funky house sceptics, let me draw your attention to this

I think that for stuff that's not commercialy available (or very very difficult to come by) I kind of turn a blind eye. Same goes for if it's a constructive point in a discussion (ie Tim's EOY round-ups). That's not official mod policy though.

Any "could you please YSI this?" and links to commercially available tracks purely for the intention of giving them away for free get zapped.

"meltdown" is on this ill blu minimix too - http://www.urb.com/2010/07/23/ill-blu-exclusive-qa-minimix-via-kcrw/ - it's ok!

i think my favourite altered natives track is prob the last on their album, "rage of aquarius", the really acidy one with those "i'm a bad girl" samples, this is lots of fun too - similar bass action.

"i pretty much love them all except "house girls", when i played the youtube i was like...is that it? this is what y'all have been hyping up so much?"

if you dont like house girls you dont really like funky.

haha awes - marcus & bassboy's 'you dirty shitta' now features mc majestic doing his old "silly billy chlamyddi" safe sex lyric on top

wish cooly g would stop singing.

for that reason dont much like her new track up in my head (though it has some nice relaxed jungle techno vibes about it). phat si is the one.

haha awes - marcus & bassboy's 'you dirty shitta' now features mc majestic doing his old "silly billy chlamyddi" safe sex lyric on top

I know exactly what this will sound like but still... when can I hear this.

"up in my head" is cooly doing what cooly does, "phat si" is amazing though.

her voice is almost always flat though.

idk, it just sounds crap to me. like an imitation of vocal samples from sampling cds for producers.

well it's decoration rather than Singing Songs innit, like what cassy does (and miss kittin live)

I would rather hear Cooly G singing everytime without fail, than the bland and infantile attempts at romance that seem to dominate female vocals in funky. I mean, how old are you guys - or is it just some crypto-pedo, voyeuristic pleasure you take in listening to children court each other.

Anyway, exactly what is cool about Cooly's her voice is that she makes it sound like samples.

I would rather hear Cooly G singing everytime without fail, than the bland and infantile attempts at romance that seem to dominate female vocals in funky. I mean, how old are you guys - or is it just some crypto-pedo, voyeuristic pleasure you take in listening to children court each other.

This is a really bad argumentative strategy.

"Anyway, exactly what is cool about Cooly's her voice is that she makes it sound like samples."

except she doesnt.
she just tries to.
its sort of like the roots attempting to sound like their tracks are made from samples, instead of sounding like the band that everyone can plainly hear they are.

@ titchy

You're just wrong!

@ tim

Is that any better ;)

you know what, the main thing i dislike about them, is that she seems so self conscious in trying to generate 'soulfulness' and a certain dreaminess with her singing. more than that, i dont really buy it. shes just a bedroom singer. if it was something where its meant to be rough, i wouldnt care so much. but cos shes trying to convey Real Feeling and do it professionally, im a bit tougher on her. all the tracks people liked of hers originally were instrumental so idk why hyperdub keep releasing these ones.

What's wrong with bedroom singers? At least she has the scruples to not unleash a full vocal on the world, which is more than you can say for some of the vocals in this thread.

I think lots of people really liked 'love dub' as well. I've heard enough people play it out.

Maybe the label likes the tracks. that would be an obvious answer to your conundrum.

I don't have a problem with Cooly G's singing - with a very few exceptions her vocals seem to be the kind of thing that would neither define nor "undo" her tracks really, and focusing on them excessively (whether positively or negatively) looks a bit fetishistic IMO but yr mileage may vary.

But jon the kind of exceptionalist argument you're making here (to borrow a tag from Tom E) totally works against you. I know you think that I hate dubstep et al but consistently coming onto the thread and bashing funky for being funky kinda erodes yr credibility to make pronouncements on the topic. "At least its better than (insert thing I disapprove of)" is both a lame defence and kinda small-minded and moralistic (only about something to which no actual moral code really applies). If Cooly's singing is awesome then you should be able to come up with a positive explanation as to why this is the case rather than simply congratulating her for not being an R&B diva.

FTR Farah and Miss Fire and Katy B are all amazing and blow Cooly's singing out of the water, but that isn't necessarily a rod for Cooly's back given she's a producer first and a singer way way way second.

I have my criticisms of dubstep, sure, but I could very easily put together a mix-tape which extols the virtues of each track for being an example of dubstep qua dubstep. I find it difficult to take seriously any position which appears to consist entirely of "if this is a good example of genre X it's because it avoids the pitfalls which typify genre X."

"I would rather hear Cooly G singing everytime without fail, than the bland and infantile attempts at romance that seem to dominate female vocals in funky. I mean, how old are you guys - or is it just some crypto-pedo, voyeuristic pleasure you take in listening to children court each other."

argument also falls flat in lieu of do you mind which has one of the most adolescent girl next door vocals ever but is also maybe still the best funky song ever (sorry tim, i know you probably have lots of recent tracks you think that about!).

I am interested in this hypothetical mix tape.

Would/could be a mixture of tracks from Horsepower Productions, DJ Abstract, Hatcha, Mark One, Mala/DMZ, Skream, D1, Scuba, Burial, Pinch, Kode 9, Peverelist, Silkie & Quest, 2562, Ramadanman, Martyn, Vaccine, Toasty, Jus Wan, Pangaea, TRG, Geiom, SLT Mob, Shackleton, Forsaken, Kromestar (this is not a blanket endorsement of everything done by all of these artists BTW).

I wouldn't characterise myself as a dubstep "fan", and there's definitely certain, um, choices, it has made as a genre which I would consider to be sub-optimal. But I still think I can get a lot out of a broad swathe of the genre operating on its own terms. Martin has suggested in the past (and i'm paraphrasing here but i think this was his gist) that the fact that i've never really liked Loefah basically means that I don't like dubstep (assuming Loefah = dubstep ground zero in certain ways). But I wouldn't suggest that someone wasn't a funky fan if they disliked Crazy Cousinz but liked stuff by (say) Fuzzy Logick, Devine Collective and Major Notes. Dubstep and funky are both broad enough - and have been for long enough - that you can pick and choose among a variety of strands.

Whereas I think (and I'm reluctant to start this whole argument again but...) talking about a style as if it's only successful when it deviates from the style's "standard" approaches is basically saying "I don't really like this style."

But I could be misreading Jon's position. I've invited him previously to identify any funky he enjoys outside of Cooly/Roska/Scratcha, and talk about what he likes in it.

I really like Cooly G's singing, it works on a bunch of levels for me. focusing on them isnt fetishistic, it's fair as they are one of her unique selling points (otherwise she just makes dark percussive house). Where so many uk funky singers fall down for me is they aspire to be some hyperpolished r&b singer, usually by over embellishing everything badly, and pale in comparison. some of them succeed and when they do its amazing but many dont.

But this is my positive explanation: Cooly by contrast just samples herself and buries in the sample in the mix, it's quite dubby and especially burial approach which is probably why dubsteppers have taken to her and perhaps funky purists see this as a failing of some kind but at least it's an alternative take for the genre.

i also like her london rudeness, in her accent and use of slang. it's a real strength for me and adds identity, makes it local rather than global and adds some feminine pressure.

talking about a style as if it's only successful when it deviates from the style's "standard" approaches is basically saying "I don't really like this style.... "if this is a good example of genre X it's because it avoids the pitfalls which typify genre X."

You may hate this argument but why not avoid pitfalls? everyone has parts of genres they don't care for? you can like a style but see how you could like it more. i'm far more interested in uk funky being uk funky than uk funky trying to be the worst end of r&b.

this whole argument assumes a genre has a "standard". some do and some dont to a lesser degree and most go through a transition from "dont" to "do" as they emerge. so the concept of "deviation" depends on how tightly the "standard" has been put into place at a given time. in this case funky is so broad right now that i think it's fair to say you can like non-standards without implying you dont like funky as a whole surely?

the trackier end of funky has been trumping the vocal end for a while now imo. and i dont even mean the stuff that fact/RA/dubstep people like, im talking what you hear on a marcus/other pirate show.

the trouble with referring to a genre's "standards" is that everyone seems to have different ones (some like the r&b vox, some don't, some like radio MCs, some don't &c &c). hence why this thread constantly devolves into hysterical "that's not funky!!!" policing or unpleasant "if you don't like this you don't like funky!!!" accusations. i mean tim, didn't you write not long ago that part of funky's thrill is that it was a genre in flux and you didn't know where it'd head next?

i don't think any of the specific traits we're talking about are inherently good or bad, it's about what you do with them. the tracks that have caught my ear the most this year pretty much range across the spectrum of funky.

Haha Lex I think you ARE actually posting things that are totally outside funky eg that Kingdom EP and the Benga track (and I think you are doing this deliberately in as a bit of "my genre boundaries are wider than yours" friendly one-upmanship). It's be a bit like posting a load of Stanton Warriors MP3s on a 2-step thread ten years ago.

I mean, surely we all agree that funky is essentially anchored by a particular kind of beat and everything is in flux around that basic rhythmic framework? Ie it can be anything sonically but not rhythmically.

I think the problem with a lot of funky diva vocals is that, to paraphrase Tim from some other thread I've forgotten, there's maybe a bit too much swoon at the expense of the snap. This is why Egypt rules, basically.

i didn't post the kingdom ep!! and wouldn't have posted it here anyway.

I mean, surely we all agree that funky is essentially anchored by a particular kind of beat and everything is in flux around that basic rhythmic framework? Ie it can be anything sonically but not rhythmically.

this doesn't really feel intuitively right, though i can't really think of examples as i'm much more interested in the sonix. i still think the fact that "stupid" and "katy on a mission" have different tempos is negligible compared to the many similarities - sonic, thematic, the similar vocal approaches of roses gabor and katy b to the track.

Yes but Redlight is an outlier anyway, so saying that 'Katy On A Mission' is funky because it bares some similarity to 'Stupid' doesn't hold, it's taking that one extra jump out of the genre. You're using false genre unifiers.

Themes, vocals approaches and bass noises aren't really core elements of funky so you can't use them to draw those sort of connections. There's not really any thread that connects 'Get Low', 'Can You Kiss Me There', 'Holy Ghost' and 'Heads Shoulders Knees & Toes' other than a rhythmic one.

i didn't post the kingdom ep!! and wouldn't have posted it here anyway.

This presumably an accident then?

it was a quote of someone else who had already posted it

i never really know where to post british urban music stuff any more here. like, i'd have no idea where to put goldielocks' excellent new single. but like british politics, it's something that ilx really knows how to suck the fun out of compared to IRL conversations.

lex seems to just enjoy the now-old 'oh wow everything is in so much flux how can anyone possibly KNOW where it fits?!?!' hype. hence posting kingdom in this thread when it doesnt belong, and posting dubstep like that benga track here as well. or maybe he just has tin ears.

me personally i seem to have the funnest political discussions when i'm talking to politicians i support

weird huh

Once again lots of people go out of their way to misread what I write so as to paint me as some sort of genre police officer. In fact I wrote this:

But I wouldn't suggest that someone wasn't a funky fan if they disliked Crazy Cousinz but liked stuff by (say) Fuzzy Logick, Devine Collective and Major Notes. Dubstep and funky are both broad enough - and have been for long enough - that you can pick and choose among a variety of strands.

Martin then replies to say "no no you're wrong" only to say the exact same thing back to me.

All I was actually saying is that Jon only seems to come into this thread to congratulate stuff on the grounds that it doesn't sound like 99% of the funky-which-he-dislikes. And I said that if your approach is to only like a thing to the extent that it starts to turn into something else, well, doesn't that by definition suggest you don't really like the original thing. Which is fine, but, like, why would it convince anyone in this thread to agree?

You may hate this argument but why not avoid pitfalls? everyone has parts of genres they don't care for? you can like a style but see how you could like it more. i'm far more interested in uk funky being uk funky than uk funky trying to be the worst end of r&b.

(a) what is your definition of "uk funky being uk funky"? Does it involve an absence of vocals influenced by R&B?

(b) I'd be interested to know what an actual example of "uk funky trying to be the worst end of r&b". What is "the worst end of r&b" anyway? This seems like a strawman to me.

(incidentally, Lex, while you're very quick to criticise me for being "hysterical" in this thread, I note that it's the only thread in which you'll always give a free pass to people sticking the boot into R&B)

I think the problem with a lot of funky diva vocals is that, to paraphrase Tim from some other thread I've forgotten, there's maybe a bit too much swoon at the expense of the snap. This is why Egypt rules, basically.

While this has some merit I think, the "problem with a lot of funky diva vocals" IMO is simply that the songwriting is inconsistent and not all of the vocalists are actually any good. I don't know that it needs accusations of secret pedophiliac tendencies on the part of listeners to explain it.

Should probably have pointed out that swoon/snap thing came from a discussion that was entirely unrelated to funky, think it was some 'L-Jag tries get into r&b' thread.

Need to say this: Still kinda amazed that in a thread where Jon says:

I would rather hear Cooly G singing everytime without fail, than the bland and infantile attempts at romance that seem to dominate female vocals in funky. I mean, how old are you guys - or is it just some crypto-pedo, voyeuristic pleasure you take in listening to children court each other.

... I'm the one who gets jumped on.

for the record i completely disagree with anyone dissing r&b in any way & think that r&b vocals and romantic lyrics can only be a good thing for funky or dubstep or whatever - i just wish more of the singers in question would stamp their personality on their tracks more, tear the focus away from the producers sometimes, rather than just being voices for hire. katy b seems to be doing this, which is a positive, though sadly more people here seemed to want to keep her out of the thread for doing it over a slightly different tempo.

i don't really see the point in engaging with jon.

I just assumed everyone thought that crypto-paedo comment was so ludicrous than they weren't going to dignify it with a response.

Katy B is great, absolutely, but if tearing the focus away from funky producers = doing a dubstep tune, I'm not sure what this means for funky positive or negative.

i meant tearing the focus away from the producer of the track she's on, ie benga - like "katy on a mission" isn't foremost a benga production with anyone on vocals, it's a katy b song produced by benga. if an album and actual viable solo career is in the pipeline i'm sure she'll do a ton of funky stuff, if she has a particularly important partnership going it's prob w/geeneus.

ike "katy on a mission" isn't foremost a benga production with anyone on vocals, it's a katy b song produced by benga.

is it churlish of me to suggest this is the case because the music is much more boring than "As I" and "Tell Me"?

If you mainly mean who it's billed to, well, only a handful of funky singers have had enough success to actually start meriting songs being billed to them - Miss Fire obv (it helps she produces as well), Ny, Katy B, Egypt. Farah seems to be credited with her songs as much as Screama is.

Seems to be a rule that when the songs are billed to the singer they tend to do less well, sadly e.g. Ny's "Dangerous" was brilliant but no one got behind it.

Sorry for bustin' in here. I don't really know anything about this here genre, so erm, could anyone recommend some good compilations/artists/producers I could check out, please? I would read through the thread but my computer would explode if I tried to load 2593 posts. Thanks!

The Ministry of Sound and Rinse FM funky compilations are probably your best starting point if you want an overview of the genre and the main players with the aid of actually knowing what the tracks are.

(long time reader, first time poster)

like "katy on a mission" isn't foremost a benga production with anyone on vocals, it's a katy b song produced by benga.

i don't think that's quite right. it started off as an instrumental way back last year and only recently got the vocal treatment precisely because the beat was so popular. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mOKTC9tboKs

"the "problem with a lot of funky diva vocals" IMO is simply that the songwriting is inconsistent and not all of the vocalists are actually any good. I don't know that it needs accusations of secret pedophiliac tendencies on the part of listeners to explain it."

i think this is the first time tim f has ever agreed with people on this.

still dont know how man on a mission ever got popular in the first place though. it was better when it was produced by bless beats and called wearing my rolex.

The Ministry of Sound and Rinse FM funky compilations are probably your best starting point if you want an overview of the genre and the main players with the aid of actually knowing what the tracks are.

― Matt DC, Friday, 30 July 2010 13:11 (3 hours ago)
Thanks, Matt. I'll check those out.

check this out, too, it was posted upthread but its beneath the fold

i think this is the first time tim f has ever agreed with people on this.

It's a fairly uncontroversial point really. Not all vocal tunes are amazing. OH MY GOD. Indict uk funky now. But not all the tunes in any of funky's strands are amazing. Not all the tunes in any genre are amazing. (I don't go out of my way to identify for them everyone here because, well, why would I waste my time and yours?)

It's like saying "I'd listen to more house but not every house tune i've heard rocks my world, seriously this genre has real probs."

In a year that has produced so many fantastic vocal tunes I don't think some duff ones or middling ones are a serious cause for concern.

But this is the structure of complaint that everyone adopts when they want to explain their lack of greater engagement with a genre, creating this fantasy of endless parades of indistinguishable sub-standard product, but when pressed they find it difficult to name more than one or two examples.

And then, of course, when they do want to congratulate something, it's in comparison to this fantasy of indentikit bad product.

the trouble with referring to a genre's "standards" is that everyone seems to have different ones (some like the r&b vox, some don't, some like radio MCs, some don't &c &c).

I'm going back to this because again it was a misreading of what I wrote that kinda can help me tease out my position on all of this: I didn't refer to the term "standard" in the sense of benchmark of quality, but rather "standard" as a put-down, i.e. typical, generic, unadventurous. My issue with this approach to thinking about genre (that is, setting up some notion of what is generic and then measuring the distance of any particular track from the generic in order to assess its worth) is, in line with my point above, the fact that it involves setting up a notion of the generic before you've examined it enough to work out what actually is generic in the negative sense rather than "generic" in the sense of "it sounds like its genre". e.g. when Martin talks about "the worst end of R&B", this is premised on the assumption that you simply can dismiss a significant minority of R&B without examination.

Like, I think Miss Fire is far and away the best diva in funky at this point - Farah might beat her ultimately but hasn't done enough - because of the way in which she always manages to make a certain softness and restraint sound like restraint, like she's brushing the tips of your ears with her vocals rather than unleashing the full onslaught so that you the listener will go to her. There's a beckoning, "come hither" vibe to her vocals which I think is pretty intoxicating. Meanwhile that slightly nasal quality to her vocals gives them a very personable quality, letting her sound unrehearsed (in a good sense) even when she's deploying laser-precision micro-melisma.

Youtube links:

Miss Fire - It's You

Miss Fire - Falling (DJ Naughty Remix)

Miss Fire - Take Off Your Clothes

Barber Bizzle ft. Miss Fire - Do You Feel The Same

Digital Dubstar ft. Miss Fire - Can't Say No

But Miss Fire's attractions simply won't emerge if you're framing this in terms of "generic R&B vocals vs Cooly G." Those kinda contrasts are gonna prevent you from getting to the heart of what is interesting about Cooly G as much as any R&B-influenced funky.

miss fire is hilariously grumpy on twitter. one of my fav things by her is that random "writer's block" tune she uploaded a while back. i don't think any of her songs really work as songs though.