The Defenition of Dubstep

[auralassassin]

I'm pretty sure that "dubstep" is a name given by junglists, etc...

techstep, wreckstep, breakstep...

just a way for them to try and put a name on something... Mr Oizo - Flat Beat is a good example of what dubstep would be if you substitute some kits and some of the spaceyness...

spaced out nuskool breaks is all.

[flaviano]

true true auralassassin i'd love to hear some pre-war house it sounds sick.

[mrjiggyfly]

Dubstep recipe:
Half a pint of dub reggae
100g of Grime
50g of Jungle on valium
A teaspoon of minimal techno

Brilliant, I love It!!!

Substitute heroin for valium for best results!!!!

[dept of hell science]

I don't buy the 100% UK culture thing, it's transglobal underground cyber music with no fixed geographic points of cultural reference cos they're changing everyday as scale free networking dicates the spread of the muscial virus...

...the comparison to jungle is on the conscious tip

spiritual vibes minus the obvious ragga chatter that made jungle inspirational and that d'n'b cut out leaving empty soulless techy soundtraks to the apocalypse ...

...with dubstep as dark as it gets, it still generates a feeling of yearning and possibly hope

when it comes right down to it, it all came from the diaspora of JA...

Boxcutter reminds me of what Si Begg should be making or would if he made dubstep...

IMHO

[8bitwonder]

true true auralassassin i'd love to hear some pre-war house it sounds sick.

you sarcy bugger

[blackdown]

the first "house" record was pressed before the 1940's...

unless you're using some new meaning for the term 'house,' this isn't true is it?

The term 'house' came from Frankie Knuckles' club The Warehouse in Chicago in the late 1970s and early 1980s. As the pool of danceable disco records dried up and as the first drum machines became affordable by most musicians, they began extending and reworking disco tunes until house evolved.

A similar progression was in place in parallel with Larry Levan at the Paradise Garage in New York, hence the term 'garage.'

[auralassassin]

it obviously wasn't CALLED house then, but if you listen to the track, it's house music. it came from the early jazz era with a 4/4(four on the floor, as has been mentioned, not just 4/4 time) beat... in that era, most of the drummers were on the bigbeat, swing sound.. so it was way ahead of it's time, or behind--depending on your views on 4/4

I'm not contesting Frankie Knuckles, I'm just saying it had been done before either of them were even a stain in their moms panties.

[kion]

I think captain caveman beat them all to it.

[blackdown]

I don't buy the 100% UK culture thing, it's transglobal underground cyber music

you say this week-in, week-out - 'dubstep is net music' - but it's rubbish. the medium doesn't define a sound nor the culture it comes from.

there's websites on all categories of music, spreading information and music itself. because there's crunk available on iTunes does that now mean crunk is exclusively 'internet music' ? because rock can be burned to CD does that suggest that rock is in fact 'CD music' ? because broken beat gets played on 1Xtra, does that mean it's 'radio music.'

the suggestion that any form of music is defined by the medium it's broadcast by is actually false.

When the Dubstep forum went down for a month, dubstep went on. How does that work if it's exclusively 'cyber' music?

in essence you're trying to deal with the fact that you live in New Zealand but like English music. Now we all accept that dubstep has a committed international following, and that the next wave of interesting dubstep moves are being made worldwide.

but just because you live in NZ and like this sound now doesn't mean you can erase 6 years of graft by a group of committed London-based individuals. wake up cuzzy.

[clarkycatdealer]

i think this cyber nonsense has very little to do with the sound . . . but obviously it helped spread it faster. though even if the net didnt exist we'd still have breezeblock and rinse here...

also it is quite easy to draw lines between stuff which sounds similar by coincidence i mean ... with that house example , i think you can't take away the drug culture...sound systems that went with it and that. i mean mate there are four on the floor polka tunes , industrial noise tings , ,theres segments of classical music with a 4/4 its such a standard beat......

[clarkycatdealer]

also if what i'm listening to on a daily basis these days is "spaced out nuskool breaks" err i should fucking shoot myself.

[dept of hell science]

I don't buy the 100% UK culture thing, it's transglobal underground cyber music

you say this week-in, week-out - 'dubstep is net music' - but it's rubbish. the medium doesn't define a sound nor the culture it comes from.

the suggestion that any form of music is defined by the medium it's broadcast by is actually false.

When the Dubstep forum went down for a month, dubstep went on. How does that work if it's exclusively 'cyber' music?

in essence you're trying to deal with the fact that you live in New Zealand but like English music. Now we all accept that dubstep has a committed international following, and that the next wave of interesting dubstep moves are being made worldwide.

but just because you live in NZ and like this sound now doesn't mean you can erase 6 years of graft by a group of committed London-based individuals. wake up cuzzy.

i beg to differ cuzzy bro...

radio defines what music gets played, you do know about formats...

...mTV defines what videos get played

the preferred medium for dubstep is a big sound system so it has to have lots of bass...

...how's that for the medium defining the music ???

when the dubstep forum went down it already had momentum from a commited group of international followers. Try taking the net, the pirate streams and mp3 mixes away and see what happens to dubstep, besides I didn't say exclusively...

...hyperdub was the first to notice and spread the virus and through dubplate.net (note the dot NET!!!) it promoted new sounds but even then they weren't exclusively english or cultural

we don't do english cultural music anymore than you do jamaican music or detroit house or chicago garage music. We make trans global underground cyber music for the digital masses...

...you might not have noticed but there isn't much english about what we do cos we don't sound like a lot of what you do and i like a hell of a lot more than just english music

we managed without rinse and breezeblock in defining our sound but we couldn't have done it without the net...

...I'm not trying to erase anybodys 6yr graft cos we been into garage/breakstep since day one and spontaneously evolved alongside what is now considered dubstep

what it seems you as a journo is trying to do is retain some measure of cultural control over the sound by fixing into a strict english cultural frame of reference which is blatantly false and you know it while following in the tradition of dubplate culture which is elitist and counterproductive to both artists pockets and the masses who want a format that suits their 21st century lifestyle...

...I'm patiently waiting for the first music journo to actually pick up the cyber angle and run with it but since you're now actively involved in the scene/culture as a producer/DJ you have a vested interest to protect it or lose your place in it

I don't think it'll be you...

[blackdown]

...mTV defines what videos get played

*sigh* maybe this argument is a bit beyond you 'Mug? MTV exert editorial control over their channel, but this doesnt mean they culturally define what rap or rock is? if i play Dolly Parton over the DMZ soundsystem is she dubstep now? yawn.

...you might not have noticed but ...

what i have noticed is every single post you write is spam about your halfbaked productions. what i have noticed is you publically having a go yet privately sending me emails and PMs begging to be on this compilation or that project you hypocrite.

every time you post you act like a rotting troll. even when an entire online community tell you you're spamming them and your self promotion is ugly, immodest and counter to the humility displayed by lots of the scene, you still spam away.

And then you wonder why the big players, or even the small players, dont play your sound? even if you made the most genre-breaking tune i'd still wager no one would play it. you've shat in somone's garden seven nights a week and now are asking to come in for dinner!? You 'Mug.

what it seems you as a journo is trying to do is retain some measure of cultural control over the sound by fixing into a strict english cultural frame of reference which is blatantly false...

Seeing as you've never even been here 'Mug, this is particularly laughable bullshit. The sound evolved out of UK garage in London. For the best part of five years no one gave a fuck about this sound anywhere else.

Neither myself or anyone else in dubstep was trying 'retain' any 'strict english cultural frame' - we were trying the opposite, to expand the sound worldwide. why else was there a US Forward>> tour in 2002? why else did dubplate.net and Hyperdub get built? why else did Ammo export lots of their vinyl? why else did I start a blog?

i want to state this quite clearly though in case people have got it twisted: i'm excited about international dubstep outposts. I want the sound to get bigger and global. i look forward to the new albums from people all over the globe - and if they sound great, i'll back 'em.

and you know it while following in the tradition of dubplate culture which is elitist and counterproductive to both artists pockets and the masses who want a format that suits their 21st century lifestyle...

i think arguing about formats is anal and boring - you do it all the time and never listen.

i like dubs because they create an editorial barrier that ensures a tune is six times ( £5 12" v £30 10" ) better than others. they also ensure new music is heard and experiments can be tried quickly.

however if someone want to use final scratch, CDs or serrato to play new music that's cool. there are sonic consequences, but i'm sure they can be dealt with. it's not about the medium it's about the music.

you can't accuse me of dubplate eliteism. i single handedly set up the Bleep/Road page so Mugs like you could hear this sound. However you might talk about "masses who want a format that suits their 21st century lifestyle" but currently dubstep vinyl outsells MP3s - the people are voting against you.

...I'm patiently waiting for the first music journo to actually pick up the cyber angle and run with it but since you're now actively involved in the scene/culture as a producer/DJ you have a vested interest to protect it or lose your place in it

Give an idiot half an idea... I know you think it's wildly significant that I produce and write but get this into your head: the reality is i've been producing since 2001 so there's no 'now' about it. i'm also not the only person in the scene to be a producer and journalist at one time or another.

but perhaps though this explains why I'm a journalist and you're just an internet troll - sorry a 'Mug - because clearly you can't see that the 'cyber' angle is no angle at all. "ooh look some information got spread on an information spreading system called the internet" - hold the fucking front page!

please you wasteman, every time i see you post i wish you'd spend less time spamming and spouting shit, and a little more time listening. i doubt it will happen though.

[j_j]

owned!

[j_j]

Blackdown wrote ;what i have noticed is every single post you write is spam about your halfbaked productions. what i have noticed is you publically having a go yet privately sending me emails and PMs begging to be on this compilation or that project you hypocrite.



LOOOOL !!!

[kion]

Blackdown - in a nutshell!

[7 below]

Ha ha ha ha ha aha aha....

especially like the 'mug reference..

[dept of hell science]

that's more like it blackdown...

...finally a bit of passion now if only you could transmute that to your boring music that is both dull and lifeless

I'd stick to writing from the sidelines if I was you...

BTW I sent you one email asking you if kode9 was accepting submissions for dubstep allstars 3 and one PM asking if bleep was selling original mixes of a single artist, hardly begging and nowhere near hypocritical you arrogant twat ...

and didn't someone say before something about "100% british mash up culture" which is what i still don't buy but it's obvious you do...

...so get this, we didn't evolve our sound out of london, we don't make cultural music but we did evolve at the same time, yes, out of garage and for 5 years we did give a fuck and still do. Thanks for setting up bleep/road but we were listening to and buying shit the whole while before you did that

See that's what cracks me up, is now that dubstep is the next big thing it's suddenly getting promoted as a UK underound thing but it's far more than that now and that's the angle I think someone needs to write about. How this music differs from others is that it evolved on line in real time across the globe...

...hyperdub and dubplate.net weren't about cultural exclusive music and at a guess i'd say you probabaly started a blog to foister your opinions on others and started producing for the fame and the chix like everyone else

you know, I used to think it was about having players play out our sound, getting vinyl pressed, about kissing arse and blagging tunes which i'm sure as a music journo you'd know all about but it's not. It's about creating art for the masses breaking even and not giving a shit who plays it or what happens to it after it enters the public domain

ugly, immodest spam ??? I'd say hype and self promotion in a music forum but no worse than blogging or myspace of which i am philosophically opposed to

i look forward to the new albums from people all over the globe - and if they sound great, i'll back 'em.

...unless it's from us which makes you a hypocrite and a liar but then again that's why you're a journo and why I'm not

...lastly try telling the kids who watch MTV that their editorial control doesn't define hiphop culture for them and they'll probably jack you for your laptop and shoes

thanx for responding though

[blackdown]

Next!

[dept of hell science]

AIR