New Burial album. More info?

great thread

to me, the NSB and garage things were totally separate. NSB basically had nothing to do with house, and even comparatively little to do with jungle compared to 2-step. tim did a nice job running down alot of the jungle=>2-step production ties, but in an even more generalized manner check how many 2-step tracks used identical samples or even recreated old school jungle tracks (off the top of my head i can remember "worries in the dance", "super sharp shooter", the fugees "ready or not", etc etc all of which shows that direct debt to jungle). there was some crossover with modern D&B and NSB around 01 or so (man, i cant remember the label or the artists on it that springs immediately to mind, i know itll hit me later...) which i find to be the most close relation of NSB to anything else. breakbeat garage to me seemed like the same set of influences as 2-step, but with the emphasis on the jungle roots moreso than the house roots (which in some tracks might be nearly completely removed, some of Deekline's stuff falls in here). NSB and more modern D&B were like the bad offshoots of the more interesting parts of the hardcore=>jungle=>2-step path.

to me, the NSB and garage things were totally separate. NSB basically had nothing to do with house, and even comparatively little to do with jungle compared to 2-step

did you, when this shit first came out ever listen to breakstep, breakbeat garage, speed garage, 4X4 garage, prog house, tearout and bassline which all crossed over into breaks and back again...

...it's so easy to draw lines now and exclude stuff but at the time d'n'b was an exclusive beast of a genre with not much room for anything else courtesy of the massive egos of many in the scene aqnd cos of the extreme bpm's it reached

all those other genres were mixable and has been mentioned woith the stantons they did it to superb effect on stanton sessions 1...

...nuskool was/is not bad. It was/is funky and danceable at its best and tired and plodding at its worst. One thing about burial is there aint much funk in it and barely danceable so does that make it tired and plodding ???

...time will tell

great thread

-- That one guy that hit it and quit it, Sunday, 25 November 2007 20:56 (1 hour ago) Link

Question: How did "Untrue" become the token dubstep album of 2007 for the indie crowd?

they all met in chicago and voted on it

http://home.uchicago.edu/~jniimi/keithjessmatos.JPG

This album's pretty good. I liked the first one too.

Just so I don't feel left out here, there are like a hundred people internationally who can list the identifying characteristics of dubstep, 2 step, uk garage, breaks, whatever the hell breaks subgenres keep getting name-checked, etc. -- right? This is the beardiest crap I've walked into in years.

I'd hazard a guess that Burial's doing well because the music is fairly immediate, accessible to a larger crowd, and plays fairly well for home listening. The fact that the mysterious background thing plays as a good soundbite for writer fodder doesn't hurt, either. Are there more than a handful of dubstep guys actually releasing albums of material rather than mixes or compilations (which usually scream "file me at the end of the CD rack")?

pollywog the important thing to note here is that jungle and drum & bass refer to slightly different things.

You're right that there was not much if any crossover between 2-step and late 90s/early 00s drum & bass - the point being that the *jungle* producers that went into 2-step garage did so at the moment or even before the moment that it turned into drum & bass, possibly alienated by the directions the scene was taking for reasons both sonic and social.

If you're comparing 2-step to, say, Bad Company, then of course you're not going to hear much crossover. You need to go back to the hardcore and jungle records of 92-95 really - e.g. Fabulous Baker Boys' remaking Jonny L's "Hurt U So" into speed garage track "Oh Boy", Future Underground Nation remaking DJ Tactix's "The Way" etc.

As for the role of 2-step, I think Bass's original point is correct here: it was 2-step that really made UK Garage into something sustainably distinct from normal house and garage per se, it was the moment that the link to "garage" in the traditional sense became tenuous. It was also UK Garage's high water mark commercially and creatively... for all of grime's qualities, the 2-step era had a shitload more brilliant tracks - perhaps largely because its relatively improved commercial standing made it more economically viable to make the music. Finally, MC-based garage and dubstep both emerged as substrains of 2-step, both taking quite a while to find their own distinct beat-matrix (grime doing so properly in 2002, dubstep not really doing so until 2004 - people who pretend that Horsepower Productions and El-B were on some totally different tip to the rest of garage are just being revisionist).

Arguably the reason that dubstep and grime prospered as genres in their own right is precisely because they remained faithful to 2-step's primary rhythmic emphasis of jittery syncopation (c.f. the relatively smoothed out flow of breakbeat, which is why breakbeat garage and breakstep were and only ever could be cross-pollinated sub-genres).

Finally, the 2-step sound was actually much more resilient than people give it credit for, pretty much dominating "garage" from late 1997 to early 2002. That's four and a half years. Compare that to jungle, grime and dubstep where no particular rhythmic matrix has been able to survive and prosper for nearly so long, let alone remain progressive and mutational for that entire period (c.f. late-era drum & bass, where trudgy post-techstep beats have only survived due to the creative stagnation o the scene).

"Just so I don't feel left out here, there are like a hundred people internationally who can list the identifying characteristics of dubstep, 2 step, uk garage, breaks, whatever the hell breaks subgenres keep getting name-checked, etc. -- right? This is the beardiest crap I've walked into in years."

Well this is precisely why I think the notion that Burial's success rests on him crafting elegies to "dead" sounds and scenes is so difficult to sustain.

I'd say the vocal element (along with his ambient/atmospheric arrangements) would be the dividing line for this album.

You either like them or you don't.

Personally I do, but if I was handing this to someone unfamiliar with UK garage I would ask them if they like trip-hop.

"Well this is precisely why I think the notion that Burial's success rests on him crafting elegies to "dead" sounds and scenes is so difficult to sustain."

for real. the hairsplitting of genre here is simultaneously fascinating and exhausting, but the thing is that it is totally warranted because the sonic cues are there. it is interesting how genre tags proliferate for breaks-based musics while on the four-four side of things, we get "minimal" or "balearic". it's enough to make one think that the play of language signifies that something larger is afoot though i think that's a red herring and begs to be pulled apart some more. what is interesting to me is how aggressive stuff like grime is compared to 2-step garage. i hear the aggression from the other side in villalobos's remix of "blood on my hands" which is by far the most aggro thing he's done. the original track pushes the aggression into the atmosphere, but the remix flips the sonics around pushing it into the beats. and the beats are also what's key here cos its ostensibly dance music which is a bit tryannical to say as you can hear how sometimes producers feel a bit shackled to that term. it's limiting, but it's also liberating!

"did you, when this shit first came out ever listen to breakstep, breakbeat garage, speed garage, 4X4 garage, prog house, tearout and bassline which all crossed over into breaks and back again...

...it's so easy to draw lines now and exclude stuff but at the time d'n'b was an exclusive beast of a genre with not much room for anything else courtesy of the massive egos of many in the scene aqnd cos of the extreme bpm's it reached"

indeed, but the production techniques and sound in general of D&B was something i was purposely trying to avoid, which is why it was so easy to completely dismiss NSB (outside of a couple Passenger records which were kinda on the more atmospheric tip, bordering on broken beat [another breakbeat style with junglist roots that was DEFINITELY a whole other sound from both 2-step and NSB!]). there were some crossovers with NSB and jungle, i remember knowledge having a couple of their free CDs circa 01 with lots of that kind of stuff on it.

"all those other genres were mixable and has been mentioned woith the stantons they did it to superb effect on stanton sessions 1...

...nuskool was/is not bad. It was/is funky and danceable at its best and tired and plodding at its worst. One thing about burial is there aint much funk in it and barely danceable so does that make it tired and plodding ???

-- pollywog"

stanton warriors did indeed do a good job of fusing the NSB sound and 2-step. "right here" is the jam. but they were really about the extent of that kind of crossover. im not trying to pass judgement on NSB (though i dont like it!) in saying that it was not related to 2-step directly, it just definitely had a far different sound and feel despite the similar tempo.

"people who pretend that Horsepower Productions and El-B were on some totally different tip to the rest of garage are just being revisionist).

-- Tim F"

now that i absolutely have to disagree with. i remember the discussion on the 2-s✧✧✧@f✧✧✧.n✧✧ list (now @f4.ca, im still subbed), a US based 2-step email list, around early 01 that centered largely around 2 records:

Es-G "Roll London City" on Shelflife http://www.discogs.com/release/204320

and

Horsepower Productions "Gorgon Sound" on Tempa http://www.discogs.com/release/151379

the idea was that these kinds of tunes that were heavily dub influenced were on a different tip from the rest of 2-step, they were more "serious" in a way, more dread less floss. that kind of sentiment was quite prevalent on that list, i believe it was the first place i ever saw the word "dubstep" mentioned and that was in 01 referring to exactly those kinds of records! i have a CDr from these guys:

http://www.discogs.com/release/608530

who were on that list. its from 02 and it is called "dubstep style". even over here in the US this terminology was being used for a specific sound that was different from 2-step in general.

check this article about the split of grime, breakstep, and garage, they were talking about it as far back as the end of 00:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Archive/Article/0,4273,4101753,00.html

burial will be happy to see how much mileage you have all gotten from discussing his album.

"This is the beardiest crap I've walked into in years."

mh

here here!

>im not trying to pass judgement on NSB (though i dont like it!) in saying that it was not related to 2-step directly, it just definitely had a far different sound and feel despite the similar tempo.

well the difference was swing, wasn't it? iirc when i was playing the amalgam of breakstep, ukg, 4x4 garage, breakbeat house etc that we used to just call '2-step', those NSB records stood out like an emo kid at a metal show, because there was no swing! i do distinctly remember hearing people say things like 'it just sounds like slow-ed down drum'n'bass!'

Pipecock, of course Horsepower Productions represented a slight twist in the sound, but it was still 2-step. In fact I'd argue that their productions were not really any more abstract than a lot of the stuff being done by Dem 2, Chris Mack, Steve Gurley etc... The main reason people think "Gorgon Sound" heralded a new level of abstraction was that it sounded a bit like Pole, and so caught the attention quite a few people who'd been following that strand of music (not just Pole but Rhythm & Sound, Jan Jelenik, Kit Clayton).

It didn't hurt that (like Burial) Horsepower Productions had the whole marketing position down pat and were getting hyped up by Hyperdub and people like Nico from No U Turn (whose aborted garage label Turn U On was so well-named that he must have considered actually, y'know releasing stuff on it to be a redudant move). But listen to Horsepower Productions tracks like "One You Need" and "When You Hold Me" (some of their best work, though written out of the history books) and it's... well... just plain old 2-step garage! The only track on In Fine Style that really strains at the 2-step tag is "Pimp Flavours", and even that is closer to other 2-step than it is to what has subsequently become known as dubstep.

In fact nothing on the first Horespower Productions album is even as far out as Bump & Flex's astonishing Dancehall Dub of Cleptomaniacs' "All I Do", or Sticky's "Boo!", both of which stand as a much more radical twist on the 2-step sound, but won't get props from boring dubstep revisionists.

Nonetheless, the stuff that started getting the dubstep label in 2001 (Horsepower Productions, Zed Bias, El-B, the earlier and superior Oris Jay, the first Menta releases) is all stuff I love, and I can also see how it resembles a distinct sub-set of 2-step garage. But that doesn't change the fact that it was 2-step garage. As per my point above, the distance from early Steve Gurley records to this stuff is smaller than the distance between Sunship and Wookie, or the distance between Zed Bias and Ed Case, or the distance between M-Dubs and the Artful Dodger.

People who say "oh no it was clearly a totally different thing" almost always do this simply so they can dismiss all the 2-step that's never gotten the hagiography treatment from Hyperdub, Martin Clark et. al. (not meaning to criticise Martin or the Hyperdub writers, all of whom were at pains to emphasise the continuity between this music and the rest of 2-step). It's precisely the sort of revionist line that pollywog pushes here, the notion that 2-step was "all about" R&B remixes and dubstep and grime were what transformed and retrospectively redeemed the genre.

I sincerely wish I could have been around to see those artists that you mentioned instead of having to discover all this after the fact.

But in 2001 I was still listening to Radiohead and Rage against the Machine, I was still in high school in America. Very far away from London, just like a lot of people who are now doing their best to understand where this music came from.

A lot of us get it wrong, you don't as far as I can tell.

But isn't the misinterpretation of music where a lot of new music comes from?

Wasn't 2-step a misinterpretation of an American sound to begin with?

I don't like that drum and bass and breaks artists have tried to twist 2-step influenced music away from its roots and make it more masculine sounding.

But so far I have yet to meet the stereotype of the drum + bass producer/repressed metalhead dabbling in something he doesn't give a shit about.

A lot of the best, and most interesting takes on the style are coming from what I would think of as really unlikely artists.

Personally, I don't consider modern dubstep a kind of garage.

Ever since Horsepower remixed Elephantman I think we have had something different.

Levan would not have played a Battyman bashing tune if he was smart.

They remixed one, I think thats the crucial difference between Horsepower and their increasingly tenuous garage forebearers.

(I absolutely love the Turn U On releases BTW).

Horsepower loved jungle right?

I think that was the primary set of sounds they were trying to emulate.

So its not entirely without merit to think of music heavily modeled on theirs as having a jungle template first, 2-step second, dub techno third. I think most dubstep artists would feel more comfortable aligning themselves with jungle and drum and bass then the Paradise Garage, Todd Edwards, and Dem 2.

"well the difference was swing, wasn't it? iirc when i was playing the amalgam of breakstep, ukg, 4x4 garage, breakbeat house etc that we used to just call '2-step', those NSB records stood out like an emo kid at a metal show, because there was no swing! i do distinctly remember hearing people say things like 'it just sounds like slow-ed down drum'n'bass!'

-- BATTAGS"

i'd say that was a good 70% of the difference. the other 30% was the more drum and bass style bass and synth lines. combined, it just didnt work right. those really were fun times for deejaying that music, you could get away with doing so much stuff and it really went down with people who were not even regular dance music fans.

"Pipecock, of course Horsepower Productions represented a slight twist in the sound, but it was still 2-step. In fact I'd argue that their productions were not really any more abstract than a lot of the stuff being done by Dem 2, Chris Mack, Steve Gurley etc... The main reason people think "Gorgon Sound" heralded a new level of abstraction was that it sounded a bit like Pole, and so caught the attention quite a few people who'd been following that strand of music (not just Pole but Rhythm & Sound, Jan Jelenik, Kit Clayton)."

well for me i was already into that dubby techno stuff anyway, but i'm not sure that everyone who picked it up were also into it. basically, it was sort of the beginning of the "serious" attitude of which it seemed like there was very little in 2-step. the attitude was not entirely different to the people who are over obsessed with dub techno, and in fact i feel like the results ended up kind of similar: alot of heavily thought out music with less emphasis on dancefloor fun.

"But listen to Horsepower Productions tracks like "One You Need" and "When You Hold Me" (some of their best work, though written out of the history books) and it's... well... just plain old 2-step garage!"

for me, that 12" on on-u sound is their best. i never did get tempa 001 though! dammit! yeah, they definitely came from a more housey sound, it would be interesting to ask them why they left that and went straight for the more dubbed out sound and never really revisited that vocal style.

"In fact nothing on the first Horespower Productions album is even as far out as Bump & Flex's astonishing Dancehall Dub of Cleptomaniacs' "All I Do", or Sticky's "Boo!", both of which stand as a much more radical twist on the 2-step sound, but won't get props from boring dubstep revisionists."

but those kinds of people are tools anyway ;)

those tracks were fantastic no doubt, but they still had the overall lighthearted (?!?! lack of a better word...) feeling of 2-step that the horsepower stuff didnt. i mean, i loved all the sounds at that time, so im not passing judgement on any of them. but that dubbed out sound defintiely had its own little clique of people who suddenly were attracted to that sound and only that sound. it kicked off with the ghost records and then the horsepower and other jams we have mentioned. i dont know why that sound had the effect that it did, but the effect was there even at the time, i dont think it is revisionist to point that out. let's put it this way: those early dubstep records were all played in the 2-step scene, but there was almost immediately a new branch that was ONLY into that kind of sound.

"People who say "oh no it was clearly a totally different thing" almost always do this simply so they can dismiss all the 2-step that's never gotten the hagiography treatment from Hyperdub, Martin Clark et. al. (not meaning to criticise Martin or the Hyperdub writers, all of whom were at pains to emphasise the continuity between this music and the rest of 2-step). It's precisely the sort of revionist line that pollywog pushes here, the notion that 2-step was "all about" R&B remixes and dubstep and grime were what transformed and retrospectively redeemed the genre.

-- Tim F"

i can definitely see how that perspective would irritate you (it irritates me as well, but ive been irritated with the outside perception of 2-step since i first got down with it!), and really sticking up for the genre as a whole is still something that is going to have to be done by people who just didnt understand how awesome inclusive a sound it was and how it tore down so many barriers that even jungle didnt do a great job with. all i can say is that i saw a change in attitude and perception of the music in regards to those early dubstep tunes, not dissimilar to the change in attitude of people when the so solid type stuff came out. i loved it all, i was buying the best of all the side and sub genres, but that less serious feeling was holding back alot of guys from getting into the sound and dubstep and grime were their ways of taking it back from the much more ("gay") house influenced sound...

"Wasn't 2-step a misinterpretation of an American sound to begin with?"

hmmm, not sure i would say that exactly. it was kind of a combination of speed garage (itself a bastardized version of house music and jungle as well) and todd edwards.

"I don't like that drum and bass and breaks artists have tried to twist 2-step influenced music away from its roots and make it more masculine sounding."

that is definitely a problem with dubstep and grime, IMO. they are definitely sausage party type music, like drum and bass.

"Personally, I don't consider modern dubstep a kind of garage."

neither would i, which is why i say burial has alot more to do with 2-step than anything modern.

"Levan would not have played a Battyman bashing tune if he was smart."

that im not so sure of, he definitely played a good bit of reggae music that i know of, not sure how anti-gay it was, but the general attitude of rastafari is anti-gay.

"I think most dubstep artists would feel more comfortable aligning themselves with jungle and drum and bass then the Paradise Garage, Todd Edwards, and Dem 2.

-- Siah Alan"

i think that is true, and that might be why so many people are so critical of the vocals on the Burial album. they are gay as hell and housey as hell. which is why they are awesome and why Untrue is not the same sound as his first album which had much more of that serious vibe to it.

the notion that 2-step was "all about" R&B remixes and dubstep and grime were what transformed and retrospectively redeemed the genre.

I don't think it needs redemption. I loved the ruff and rugged shit, the sexy vocals and stuttery beats first time round. I also really loved oxide of neutrino fames production. He is totally unheralded in the general scheme of things but his productions were more dark and revolutionary than anything ghost or tempa put out

see thats the thing Tim.Being in NZ and hearing it while being removed from the epicentre gave me a unique perspective. I didn't/don't know what is/was 2 step and what was garage so I drew my own line. Cheese = 2step, rudeboy = garage

heres 2 for the boring revisionists. I rate it and even more so propped sticky and ms dynamites boo harder...

cleptomaniacs_-_all_i_do_bump__flex_dancehall_dub .mp3 - 8.05MB

sticky_feat_lady_dynamite_-_boo.mp3 - 5.01MB

...and yeah, this thread in relation to burial is the classic "If i wasnt talking shit about you i wouldn't be talking about you at all"

be thankful, s'all G :)

"Being in NZ and hearing it while being removed from the epicentre gave me a unique perspective. I didn't/don't know what is/was 2 step and what was garage so I drew my own line. Cheese = 2step, rudeboy = garage"

clearly no relation to reality where the music was coming from, but obviously it has meaning to you. your constantly pro-breakz ranting stems from the fact that you always detach the sounds from their context, which is fine, but leads to all your historical and descriptive arguments being utter bullshit.

still thinking linear huh ???

this is my new all-purpose comeback to anything

I think Burial's 1st lp reminded me most of Goldie's Timeless, like it was a distillation of jungle up to that point (thank you Rob Playford!). Burial's 1st lp sort of synthesized stuff going on in different movements, from 2-step/UKG, minimal dub of BC/Rhythm & Sound, and the backwash of Mille Plateaux & Touch. This second lp seems to be a continuation of the theme, which is fine by me. I wasnt anticipating something mindblowing. What intrigues me is how he eschews the general sound of dubstep in favor of 2-step structure. Emotionally, it gives me that eerie feeling of hearing a rave from 1/2 mile off as the sound echoes & distorts over some illegal landscape. I hope he keeps it up.

clearly no relation to reality where the music was coming from, but obviously it has meaning to you. your constantly pro-breakz ranting stems from the fact that you always detach the sounds from their context, which is fine, but leads to all your historical and descriptive arguments being utter bullshit.

oh look the troll is a closet psycho analyst who only speaks to slag me off...what a funny troll you are

...what my historical and descriptive arguments do is personalise the context to my own experiences and of those who surrounded me that were into the same sounds. That makes it fact to me and merely an opinion to everyone else.

shouldn't you in the interests of concise historical relevence and the irrevocable truth then attach footnotes and a bibliography to every post and implement your policy across the board...

...like would you have be believe also that the music only came out of london ???

I don't need to accept a reality for where the music comes from but could you, being that you are so wise and all that, then differentiate 2step form garage if i gave you a list of songs and artists and tell me what their reality was in relation to their geographical location ???

...hahaha what a fucking retard you are

pollywog, you're attempts to different 2-step and garage are part of the whole problem.

"garage" as a term refers to soulful, vocal-based US house, often with quite skippy snare patterns. "Speed garage" was called "speed garage" because it sounded like US garage sped up. "2-step garage" got its name because it sounded like "speed garage" with 2-step beats rather than 4X4 beats. The term "UK Garage" basically covers both. It's precisely when So Solid Crew et. al. emerged that the continued use of the term "garage" began to seem odd. For a while some people referred to "garage rap", but it was this (plus the final abandonment of any remaining rhythmic connection to US garage via skippy snare patterns) that led to the rise of the term "grime".

So to say 2-step equals R&B and garage equals MCs is wrong on multiple levels. If anything, the "garage" in UK garage refers to the genre's (progressively more and more distant) connection to house music. If you listen to a lot of the diva vocals on tracks from 1997-2000, they draw as much from house as they do from R&B - e.g. the "ooh! Ah-ah-ah-ah-aahhah" in "Neighbourhood" is a fairly typical house vamp.

should be "your attempts" obv.

and "differentiate" not "different"! I am illiterate today.

yeah sorry, being lazy...

...in all my references to garage i am talking about UKG not the soulful based stateside house music

Do you know who coined the term 'grime' for UKgarage rap and when it became widespread to call it that ???

I know the misnomered rephlex compilations caught some flak over the name...

"yeah sorry, being lazy...

...in all my references to garage i am talking about UKG not the soulful based stateside house music

Do you know who coined the term 'grime' for UKgarage rap and when it became widespread to call it that ???

I know the misnomered rephlex compilations caught some flak over the name...

-- pollywog"

that im really not sure of. i remember all the weird other names (8-bar, sublow, eskibeat, etc) but i cant for the life of me pinpoint when i first heard "grime". i think it had to have been after i quit buying garage related music for a while, so maybe late '02?

I first started hearing the term "grime" when listening to Femme Fatale's 1xtra show in, oh, October 2002. But it probably predates that.

"...in all my references to garage i am talking about UKG not the soulful based stateside house music"

I know, the but the "garage" UK Garage itself refers to the soulful stateside house music. That's where this music came from! Which is why saying the "garage" in UKG refers to So Solid Crew rather than the preceding 2-step is so off-base.

2001 - N.O.R.E - "grimey" (from "god's son")

2001 - ward 21 - "grimey" (from "mentally disturbed")

2002 - dillinja - grimey EP

2002 - troublesome - "grimey" <- actual UKG track

2003 - so solid - "so grimey"

i've heard variously that musical mob coined the term (or maybe someone confused "inventing" with "naming" w/r/t "pulse x"), that wiley came up with it or that d double e came up with it. all three claims sound dubious at best.

"2001 - N.O.R.E - "grimey" (from "god's son")

2001 - ward 21 - "grimey" (from "mentally disturbed")

2002 - dillinja - grimey EP

2002 - troublesome - "grimey" <- actual UKG track

2003 - so solid - "so grimey"

-- moonship journey to baja"

i feel like someone from wu-tang used the phrase "grimey" well before those, but i couldnt tell you where. so yeah, around late 02 seems right to me based on when i quit caring. i liked the name 8-bar personally, especially since so many of the beats were repetitive loops. i used to mix "a pulse x" with basic channel! id get my dick sucked now by some hipsters if i did that shit today.

Which is why saying the "garage" in UKG refers to So Solid Crew rather than the preceding 2-step is so off-base.

...but didn't you say 2step was a dominant form of UKG, yet if 2step preceded "garage" then surely UKG would be a subset of 2 step ???

I know where UKgarage came from I can hear the progression to 2step in garage type house stuff like 1995's nightcrawlers-surrender your love and 1993'3 Robin S - show me love

he's saying that 2-step precedes so solid crew

^^^and that UKgarage then came after 2step ???

"^^^and that UKgarage then came after 2step ???

-- pollywog"

no, UK garage is the highest term. it encompasses speed garage, 2-step, and any other garage related music made in the UK. it was never its own genre, more a classification of related genres.

progression of UK garage: speed garage -> 2 step -> garage rap

on any "ayia napia" or "ministry of sound presents garage" comp or even comps labeled "2 step" or "speed garage" you'd have some combination of all three styles. i call it a "progression" because that's the chronological order in which they showed up

pollywog we've all explained this about ten times you. It's really not that difficult.

UK Garage refers to all these styles.

2-step didn't actually "precede" So Solid Crew in the sense you're interpreting it, since So Solid Crew actually made 2-step, and hence exist within the scope of this subset.

However, there were obciously 2-step tracks around before So Solid Crew with a stronger link to US garage, and since UK garage refers to all these styles (but has its roots in US garage) it's ridiculous to say that So Solid Crew are "garage" whereas the 2-step tracks that came out before So Solid Crew are not.

Tim F wins the internet !!!

...cos i cant follow the argument anymore, especially when you're all saying different things. Its like one big circle jerk...

...can you recommend me some speed garage or a mix i might be able to download as i went from d'n'b to breaks to UKG without ever getting into speed garage

or we could talk about burial some more...

If you can find it, I strongly recommend you track down Dreem Teem's "In Session vol 2" mix from the end of 1997 - a mix of speed garage and early 2-step garage, and you can really hear the latter emerging out of the former.

Some crucial speed garage (a woefully short and incomplete list):

New Horizons - Find The Path (Sweet DJ Release)
Gant - Sound Bwoy Burial
Double 99 - Rip Groove
Scott Garcia ft. MC Styles - It's A London Thing
Boris Dlugosch Presents Boom - Hold Your Head Up High (Julian Jonah Bad Boy Mix)
New Horizons - It's My House (Bashment Mix)
187 Lockdown - Gunman
Fabulous Baker Boys - Oh Boy

...i'll see what i can find

Thanx for the education cuz...

"Determined" (if anyone has an MP3 of this please hit me up)

happy to oblige (even if it's only 128kbit).

btw Tim, the part upthread about Wideboys reverting to funky house in the wilderness years is not quite true: yes, they did some funky house-ish stuff then, but at ukg tempo and aimed strictly at the ukg market. they also did a fair amount of 2step during the period when it was terminally unfashionable, and they started dabbling with bassline as early as 2005. this year's "Snowflake" is a good example of their wide array of ukg allegiances as it comes with a 2steppy mix, a London-style 4x4 mix and two bassline mixes - one for the organ house axis, one of the ruffer T2/DJ Q-type variety (the absolutely killer "Uf Norf Dutty Bass Mix").

but generally, you're spot on about their mercantile impulse - they even have an electrohouse alias nowadays (Atari Era)!

Mind Taker you are a champion. I lost this about five years ago and have been looking ever since! What a great and unusual track, so bizarre to think that it came out in 1998 or something like that. The closest other thing I can think of is David Howard's "U & I" - it's got that same "beats that sound like a shower of tiny ball-bearings" vibe. Love the vocal science too: "I'm Determined! Yes we're up! Hey! Hey! Hey! Yes we're up! Up!" Stuff like this and "Everybody Come On" and the "Jump & Shout" and "Demons" and "Please Don't Turn Me On" remixes paint such a different picture to their subsequent career.

Yeah I am skewing the Wideboys story a bit - although when I heard the 4/4 version of Sambuca it really did sound hard to distinguish from funky house! I haven't heard "Snowflake" in any of its versions, will definitely have to track that down.

Caught up in the spirit of generosity:

New Horizons - It's My House (the bashment mix).mp3

Too kind, both of you.

well, there are several 4x4 versions of "Sambuca": don't know which one you're referring to, but i prefer the one under their Del Monte guise.

xp cheers!

Dem 2 - Destiny (New Horizons Remix).mp3

gawd i love this stuff

in the recent spirit of this thread, if anyone has the dubaholics' dub mix of "desire" by ultra naté i'd... ooh man i don't know what i'd do

Oh I don't have that one, but the Dubaholics Dub Mix of Matt Darey's "Beautiful" is one of my favourite 2-step tracks.

many thanks for the mp3s, this side of garage is one i have very little of so its greatly appreciated :) that bashment mix of Its My House is incredible!

going back to the mention of early 4x4 / speed garage upthread, a few mixes which i really enjoyed and which helped to introduce me to the genre...

United Vibes - FourFour Special - this one is a bit more in the vein of US roots i think, but i love it so much!

http://archive.subfm.com/UnitedVibesFourFourSpecial05Feb07SubFM.mp3

Ramsey & Fen & MJ Cole - "Underground Explosion"
Greg Stainer & MJ Cole - "Closer"
Todd Edwards - “Steal U’re Heart”
Sunship - “Sun Funk”
Jason H & MJ Cole - "Control"
24Hr Experience – “Jazz From the Heart”
Todd Edwards - "Winter Behaviour"
DJ $ki – “I Need You 98”
DJ Speedy – “The Harder They Come”
Tuff Jam - "Tumblin Down"
Matt Jam Lamont- "Feel My Love"
Dj $ki- “Do it : To – Nite”
Daniel Ward & Hermit – “Step to it”
Ant Hill Mob - "Player”
Groove Chronciles - “Nobody But You”
Smokin Beats - "Look Who's Lovin Me"
Jason Kaye & Steve Gurley - "Set It Out"
Rocksteady – “Watcha Gonna Do”
Todd Edwards - "The Dream"
R.I.P. – “Burning Up”
R.I.P - "Obsessed"
Jeremy Sylvester - "Stay"
KMA - "Cape Fear"
Tuff Jam - "Experience" (New Horizons Rmx)
? ? - ? ? (Duty Free)
Jeremy Sylvester - "Crazy Dub"
High Times - "Feel It"
Ordinary People – “Baby You Make My Heart Sing”
New Horizons - "Find The Path" (Tuff Jam mix)
Tuff Jam - “Out of my Head 97”
R.I.P – “Players”
Groove Chronicles – “Voices”
Louie Vega & Kenny Gonzalez – “No Cure”
Anthill Mob - "X2C"
NCA – Goodbye (Laurence Bagnall mix)
Ordinary People - “Keep your Love”
Big Bird – “Flav”
Anthill Mob - “Enchanted Rhythm”
? ? - ? ? (G.O.D. 4)
Dem 2 - "Beautiful People"
Groove Chronciles - "Hold On"
Smokin Beats - "Jazz House"
Ordinary People - "I Need"

Oris Jay on the Basement - this one is a bit ruffer

http://www.sendspace.com/file/8l7hsp

Scott Garcia- Music Takes You (Buzz Bomb)
Unknown- Unknown
Big Bird- Flav (City Dub Traxx/ Nice ‘n’ Ripe)
Livin Large ft Colonel Abrams- Love is what we need (unknown mix)
New Horizons- Find the Path (In your Mind) (Tuff Jam remix) (500 Rekords)
Underground Distortion- Everythin’ is Large (Boom City/Satellite)
4 Deep Connextion- Twisted Future (DFL)
New Horizons- Inspiration (500 rekords)
Colonel Abram- So Confused (The Bootleg) (Great Jones)
New Horizons- It’s My House (bassline mix) (500 Rekords)
Somore ft Damon Trueitt- I Refuse (What You Want)
(Industry Standard Mix) (Locked On)
Tuff Jam- Track No Name (Unda-Vybe)
Mike Dunn presents the MD Express- God Made Me Phunky
Nu-Birth- Anytime (Locked On)