*stop compiling Funky Sainsburys Volume 6 album*
just trying to understand why it hasnt grabbed as many ears - esp girls ears
This is an even better question than before though (and even though I know it sounds patronising/ott to say this, I do really appreciate when people come on here with constructive questions).
I maybe can't give you the best answer to it though because I've lost touch somewhat with what the 'average girl' is into, esp the average suburban girl. Back when I was in high school, r'n'b was massive with the females and of course fitted with a lot of stuff in 2-step garage (also jungle had some great r'n'b-ish bits which is sometimes forgotten), but I get the impression that it's not
quite as big as it once was in the UK.
Some people might disagree with me here, but I do think that in its earlier stages the UK funky scene had too much of a cautious, conservative estimation of what 'the laydeez' would & could be into - which led to a lot of focus on slightly watery, tepid soulful-house style vocals. But this def isn't the case any more, the female vocal tunes that you here now have much more rudeness (in all senses of the word) to them. This sort of attitudenal/assertive female voice is def one of the strong points of funky for me. Of course I have seen the case made that the change has gone too far, so that rather than being overly tasteful and mature the vocals are now overly shrill and girlish. This may be true in a few cases, but overall the development seems positive.
I'd be interested to know - do you think funky getting bassier would link into it appealing to a wider audience of girls? Maybe that's not quite what you were asking, but it's interesting to ponder. I can see both sides I think - on the one hand, you often get this perception of bassy music as sexy (not sure exactly where this comes from, maybe because it moves the lower parts of the body, maybe just because sub-bass has an 'organic', non-digital feel) and you have this long tradition of 'wind up your waist to the bass' and so on. But on the other hand, bass-heavy music is often associtated with a 'serious boys' kind of audience - again hard to say exactly why, but maybe because the focus on bass leads to a lack of vocals or other hook elements. Actually I think this latter view of bass music is a wee bit of a stereotype at this stage, but interested to hear what you think.
