leaping the grime/dubstep bandgap
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read the tracklist
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
Monday, January 31, 2005
Friday, January 28, 2005
The view from the top
London is an 8 million-person melting pot. Writing about grime is grassroots reporting within that pot. Seeing hard data that correlates with daily experience, therefore, is gratifying and interesting. Check the Guardian's visual representation of multicultural LDN:
Maps: London by ethnicity
Maps: London by religion
What the maps don't show
Master article
Maps: London by ethnicity
Maps: London by religion
What the maps don't show
Master article
Monday, January 24, 2005
Tuesday, January 18, 2005
Rhythm vision
A simple observation: what a golden grime era we're living in.
Last Sunday's Rinse set with Wiley, JME, Trim, D Double E and Footsie just took the piss. The tunes Wiley was dropping just took the piss.
Compared to the rigid structures of d&b, house or rock, grime is outrageously fluid. Such is the cultural weight behind them, anything - half time, 3rd beat snares, variable tempos, no beats... accordions - anything Wiley and Roll Deep do is runnin'. Anything is grime. Except perhaps, what has come before.
And this is even in a post-Dizzee era, when Dylan has already burnt the rulebook.
Beyond Roll Deep there's a new remix to last year's most rhythmic yet popular riddim Bongo Eyes remix. First heard played by Bossman on Cameo's show last October, the new Bongo Eyes remix has the balls to reverse the whole bar. Not even the direction of the rhythm of the track is sacred!
Cameo himself was talking about "R'n'G" - yes that's rhythm & grime - to represent Terror Danjah r&b tracks like Life.
And these observations don't even give due credit to Targets' sinogrime/electro melodies, DOK's g-funk (grime-funk?), Syre's modal sinogrime and ...
Last Sunday's Rinse set with Wiley, JME, Trim, D Double E and Footsie just took the piss. The tunes Wiley was dropping just took the piss.
Compared to the rigid structures of d&b, house or rock, grime is outrageously fluid. Such is the cultural weight behind them, anything - half time, 3rd beat snares, variable tempos, no beats... accordions - anything Wiley and Roll Deep do is runnin'. Anything is grime. Except perhaps, what has come before.
And this is even in a post-Dizzee era, when Dylan has already burnt the rulebook.
Beyond Roll Deep there's a new remix to last year's most rhythmic yet popular riddim Bongo Eyes remix. First heard played by Bossman on Cameo's show last October, the new Bongo Eyes remix has the balls to reverse the whole bar. Not even the direction of the rhythm of the track is sacred!
Cameo himself was talking about "R'n'G" - yes that's rhythm & grime - to represent Terror Danjah r&b tracks like Life.
And these observations don't even give due credit to Targets' sinogrime/electro melodies, DOK's g-funk (grime-funk?), Syre's modal sinogrime and ...
Monday, January 17, 2005
DMZ Allnighter Alert
DUBSTEP PIONEERS DIGITAL MYSTIKZ ANNOUNCE CLUB NIGHT DEBUT: DMZ @ 3RD BASE.
Dubstep innovators and John Peel faves Digital Mystikz have unveiled details of their very first event. DMZ takes place Saturday March 5th 2005 at 3rd BASE, St Matthews Church, Brixton.
These DJs represent the cutting edge of the South London dubstep sound. Digital Mystikz and Loefah headline with Sgt Pokes. They are joined on a heavyweight line up by SLT Mob (Rinse FM, Rephlex, Soulja), J Da Flex (1Xtra, Thriller Funk, FWD>>), Kode 9 + Daddi Gee (Hyperdub, Tempa, Rephlex), Plasticman (Terror Rhythm, Rephlex), Youngsta (FWD>>, Rinse FM) and Skream & Chef (Big Apple, Rinse FM).
DMZ will showcase the best in the post-garage hybrid “dubstep.” If grime is the voice of angry urban London, dubstep is its primary echo, the sound of dread bass reflecting off decaying walls. Mixed into this echo are shards of dub reggae, jungle, broken beats, grime, Detroit techno and dark swung 2step. DMZ at 3rd BASE is a chance to experience the bass-heavy fusion in its full Mystical glory.
Digital Mystikz and Loefah exploded onto the scene last year with mesmerising releases on Big Apple, Tempa and their own DMZ label. They were stars of the Grime 2 compilation on Aphex Twin’s Rephlex label. They’ve DJed at dubstep nerve centres club Forward>> and Rinse FM. John Peel was a big fan and they DJed at his Maida Vale tribute night held by Annie Nightingale on Radio 1. DMZ at 3rd BASE: come meditate on bass weight.
DMZ
SATURDAY 5TH MARCH 2005
10 - 6am. 3rd BASE. St. Matthews church. Brixton. SW2.
ENTRY £ 5 (MEMBERS) - e-mail digitalmystikz@hotmail.com for membership. £ 7 (NON MEMBERS)
DIGITAL MYSTIKZ + LOEFAH + SGT POKES
SLT MOB
J DA FLEX
KODE 9 + DADDI GEE
PLASTICMAN
YOUNGSTA
SKREAM & CHEF
SOUND SUPPORTED BY A 12K TURBOSOUND SYSTEM WITH NO LIMITERS.
Online: www.dmzuk.com and www.hyperdub.com
email: digitalmystikz@hotmail.com
Dubstep innovators and John Peel faves Digital Mystikz have unveiled details of their very first event. DMZ takes place Saturday March 5th 2005 at 3rd BASE, St Matthews Church, Brixton.
These DJs represent the cutting edge of the South London dubstep sound. Digital Mystikz and Loefah headline with Sgt Pokes. They are joined on a heavyweight line up by SLT Mob (Rinse FM, Rephlex, Soulja), J Da Flex (1Xtra, Thriller Funk, FWD>>), Kode 9 + Daddi Gee (Hyperdub, Tempa, Rephlex), Plasticman (Terror Rhythm, Rephlex), Youngsta (FWD>>, Rinse FM) and Skream & Chef (Big Apple, Rinse FM).
DMZ will showcase the best in the post-garage hybrid “dubstep.” If grime is the voice of angry urban London, dubstep is its primary echo, the sound of dread bass reflecting off decaying walls. Mixed into this echo are shards of dub reggae, jungle, broken beats, grime, Detroit techno and dark swung 2step. DMZ at 3rd BASE is a chance to experience the bass-heavy fusion in its full Mystical glory.
Digital Mystikz and Loefah exploded onto the scene last year with mesmerising releases on Big Apple, Tempa and their own DMZ label. They were stars of the Grime 2 compilation on Aphex Twin’s Rephlex label. They’ve DJed at dubstep nerve centres club Forward>> and Rinse FM. John Peel was a big fan and they DJed at his Maida Vale tribute night held by Annie Nightingale on Radio 1. DMZ at 3rd BASE: come meditate on bass weight.
DMZ
SATURDAY 5TH MARCH 2005
10 - 6am. 3rd BASE. St. Matthews church. Brixton. SW2.
ENTRY £ 5 (MEMBERS) - e-mail digitalmystikz@hotmail.com for membership. £ 7 (NON MEMBERS)
DIGITAL MYSTIKZ + LOEFAH + SGT POKES
SLT MOB
J DA FLEX
KODE 9 + DADDI GEE
PLASTICMAN
YOUNGSTA
SKREAM & CHEF
SOUND SUPPORTED BY A 12K TURBOSOUND SYSTEM WITH NO LIMITERS.
Online: www.dmzuk.com and www.hyperdub.com
email: digitalmystikz@hotmail.com
Thursday, January 06, 2005
Stop The Bashment Bashing
Like many an idea, Stop The Bashment Bashing began in the pub, or the Knowledge mag Christmas party to be precise. As the issue of homophobia in dancehall was debated in mainstream circles, Sarah Bentley explained how she had become increasingly enraged at the ignorance about dancehall displayed by mainstream journalists. After a few pints, I goaded her into unleashing her fury. Within a few minutes it was clear her point of view needed airing. Mainstream media wouldn’t listen, so Blackdown Soundboy obliged.
Without writing a biog for her, Sarah Bentley is to dancehall magazine journalism what Chris Muniz and Pete Rogers are to d&b journalism, Steve Yates is to hip hop, or what perhaps myself or Chantelle Fiddy hope to be to garage. Her views are not necessarily those of Blackdown Soundboy, but properly informed on the international dancehall movement, they’re very worthwhile.
//Stop The Bashment Bashing//
Words: Sarah Bentley
If you’ve read the UK mainstream press this autumn you couldn’t have escaped the controversy over Jamaican dancehall and reggae artists apparent homophobic lyricism. Sizzla has been banned from performing in the UK. Beenie Man was retained by the police on the basis that his lyrics, ‘incited violence’. And Buju Banton’s, ‘Boom Bye Bye’ tune, somehow dominated headlines again, twelve years after its original release.
So how did all this happen? Well, Gay Rights activist and OutRage’s front man, Peter Tatchell, had timing on his side. With the rise in popularity of dancehall the papers were ripe to listen to his long standing argument that dancehall is, ‘murder music’. And why not? Anyone whom believes they are being disrespected has the right to speak out. But the right to sabotage an entire musical genre and with it a large proportion of a nations economy, that’s a different thing.
Throughout 2004 I watched in horror as journalists, radio and TV presenters seized Tatchell’s mantle to brand all dancehall artists murder inciting homophobes with no regard for the wider effects these comments were having.
My favourite newspapers ran copy with embarrassingly inept descriptions of the various Houses of Rastafari (check Alexis Petridis article that states “Bobo Rasta’s believe in racial segregation”). Buju Banton was wrongly accused by The Guardian in June of being involved in a violent ‘gay attack’ in Jamaica.
Inexcusably wrong patios translations were rife. Check every ‘literal’ patios translation on Outrage.com. And the nation developed pseudo expertise on Jamaican culture, history and social science. Check my pensioner parents telling me about the perils of ‘that terrible reggae’ after watching Channel Four documentary ‘Trainers, Reggae & The Olympics’. To date no "Apologies for an error made in issue/programme xx” have been printed/broadcast.
Thanks to OutRages online ‘Essential Guide To Homophobic Lyricism In Dancehall’, anyone could become an overnight expert in bashment bashing. It was so easy. Check the web and make that money. It didn’t matter that patios was a creole that required more than a literal translation. What do you mean burn, doesn’t mean burn? And fire doesn’t necessarily mean physical fire? You can’t get one up on us that easily. We might be western but we’re down. We know what your jungle language means, man.
Before I proceed I’d like you to know I’m a stereotypically left wing music hack. I drink soya milk. I’ve been to Trade. I use eco friendly washing powder. I’ve applied nail varnish to a gay friend’s toenails. I fully accept Jesus, if he did exist, was a blackman. I read The Guardian and The Observer. I believe no one should suffer prejudice. Violence is wrong. I mourn if I accidentally tread on an ant. But, when it comes to dancehall, the general publics not getting the full picture. And now the witch hunts on, there’s no stopping the hypocrisy of its most ardent critics. And someone, anyone, has to start presenting the flip side.
Fact is, its illegal to be a sexually active gay man in Jamaica. Buggery or in fact any intimacy between two men is unlawful and punishable by prison. No such direct laws refer to lesbians. It seems Jamaica’s don’t take so much offence to the thought of two women getting it on. Somehow, I doubt dancehall, a genre of music yet to be invented when Jamaica was granted independence in the 60’s, had little impact on the Jamaican governments decision to maintain the law the British had previously imposed.
Taking things to 2004 a recent opinion poll stated 96% of the country opposed having this law over turned. And if you think 96% of the country is influenced by dancehall, you’re wrong. Like garage in the UK, dancehall is the music of ghetto youths. If anything unites the 96 out of 100 people that didn’t want the buggery laws over turned, it would most likely be the church.
We all know Christianity is big in Jamaica and the island has more churches per square capita than anywhere else in the world (broadsheet hacks got that right at least). Well has anyone ever thought where that strident belief in the Bible came from? Er, hello, we took it there. Before being shackled, wedged into a coffin size space and packed off to the Caribbean, do you think Africans had much experience with Christianity?
Christianity was the religion of the plantation owners and slave masters. After blacks supposed emancipation in 1830, ex slaves, desperate to gain respectability, social mobility and status, only found equal footing to Jamaica’s light skinned, upper class society in religion. Back then, both in Jamaica and in England, the churches word was final. And with regards to homosexuality, the Bible taught this was a heinous sin, one the monarchy believed should be punishable by death.
175 years on and still it’s the light skinned population that fill Jamaica’s uptown restaurants, security guarded housing estates and private schools. Jamaica’s poorest rural and downtown communities are almost entirely populated by descendents of the original African slaves. Many people are still illiterate. Men and women do hard labour jobs for less than £20 a week. Gang, and political related fighting devastates downtown communities. The church continues to be a central force in people’s lives.
Now I’m not trying to excuse homophobia, I’m merely trying to illustrate the background to Jamaica’s hard-line stance. Now we’re all such shining examples of liberated, PC-ness, it’s easy to forget that homosexuality wasn’t legalised in Britain until 1967 and even then the age of consent was 21. It wasn’t until 1980 and 1982 Scotland & N.Ireland came to the same conclusions, the last amendment a mere 22 years ago. Furthermore it wasn’t until 1994 England lowered the age of consent to 18, the debate on lowering it to 16 still a hot debated subject in this country today.
Without intending to sound patronising, Jamaica is a third world country. Soap operas don’t have token ‘gay characters’. The nation doesn’t watch Queer As Folk whilst eating their tea. TV presenters do not dress in drag. They don’t have a fashionable gay district with nice bars and restaurants border-line homophobes like my Dad can visit to conclude, “They aren’t that bad are they? The gays.” Most people are worrying about how to feed their children and pay the rent. It might take longer for the notion of the homosexual lifestyle to become accepted in Jamaica than in did in England. Is that really so surprising?
The baiting of conscious dancehall artists Buju Banton and Boboshanti Rastafarians Capleton, Sizzla and Antony B rattles me more than any factor of this whole blood thirsty affair. Buju, Capleton and Antony B all started their artistic lives as gun toting rude boys before experiencing a spiritual enlightenment that switched them onto more righteous ways. Today they offer hope to young men in Jamaica’s desperate ghettos. They employ people from their local communities, the artist’s income also the lifeline to the survival of tens of other families.
They wear humble clothing or traditional African dress. They denounce drug taking and drinking. They eat strict vegetarian diets. Women are their empresses and queens (albeit they have a few of them). Achievement is measured through the richness of a person’s heart, soul and mind, not their wallets. They openly praise the family unit, particularly mothers. They are the antithesis of the thugged out, gangster puppets and glassy eyed, sexually available hoes of the US rap world.
Lyrically their main subject matters are Rastafarian philosophy and the promotion of black pride, education, unity, clean living and love. Yes they perform homophobic lyrics in a low percentage of their material but they perform them within the context of Biblical teachings. Is it really reasonable to expect religious artists in a country where homosexuality is illegal, to not express anti-gay sentiments?
Sure to the unaccustomed ear the vernacular seems harsh. But, like the artists say, their words shouldn’t be taken literally, an aspect of patios people choose to embrace and ignore in equal measure. When Bob Marley sang, “I shot the Sheriff,” I don’t remember him being arrested for inciting violence against the police. It’s safe to conclude Bob didn’t like the way the police conducted themselves (after all he said he shot one), so why can’t the same conclusion be drawn from Capleton singing, “Burn fire pon de battyman.”
Patios is a dialect that uses strong words to express a feeling. Take the following sentence, “I step pon Tatchell an burn fire pon de murder music campaign”. What I mean by this statement is, “I earnestly disagree with Peter Tatchell and I’d like to see his Murder Music campaign come to an end.” However the literal translation, as pioneered by the OutRage department of creole expertise, means, “Stamp on Peter Tatchell and all homosexuals and set alight anyone whom supports the Murder Music Campaign.” There are subtle, but oh so important differences: Dislike-death. Anger-violence. Disagree-eradicate.
I’m not denying it must be hard to be gay and live in Jamaica. But it’s also hard being an average person on the street there as well: robbery, rape and sexual attacks on women far more frequent crimes than gay assaults. Personally I find homophobic lyrics uncreative and lazy (Jamaican artists know the public will love any tune featuring them-it’s a no brainer). But until government changes the law and initiates nation wide programmes of education and integration, why would dancehall artists stop using anti-gay lyrics?
It all goes back to the same age-old argument. Does music reflect life or dictate it? Well I’ve been to Jamaica and seen crews of openly gay men dancing to Elephant Man’s ‘Log On’ at downtown dances such as Passa Passa. A few people stared, but no one stamped on them. I’ve read newspaper columns where male writers have written accounts of being come on to by a gay man in the bank, the man merely embarrassed, not enraged as the whole queue laughed at him, “in his predicament.”
Looking at today’s music business it appears that if you’re raking in millions for corporations you’re merely a victim of social circumstance singing/rapping about your personal experiences. However if you’re not shifting 50,000 units you’re the devil, the cause of every social ill you dare mention (in the case of dancehall the ill is homophobia not homosexuality) and fare game to the media bloodhounds.
As a departing shot I’ll leave you with the profound words of 50 Cent, a rapper whom regularly appears on kiddie music station MTV donning a bullet proof vest spitting lines such as, “But I’ll hunt or duck a nigga down like it’s sport, Front on me, I’ll cut ya, gun-butt ya or bump ya…I’m the type that’ll kill your connect when the coke price rise.”
With morality like that filling our pre-watershed TV schedules, no wonder there is such a furore over dancehall.
Without writing a biog for her, Sarah Bentley is to dancehall magazine journalism what Chris Muniz and Pete Rogers are to d&b journalism, Steve Yates is to hip hop, or what perhaps myself or Chantelle Fiddy hope to be to garage. Her views are not necessarily those of Blackdown Soundboy, but properly informed on the international dancehall movement, they’re very worthwhile.
//Stop The Bashment Bashing//
Words: Sarah Bentley
If you’ve read the UK mainstream press this autumn you couldn’t have escaped the controversy over Jamaican dancehall and reggae artists apparent homophobic lyricism. Sizzla has been banned from performing in the UK. Beenie Man was retained by the police on the basis that his lyrics, ‘incited violence’. And Buju Banton’s, ‘Boom Bye Bye’ tune, somehow dominated headlines again, twelve years after its original release.
So how did all this happen? Well, Gay Rights activist and OutRage’s front man, Peter Tatchell, had timing on his side. With the rise in popularity of dancehall the papers were ripe to listen to his long standing argument that dancehall is, ‘murder music’. And why not? Anyone whom believes they are being disrespected has the right to speak out. But the right to sabotage an entire musical genre and with it a large proportion of a nations economy, that’s a different thing.
Throughout 2004 I watched in horror as journalists, radio and TV presenters seized Tatchell’s mantle to brand all dancehall artists murder inciting homophobes with no regard for the wider effects these comments were having.
My favourite newspapers ran copy with embarrassingly inept descriptions of the various Houses of Rastafari (check Alexis Petridis article that states “Bobo Rasta’s believe in racial segregation”). Buju Banton was wrongly accused by The Guardian in June of being involved in a violent ‘gay attack’ in Jamaica.
Inexcusably wrong patios translations were rife. Check every ‘literal’ patios translation on Outrage.com. And the nation developed pseudo expertise on Jamaican culture, history and social science. Check my pensioner parents telling me about the perils of ‘that terrible reggae’ after watching Channel Four documentary ‘Trainers, Reggae & The Olympics’. To date no "Apologies for an error made in issue/programme xx” have been printed/broadcast.
Thanks to OutRages online ‘Essential Guide To Homophobic Lyricism In Dancehall’, anyone could become an overnight expert in bashment bashing. It was so easy. Check the web and make that money. It didn’t matter that patios was a creole that required more than a literal translation. What do you mean burn, doesn’t mean burn? And fire doesn’t necessarily mean physical fire? You can’t get one up on us that easily. We might be western but we’re down. We know what your jungle language means, man.
Before I proceed I’d like you to know I’m a stereotypically left wing music hack. I drink soya milk. I’ve been to Trade. I use eco friendly washing powder. I’ve applied nail varnish to a gay friend’s toenails. I fully accept Jesus, if he did exist, was a blackman. I read The Guardian and The Observer. I believe no one should suffer prejudice. Violence is wrong. I mourn if I accidentally tread on an ant. But, when it comes to dancehall, the general publics not getting the full picture. And now the witch hunts on, there’s no stopping the hypocrisy of its most ardent critics. And someone, anyone, has to start presenting the flip side.
Fact is, its illegal to be a sexually active gay man in Jamaica. Buggery or in fact any intimacy between two men is unlawful and punishable by prison. No such direct laws refer to lesbians. It seems Jamaica’s don’t take so much offence to the thought of two women getting it on. Somehow, I doubt dancehall, a genre of music yet to be invented when Jamaica was granted independence in the 60’s, had little impact on the Jamaican governments decision to maintain the law the British had previously imposed.
Taking things to 2004 a recent opinion poll stated 96% of the country opposed having this law over turned. And if you think 96% of the country is influenced by dancehall, you’re wrong. Like garage in the UK, dancehall is the music of ghetto youths. If anything unites the 96 out of 100 people that didn’t want the buggery laws over turned, it would most likely be the church.
We all know Christianity is big in Jamaica and the island has more churches per square capita than anywhere else in the world (broadsheet hacks got that right at least). Well has anyone ever thought where that strident belief in the Bible came from? Er, hello, we took it there. Before being shackled, wedged into a coffin size space and packed off to the Caribbean, do you think Africans had much experience with Christianity?
Christianity was the religion of the plantation owners and slave masters. After blacks supposed emancipation in 1830, ex slaves, desperate to gain respectability, social mobility and status, only found equal footing to Jamaica’s light skinned, upper class society in religion. Back then, both in Jamaica and in England, the churches word was final. And with regards to homosexuality, the Bible taught this was a heinous sin, one the monarchy believed should be punishable by death.
175 years on and still it’s the light skinned population that fill Jamaica’s uptown restaurants, security guarded housing estates and private schools. Jamaica’s poorest rural and downtown communities are almost entirely populated by descendents of the original African slaves. Many people are still illiterate. Men and women do hard labour jobs for less than £20 a week. Gang, and political related fighting devastates downtown communities. The church continues to be a central force in people’s lives.
Now I’m not trying to excuse homophobia, I’m merely trying to illustrate the background to Jamaica’s hard-line stance. Now we’re all such shining examples of liberated, PC-ness, it’s easy to forget that homosexuality wasn’t legalised in Britain until 1967 and even then the age of consent was 21. It wasn’t until 1980 and 1982 Scotland & N.Ireland came to the same conclusions, the last amendment a mere 22 years ago. Furthermore it wasn’t until 1994 England lowered the age of consent to 18, the debate on lowering it to 16 still a hot debated subject in this country today.
Without intending to sound patronising, Jamaica is a third world country. Soap operas don’t have token ‘gay characters’. The nation doesn’t watch Queer As Folk whilst eating their tea. TV presenters do not dress in drag. They don’t have a fashionable gay district with nice bars and restaurants border-line homophobes like my Dad can visit to conclude, “They aren’t that bad are they? The gays.” Most people are worrying about how to feed their children and pay the rent. It might take longer for the notion of the homosexual lifestyle to become accepted in Jamaica than in did in England. Is that really so surprising?
The baiting of conscious dancehall artists Buju Banton and Boboshanti Rastafarians Capleton, Sizzla and Antony B rattles me more than any factor of this whole blood thirsty affair. Buju, Capleton and Antony B all started their artistic lives as gun toting rude boys before experiencing a spiritual enlightenment that switched them onto more righteous ways. Today they offer hope to young men in Jamaica’s desperate ghettos. They employ people from their local communities, the artist’s income also the lifeline to the survival of tens of other families.
They wear humble clothing or traditional African dress. They denounce drug taking and drinking. They eat strict vegetarian diets. Women are their empresses and queens (albeit they have a few of them). Achievement is measured through the richness of a person’s heart, soul and mind, not their wallets. They openly praise the family unit, particularly mothers. They are the antithesis of the thugged out, gangster puppets and glassy eyed, sexually available hoes of the US rap world.
Lyrically their main subject matters are Rastafarian philosophy and the promotion of black pride, education, unity, clean living and love. Yes they perform homophobic lyrics in a low percentage of their material but they perform them within the context of Biblical teachings. Is it really reasonable to expect religious artists in a country where homosexuality is illegal, to not express anti-gay sentiments?
Sure to the unaccustomed ear the vernacular seems harsh. But, like the artists say, their words shouldn’t be taken literally, an aspect of patios people choose to embrace and ignore in equal measure. When Bob Marley sang, “I shot the Sheriff,” I don’t remember him being arrested for inciting violence against the police. It’s safe to conclude Bob didn’t like the way the police conducted themselves (after all he said he shot one), so why can’t the same conclusion be drawn from Capleton singing, “Burn fire pon de battyman.”
Patios is a dialect that uses strong words to express a feeling. Take the following sentence, “I step pon Tatchell an burn fire pon de murder music campaign”. What I mean by this statement is, “I earnestly disagree with Peter Tatchell and I’d like to see his Murder Music campaign come to an end.” However the literal translation, as pioneered by the OutRage department of creole expertise, means, “Stamp on Peter Tatchell and all homosexuals and set alight anyone whom supports the Murder Music Campaign.” There are subtle, but oh so important differences: Dislike-death. Anger-violence. Disagree-eradicate.
I’m not denying it must be hard to be gay and live in Jamaica. But it’s also hard being an average person on the street there as well: robbery, rape and sexual attacks on women far more frequent crimes than gay assaults. Personally I find homophobic lyrics uncreative and lazy (Jamaican artists know the public will love any tune featuring them-it’s a no brainer). But until government changes the law and initiates nation wide programmes of education and integration, why would dancehall artists stop using anti-gay lyrics?
It all goes back to the same age-old argument. Does music reflect life or dictate it? Well I’ve been to Jamaica and seen crews of openly gay men dancing to Elephant Man’s ‘Log On’ at downtown dances such as Passa Passa. A few people stared, but no one stamped on them. I’ve read newspaper columns where male writers have written accounts of being come on to by a gay man in the bank, the man merely embarrassed, not enraged as the whole queue laughed at him, “in his predicament.”
Looking at today’s music business it appears that if you’re raking in millions for corporations you’re merely a victim of social circumstance singing/rapping about your personal experiences. However if you’re not shifting 50,000 units you’re the devil, the cause of every social ill you dare mention (in the case of dancehall the ill is homophobia not homosexuality) and fare game to the media bloodhounds.
As a departing shot I’ll leave you with the profound words of 50 Cent, a rapper whom regularly appears on kiddie music station MTV donning a bullet proof vest spitting lines such as, “But I’ll hunt or duck a nigga down like it’s sport, Front on me, I’ll cut ya, gun-butt ya or bump ya…I’m the type that’ll kill your connect when the coke price rise.”
With morality like that filling our pre-watershed TV schedules, no wonder there is such a furore over dancehall.
Sunday, January 02, 2005
SNAPSHOT 2004
2004 DUBSTEP 5
KODE 9 FT DADDI GEE “SIGN OF THE DUB” (Hyperdub) and “FUKKAZ (SUBKON VOX)” (dub)
One beatless bass excursion. The other a sino-dub quantum leap. The next dubstep phaze has begun.
DIGITAL MYSTIKZ “GIVE JAH GLORY” (Tempa) and “FORGIVE” (dub)
Deep sounds from within. Essential.
LOEFAH “JUNGLE INFILTRATOR” (Big Apple) and “HORROR SHOW” (DMZ01)
DMZ’s Loefah’s opening shots.
PLASTICMAN “SHALLOW GRAVE (SKREAMZ MIX)” (Terror Riddim dub) and “FUNERAL VIBEZ”
Yo Gilles Peterson are you still “looking for the perfect beat?” Skreamz has made it.
GEENEUS “CONGO” (Tempa)
From the essential Tempa Allstars 2 doublepack.
2004 GRIME 5 (that could be 50)
ROLL DEEP “LET IT OUT” and “UNKNOWN (the Asian one on the LP demo)”
Proof that grime 2004 belonged to the Entourage
TRIM FT RIKO, WILEY, D DOUBLE E AND FOOTSIE (TERROR DANJAH PRODUCTION) “BOOGEY MAN” (White)
Irresistible grime anthem and Trim’s vinyl debut.
TARGET AND RIKO “CHOSEN ONE” (Aim High)
Talking loud and saying something. Target’s a genius.
DOK FT BRUZA “GET ME” (Aftershock)
“Yo DOK is this me blad?” G-funk goes Cockney-Eski.
WONDER FT KANO “LATELY” (New Era)
Surfing the popular/innovation boundary.
ALBUMS OF 2004
HIGH CONTRAST “HIGH SOCIETY” (Hospital)
Ecstatic, euphoric, irresistible.
JUNIOR BOYS “LAST EXIT” (Kin)
80s + r&b bounce + melodies to kill for = this years’ Metro Area.
DIZZEE RASCAL “SHOWTIME” (XL)
Inpenetrable yet essential.
GRIME MIXTAPES
LOGAN SAMA
The definitive grime mega-mixtape, even though it’s talked over.
ROLL DEEP PRESENT CREEPER VOL 1
Not as good as their Rinse FM sets but seriously mucky in places.
AIM HIGH VOL 1
It’s by Target. Say no more.
RUN THE ROAD
A labour of love throughout 2004 by me and 679’s Dan Stacey.
MIXTAPES/COMPS OF 2004
KNOWLEDGE MAGAZINE PRESENTS BASSBIN RECORDS MIX
Doc Scott-style dub roller.
KNOWLEDGE MAGAZINE PRESENTS INPERSPECTIVE RECORDS MIX
The return of the breaks to d&b
HOLLATRONIX “Inperfection makes is fresh-sha”
R&b, crunk, classic hip hop, dancehall and even The Clash. Fresh.
YOUNGSTA LIVE AT FWD>> VOL 1
A love/hate CD, yet the definitive snapshot of a skunked out sound pushed to the limits … for better or worse.
MC OF THE YEAR: Trim
GRIME INNOVATOR OF THE YEAR: Wiley
D&B TUNES OF THE YEAR
CALIBRE FT MC FATS “DROP IT DOWN” (Signature)
Blissful sub-bass singjay jam.
AR RAHMAN “THE AMERICANS ARE COMING (NURIYA HAMIED & MOISES MODESTO REMIX)” (bootleg)
Insane Indian string epic given the bootleg d&b treatment.
FUTURE PROPHECIES “EASTERN ORGANIC” (Sound Trax test press)
Steps like “Pulp Fiction”. Sounds like Digital Mystikz or DJ Distance. Refreshing Oriental sounds.
Q PROJECT “NATION 2 NATION” (Hospital)
The perfect marimba groove?
0=0 “SOUL HUNTER TESTIFIES” (Inperspective dub)
What Squarepusher should have sounded like. Is this the rhythmic limit of d&b? Is this even d&b?
R&B 5
CHRISTINA MILIAN “DIP IT LOW”
KELIS “MILKSHAKE”
ASHANTI “ONLY U”
KELIS AND ANDRE 3000 “MILLIONAIRE”
BRANDY “APHRODISIAC”
TOP 6 PLACES IN 2004
Hackney Wick by twilight
Interviewing Roll Deep and Whileout Onez in Limehouse aka “Whilehouse”
The space in front of Plastic People’s speakers during Forward>>, RinseSessions or Co op
The 2am Sunday nightbus home from DMZ Sessions in Croydon
In Sainsbury’s: getting a call from Riko to say he’s free
On the footie pitch getting the f**kin tackles in
2004 BOTTOM 5
War and poverty
Inequality and intolerance
Intra-scene bitching
Right wing media
The collapse of the dance/urban magazine sector/record sales
FUTURE 5 FOR 2005
The Digital Mystikz, Loefah and Kode 9 & Daddi Gee LPs
Burial, Pinch, Fumin and Lowdeep releases
Kano’s LP
Influx Datum’s LP (Formation)
Drumfunk Vol 1 compiled by Paradox
WISHFUL THINKING 5 FOR 2005
A Trim LP
Some next MC who raises the bar further
Some insane next scene from around the world that’s not buss yet
World peace
A Dusk & Blackdown 12”
KODE 9 FT DADDI GEE “SIGN OF THE DUB” (Hyperdub) and “FUKKAZ (SUBKON VOX)” (dub)
One beatless bass excursion. The other a sino-dub quantum leap. The next dubstep phaze has begun.
DIGITAL MYSTIKZ “GIVE JAH GLORY” (Tempa) and “FORGIVE” (dub)
Deep sounds from within. Essential.
LOEFAH “JUNGLE INFILTRATOR” (Big Apple) and “HORROR SHOW” (DMZ01)
DMZ’s Loefah’s opening shots.
PLASTICMAN “SHALLOW GRAVE (SKREAMZ MIX)” (Terror Riddim dub) and “FUNERAL VIBEZ”
Yo Gilles Peterson are you still “looking for the perfect beat?” Skreamz has made it.
GEENEUS “CONGO” (Tempa)
From the essential Tempa Allstars 2 doublepack.
2004 GRIME 5 (that could be 50)
ROLL DEEP “LET IT OUT” and “UNKNOWN (the Asian one on the LP demo)”
Proof that grime 2004 belonged to the Entourage
TRIM FT RIKO, WILEY, D DOUBLE E AND FOOTSIE (TERROR DANJAH PRODUCTION) “BOOGEY MAN” (White)
Irresistible grime anthem and Trim’s vinyl debut.
TARGET AND RIKO “CHOSEN ONE” (Aim High)
Talking loud and saying something. Target’s a genius.
DOK FT BRUZA “GET ME” (Aftershock)
“Yo DOK is this me blad?” G-funk goes Cockney-Eski.
WONDER FT KANO “LATELY” (New Era)
Surfing the popular/innovation boundary.
ALBUMS OF 2004
HIGH CONTRAST “HIGH SOCIETY” (Hospital)
Ecstatic, euphoric, irresistible.
JUNIOR BOYS “LAST EXIT” (Kin)
80s + r&b bounce + melodies to kill for = this years’ Metro Area.
DIZZEE RASCAL “SHOWTIME” (XL)
Inpenetrable yet essential.
GRIME MIXTAPES
LOGAN SAMA
The definitive grime mega-mixtape, even though it’s talked over.
ROLL DEEP PRESENT CREEPER VOL 1
Not as good as their Rinse FM sets but seriously mucky in places.
AIM HIGH VOL 1
It’s by Target. Say no more.
RUN THE ROAD
A labour of love throughout 2004 by me and 679’s Dan Stacey.
MIXTAPES/COMPS OF 2004
KNOWLEDGE MAGAZINE PRESENTS BASSBIN RECORDS MIX
Doc Scott-style dub roller.
KNOWLEDGE MAGAZINE PRESENTS INPERSPECTIVE RECORDS MIX
The return of the breaks to d&b
HOLLATRONIX “Inperfection makes is fresh-sha”
R&b, crunk, classic hip hop, dancehall and even The Clash. Fresh.
YOUNGSTA LIVE AT FWD>> VOL 1
A love/hate CD, yet the definitive snapshot of a skunked out sound pushed to the limits … for better or worse.
MC OF THE YEAR: Trim
GRIME INNOVATOR OF THE YEAR: Wiley
D&B TUNES OF THE YEAR
CALIBRE FT MC FATS “DROP IT DOWN” (Signature)
Blissful sub-bass singjay jam.
AR RAHMAN “THE AMERICANS ARE COMING (NURIYA HAMIED & MOISES MODESTO REMIX)” (bootleg)
Insane Indian string epic given the bootleg d&b treatment.
FUTURE PROPHECIES “EASTERN ORGANIC” (Sound Trax test press)
Steps like “Pulp Fiction”. Sounds like Digital Mystikz or DJ Distance. Refreshing Oriental sounds.
Q PROJECT “NATION 2 NATION” (Hospital)
The perfect marimba groove?
0=0 “SOUL HUNTER TESTIFIES” (Inperspective dub)
What Squarepusher should have sounded like. Is this the rhythmic limit of d&b? Is this even d&b?
R&B 5
CHRISTINA MILIAN “DIP IT LOW”
KELIS “MILKSHAKE”
ASHANTI “ONLY U”
KELIS AND ANDRE 3000 “MILLIONAIRE”
BRANDY “APHRODISIAC”
TOP 6 PLACES IN 2004
Hackney Wick by twilight
Interviewing Roll Deep and Whileout Onez in Limehouse aka “Whilehouse”
The space in front of Plastic People’s speakers during Forward>>, RinseSessions or Co op
The 2am Sunday nightbus home from DMZ Sessions in Croydon
In Sainsbury’s: getting a call from Riko to say he’s free
On the footie pitch getting the f**kin tackles in
2004 BOTTOM 5
War and poverty
Inequality and intolerance
Intra-scene bitching
Right wing media
The collapse of the dance/urban magazine sector/record sales
FUTURE 5 FOR 2005
The Digital Mystikz, Loefah and Kode 9 & Daddi Gee LPs
Burial, Pinch, Fumin and Lowdeep releases
Kano’s LP
Influx Datum’s LP (Formation)
Drumfunk Vol 1 compiled by Paradox
WISHFUL THINKING 5 FOR 2005
A Trim LP
Some next MC who raises the bar further
Some insane next scene from around the world that’s not buss yet
World peace
A Dusk & Blackdown 12”
Monday, December 20, 2004
"Don't check me with no integer beats…"
Why "grime?"
It could have been any one of a handful of terms - sublow, eski, 8bar or eastbeat - but in 2004 garage's hottest hybrid has somehow firmly inherited the name "grime."
The scene itself still isn't comfortable with a term that was imposed upon them by the very 2step "godfathers" who had excluded them. The term had implied, negative associations from the outset, defined by an absence of warmth, not the presence of anything. DJs like Matt Jam Lamont and EZ proclaimed they "don't play any of that grimey garage." And that was that.
But personally I've come to love the term. Compare it with the tediously dry and functional "drum & bass." Surely pretty much every black music form, ever could be covered by "drum" and "bass," especially if someone had lent Robert Johnson some instruments? So too by "r&b" aka rhythm & blues, so broad a term they've used it twice.
Grime, when you think about it, is fiercely evocative. It's all dirt and evolutionary ooze, compressed London sounds set to infinite urban delay/decay.
Sit on the overland train from Highbury and Islington to Hackney and you'll see grime. Homerton station is the best: harrowing disintegrating towerblock being choked by green repair-netting to the right, bomb struck once-terraced house rubble to the left. Beyond Hackney Wick is a no-mans-land before Stratford station looms. Derelict canals choke with luminous green algae on one side. Disused factories like rotting urban skeletons on the other.
Yet these scenes are so much more inspirational than the more celebrated parts of London. Head into the (nearby) City, around Bank tube or Liverpool St station, and it's just miles of geometric line and planes, sterile surfaces and granite culture-repelling defences. Street after street of dehumanised data stores, installed to divide money into either ones… or zeros. It’s a lifeless, futuristic techno citystate… that no one actually lives in.
Nah, for inspiration, give me the grimey bits of London anytime. There's no straight lines and precision points, no rules or laws, no clean streets, no absolute black nor white. Instead values somewhere between quantized zero and ones apply (though if you measured them, they'd only change…). This is some glorious fertile middleground, found between the gaps.
In grimey, shithole areas like Hackney, Whilehouse and Bow grew Dizzee and Wiley, Trim and Scratchy, Riko and Target. Producers like Wonder and P-Jam now compose vital atonal jams, with notes that fall between the traditional scales. Like Chantelle always says, "shit makes the best fertiliser." Alongside all the desolate metallic train tracks grow intense purple flowers.
Humans are greater than the sum of our parts. A bucket of water, salt, protein, DNA, RNA etc combined does not create life. We evolved, not in a vacuum or on the surface of the sun, but out of a primordial bubbling side-pond. So did grime.
PS And people still can't see dubstep and grime are cousins! Tcha!
It could have been any one of a handful of terms - sublow, eski, 8bar or eastbeat - but in 2004 garage's hottest hybrid has somehow firmly inherited the name "grime."
The scene itself still isn't comfortable with a term that was imposed upon them by the very 2step "godfathers" who had excluded them. The term had implied, negative associations from the outset, defined by an absence of warmth, not the presence of anything. DJs like Matt Jam Lamont and EZ proclaimed they "don't play any of that grimey garage." And that was that.
But personally I've come to love the term. Compare it with the tediously dry and functional "drum & bass." Surely pretty much every black music form, ever could be covered by "drum" and "bass," especially if someone had lent Robert Johnson some instruments? So too by "r&b" aka rhythm & blues, so broad a term they've used it twice.
Grime, when you think about it, is fiercely evocative. It's all dirt and evolutionary ooze, compressed London sounds set to infinite urban delay/decay.
Sit on the overland train from Highbury and Islington to Hackney and you'll see grime. Homerton station is the best: harrowing disintegrating towerblock being choked by green repair-netting to the right, bomb struck once-terraced house rubble to the left. Beyond Hackney Wick is a no-mans-land before Stratford station looms. Derelict canals choke with luminous green algae on one side. Disused factories like rotting urban skeletons on the other.
Yet these scenes are so much more inspirational than the more celebrated parts of London. Head into the (nearby) City, around Bank tube or Liverpool St station, and it's just miles of geometric line and planes, sterile surfaces and granite culture-repelling defences. Street after street of dehumanised data stores, installed to divide money into either ones… or zeros. It’s a lifeless, futuristic techno citystate… that no one actually lives in.
Nah, for inspiration, give me the grimey bits of London anytime. There's no straight lines and precision points, no rules or laws, no clean streets, no absolute black nor white. Instead values somewhere between quantized zero and ones apply (though if you measured them, they'd only change…). This is some glorious fertile middleground, found between the gaps.
In grimey, shithole areas like Hackney, Whilehouse and Bow grew Dizzee and Wiley, Trim and Scratchy, Riko and Target. Producers like Wonder and P-Jam now compose vital atonal jams, with notes that fall between the traditional scales. Like Chantelle always says, "shit makes the best fertiliser." Alongside all the desolate metallic train tracks grow intense purple flowers.
Humans are greater than the sum of our parts. A bucket of water, salt, protein, DNA, RNA etc combined does not create life. We evolved, not in a vacuum or on the surface of the sun, but out of a primordial bubbling side-pond. So did grime.
PS And people still can't see dubstep and grime are cousins! Tcha!
Thursday, December 02, 2004
MC or die
“Pow! I’m Lethal B/If you don’t know about Lethal B/Betta ask someone quickly” – Lethal B
“The spotlight’s on me” – Fumin
"I’ll crack your skull" – Demon
“Rudeboy fi jus sekkle/Don’t make Jamakabi draw for the mekkle” – Jamakabi
Lethal B and friends on the "Forward Riddim" aka "Pow"
If there’s two things that 99% of all grime lyrics have in common it’s extreme aggression aimed in a predictable direction: another MC. Just check the bars on Lethal B’s “Forward Riddim.”
A great deal of the commentary about grime comes from the outside in. And maybe because so much comment has come from outside, it’s often overlooked that most of the MCs are talking to each other within the grime community, oblivious to the wider audience. (I showed Terror Danjah a blog once, he looked somewhere between baffled and uninterested).
The tone of the lyrics aimed at fellow MCs is so relentlessly aggressive, you begin to wonder if all the MCs in grime are not just lyrically, but psychologically at war with each other. Even within the few minutes of the “Forward Riddim” you can get Pow-ed, your skull cracked, arms house [aka a fight] at your mum’s house and Jamakabi with his gun drawn. It’s like a permanently mentally militarised community, continually expecting attack and delivering internal pre-emptive strikes.
In some situations a resting state is the default state: not so in grime. If you’re not out exerting your aggression and existence on pirate radio you’re failing. Other MCs will swarm forward, take your slot on radio or your eight bars on the riddim and exert their own existence and warn their foes. Without hype you don’t exist. If you haven’t exerted your existence, you’ve not existed.
In this light grime MCing seems an extreme manifestation of a primal and ancient need, the need to be remembered, to have made a difference or a mark. Knowing this, it explains why MCs lyrics are so obsessed with names.
Every MC and all their mates have street aliases they adopt. (By contrast it’s then shocking when MCs reveal their real name, like Riko calling himself “Zane” on Trim’s “Boogie Man” or Flowdan using “Mark” on Creeper Vol 1 mixtape).
This alias then becomes a powerful weapon in other people’s mouths. It’s become a shortcut to grime fame/infamy to call out MCs names (most of all Wiley’s name - see Dirrty Doogz, Sharky Major, 2Tuff and most recently Bashy) on pirate radio. MC even say pre-emptively, “you don’t want to call out my name.” Other MCs have described the worried text messages from friends they get when someone calls out their name somewhere over the pirate ether. Kano’s even parodied the phone call MCs get on his new b-side “Mic Check 1,2.”
The same applies for trademark flows. Grime has perfected the trademark flow, whether it be a single lyric, sonic gimmick or rhyme that clearly demarks that MC over some next MC. See D Double’s “meh meh,” Flirta D’s sound effects, JME’s “Serious” and Lethal B’s “Pow.” In truth every decent MC has one.
The seriousness to which MCs take these trademarks is shown by the ongoing war over Lethal B’s use of “Pow.” On a dubplate designed to counter the “Forward Riddim” Roll Deeps’ Trim point to God’s Gift using it four years ago on his seminal “Mic Tribute” tune. On this same garage (not grime) track Gift reproduced all the garage MCs lyrical trademarks back to back. Even back then the trademark flow was core to an MCs status.
B-Live, an MC from the old garage guard, has recently and quite successfully tried to muscle into the grime hype by making “Merkers.” This dubplate uses Wiley’s minimal “Fire Hydrant” to merk MCs. But B-Live is very careful only to merk undefined and anonymous wannabe MCs, while name checking and therefore praising the current big boy grime MCs. To call out that many grime MCs names on one tune in a negative way would surely have caused untold hassles for him.
Dubplates like “Merkers” quickly achieve MCs aims: to be acknowledged and to gain status. In reality only a small percentage of MCs will ever gain major record deals but it’s misguided to even suggest this is their primary aim. Working out how to sell to the masses is very much a secondary phase in their careers (note how different Roll Deep’s street vinyl output (tough/grimey) is versus the tracks they claim on radio are destined for the Roll Deep album (hookey, r&b-lead)). Most MCs simply want the respect of their peers.
A final unanswered question remains: how much can be quantitatively ascertained about the London community in which grime MCs live, from their lyrics? Because if those lyrics are to believed, everyone in the community is angry and sees themselves at war with the people around them. Why?
“The spotlight’s on me” – Fumin
"I’ll crack your skull" – Demon
“Rudeboy fi jus sekkle/Don’t make Jamakabi draw for the mekkle” – Jamakabi
Lethal B and friends on the "Forward Riddim" aka "Pow"
If there’s two things that 99% of all grime lyrics have in common it’s extreme aggression aimed in a predictable direction: another MC. Just check the bars on Lethal B’s “Forward Riddim.”
A great deal of the commentary about grime comes from the outside in. And maybe because so much comment has come from outside, it’s often overlooked that most of the MCs are talking to each other within the grime community, oblivious to the wider audience. (I showed Terror Danjah a blog once, he looked somewhere between baffled and uninterested).
The tone of the lyrics aimed at fellow MCs is so relentlessly aggressive, you begin to wonder if all the MCs in grime are not just lyrically, but psychologically at war with each other. Even within the few minutes of the “Forward Riddim” you can get Pow-ed, your skull cracked, arms house [aka a fight] at your mum’s house and Jamakabi with his gun drawn. It’s like a permanently mentally militarised community, continually expecting attack and delivering internal pre-emptive strikes.
In some situations a resting state is the default state: not so in grime. If you’re not out exerting your aggression and existence on pirate radio you’re failing. Other MCs will swarm forward, take your slot on radio or your eight bars on the riddim and exert their own existence and warn their foes. Without hype you don’t exist. If you haven’t exerted your existence, you’ve not existed.
In this light grime MCing seems an extreme manifestation of a primal and ancient need, the need to be remembered, to have made a difference or a mark. Knowing this, it explains why MCs lyrics are so obsessed with names.
Every MC and all their mates have street aliases they adopt. (By contrast it’s then shocking when MCs reveal their real name, like Riko calling himself “Zane” on Trim’s “Boogie Man” or Flowdan using “Mark” on Creeper Vol 1 mixtape).
This alias then becomes a powerful weapon in other people’s mouths. It’s become a shortcut to grime fame/infamy to call out MCs names (most of all Wiley’s name - see Dirrty Doogz, Sharky Major, 2Tuff and most recently Bashy) on pirate radio. MC even say pre-emptively, “you don’t want to call out my name.” Other MCs have described the worried text messages from friends they get when someone calls out their name somewhere over the pirate ether. Kano’s even parodied the phone call MCs get on his new b-side “Mic Check 1,2.”
The same applies for trademark flows. Grime has perfected the trademark flow, whether it be a single lyric, sonic gimmick or rhyme that clearly demarks that MC over some next MC. See D Double’s “meh meh,” Flirta D’s sound effects, JME’s “Serious” and Lethal B’s “Pow.” In truth every decent MC has one.
The seriousness to which MCs take these trademarks is shown by the ongoing war over Lethal B’s use of “Pow.” On a dubplate designed to counter the “Forward Riddim” Roll Deeps’ Trim point to God’s Gift using it four years ago on his seminal “Mic Tribute” tune. On this same garage (not grime) track Gift reproduced all the garage MCs lyrical trademarks back to back. Even back then the trademark flow was core to an MCs status.
B-Live, an MC from the old garage guard, has recently and quite successfully tried to muscle into the grime hype by making “Merkers.” This dubplate uses Wiley’s minimal “Fire Hydrant” to merk MCs. But B-Live is very careful only to merk undefined and anonymous wannabe MCs, while name checking and therefore praising the current big boy grime MCs. To call out that many grime MCs names on one tune in a negative way would surely have caused untold hassles for him.
Dubplates like “Merkers” quickly achieve MCs aims: to be acknowledged and to gain status. In reality only a small percentage of MCs will ever gain major record deals but it’s misguided to even suggest this is their primary aim. Working out how to sell to the masses is very much a secondary phase in their careers (note how different Roll Deep’s street vinyl output (tough/grimey) is versus the tracks they claim on radio are destined for the Roll Deep album (hookey, r&b-lead)). Most MCs simply want the respect of their peers.
A final unanswered question remains: how much can be quantitatively ascertained about the London community in which grime MCs live, from their lyrics? Because if those lyrics are to believed, everyone in the community is angry and sees themselves at war with the people around them. Why?
Friday, November 26, 2004
Currently feeling...
AIM HIGH 2
Target's new mixtape. No I've not heard it but the radio advert is messy.
DJ PINCH "Quawwali"
Minimal Purposemaker/dubstep drums meet some gloriously intimate melancholic vibes from new Bristol dubsteppa.
BURIAL [the two tracks Kode 9's playing on Rinse]
Mad electronica/Pole/Domu fusions.
SUNSHIP "Almighty Father (Skreamz Half Bar mix)"
Standing at Digital Mystikz' DubSessions in Croydon, Skreamz says to me he wants to remix this tune. One phone call later...
ROLL DEEP "unknown"
Danny Weed produced mad bhangra loop vocal tune. "Energy I'm supplying it..." spits Wiley.
DJ DINESH AND KID DELI "Egypt"
Horsepower and Goldspot are BACK and on the same 12". Droney sinodub niceness.
Target's new mixtape. No I've not heard it but the radio advert is messy.
DJ PINCH "Quawwali"
Minimal Purposemaker/dubstep drums meet some gloriously intimate melancholic vibes from new Bristol dubsteppa.
BURIAL [the two tracks Kode 9's playing on Rinse]
Mad electronica/Pole/Domu fusions.
SUNSHIP "Almighty Father (Skreamz Half Bar mix)"
Standing at Digital Mystikz' DubSessions in Croydon, Skreamz says to me he wants to remix this tune. One phone call later...
ROLL DEEP "unknown"
Danny Weed produced mad bhangra loop vocal tune. "Energy I'm supplying it..." spits Wiley.
DJ DINESH AND KID DELI "Egypt"
Horsepower and Goldspot are BACK and on the same 12". Droney sinodub niceness.
Friday, November 19, 2004
Sway thoughts part 1
Last night I interviewed Sway, a hot new MC, producer and artist from Hornsey, north London. He’s from the UK hip hop scene but has bucket loads of personality. He likes grime, MCed with Kano on 1Xtra recently, but isn’t aggi. And, frankly, after a year of “IIIIIIIII’LL CRACK YOUR SKULL” it’s a breath of fresh air. He’s funny, descriptive and engaging. Below are some extracts of the interview, interspersed with the ideas they triggered …
Sway: "British hip hop has a grey stigma over it. I’ve come out of that scene and I wont even lie, it was lacking quality a few years ago. I didn’t blame people for not wanting to listen to it. It was doing what New York was doing ages ago. It was like we were ten years behind."
"Then UKG came out with mans doing their own thing, inspired by ragga and drum & bass. It was a new UK sound, and it was UK hip hop but they had to distance themselves from that grey term. It was UK hip hop but everyone was in denial. The underground rap cats that weren’t making no money were too proud to say that ‘look, that’s hip hop’ were like ‘fuck that garage shit.’ The garage acts were like ‘fuck that backpacker shit.’ So no one was collaborating."
"Then this word ‘urban’ came out. And a lot of people were like ‘awh this word ‘urban’ has made all black music pigeon holed together.’ They don’t know what it’s done for the scene. But by putting all them catagories: r&b, hip hop, UKG, drum & bass, they’re making it one music. And I like that cos now I can do tunes with Wonder or Terror Danjah without having to call it a grime-UK hip hop collaboration. So that word was a really good thing for the scene. I don’t think people will see it until 2005, because there’s a new wave coming through which is merged both of them."
I witnessed Ras Kwame’s State of the UK show being broadcast last Sunday and no subject made we want to leap the mixing desk, smash the soundproof glass and shout my 2p worth than the issue of the word “urban.” There was a great deal of debate about it, but the sentiment that made my blood boil was expressed by a journalist from New Nation newspaper. Her point was that “urban” was taking black music away from the black community, or at least diluting the blackness of the music.
I suspect debate around the words “black music” and “urban” wont go away in a hurry. Only this week I was reading more fraff on Drum & Bass Arena about 1Xtra calling it “black music,” and white fans feeling excluded.
A great deal of the debate’s confusion seems relates to whether we’re talking about music or culture, about music of black origin or made for the black community. But whatever, my 2p is twofold…
Firstly I think the term “urban” works, literally, because this music does appeal to people in urban areas. Where the pirates tail off around London, so does grime’s appeal. When I go to small Devon rural villages I don’t experience people with the same multicultural perspectives as when I go to the centre of Bristol.
Secondly Ms New Nation’s view seems almost isolationist. And if there’s one thing I can guess London’s black communities don’t need more of, it’s less contact with other communities. If this country is to survive in any kind of cohesive form, without the kind of rural “passive apartheid” effect the commissioner for racial equality was talking about recently, surely multiculturalism is the way forward.
No one’s telling Scratchy he can’t be in Roll Deep, or Jeff Mills he can’t make techno, so why can’t “urban” music involve white people? Stanza from Skandalous Unlimited was at this debate and he’s Asian and from Watford, where does racial purism leave him?
Purism in music is futile anyway. Blues musicians using classical western instruments with African song, gospel artist using European choral traditions, it’s always been about dialog, or at least degrees of dialog. Why stop now?
Why can’t “urban” mean a lose collection of music forms that derive from common musical roots that appeal to a geographically similar community? Now that is a bit of a mouthful. Let’s just call it “urban”…
Much more Sway to follow when my eyes aren’t falling out with tiredness…
Sunday, November 14, 2004
Eski etymology
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…
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…
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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