what the sonics of funk actually are entirely meaningless.

I tried listening to some "funky house" and I have like absolutely no patience or interest for what's on youtube and the interweb. Maybe it will be good "someday"...

 

[nomos]

nice thread GFC.

I refuse to accept that all the grooveless, muddy, plodding, mechanical borestep coming out of all this is even dubstep...

yeah i've been saying something like this for a long while now on my blog, except i'm asking whether it's worth fighting for the term. the most exciting music is coming from artists who are distancing themselves from it. at this point there's very little shared between that lot and the 'sound' now known around the world as 'dubstep.' people have been squeamish about acknowledging factions for fear of disturbing some imagined unity in the 'scene' but that's mostly been a marriage of convenience.

funky

there's plenty that's 'funky' by one definition or another going back to horsepower and el-b. but if you want things that sound like funk then try the opening 20-30 mins of this...

http://rinsefm.blogspot.com/2007/11/kode9-vs-flying-lotus-20th-november.html

 

[Gavin]

Is this a function of dubstep's globalization? I've only seen two sets but the U.S. DJ's was definitely more on the "slamming" tip, the UK one had more swing (though a fair amount of banging). Banging can be effective, moreso when the tracks switch up every minute or so, otherwise I get bored. I noticed that the banging tracks got a more immediate response, but then people got into a lull until the next track... something with more swing, or a reggae vibe could carry the audience longer but you didn't necessarily get the "whoos" and hands in the air when the track dropped.... To what extent was jungle's watering down a result of its global reach (which means it gets reduced to sonic signifiers instead of a music-based subculture)?

 

[UFO over easy]

yeah i've been saying something like this for a long while now on my blog, except i'm asking whether it's worth fighting for the term. the most exciting music is coming from artists who are distancing themselves from it.

yeah.. but look at drum and bass.. no one fought for that and now even though there's still interesting music being made, it's still clinging to a scene that doesn't want it there, so there's nowhere to hear it, hardly any radio and no real community outside the internet.

it's good that there's still a lot of great 140 stuff being made but I reckon unless we fight for it (I know that sounds a bit dramatic) we'll get to the same point where the scene gets so diluted the interesting stuff will be gradually rejected till there's nothing left.

 

[ether]

Nice bit of ignorant anti-raver bias coming to the fore here :slanted:

i think there is a definite distinction to be drawn between 'ravers' and 'crusties'.

never associated dubstep with drugs or even heard them mentioned until a few months ago.
the tempo of the music combined with the roots sound system legacy always seemed to suggest they didn't jell, apart from the odd waft of herb of course (sorely missed incense since the smoking ban)

older faster forms of dance music where far more raliant on large raves to propagate the music, without the internet, tape packs (recorded at live events) and localised pirate radio where needed by and large for the music to have an audience.

dubstep works as a listeners music, it can be easily heard (geographically) and enjoyed domestically. The sound system is more of a choice to embrace the physicality of the sound allowing it to be better understood, a 'tool' rather than for sweaty gurny havit large concerns.

i'm bored of 'raves' as they get less like 'dances' as the music becomes more functional and less emotional.

even if that makes me an ignorant anti-raver.

 

[nomos]

yeah.. but look at drum and bass.. no one fought for that and now even though there's still interesting music being made, it's still clinging to a scene that doesn't want it there, so there's nowhere to hear it, hardly any radio and no real community outside the internet.

i think you're making my point though. clinging to a corpse (dnb) is not a plan for the future. better to find new spaces, make them your own, and resist names for as long as possible so new things can grow. and there was loads of fighting over jungle/dnb in the mid-90s (remember 'the committee'?). one result was mass defection; people bringing to garage what dnb wouldn't tolerate anymore.

it's good that there's still a lot of great 140 stuff being made but I reckon unless we fight for it (I know that sounds a bit dramatic) we'll get to the same point where the scene gets so diluted the interesting stuff will be gradually rejected till there's nothing left.

is it even a 'scene' anymore though, in any unified, meaningful sense? i think that's over (and i'm not just saying that from over here, people from there have said as much to me). 'dubstep' will persist for god knows how long but i think people like you and myself will increasingly look elsewhere for the things we liked in it in the first place. personally i'm more interested in creative people following trajectories through hyperdub (including at other tempos) than wasting energy fighting over boundaries.

 

[Immryr]

i'd say yes, it is still a scene. it may have fringes and things that run parallel with it, but that doesnt change it from being a scene.

 

[noel emits]

i'd say yes, it is still a scene. it may have fringes and things that run parallel with it, but that doesnt change it from being a scene.

It's also now reched the point where it's 'another entertainment option'. Reliability and predictability loom.

'What shall we do tonight dear?'

'Oh I fancy a little bit of dubstep, how about you?'

'Yes that would be wobble-ket-tastic and unlikely to provide much in the way of surprises, let's go.'

 

[UFO over easy]

is it even a 'scene' anymore though, in any unified, meaningful sense? i think that's over

the paragraph above is excellent but this bit isn't really true... platform one, dots and even dmz (although that's the only big night I can think of, and I haven't been for a while) are proof that there is still a scene with a real sense of unity and togetherness..