Thrive in '95 - Jungle's zenith

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Pearsall

Prodigal Son
ah, this thread is great. maybe I should do an all-95 mix at some point

if we're talking '95 Hype, then I am also a huge fan of his remix of 'Ganja Man' - long, low-key intro, and then some of the most splendidly bonkers beats ever committed to wax, like a robotic chicken being electrocuted and then tossed in an industrial dryer, and then back out again, and in again, and out again ...

 
Corpsey

Corpsey

bandz ahoy
HMGovt said:
^^^^^^
rewind

That must have been around the time it became packed out with hollow-cheeked unsmiling barely nodding on the spot blokes wearing outdoors arc'teryx in a basement.
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This is just evading the question, though.

I remember reading a Dillinja interview where he said that kids didn't 'get' breakbeats anymore so he'd stopped making tunes with them.

TBF when I was going to raves where they were playing Clipz and Hazard tunes there were loads of girls there (alongside the scowling blokes).
 
droid

droid

Well-known member
Pearsall said:
ah, this thread is great. maybe I should do an all-95 mix at some point

if we're talking '95 Hype, then I am also a huge fan of his remix of 'Ganja Man' - long, low-key intro, and then some of the most splendidly bonkers beats ever committed to wax, like a robotic chicken being electrocuted and then tossed in an industrial dryer, and then back out again, and in again, and out again ...

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droid said:
Krome & Time - Ganja Man (DJ Hype Remix)

It's about time we paid homage to one of the most instinctive dancefloor forces in Jungle. Alongside Trace, Foul Play and Origin Unknown, Hype is one of those artists who consistently pushed the art of the remix to eclipse the original tune. Some awesome creativity after the amen drop on this. Hammering in sync with the bass, pitching the breaks all the way down and then way up again, filling in gaps in the beats you didnt even know existed via some kind of fractal witchcraft, then flicking between a range of increasingly demented loops as it barrels to conclusion. The original is good, but this is next level.
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...
 
droid

droid

Well-known member
Brilliant, but I wouldn't put him up on the top tier. You could make a good case for Photek, Andy C, Bukem, Nico, Foul Play and SS as well, maybe a few more....
 
droid

droid

Well-known member
Override - Controller

We return to the space age with another semi-obscurity from Klute on the lesser known Octopus label. Whale noise, trilling flutes, spacey pads and a classic stoned sci fi vocal sample usher us into a cascading torrent of breaks that accelerates as the bass drops and the beats trip over themselves to follow. It rolls on eternally and then we hit the breakdown, followed by groove reconstruction during which the framework of breaks builds up again and the skeleton of the tune is exposed. A brilliant set opener.


 
firefinga

firefinga

Well-known member

Such a lovely tune. Normally I'd slag off anyone sampling a flute but this was done superbly.
 
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droid

droid

Well-known member
Higher Sense - Bizarre (Desired State Remix)

Dubstep has ensured that 'heavy' has become a discredited term when it comes to bass music, but heavy is the only way to describe this one. But it's not heavy like an anvil. This is the weight of the waves piling on top of you when you get pushed under in the surf, a rolling, relentless dynamic pressure. You cringe beneath it as you are mocked by imperious diva vox and descending whistles. You catch sight of the surface at 4:10 when the pads make their entrance and guide you into a (all too short) clam and luscious breakdown, and then you're dragged back underwater for another pummelling.

An Ant Miles tune remixed by himself and Andy C with that classic RAM sound. Beloved by DJ's. Might just be the best Shadow release of '95.

 
droid

droid

Well-known member
4-Hero Universal Love (Metalheadz Remix)

There are at least 4 mixes of this tune floating around, including another metalheadz mix. Unfortunately the only place you can hear this on wax is on the 3 a side Reinforced compilation, jungle book. Its a shame because this is by far the best mix. The title 'Metalheadz' mix is ambiguous, what does it mean exactly? Is this just 4 hero remixing themselves? There's a slight whiff of Goldie, the fastidious air of someone directing things in the studio... if so, it's another triumph. Leading with an ominous bass loop, the main drive comes from a spiralling apache edit interspersed with pseudo screeches, female exhortations and an eerie synth line. Around 3:40 we catch a glimpse of the main melody line and then, finally at 4:40, the main vocal hook slips uncertainly out of concealment. Before you know it, its over.

Would love a 12" edit of this one.


This is the other Metalheadz mix, which I think is credited to Goldie. Too maximal:

 
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Pearsall

Prodigal Son
oops to my inadvertent repost!

Ron Tom - Pirates

I've always loved this tune, and managed to score a copy at a decent price last year. Love the combination of sweet reggae vocals and tearing breaks, and then how later about halfway through the tune it breaks down to an almost 1993-style darkside stab pattern, and then later we get the sweet rare groove breakdown, then a bit of ragga chat. Lots of stuff to unpack in this one tune!

 
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baboon2004

Darned cockwombles.
apparently the guy who made it went on to cowrite Overload by the Sugababes (and possibly some of their other stuff)?
 
droid

droid

Well-known member
DJ Trace - Final Chapter (Rollers Mix)

The nemesis of '95! Paramount amongst a wave of producers striving to exert influence over the scene, Trace dominated the year with a clutch of exquisitely tough dancefloor rollers. Soul Pride, Think, Amen, 808 bass and soundsystem samples - Its a formula that has been replicated thousands of times, but rarely with such insouciant prowess. The vocal samples propel the groove through a thicket of tightly furled filgrees of beats and rolling open fields of angular think snares and chipmunks. No flashy Remarc style amen edits here, instead the break is deployed as a switching mechanism, demarcating the rhythmic structure with sporadic appearances and adding new layers of timbre via subtle filtering. This was his first 12" in 95 and it established the formula he would perfect with his Babylon remixes.


 
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blissblogger

Well-known member
imagine how this would read to someone who had no idea of the code, i.e. that some of the lowercase words refer to breakbeats

"through a thicket of tightly furled filigrees of beats and rolling open fields of angular think snares and chipmunks"

they'd probably think it was some kind of tripped out poetic pastoral-horror vision ("are the snares for the catching of those poor chipmunks?")
 
droid

droid

Well-known member
DJ Trace ‎– Stoppin

An unreleased white label released somewhere near the end of '95 sees Trace rocking the Soul Pride and Think again, but this time with a foray into some runnin' synth bass. This one's all about the disorienting pulse of the pads and atmospherics which spiral gleefully around the drum and bass core like a tangle twister. Very much typical of the Lucky Spin sound at the time, this is nonetheless an unusual excursion into melodicism from the hardstep master.

 
droid

droid

Well-known member
DJ Trace - Lost Entity Remix

Replete in the rave era, joy isnt an emotion ordinarily found in jungle, but there's a sense of exaltation here, no doubt inherited partly from the '93 original. The intro is dominated by lush hardcore pads with a hi hat pattern hinting at a 4 to the floor that never arrives, then a loose amen splashes in with an ebullient smattering of delay and reverb followed by a sustained 4 note bass line that... reaches out to all the rudeboy inna the place. The rave lineage is extended with a hesitant piano style breakdown that bisects the tune down right the middle, and we get some rolling conga and bass action before things wrap up.

A refreshingly direct number that points again to Trace's versatility, I first heard this on the outstanding dee jay/lucky spin compilation 'ruff & ready vol. 1', contender for the best jungle collection in a very crowded field.

 
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thirdform

pass the sick bucket
Pearsall said:
1995 was probably also the point where jungle started to be produced and released outside the UK (were there any non-UK jungle releases in 1994 that weren't just licenses from UK labels? I'm not aware of any), like this Amen tearout on Germany's Smokin' Drum

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oi i was gonna post that. crackin tune though no? when i first heard it i thought it was UK, until I looked at discogs.
 
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thirdform

pass the sick bucket
Corpsey said:
Kind of amazing how Hype went from making stuff like that to playing the sort of jump up you'd get at tru playaz nights. Again, maybe the drums got pushed as far as they'd go without alienating dancefloors, or maybe he (and others) just got bored of them?
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jungle/dnb only really got big nationwide after 96. you can notice this from the tapes as well. 94-95 was mostly roast, ruffneck ting, awol, thunder and joy. 96 people start biggin up helter skelter and slammin vinyl tapes, which was more a happy hardcore rave really. yes i know helter skelter played jungle from day 1 but it was never where dubs got broken through, unless you were Bukem holding back tunes for 20 years.

Brits always need a tune they can hum, even if it's an obnoxious bassline otherwise they are not interested. it's the great deficiency of being the most advanced capitalist country in the world.
 
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droid

droid

Well-known member
DJ Trace - The Mutant Remix, Rollers Instinct

It had to come eventually... A record that set a trend that may have had the most corrosive influence on jungle along with Pulp Fiction & Super sharp shooter, but unlike the latter styles, this one was the invention of just one man. The destruction commences with a template that was repeatedly rinsed in the years to follow, especially by Trace's mates at No-U Turn - a bar of the 'life could' break followed by a bar of sliced up apache. The strings and melody come in and already we're in new territory, a seductive slippery slope that sucks you in with intricate stereo panned rolling apache edits before hitting you with a monster reese, and then... ...some saxophone? The tune rolls on, apaches on the warpath, lush melody undermined by the hulking mass of that distorted bass, and I was fooled just like the rest of the scene. At the time this seemed like an exciting new direction, a new strain of beat science rather than the beginning of a dead eyed journey into a sterile wasteland of ultra clean production and rhythmic desolation.

Damn you Trace!

 
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