I was in a rural place yesterday with someone far removed from urban culture, and as we walked through the winter sunshine, out of the blue he said: “do you know where the word ‘ghetto’ comes from?”
I didn’t.
His explanation went like this…
The Turks overran Constantinople in 1453, throwing out the Venetians and threatening their commercial position as traders in the eastern Mediterranean. The Venetians then invited the Jews into Venice, because they recognised the shrewd commercial abilities of the Jewish people.
This was an era when Jews were more likely to be being thrown out of countries, not invited into them. In 1492 Isabella and Ferdinand threw all the Jews out of Spain. The one condition imposed upon the Jews by the Venetians, was that they had to live in a certain quarter, a part of Venice that was a fort. And the Venetian word for fort was…
…‘ghetto’
Of course in grime 2004 there is an MC called Ghetto, an electrically charged hype man of Nasty Crew fame. Visually, he bares more than a passing resemblance to Chris Rock. Sonically, primeval forces get channelled up through the violent undulation of his body into the mic in his hand. Or so it seemed when I saw him recently at Fabric and Sidewinder in Hackney.
Walking through the rural winter sunshine I wondered if Ghetto knew where his name came from, knew its etymology? Ignoring the obvious issue surrounding the lack of impact of educational organisations in inner city London, I wondered: why should he? Should it even matter? What does this say about grime?
Grime is a relentlessly progressive scene. Don’t release a tune for two months (Skepta!) and you’ve fallen off. So Solid are old school, even though they ruled 2001. Have your station off air for a month (Heat! Raw Blaze!) and the baton passes to another station. In stark contrast to scenes like hip hop or techno, grime doesn’t worship its elder statesmen either. You’re either all up in people’s faces right now, or you’re no one, no where.
This is a reflection of much of urban culture in general. If an event isn’t on posters around your ends, plugged on pirate radio or seen in RWD mag given away free in Rhythm Division, it doesn’t exist. Watford is “up north.” This is the sphere of influence. Anything beyond that is “offkey.”
Given this horizon of perspective it’s ridiculous to think Ghetto would know the history of the name he uses every day. And again, why should he have to? Believe me nothing irritates me more than the Radio 4-style intelligentsia’s assumption that the only knowledge worth knowing is gained through understanding of highbrow classical culture.
But regardless of what Ghetto knows or doesn’t, it’s fascinating to speculate on how much the combination of this precisely defined perspective, with all that it includes and excludes, has shaped grime. There seems to a variety of differing consequences.
On one hand grime’s unconstrained by it’s forefathers. That’s healthy. Frankly if I went to another hip hop night that plays “Rappers Delight” I’d wanna lamp the DJ. If I hear another dad-house duffer tell me that acid house was the be-all and end all and it’s not as good as it used to be “back in the day” (1988 and all that…) I’d wanna lamp him too. So god bless grime’s dubplate culture.
On the other hand, the narratives grime perpetuates, particularly the “ghetto/keep it real” perspective, are seldom built upon, a point I saw made by Sony A&R George Roberts today live on Ras Kwame’s 1Xtra show.
So oddly then, grime’s perspective seems to both constrain and release it. Ah good old dynamic tension: ever the source of real inspiration. Just like MC Ghetto…
Sunday, November 14, 2004
Wednesday, November 10, 2004
Where is dubstep?
If grime is the voice of angry urban London, dubstep is its primary echo, the sound of dread bass reflecting off decaying walls.
To feel it, leave the sterile cleanliness of London’s centre. Follow the carrier wave as it heads for the margins, travelling south through Elephant & Castle, via Norwood and Thornton Heath to Croydon: the home of dubstep.
It’s not easy to catch the dubstep vibrations of Digital Mystikz’ Mala and Coki, Loefah and Kode 9. It’s a very precise wavelength, found in the riddim spectrum past drum & bass’ caustic anger, miles from house’s ecstatic warmth and a step from grime’s lyrical fury.
You can hear it in mesmerising Hatcha and Crazy D sets at Forward>>, in skunked-out Youngsta sets on Rinse 100.3 and on vinyl at the Big Apple Records shop in Croydon - where Benga, Plasticman, Skreamz or Horsepower are likely to pass through.
Tune your ear right and you’ll detect the secondary echo’s of King Tubby’s dub excursions, Wiley’s and Jammers’ “sinogrime” experiments, strange b-movies, Metalheadz at it’s peak, Zed Bias and El-B’s dark swing, Basic Channel’s decay and Detroit’s mournful machinefunk.
But most of all you’ll hear the echoes of modern multicultural London, of Jamaican, African, Chinese, Indian, American, Cockney and even Scottish accents. Reflections come off crumbling warehouses, dirty towerblocks, endless row terraces, unhinged nightbus rides, skunked-out cars and clattering overland trains. London: this is the defining influence on dubstep; that which gives it its tempered, edgy, compressed character. These are the echoes of a tense, intense city. This is mystical margin music. This is London, 2004.
To feel it, leave the sterile cleanliness of London’s centre. Follow the carrier wave as it heads for the margins, travelling south through Elephant & Castle, via Norwood and Thornton Heath to Croydon: the home of dubstep.
It’s not easy to catch the dubstep vibrations of Digital Mystikz’ Mala and Coki, Loefah and Kode 9. It’s a very precise wavelength, found in the riddim spectrum past drum & bass’ caustic anger, miles from house’s ecstatic warmth and a step from grime’s lyrical fury.
You can hear it in mesmerising Hatcha and Crazy D sets at Forward>>, in skunked-out Youngsta sets on Rinse 100.3 and on vinyl at the Big Apple Records shop in Croydon - where Benga, Plasticman, Skreamz or Horsepower are likely to pass through.
Tune your ear right and you’ll detect the secondary echo’s of King Tubby’s dub excursions, Wiley’s and Jammers’ “sinogrime” experiments, strange b-movies, Metalheadz at it’s peak, Zed Bias and El-B’s dark swing, Basic Channel’s decay and Detroit’s mournful machinefunk.
But most of all you’ll hear the echoes of modern multicultural London, of Jamaican, African, Chinese, Indian, American, Cockney and even Scottish accents. Reflections come off crumbling warehouses, dirty towerblocks, endless row terraces, unhinged nightbus rides, skunked-out cars and clattering overland trains. London: this is the defining influence on dubstep; that which gives it its tempered, edgy, compressed character. These are the echoes of a tense, intense city. This is mystical margin music. This is London, 2004.
The Wonder of Kano...
Wonder and Kano’s Lately has stuck out of 2004 like a sore thumb. It’s not that there wasn’t dissonance in grime before it, but never has it been so mesmerising. When you first hear it, it’s unpleasant. Your ears scream “how can it be so out of key?” But the more you hear it, the more it grows on you. And that’s the beauty of it.
Is a discordant tune more pleasurable because it takes effort to find the pleasure? You’ve worked for your buzz. Certainly they’re pleasurable because there’s a kind of deceptive subversion about them. They’re popular yet underground, the kind of glorious balance, a best of both worlds only Timbaland or The Neptunes (pointy snare in one hand, Britney in the other) can usually reach.
Seeing a tune like this become big in grime is pleasurable for another reason. Maybe it’s just me, but watching people being spoonfed shit music makes me deeply angry. Or depressed. Every time a crowd go mad to Robbie Williams/Abba/McFly it makes me want to give it all up. Extreme perhaps, but seeing people responding to Lately, to shit they’ve not been shovelled is heartening. We are clever. We are alive. You can’t tell us what to like. And maybe this is the liberation Coltrane, Ayler et al felt during the ‘60s free jazz/racial struggles.
Just highlighting Wonder’s twisted melodies understates Kano’s flow. Kano’s a great MC, but in this case however it’s not what he’s saying, it’s that he’s saying it at all, that adds to dynamic balance of Lately. Harsh as some grime voices are, Kano’s familiar vocals eases the blow of Wonder’s instrumental. Look at Trim over Wiley’s minimal anthem, “Fire Hydrant.” A flow can cover a multitude of underproduction sins.
If you’re into dubstep this asks serious questions. Dubstep is often dissonant and instrumental (the “dub” in dubstep isn’t just a dub reggae reference, but dub as instrumental). But without the voice to pull it back, isn’t the magic balance overturned? Surely then you're just being "wilfully obscure," a phrase dizzee's manager once used repeatedly in a conversation about Dizzee’s “Happy Talk.” And who wants to be “wilfully obscure” when you can engage with people? And actually say something?
Answers for dubstep, perhaps, are either use of occasional melody or vocals. The balance is found elsewhere, between light and dark, in-key and discordant. Another answer is to use progression ( copyright Digital Mystikz), so the tune develops and engages the ear. But love dubstep as I do, few tracks hit that magic balance in the quite way Lately does.
Is a discordant tune more pleasurable because it takes effort to find the pleasure? You’ve worked for your buzz. Certainly they’re pleasurable because there’s a kind of deceptive subversion about them. They’re popular yet underground, the kind of glorious balance, a best of both worlds only Timbaland or The Neptunes (pointy snare in one hand, Britney in the other) can usually reach.
Seeing a tune like this become big in grime is pleasurable for another reason. Maybe it’s just me, but watching people being spoonfed shit music makes me deeply angry. Or depressed. Every time a crowd go mad to Robbie Williams/Abba/McFly it makes me want to give it all up. Extreme perhaps, but seeing people responding to Lately, to shit they’ve not been shovelled is heartening. We are clever. We are alive. You can’t tell us what to like. And maybe this is the liberation Coltrane, Ayler et al felt during the ‘60s free jazz/racial struggles.
Just highlighting Wonder’s twisted melodies understates Kano’s flow. Kano’s a great MC, but in this case however it’s not what he’s saying, it’s that he’s saying it at all, that adds to dynamic balance of Lately. Harsh as some grime voices are, Kano’s familiar vocals eases the blow of Wonder’s instrumental. Look at Trim over Wiley’s minimal anthem, “Fire Hydrant.” A flow can cover a multitude of underproduction sins.
If you’re into dubstep this asks serious questions. Dubstep is often dissonant and instrumental (the “dub” in dubstep isn’t just a dub reggae reference, but dub as instrumental). But without the voice to pull it back, isn’t the magic balance overturned? Surely then you're just being "wilfully obscure," a phrase dizzee's manager once used repeatedly in a conversation about Dizzee’s “Happy Talk.” And who wants to be “wilfully obscure” when you can engage with people? And actually say something?
Answers for dubstep, perhaps, are either use of occasional melody or vocals. The balance is found elsewhere, between light and dark, in-key and discordant. Another answer is to use progression ( copyright Digital Mystikz), so the tune develops and engages the ear. But love dubstep as I do, few tracks hit that magic balance in the quite way Lately does.
Wednesday, November 03, 2004
Currently feeling...
Crazy Titch "Gype Riddim"
orchestral grime? Crazy Tim on production
Kode 9 "All Dem Fuckin People (Subkon/Daddi Gee vocal)"
post-Timbaland shizzle
Trim "Bogey Man"
"I sleep in hooded jim jams"
Wiley "Fire Hydrant remix"
ghetto post-dancehall Robert Hood?
Digital Mystikz - "Forgive"
like the first time you heard Strings of Life, except more LDN.
Digital Mystikz "Give Jah Glory"
can't wait for parts 2 & 3
Kele Le Roc "Frontline"
guilty sing-a-long vox grime pleasures
Run the Road comp
plug plug shameless plug
Kano "Ps&Qs"
contains hitlines and kicklines
JME "JME EP"
clipped. angry. "come to the endz and leave you gutless!"
Blackdown "Opium Choke"
plug plug shamless plug
orchestral grime? Crazy Tim on production
Kode 9 "All Dem Fuckin People (Subkon/Daddi Gee vocal)"
post-Timbaland shizzle
Trim "Bogey Man"
"I sleep in hooded jim jams"
Wiley "Fire Hydrant remix"
ghetto post-dancehall Robert Hood?
Digital Mystikz - "Forgive"
like the first time you heard Strings of Life, except more LDN.
Digital Mystikz "Give Jah Glory"
can't wait for parts 2 & 3
Kele Le Roc "Frontline"
guilty sing-a-long vox grime pleasures
Run the Road comp
plug plug shameless plug
Kano "Ps&Qs"
contains hitlines and kicklines
JME "JME EP"
clipped. angry. "come to the endz and leave you gutless!"
Blackdown "Opium Choke"
plug plug shamless plug
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