FutureNextLevel

Yup

Sat, 26 May 2012 01:24:09 +0100

I need to do more things that represent posts on here. i really do.

but hopefully nothing will be held against me.

Joey Brooks: Be With You

Mon, 13 Feb 2012 20:43:00 +0000

Apparently this is Mavado’s sister. Not that who your family are matters too much when you can deliver a track like this. Lush shimmering lusty pop. Bonus points for being redolent of Chameleon. This certainly goes some way to plugging Cassie’s void while she’s off on some turgid euro electro tip.

Photo

Wed, 19 Oct 2011 17:18:15 +0100

garage ustream session

Fri, 30 Sep 2011 10:35:40 +0100

To celebrate September’s anomalous heatwave, Skipple and I played some garage. Check the recording here.

Smiley Culture Hosting Channel 4 show Clubmix

Tue, 15 Mar 2011 22:57:32 +0000

Jukenglework

Tue, 15 Mar 2011 22:26:00 +0000

The rhythm connection between Jungle and Juke / Footwork can be measured at one hundred and sixty beats per minute. Well above the heart rate pound and dancefloor regulating ‘one forty’ bpm at half time. Some variation is accepted but less common. They are also both hectic and full of full on percussive clatter. There is also the space between; which can be euphoric or just brutally whacked out. One has the breakbeat, the other machine gun tom toms. They share a vocal science. Deft sampling of the human voice, manipulating it into something more unrecognisable and unworldly. Both are literally awesome, but combined they become something else.

This hasn’t escaped me and i’ve been experimenting with mixing them both together, struggling with the multitude of drums. Clatter upon clatter, defying my gentle pitch shifting nudges.

So my ears pricked up when @laurent_fintoni mentioned a literal sonic meld of the two. I don’t know who is responsible but I want to pat their back.

Footwork Jungle fusion. Who is ready? I might see on Saturday when I play at Jukebox on the Stokey / Dalston cusp.

Smiley Culture RIP

Tue, 15 Mar 2011 20:35:00 +0000

I’m very sad to hear the news about the passing of legendary UK MC / deejay Smiley Culture. Especially in the reported circumstances, currently the subject of an IPCC investigation.

It’s important to remember how culturally significant he was. The first black British street voice to have a chart hit. He made it possible for authentic British voices with real conscious narratives to be heard in a popular context. He was largely a one hit wonder to many, but to others he was the grandfather British MC. He started a lineage that can be followed through the Hip House MCs of the late 80s and early 90s, through jungle MCs, UK Hip Hop and to acts today such as The Streets and the grime-gone-pop acts that dominate today’s charts.

Indeed, without Smiley, the very idea that it might be possible to be successful with lyrics about the black urban experience may never have been planted. Today the pop charts are littered with these voices.

His chosen alias in many ways pre-empted his importance. The early UK reggae sound system culture, with which he was involved, would evolve through acid house, hardcore and jungle and the ‘Smiley Culture’ would become eponymous with it.

Tonight I re-listened to my favourite Smiley Culture tracks. Police Officer is the one everyone remembers. Today that track took on a more sombre tone. What is essentially a tale of how Smiley’s minor celebrity got him off the hook when he had a brush with the law is totally different to what he must have experienced this morning when police raided his home.

A post over at History is Made at Night flags up a quote from There Ain’t No Black in the Union Jack author and theorist Paul Gilroy that scratches under the surface of Smiley’s other big hit Cockney Translation. An erudite observation that resonates loudly in light of the Met’s ongoing mistreatment and dangerous social profiling of black men.

Today on twitter Gilroy commented: “The Met are obviously planning to celebrate the 30 yr anniversary of Operation “Swamp 81” in style.”, referring to the racist stop and search policing tactics that would spark the Brixton riots. Let’s hope there was no foul play involved with Smiley’s demise today but one cannot help but have doubts. Hopefully the IPCC investigation may shed some light on what happened, but again one cannot but have doubts.

The exact circumstances will remain tragic whatever we learn. But what we do know is that Smiley has left a musical legacy few can compete with and that his contribution to UK music culture cannot be overstated.

Baby Minaj. Just for LOLs.

Tue, 15 Mar 2011 19:50:28 +0000

Baby Minaj. Just for LOLs.

promotional demonstrator of music technologies

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 10:06:50 +0000

“The primary purpose of this music data assembly is to demonstrate the latest musical developments I’m involved with in addition to other musical workers. So in summary, it is a promotional demonstrator of music technologies.”

Heinrich Mueller explores the zwischenwelt for Resident Advisor. mp3

Photo

Mon, 14 Mar 2011 08:49:55 +0000

Terror Danjah: Undeniable (Hyperdub HDB007)

Mon, 20 Sep 2010 22:54:00 +0100

Terror Danjah has always stood out from his peers. His track Poltergeist encapsulated everything that was great about grime back in 2004. It was raw, kinetic and odd. It was the sound of grime maturing from post garage mutation into a genre in its own right. It was music clearly made on its own terms and it was, to lazily use this album’s title, undeniable.

Grime, more recently, has become somewhat fractured and far less compelling. While many key exponents abandoned ship to pursue something more lucratively popular, Terror Danjah remained true to, what might be called the grime aesthetic and the niche within it his own productions, alongside work by Wiley, Danny Weed, Target and Ruff Squad et al carved. But he in particular put down the foundations for what we can still hear today in the ‘Purple’ sound of Joker, Gemmy and Guido. Vivid synaesthesia sonics; synths spouting colour as audible luminescent and lurid metaphors.

Indeed, there is a strong visual aspect to his sound. I’ve always thought of Terror Danjah tracks as mini audio cartoons, always vibrant and playful. This is of course facilitated by his use of trademark ear worms; the gremlin giggle, the swooshes, as well as the masterful synthplay (as exemplarily executed on ‘Acid’). These not only make his tracks unmistakeably Terror Danjah, but also add a nice narrative thread. Like these sounds are all conversing within the tracks. Like each track tells of a different encounter between these characters.

Sadly the majority of vocal tracks contained on Undeniable aren’t as strong as the instrumentals behind them. In ‘old grime’ MCs embellished the tracks. In ‘new grime’, as good as Terror Danjah’s, I guess they largely detract. They are at times a little cheesy, overly produced and fundamentally don’t add anything to the music. This is a shame because I feel that if Terror Danjah was to produce an entirely instrumental album, without the vocal concessions, it would be a much better record.

That said, it is pleasant to hear Bruza’s indomitable tones over a strong Danjah beat on Leave Me Alone, throwing back to some of his best work at the helm of the Aftershock crew. D Double E makes an appearance on the title track and, while it is not vintage D Double, his peculiar timbre works well over Danjah’s sound palate.

The best thing about this album is, however, the entirely noticeable development of Terror Danjah’s unique production style. He injects recent influences, not least the groove and roll of funky and post dubstep, and marries them with his signature style. The tracks that switch in and out of a 4x4 stomp are wonderfully futuristic and especially technically accomplished; a total flip of Lil Silva’s grime house sound yet totally comparable. For instance the track ‘S.O.S’, the standout track here, all eight minutes, six seconds of it, is epic future music.

Dubstep’s trajectory somewhat stifled grime, it created a forced hiatus where creativity struggled and producers changed tact. But Terror Danjah remained unsuppressed and this record is testament to his creativity and forward thinking. Which, is largely why it has found it’s home on Hyperdub. But perhaps it is not right at all to frame this record within grime or dubstep, as Terror Danjah is irrefutably one of his generation’s most consistently fascinating and outrageously creative producers. I’d argue that Terror Danjah could have made a better long player back in 2004 but that would undermine the genuine work of brilliance Undeniable is. Instrumentally at least.

No Jokin Jus' Jukin' Footwurkin' No Workin'

Thu, 19 Aug 2010 20:28:42 +0100

My little juke and footwurk ustream session. None of my face.

RIP RAMM:ELL:ZEE

Wed, 30 Jun 2010 01:08:32 +0100

“We failed what could have been “Our” culture. I went to the Puck Building (Guernsey’s Auction) in June of the year 2000 and offered my services. Everyone who was anyone in this “sub culture” had works for sale. No one sold, except for a few. I felt that the “culture” died right there. There was too much “mannerism ” not enough “burner”!!! Our futurism! We should have only stuck to doing the “letter” and joined together to fight the light dwellers. but, we will always be Kings From the Dark Continent. The veins of this Gotham! Remember this the next level, as you said, is the third dimension. I hope.”

@davequam badman

Fri, 28 May 2010 00:30:14 +0100

@davequam is running one of my favourite blogs right now. It’s After the End of the World doesn’t have a particularly well defined remit, and it’s great for it, but you’ll find posts about noisenik Kevin Drumm alongside posts exploring music from variously scattered global diasporas.

His blog has lead me to joining Dutch social networking sites just to get in touch with Dutch-Aruban teenagers and subsequently having awkward Google translated conversations with them on MSN.

Ghetto house mutations form the staple of the blog’s content however, and i have found fewer places on the net offering better coverage of Chicago’s juke scene.

Blogs like this are vital in exposing localised music to the rest of the world. I love music about which you know nothing. Nothing more than the artist’s name and a track title, harking back to the first records i started buying in the pre internet age. Dave Quam has got mystique music in high dosages. Hard drive jealousy much.

Read his blog and be sure to check out this mix from Dave. It’s rather very special and includes an amazing juke edit of a Pink Floyd track by Dj Spinn.

And here’s me doing a little bubblin’ set on my Ustream broadcast from the other night.

Boomnoise Bubblin’ by boomnoise

Kuedo: Dream Sequence EP

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 19:13:08 +0000

My review of Kuedo’s Dream Sequence EP is up on FACT. Below is a well put together unofficial video of the track.

we are plastic people save plastic people

Mon, 22 Feb 2010 11:13:00 +0000

we are plastic people save plastic people

Marcus Nasty: Rinse 10

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 02:06:34 +0000

My review of Marcus Nasty’s largely disappointing Rinse mix on Fact Magazine

Expect more from me on Fact soon, as well as more FNL posts.

Ikonika: synth conductor

Wed, 16 Sep 2009 23:45:00 +0100

Planet Mu’s recent exemplary form continues with a release from Hyperdub synth conductor Ikonika.

I always imagine Ikonika’s music as a soundtrack to one of Phillip K Dick’s tales detailing future-now, social-psychotropic collapses; a paranoid / schizoid take on the real. And these Planet Mu tracks Smuck and We Could Be Ikons are just that.

Ikonika’s melodies always sit at odds with their wooziness; they are encompassing and comforting, groove driven and seductive. A particular funk and groove dominates and places her music in a category of its own. Referring to dubstep or wonky would be great disservice to the sound Ikonika creates. It’s entirely its own entity.

Ikonika’s tracks are more orchestrated than simply ‘produced’. It’s as if Ikonika had an army of sentient synthesizers at her disposable and lauds over them with an oversized solar powered baton. The sun feeding in and zooping up the florescent effervescence whilst she maintains total control and maintains a totalitarian vision of what the synthborgs should, and should not be doing.

Smuck, on the A side, is a particularly great example of this. The name alone implies something highly unsanitary, and the track is dirty. It’s a highly disciplined orgy of synthetic funk. It’s like a rummage down the pants of the synthesizer you lust after, without even knowing its name. You have to submit to the wooze of layered synths and beats that are so well placed they aren’t. So deliberately badly placed they couldn’t be more perfect. It’s total.

Smuck, it turns out (according to Urban Dictionary) is the Hebrew word for pre-circumcised penis flesh. Therefore i’m not sure how apt it is to call this track tasty. But it’s certainly something you want to irrefutably gobble down with the knowledge it might not be the best thing for you to consume.

Scandinavian phenomenon and sadly something of a ‘dish du hier’, Skweee, is the point of inspiration for the flipside track We Could Be Ikons. It’s a reversion of Eero Johannes’ ‘We Could be Skweeeroes’ from the Harmönia compilation ‘Skandinavian Skweee Volume 2’. A fitting remix as Ikonika’s tracks all have the component ingredients of the idiosyncratic Skweee smorgasbord, but her take drops the P-funk referencing bass slap of Johaannes’ original and replaces it with a k-funk bounce, simultaneously injecting a certifiably UK Garage swing and the pads help lift track on to a new plain.

This release is disco waltzer music for the deprived. Skwreeeam if you want to go faster. It’s the plink plonk synth flex of someone who has had their cerebellum ruptured and set lose in the synth asylum. It’s a beauteous simultaneous attack on, and a gift to your pleasure centres.

Ikonika ZIQ254 is released on Planet Mu 26 October 2009.

Chase me baby!

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 00:15:00 +0100

The wind up and release pop RnB slam of AM to PM has always been a pure rush for me and for that alone Milian holds weight here. 8 years on from that track and a torrent of largely forgettable singles later, Milian has shapeshifted into an omnipotent neomythical beast. On Chameleon, produced by The Dream, she lists her prowess, not unlike any next RnB artist’s narcissistic self bigging up, only Milian’s attributes are post-human.

Chameleon is a paean to her super-human awesomeness. She can turn 1 into 1 billion. You don’t doubt it. When she say’s ‘ i can be the quietest … Shh! Irrelevant’, it’s enough to make you melt. BC- AD; she’s been doing it forever. That’s before Christ to now. ‘Bigger than a city / Smaller than a town’ she is a dream. She transcends scale. ‘I can be a ghetto bitch /Yep, you love me /I can be surviving / Dinner’s in the oven.’ I do love you. Chameleon is a pop future bomb.

Dubbage: An Interview with Tippa from Circle

Tue, 24 Mar 2009 16:39:00 +0000

Recently you might have heard the term ‘Dubbage’ being bandied about on London pirate radio station Rinse FM, mainly stemming from the shows of the Circle camp, Gumbo and others. In March 09 the term seems to be gaining considerable momentum and is being referenced on forums, mainly in the form of the question ‘what is Dubbage?’ Ever curious about genre mutations, I was keen to find out more about it. I got in touch with Circle over MySpace and a few messages back and forth turned into this interview with Tippa.

Dubbage?

This is actually funny because all of a sudden everyone is asking us! We only started saying Dubbage because we felt the type of House we played was different from the other new rising stars of the scene. Now everyone has just started calling that style Dubbage and is referring to it as a new scene, or a new thing but it ain’t. It’s just a name we call it to separate us from the funky scene.

So what is Dubbage?

If I could sum up a Dubbage track in words it would be a Deep House track that has sounds which could make it borderline tech, or has sounds and depth as a Dubstep track would have but sounds like House. It’s more beats… simple beats but with intelligent sounds. I was having this conversation with Geeneus the other night as well. He was playing me tracks off his new album and was asking me what genre I reckon it would fall under. They weren’t funky cause they were well produced and production was on point, and it wasn’t typical soulful House as it was too techy and dubby. Then we both looked at each other and said ‘Dubbage’! It’s long winded, and I confuse myself at times when trying to explain this to anyone but in a nutshell, I believe this is it.

So who’s making Dubbage right now?

Producers making music which could be classed as ‘Dubbage’ from London, who are closely linked to Circle are: Geeneus, W Beeza and IC. If a scene were to progress from this name or term, then these guys would be the front runners. IC is a part of Circle and his stuff will be pushed more on the shows. WBeeza gives us all his tracks before anyone else and his stuff is proper on point, as is Geeneus’. Gee will produce stuff across the board though but his Gypsy Woman refix would definitely be classed as Dubbage.

Is the name necessary? Some people would say it’s all just House.

It’s not necessary at all but if something’s said, people are tickled, innit? They hear something they like or hate as a phase and will run with it. It then spreads like wildfire and all of a sudden everything is placed in a genre or a new one is created. It’s fucked really…it’s like gossip: you plant a seed, whether it be intentionally or not and it spreads. At the end of the day people will say it’s all House but funky is something different which is why people’s ears are standing up to it. It’s something fresher, more exciting… it spins away from House, its meaning, its beliefs, what it stands for. See that’s someone from Circle giving funky props but it’s not for us.

Is Funky something you want to distance yourself from?

We have said that we won’t be playing any of the current new stuff that is poorly produced and sounds like grime. We have also said that we won’t be associating with events that solely push that side 100%, yeah our names do appear on flyers and events that play funky, but do we turn up and play funky, that’s the question. The funky scene is good for the youngers. but they have to control it somehow to go in the direction they want. When we all first started playing there was more of a mix with House and the tracks that were classed as funky was not as grimey as they are now. It was poorly produced but not as bad as it is now which is why we have concentrated on playing more House than anything else and within that we have concentrated on more of the beats side of things than the soulful stuff. Now the olders of the House scene will play soulful, but when you go to their events they’re dead out… stiff.

What about Circle events? What’s played?

When you come to Circle events (Yellow / Format) we play beats - House - but beats. Most of these wankers in funky think we play strictly US. Where they fucking got that idea from is bullshit. All they need to ask us is where the music comes from and we will tell them. Bugs in the Attic, Restless Soul, Aphrodisiax, Freerange, Wbeeza, Geeneus, IC etc - loads of UK and European stuff. In fact the majority is UK and European but they think it’s US. Why?…because they haven’t educated themselves on the music they play or where it originated from. We have never ever said that we hate, we won’t play or that funky is completely shit.

Remember, if it weren’t for DJs like Supa D, Angie B, Footloose, Kismet there would be no funky scene. When the first funky tunes started being played 3-4 years ago these were the DJs that first played them on a certain station. When producers like Invasion Records, Tadow, Lightfinger/Fingerprint, Dubplate Wonder and Apple first started making that new sound, they were the DJs that got it out there for them.

Do you like much Funky then?

Funky tracks have crept into our sets. One or two tracks still get played. We love Hardhouse Banton’s Sirens, Crazy Cousins’ Do you Mind, Geeneus’s As I etc. There’s a small percentage that is well produced and sounds really good but there’s more shit than good and that percentage after 3 years ain’t got any better. If anything the sound has changed again and maturing into some next grime ting with 10,000 MCs all chatting nonsense. You’re seeing it now, failed grime DJs and MCs jumping on the bandwagon.

Another ‘genre’ that’s been mentioned in relation to House recently is Wonky (Not to be confused with the post-Dilla hip hop sound). Circle made ‘Say no to Wonky’ t-shirts – is that to do with the grimey House thing?

Ha ha ha! Ok, this is the god’s honest truth: we/Circle were all on radio, someone messaged us or something, or we were talking between ourselves on the mic and someone was saying ‘what do you call Grime Funky?’ and someone said ‘Wonky’. Again, something unintentional that people heard, took on board and started crying about it. So much so that it got back to us and made us laugh. It was a joke but they took it serious and had a cry, certain producers acting like pussies, ringing certain DJs and crying to them, which got back to us hence the t-shirts we printed up. It was our way of saying ‘fuck off you cry babies.’ We don’t even wear those t-shirts. There’s no need, it was a joke; the kids got upset, big deal, deal with it, innit? As far as I’m concerned, it’s done with but people still refer to Grime/Funky as Wonky. We never told them to. They heard it and ran with it… another seed… go figure!

Where do you think the current UK House thing will go?

There are two roads this generation can go down in terms of the new House sounds. The non funky road which is slowly developing into something new, or the ever changing funky road, which is now seeing a change with the MCs jumping on board. Whichever road you take or prefer it’s exciting. People from the funky side will say that the road we defected to is boring. That’s their opinion, and I personally won’t bite anyone’s head off for that. We expressed our opinion on where Funky’s going, so it’s only fair everyone has an opinion but don’t start crying about it – that’s long.

How far can Dubbage go?

The thing is I actually do think it will lead into a sub genre. For some reason over the last couple of years a lot of people follow and listen to a lot of our opinions and take it as gold, when sometimes it’s just our personal opinion… it means nothing really, but people see it as ‘well if Circle say so, then it must be so’ and it ain’t always, or should be like that. But it’s good I suppose. It shows we’re actually influencing a lot of the younger heads which is why I think this Dubbage thing will lead into something big. Imagine that, something we were just messing with as in a different name actually turns into something.

You can catch Circle on Rinse Fm every Monday at 9pm

Photo c/o Cogdogblog