Juan Atkins has never had a S&D thread...

the techno you can buy at "out music" record stores is dubstep

Ha yeah that too.

Not necessarily a diss - obv I liked Kompakt in 2001!

"whereas what I infer in people's fanboyism for neuvo dub-techno is an identification with its air of privation"

privation analogous in meaning to "out music" record stores?

i think tim means exclusivity

or maybe he really means privation, i dunno ... though i doubt there's anybody who seriously thinks dub-techno is a healthy aesthetic ordeal in the same way ∅ records are

i have a suspicion about nuevo dub techno because it's like, "we're here. again?" like lots of other techno and house this year. however i appreciate the way the arc of time has descended on the music and a de facto lazy suspicion (my own, i mean) is often proved wrong by the quality of the tracks. it's not "shabby chic" ya know? faux aged or reliant on credibility thru association. it's like real chic: expand on or within the details of an artist/label's output, create a micro-genre, and do it with exceedingly high quality. like the mikkel metal album for example or even the "starlight" remixes in question or andy stott or the coldest season, which has become one of those go-to albums for me when i can't decide what else to play.

xp, ha

A little bit exclusivity, but also "privation" in the sense of, I dunno, isolationism. But obv not as extreme as a lot of stuff in out music stores. This stuff is the out-music equivalent of chill-out perhaps; which makes dubstep the out-music equivalent of those bass mixes designed for playing from your soup-car speakers while patrolling the block.

it's so formulaic, some of the dub techno, even when I like something on say, Sandwell District it's like, this is just a big slab of music with a very clear dimension of gloom to it but there's no multifacted way to like it, it's just so easy to praise lazily.

maybe it just depends on whether you like your musical pleasure with rigor or your pleasure to just be floaty and nice (have the words "warm blanket of fuzz" ever been used to describe this music?). depends on the day, right? btw, my listening model is almost always daydream-mode. xp, again.

you know, i'm generally skeptical of most dub techno because i feel like Basic Channel did it best. however....

"a lot of shopping malls play a sort of house music that you don't hear in clubs too much, which is heavy on melody, eg all those "bargrooves" compilations. I agree with the above poster that dub house/techno in 2008 (esp the Detroit guys like Scott/Huckaby etc) is veering towards this territory, albeit with a great deal more respect given. it's some seriously gloopy shit which is great to listen to but can't imagine dancing to it apart from perhaps way afterhours.

― Local Garda"

is straight nonsense. perhaps it is best experienced when played on a system that allows the bass to properly pummel you, but that shit when done right is deep dance music 100%. Patrice Scott (can't see why he is getting lumped in with dubby shit) and Mike Huckaby are definitely doin it right.

"I sort of think of dub-techno as th stuff they play at vinyl stores as a counterpoint to the uptempo stuff. Or maybe that's just the only place I tend to hear it in public.

― Tim F"

this probably goes without saying, but you are simply listening to the wrong disc jockeys.

http://www.ngfl-cymru.org.uk/fact_or_opinion.gif

Fact:
1. Dub techno is just like any other genre. Some of it is really formulaic, and some of it isn't. If you like it at all, it is necessary, as with any other genre, to do the hard work and figure out what records are really pushing the boundaries.
2. Dub techno records do attract a certain fanboy contingent that can be off-putting to what I guess could be called the anti-purist.
3. Ultimately the purists and anti-purists are both necessary in this music to keep each other honest.
4. Like any other type of record, a dub techno record can be functional depending on the context and the DJ.

Opinion:
1. There is a certain laziness is how reverential SOME of these records are.
2. I think there is something vaguely cynical about the current preponderance of dub techno and house records that are always coming out in limited pressings of 500 with colored vinyl; this phenomenon seems to simultaneously exploit purists and make it hard for the "normal" lover of this music to get their hands on things. This is especially a problem when the label is a European one and the buyer is in America.
3. I think there is more reason to be suspicious of some of the discourse around "non-functional" 4/4 music than the music itself. I love Lawrence, play his records at home and when I DJ (sometimes even in the middle of the night! Contrast is important to me.).
4. Some of the nu-detroit-basic-channel stuff os fairly by the numbers. The "Starlight" remixes are above average but not the greatest example of this kind of music.

"I think there is more reason to be suspicious of some of the discourse around "non-functional" 4/4 music than the music itself. I love Lawrence, play his records at home and when I DJ (sometimes even in the middle of the night! Contrast is important to me.)."

Yeah this is right - as per my comment upthread I almost feel like I approach all this stuff a bit to sceptically owing to the typicality of its praise, and then I'm pleasantly surprised by how great a lot of it is.

""Starlight" remixes are above average but not the greatest example of this kind of music"

what are some, in your view, better examples of this kind of music? cause i dig the starlight remixes and would love to hear stuff that is similar

I am just now since the beginning of this month trying to catch up with techno after a long hiatus... so i can most more releases as this process continues...
so far, I think that on echospace itself, my favorite release is the Intrusion 2x12 (echospace 7). i also like the convextion lp that came out a couple of years ago on Down Low Music. his early singles are hard to find and cost a bunch of money. If you can find them for less than $40, go ahead and pick them up, especially the first release on Matrix and also his release on Tektite. Also check out Ornaments Music, which has like 5 or 6 releases now. Some of them are exceptional. Obviously Basic Channel and Chain Reaction. There are plenty of threads on those labels.

Anyways, I don't know how experienced you are and whether these records were already all well known to you or not... but these are good places to start.

"3. I think there is more reason to be suspicious of some of the discourse around "non-functional" 4/4 music than the music itself. I love Lawrence, play his records at home and when I DJ (sometimes even in the middle of the night! Contrast is important to me.)."

to the "dance critics" on here, if its not lowest common denominator peak hour Ibiza crapola, it cant possibly be effective on dancefloors. this is why i wonder what the dance culture theyre taking part in is like. if i played most of the tracks they line up to praise at one of my gigs, i'd probably be chased from the building and asked not to return. of course when i drop one of those boring Sistrum records like the recent Mike Edge one, the crowd goes nuts. culture makes a huge difference.

"4. Some of the nu-detroit-basic-channel stuff os fairly by the numbers. The "Starlight" remixes are above average but not the greatest example of this kind of music.

― Shh! It's NOT Me!"

of the actual artists from Detroit, who are the ones making the bad dub tracks? Deepchord mix of Pacou was one of their best dancefloor moments, Modell's "Incense & Black Lights" is diverse as hell in its texture and mood, Luke Hess' 2nd Fxhe 12" adds even more to the sound palette, etc. sure, some of the excessive remix comps (Starlight, Vantage Isle, Miranda, etc) have been unnecessary and redundant as well as ridiculous with the limited colored vinyl thing (which i was critical of over a year ago already on my blog, not a new issue) but even those seem to be less obnoxious when played beginning to end on CD instead of trying to pick out one track to put in a deejay mix. to me the laziest record in this style was the Sebo K joint that straight jacked a Basic Channel loop.

which basic channel and what sebo k track?

i don't mean that in a snarky way or in a "prove your mad track id skillz" way. i am just curious.

slight mistake on my part, the track is by "sebbo", not "sebo k". jeez guys, can't we find a better name?

http://www.discogs.com/release/1277283

jacked loop is from one of the Quadrant tracks as per the note on that link. moritz's rmx is of course brilliant, though.

i guess moritz wasn't as offended as you were

"i guess moritz wasn't as offended as you were

― moonship journey to baja"

did i say i was offended? i said it was lazy, which is absolutely true.

i get what you're saying, but ... i can't kick this feeling when it hits ...

man i loved both sides (well, i bought the mp3s) of that sebbo single!

i bought "ocean to ocean" today. i never knew "infoworld" had an actual vinyl release. wooooooooo

time, space, transmat

the track is by "sebbo", not "sebo k". jeez guys, can't we find a better name?

yeah thanks for that 'pipecock'

o_O username

"i get what you're saying, but ... i can't kick this feeling when it hits ...

man i loved both sides (well, i bought the mp3s) of that sebbo single!"

well it seems to me that most of the Detroit dub techno crowd puts a heavy emphasis on their sound creation techniques from Rod Modell's field recordings and crazy tweaking to Huckaby's mastering of the Waldorf Wave synthesizer. to me that is much less "by the numbers" than just sampling the guys who created the genre in the first place.....

"i bought "ocean to ocean" today. i never knew "infoworld" had an actual vinyl release. wooooooooo

― tricky"

gotta love that whole 12"!

the field recordings are definitely a nice touch and it's true that mastery of gear (even software gear) is admirable, but i think sometimes that these discussions come down to whether the songs are good or not regardless of the blood sweat and tears that went into their creation. the original sebbo is a great mixing tool because of the way it builds through the chanting. it sounds even better if you play it with the moritz von oswald remix at the same time.

"the field recordings are definitely a nice touch and it's true that mastery of gear (even software gear) is admirable, but i think sometimes that these discussions come down to whether the songs are good or not regardless of the blood sweat and tears that went into their creation."

i'm not going to disagree with that, the final product is always the most important thing. of course to me, most Huckaby and a pretty decent % of Deepchord stuff has a high quality final product. i still listen to Basic Channel and Rhythm and Sound much more than any of the knock offs, though that Incense & Blacklight has been getting lots of play from me this year.

"the original sebbo is a great mixing tool because of the way it builds through the chanting. it sounds even better if you play it with the moritz von oswald remix at the same time.

― tricky"

i like the moritz mix, which is really a whole other track that to my ears has nothing to do with the "original" which i listened to once when i got the record in the mail. it doesn't do it for me.

yeah the remix is definitely the better of the two. the way it ends is like a study of how to very delicately dismember an entire track through dubbing until it dissolves into nothing. at the same time it's like this total swamp of sound. one of these days i will pick up the record.

"yeah the remix is definitely the better of the two. the way it ends is like a study of how to very delicately dismember an entire track through dubbing until it dissolves into nothing. at the same time it's like this total swamp of sound. one of these days i will pick up the record.

― tricky"

indeed, it really does almost completely go away. i did this really nice mix one day that i didnt record in which i was mixing out of the Watamu Beach rmx into M5, it really sounded like they belonged together with the wispyness of the end of the WBrmx floating over the deep beats of the Maurizio jam. i was pretty impressed with myself ;)

haha that is why i record everything! i end up with lots and lots of crap, but there are always ideas worth salvaging. i was listening to this old swayzak mix today and they segued from a really early ellen allien electro track into maurizio by simply letting the allien track play out, but it was one of the best transitions in the mix. it was just yeahhhhhh..super smooth.

i'm usually too lazy to fire up the computer, plus my off the cuff mixes are usually just me forcing whatever new things i've picked up in any genre together which tends to have poor results just about 100% of the time. M5, M7, and Phylyps Trak II are just about always close by because they go so well with just about anything!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4T71yV387H8

How fucking spacey amazing is this?

pretty fucking spacey amazing

Saw Model 500 live last weekend at Paradiso as part of Sonic Acts (same evening/venue as Pauline Oliveros!), and they were astonishing - one of the best gigs I've been to in ages; up there w/Kraftwerk. Had no idea it was a four-dude-at-synths affair live, and that one of said dudes was Mike Banks!

picked up "deep space for pennies" largely it is STINKAH!

'Mind & Body' might be worthy of a minor re-appraisal. Amidst the pooh there's a couple of decent tracks - namely It's time, Tipsy and Incredible (dated vocals not withstanding). His collab with 4hero (The Fusion Formula) is probably his best foray into d&b however.

He always brings some great tunes as a DJ (plus some clunkers!)