Jungle

I think being told it was the incredible music of the future and also the complex intelligent art music of today did for it.

I think Reynolds nailed it when he described jungle as having arrived at a fully-formed image of itself and then realising it had nowhere else to go. What made the early years of jungle so exciting was that producers kept on throwing in stuff from way out of leftfield in a series of inspired mistakes that got churned over and spat out with what now seems like amazing haste. Now that drum & bass is literally just that, there's much less room for innovation or development.

On the other hand, what was arguably just as important to jungle's deterioration was the shift from, say, 4-bar rhythm loops to basically one-bar loops; a technique possibly inspired by post-Mills techno, and certainly the defining factor in the two styles' strange similarity. The one-bar loops give drum & bass of the last couple of years a sort of oppressive, numbing feel that even the most nasty early techstep avoided. Unsurprisingly, when producers like Paradox or Klute pull out complex-but-dancable breakbeat arrangements my ears automatically prick up with excitement.

I don't think jungle sounds particularly dated now. As a cultural reference point there's a certain datedness about it (although the general UK dance music press has been overwhelmingly positive about the scene for the last six months or so, to a perhaps unwarranted/undeserved degree. I dunno - I don't go out dancing as much as I used to), but the music is to my ears still astonishingly fresh.

There's something so, I don't know, frontier-like about the best jungle, like you're standing at the edge of a yawning musical crevice that no-one, neither producer nor audience, has yet learnt how to cross. In that sense I think jungle's only chance to really surge forward again would be a shift in recording technology as with glitch vis a vis techno, especially if it combined with a generational/geographical shift of recording artists.

All this said, I'm currently listening to Certificate Eighteen Records' latest Hidden Rooms compilation (number 3) and it's astonishingly good - a good reminder that, yo, minimalism can be a good thing.

In the canon goes:

Dread Bass - Dead Dread, maybe my favourite jungle tune ever.

Shadowboxing - Nasty Habits, maybe my favourite dance tune ever.

The Water Margin - Photek

Music - Bukem

Terrorist - Ray Keith (iirc)

The License - Krome & Time

Squadron - Ed Rush

Mindweaver - Source Direct

Music Box - Roni Size

B.S.T.-era A Guy Called Gerald

Thru the Vibe - Omni Trio

and loads more...

1. Omni Trio - "Renegade Snares (Foul Play VIP Mix)" 2. Leviticus - "The Burial" 3. Danny Breaks - "Droppin Science Vol. 2" 4. DJ Hype - "Rrrol Da Beats" 5. Ganja Kru - "Computerised Cops (Pascal Remix)" 6. Foul Play - "Open Your Mind" 7. Marvellous Cain - "The Hitman" 8. Dillinja - "The Angels Fell" 9. DJ Zinc - "Super Sharp Shooter" 10. Dead Dred - "Dred Bass"

(Note, most of my favorite breakbeat tracks are actually hardcore tunes...I tried to limit it to stuff which is generally regarded as "jungle.")

1) Jungle was actually in many ways slower than the hardcore that preceded it, 'cos while the breaks were very fast the dub basslines running at half-speed allowed dancers to dance slower and gave the music the sensation of a groove. It did speed up slightly around late '98, but really I think the sensation of oppressive speed arises from the fact that most of the tracks since then have been locked grooves - there's no development across bars, whether it be rhythms, basslines or melodic arrangements.

2) The music actually underwent a tonne of cross-hybridisation with different musical styles, of which dancehall, dub, ambient, jazz, funk, hip hop, Belgian hardcore and minimalist techno are only the most prominent. There's even been attempts to forge links with house (see Alex Reece, Nookie's collaborations with Larry Heard and some of Doc Scott's recent work) and R&B (vocal bootlegs done by folks like Ganja Kru and Teebee). A lot of that has in the last couple of years been cut out of the equation or paired down to formalist cliches - again, to jungle's loss.

The best jungle of course was the superbly uncoordinated, sometimes arrythmic mixes which came out of Rush FM/Touchdown FM/ad infinitum circa '91-3, preferably listened to in a smelly alley in Pimlico.

Destroyed by re-christening as "drum and bass" and fatal aspiration towards "proper music" by artisans whom we would prefer to view as iconoclasts but who really saw Hancock's "Headhunters" as their Sermon on the Mount. That bloody Fender Rhodes.

Kill all canons.

Last time I went to a club, you had Peshay in one packed hall playing really fast and boring jungle. In the other hall DJ Assault scratched every sort of dance music into one happy holistic NOW. Too bad a lot of people weren't paying attention.

the ss/formation axis seems to have been shunted out of the picture a little when it comes to looking back over jungle?

A lot of the best jungle comps are out of print now. DJ Hype did a couple last year that collected a lot of the classics tho. "Jungle Massive 2002" I believe it was called.

There are a few Hype classic mixes. One called Old Skool Classics: In The Mix is very good.

Other impressions: it sounds so contemporary, but it doesn't sound that much more than contemporary. Maybe I should just shut up and listen since I'm only up to track two or three. Hmmmm. I wish there weren't that continuous WOMP (it doesn't really sound like that). I like the loose part of drum n bass, but I don't like the heavy bam bam regularlity of it. Maybe that's just in some songs and not all. For "Heavy bam bam regularlity" think of the rhythm Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the U.S.A." But I like the nervous, scatteriness in drum n bass, though maybe not in huge doses.

Oh here we go again: "Remember the ti-imes we shared!"

rockist, it's a bit of a controversial choice, but if you want a nice mix of the ants-in-your-pants rhythm stuff and the jazzy vibe, look for the first metalheadz platinum breakz comp which you can still sometimes find in borders and such.

the reason i say i don't think the brazilian drum 'n' bass stuff sounds very latin is because its basically the same beats as english d'n'b, rather than some cool merengue fusion or something. i haven't listened to lots of it so maybe i haven't heard the best stuff, but sticking some lilting guitar on top doesn't really make it stand out imho.

I haven't heard that much of this stuff myself. Maybe as few as a half dozen CDs worth, plus the odd drum n bass element that will turn up in other contexts.

"Platinum Breakz" is wonderful, yes. Volume II is pretty good as well - kind of like the death throes of rhythmic complexity as techstep/neurofunk took over completely.

rockist - you want the ministry of sound's "back to the old skool drum and bass", even though it's not actually 100% old skool.

am i the only person that bought platinum breakz vol. 3 and enforcers vol. 3?

And it's SO dead in the water.

anyway, i'm gonna back up gareth and agree that Formation just don't get its dues for how important it was then back in the early to mid-90s (maybe because it lost its way big-time after that). in its prime, they'd remix their big tunes countless time, so that you'd go every week and get lost in a maze of VIP pressure. The Highly Recommended comp stands up so well.

i've seen some nasty stuff happen in all kinds of clubs over the years, and a lot of music i like is also liked my bigots and hooligans. doesn't mean i'll stop liking Roll Deep, doesn't mean i'll stop liking the Specials.

Yeah, hating the music because of the faction (which i personally consider a MINORITY based on my own personal experiences...in fact i wouldnt be surprised if there had been MORE trouble in Bristol than in London in relative terms at the clubs and with certain genres) of ugly people it attracts is probably not clever...i love hip hop despite the same problems occurring there as they have with jungle, tho i personally can't get into dancehall much because a)i'm hardly target audience b) don't seem as interested and c)dubious messages in a fair proportion of the music but that said i will appreciate the cool rhythms and other musical elements in that genre as they present themselves...hmm, funnily enough those three reasons should mean i'm not into hip hop either so i guess its just that i find hip hop more accessible

If you go here you can d/l a load of mix tapes from '91 - '95 by Bukem, Randall, Hype, Peshay, Jumpin' JAck Frost and Mickey Finn.

I hope somebody enjoys...

Excellent tracker for mixsets - loads of old school amongst many others.

(that site does not show up in safari for some reason)

Thanks for the links!

(ps how cool is it reading vintage ILM!)

it's times like this i am glad i don't have broadband.

i've gone for the K&S/Goldie and Grooverider sets from '96 for starters. I would like to hear a 94/95 jump up set tho - which of the ones on the page do you recommend the most?

Is that a Method Man vocal sample on it?

i need to get this: Ray Keith's Vintage Dread

or at least i need to get a copy of 'Sing Time' RIGHT NOW

:D

(didn't know about TrackItDown site, looks good)

Radical Sound's "What Is Love (VIP Mix)" - just because. (also I increasingly think this is the greatest)
http://www.zshare.net/download/86436989db6c28/

Marcello is my hero.

-- jess, Saturday, September 1, 2001 12:00 AM (6 years ago) Bookmark Link

i played some (non-jungle) records at the local drum and bass night the other night, but after me one of my friends dropped a set of early-mid 90's atmospheric jungle. it was so beautiful, it almost made me want to cry when he dropped "atlantis (i need you)". wonderful shit.

I've been rocking DJ Rap's "Journeys Through The Land Of Drum 'N' Bass" for the last couple of weeks and it's really nice. Okay, so it's got 'd&b' in the title but this is very much jungle on the cusp of d&b. How cool is it that she included an old Carl Craig track (as Urban Culture) - 'Woders of the wishing' as well as FSOL's 'Papau New Guinea'. Refreshingly open minded for a commercial mix cd. I'm glad I picked it up.

http://www.discogs.com/release/125712

>Radical Sound's "What Is Love (VIP Mix)" - just because. (also I increasingly think this is the greatest)

Thanks for the link, Tim - that track is f'cking *mint*!

On a heartbreaking junglistic note, I dug out my original (CD) copy of Moving Shadow & Sub Base's "The Joint LP" with an ear to relive a bit of the old "Breaks The Unbreakable" magic and the CD has crapped out! There's not a scratch on the disc, but when I try to play it in any player it makes awful "skittering" noises in the background of every track.

I tried to rip it to burn a copy and the same thing happened. Of my couple of thousand CDs this is the FIRST one that I have had this problem with; I know people talk about CDs having a limited lifespan, but is there any way to rescue this?

Also, if the description "dance music you can't dance to" can be applied to Cabaret Voltaire, how much more can it be applied to Jungle!

It may be tricky to do so with grace or style, but it's still enormous fun to bust a move to! There's nothing quite like the explosion of movement which occurs on the drops in a sweaty jungle/dnb club.

I totally love Lexis, who made cinematic, beautifully sculpted post-techstep for Certificate 18 in the late 90s. Posting "Irrampent", one of my favourites by him - the beats on this are mindbogglingly good:
http://www.zshare.net/audio/87602446672097/

DJ Rap & Voyager's provocatively-titled Intelligence album from 1995 is actually very good! I didn't know it existed until I stumbled across it in a shop.

Except that the motivational R&B (meets Kate Bush circa The Sensual World) ballad "Two Loves" should be the first entry in a thread titled "Weirdly Compelling Strategic Errors"

Heh Voyager is Pete Parsons (who is like the engineer on a million jungle tracks.) Never heard this either (except for "Ruffest Gunnark" and Engineers Without Fears version of "Spiritual Aura"--no idea if either mix is the same, but both originals are quite good.) I'd forgotten how ridiculously attractive she was. Definitely a DJ who jungle's faceless DJ/producer meme did no favors for.

yeah she was my crush #1 between the releases of 'spitirual aura' and her solo pop single 'bad girl'

http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/ciu/4d/da/f05d828fd7a07c9bc122f010._AA240_.L.jpg

?

Had one of those fleeting thoughts this afternoon and yeehaw the Internet comes up trumps again:

http://www.oneinthejungle.com/

Substantial archive of One in the Jungle sets for your listening pleasure. Good times.

This is gold, NV!

Isn't it? This site: http://www.allcrew.co.uk/pages/jungle.html has a few full shows by the looks of it.

thanks noodle.
any standouts? duds?
what's up with the "alternate versions"?

Good find. There's some great stuff on the Peshay mix (which I got down on tape at the time). Going to have to check some more of these - recommendations please...

what's up with the "alternate versions"?

― m0stlyClean

the mixes came from different sources? the first Krust link seems to contain some radio interference (inaudible on the alternative mix).

Always liked Ray Keith for a bit of the ruffer stuff, anything with Zinc on it, Mickey Finn and Aphrodite obv. A lot of these I don't remember outside the context of the show itself, used to have quite a few on tape but the programme was pretty relentless on a good night.

This blog is gold: http://dnb365.blogspot.co.uk/

Wow thank you, I've been wanting something like that for ages.

this is the place on the internet where I say Marvellous Cain - Gun Talk has to be one of the best full lengths in jungle!

Also, if you're interested in downloading the entire Suburban Base catalog: https://archive.org/details/Suburban_Bass_Complete_Discography