late 90s tech-step

john eden

male pale and stale
Torque is an example of something that for me is right in the middle

it's probably come to mean that but simon reynolds did use it to mean earlier matrix/optical i think

Yeah Reynolds neurofunk piece in the Wire was all about Ed Rush, Optical and Doc Scotts remix of Shadow Boxing: http://www.thewire.co.uk/articles/2030/

so circa 1997. I always see neurofunk as a subset of techstep I guess - that brief set of stuff circa early 31 Records, early Virus etc.

With tech step going back to No U Turn and then on to Bad Company and then up its own wormhole.

I do like the sub/version stuff tho.

I have an urge to play shadow boxing right now.
 

padraig (u.s.)

a monkey that will go ape
Torque is, for me - the end of days.

madness. just sheer madness, like. next you'll be telling me that you don't like the Ed Rush & Optical Prototype 12".

Wormhole is tougher to defend. I like it still tho.

one thing I've noticed about Ed Rush productions ca. 96-98, a little trick like - instead of having the sustained/drone note in the background he often uses a fractional vocal lick looped over & over to create the same effect ("Slip Thru" off Wormhole, "Cutslo (Lokuste Mix)). it gives this really disembodied feel. I'm into it.

*EDIT* - thinking on this - I wonder Droid if it's cos in the end you're a reggae person & I'm a techno person. not that it has to be one or t'other, of course. I mean I've dabbled in reggae for years but when I'm not listening to jungle it's all techno, really. true. techno. music. in the words of Shed.
 
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Ory

warp drive
so is bad company tech or neuro? or just something everyone wants to completely forget? still love their first couple of 12"s tbh..
 

rivet90210

Well-known member
I'd say Tech... They'd close up the space in their tracks enough to take the edge of paranoia off.
I dont think they should be forgotten. I mean, some of their releases are forgettable, but not everything. I will admit, I bought Digital Nation when it came out, for the first track alone.:eek: The rest is forgettable!
The beloved DBridge was of course a part of the group.
 
My view was always that techstep retained some sort of primitivism (a heavy beat, big bassline, some fx+atmospheres, that's it - the sound of dudes sitting in basements full of dope smoke) whereas neurofunk tried to be cleverer with sound design and really polished production.
 

zhao

there are no accidents
so is bad company tech or neuro? or just something everyone wants to completely forget? still love their first couple of 12"s tbh..

proper relentless wasn't it? it's difficult to bang one idea for 6 minutes and have it not be fucking boring or annoying yet they seemed to have pulled it off a few times. (other times not)
 

tyranny

Well-known member
I'd say Tech... They'd close up the space in their tracks enough to take the edge of paranoia off.
I dont think they should be forgotten. I mean, some of their releases are forgettable, but not everything. I will admit, I bought Digital Nation when it came out, for the first track alone.:eek: The rest is forgettable!
The beloved DBridge was of course a part of the group.



He was, and interestingly enough he rather hated it for a number of years; it's funny how the four parties involved turned out after the split... D:bridge is the only one who's done anything of any merit whatsoever...
 

tyranny

Well-known member
so is bad company tech or neuro? or just something everyone wants to completely forget? still love their first couple of 12"s tbh..





I wouldn't call them either really, by the time they came on the scene the general development of the genre had sort of settled into the same patterns of "trendy style pasted over near identical undercarriage" in the same way that house and techno had always been from the beginning; you'd have a horde of producers and labels making tunes and every once in a while there'd be a mass bandwagon everyone would hop on, be it filtered disco samples, latin guitars, acoustic basslines and "jazz" samples or whatnot, all mixed up with those big steroidal midranges and those Def Leppard-esque drums... this would be spun by the scene media as a sign of "pushing things forward" and there being a "healthy diversity" even though most of the tunes would be functionally identical if you swapped the samples out between them

bad company's genius / schtick (delete as applicable) was to realise that you could take that fast rhythmic backbeat & bassline combination and turn it into a drugged up cyber-metal type hybrid, to which they later added sonic influences from trance and hard house...

it took a number of years before people began to revisit the various tropes that had been shed along the way and explore them for their own sake, whether it be breakbeat manipulation, sampling, sound design, and messing with the general template...

99 - 2003 were pretty dreadful years to be sure, but things are looking much more rosy now i reckon...
 

nomos

Administrator
What was the one that had the "my reminiscence... niscence... niscence" sample in it? Part of the Cape Fear continuum but not by that name apparently. I have it on a Darren Jay tape ca. 1996.
 
D

droid

Guest
Must be this then:

<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value=""></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

:D
 

nomos

Administrator
aha! yes. thanks. there are so many tunes i only knew on tape, not having had much access to good vinyl selection back then.
 
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gumdrops

Well-known member
Paradox - All You 2 Step Bastards Leave Our Planet

BRILLIANT TITLE

cant imagine anyone using a title like that these days. like 'all you funky bastards' or 'all you future garage bastards' lol.
 

nomos

Administrator
BRILLIANT TITLE

cant imagine anyone using a title like that these days. like 'all you funky bastards' or 'all you future garage bastards' lol.
Haha. If the boomkat homepage read like a bulletin board of inter-scene beefs...
 
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