late 90s tech-step
- Thread starter Pestario
- Start date
dilbert1
Well-known member
ha, i thought you'd try and catch me out on that one!
no looking at it from a historians birds eye view I think the decline of jungle had more to do with it escaping its london heartlands and becoming a nation wide phenomenon. In many ways this was inevitable.
Rave in its early incarnation is purists nightmare cos alongside the hardcore you'd get djs slipping in dutch, belgian or detroit techno whatever. By 95-96 things had definitely segmented and cedemented. The ragga sound was a specifically london and essex thing. Moving Shadow, Photek etc were more nation wide.
I don't want to use the term whitewashed because it obscures more than clarifies but I think there were two impulses battling it out there. The rave one descended from house and techno, which by nature had much more of a whiter appeal, even Brocky talks about him going to raves in 88-89 and it being a predominantly white crowd, and outside of LDN him playing to predominantly white crowds. And of course the sound system lineage. They converged and for various reasons the rave side prevailed over the sound system side, probably in part due to reggae/dancehall itself changing and becoming more digitalised, as well as UK racist policing against black events.
you have to remember that garage stations like freak and London Underground started in 94. There was definitely even a contingent in London who felt left behind by ragga amen crushers, people who i guess were more fastidious and wanted more vibes based dance music, the bubbling pulse of house. Not always white people either, even older black londoners, people who went to see paul trouble anderson on Wednesdays etc.
Oh for sure im just not completely sold on ragga jungle revival making sense in the non-communal middle class art wank context of today. A few years ago I was at carnival and one of the sound systems was playing 165 bpm power soca and i was like you know what, that's exactly the ragga jungle of today. in the blazing heat as well.
a former friend of mine went to a dancehall night and got offended at the ladies doing dutty wine apparently he couldn't get their posteriors out of his face. seems like your own problem son! But that's exactly the self-conscious attitude which precludes ragga jungle from working in todays hypervigilant house and techno club context.
will this anecdote force @sadmanbarty bahti to come out of retirement?
will this anecdote force @sadmanbarty bahti to come out of retirement?
@dilbert1 this is what I meant about breakcore (some of which I do love.) But as a movement it essentially turned jungle into a form of punk rock pogo music. cos they picked up on the fast breaks without the halftime bassline poise and the sexy swing. The amen break is particularly amenable to that kind of moshing because it's all in the high end.
wektor
Well-known member
by the way, i've got some techsteppy stuff AND some hard acid coming up in my new mix on the 12th, maybe you can join the live chat?
check the Events, Releases, Sales and Mixes for details coming soon
check the Events, Releases, Sales and Mixes for details coming soon
^it's pretty weird that two titans, Technical Itch and Decoder, of the scene that also knew each other and worked together, with one also releasing on the other's label, both had side-projects of the same name within a year of each other, although Decoder's was more techno (still pretty good though)
i'm not sure if you're familiar with this sort of obscure, now-closed, late 90s US label, but they started giving away their full catalog in lossless format some years ago: https://www.discogs.com/label/6805-Sound-Sphere-Recordings