Jungle

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.

chai. cushions...spring heel jack. a live drummer (that guy from that cleveland watkiss thing?). a big ugly dancefloor like a basketball court. vision like they hadn't turned off the house lights.

a group of punters trying to dance.

hands a-jitter like 70's kung fu stars whose nylon mustaches are about to fade... and whose stuttering pose on frame declares the machine malfunctioing if not broke.

no movement below the hips. well, none other than skittering.

phew, the tracks are loOoong.

so after a couple of "tunes" a large group of them sat down. like a pictic in the, by now, otherwise uninhabited wilds of the dancefloor. and stayed sitting down, chatting and moving their hands, for the rest of the set.

And for the record - accept it... jungle is music for people who have absolutely no natural rhythm. Ugly music. It's the genre that the genuine clubbers avoid like the plague because of the hideous attitude and violence that it's associated with. Uusally because most 'junglists' are aged 15.

And I never ever went to any clubs where jungle would get people err... 'tearing out'. And I live in Bristol, mate, one of the natural original homes of jungle, so there aint nothing you can preach or teach to me about the genre.

Jungle - you'll be hiding your jungle vinyl with acute embarrassment in a few years. See also Happy Hardcore, another kiddie genre.

Deeply dud, extremely nasty.

tearing out maybe not.
butt booty movin street funk widda dub feel? dat do?

As for the remarks about kids music, and linking it with violence etc. you're like some grievous angel of Mojo and the Daily Mail. what age group is music meant for? I don't like most modern jungle, don't like trance, don't like happy hardcore, but i would never frown on kids for liking it? ugh, your breath stinks ugly from all that middle-aged stench coming out of it.

so yes, mate, you wouldn't believe it mate, but oh mATE! just coz you can only finger pop, doesn't mean other people can't frug or tootle or whatever you old folk call dancing these days.

jungle ain't the ugly thing round here.

And jungle, like happy hardcore, will always be a 'kiddie genre'.... I presume you're about the same age as myself, so I'm sure this concept can't be alien to you? Oh, but then you're 'dahn wiv the kidz' aren't you? If I come across as some hooror from the Daily Mail (never read it - I'm sure you have), then you come across as some embarrassing late 20's/early 30s 'yoof' writer or presenter who,despite looking patently ridiculous in sweaty clubs surrounded by kiddies, still continues to sweat it out and refuses to go home. See also virtually all the NME writers, anyone who works at i'D and the Face....oh, and Janet Street Porter and Annie Nightingale.

Finger pop? Err....ok. Something I should be down on wiv the kidz, eh? In 2003?

Oh,and PLEASE don't call me mate. It's toe curling.

i don't know how you perceive jungle when it was at its creative peak as kiddie music, that's all i was saying. i wasn't saying i was down wiv da kidz, i admit i having been to a d&b club for years, i was just pointing out your snootiness and ultra-conservatism i.e. your fear of the unknown (i.e. "i don't like it, therefore it's for kids. i can't dance to it, therefore no one can").

"never read it - sure you have" - classic kiddie genre!

jungle is/was incredibly close to ragga/dancehall musically, dance music at its rawest and, indeed, ugliest - so Russ is right in that respect, but some of us who appreciate beauty in music also appreciated that 'ugliness' - of course it was the main appeal, just as it was with punk in a way

I saw Die the other week DJing in Bristol - and it was an extremely unpleasant experience. More unpleasant when the whole of his crew and him came back to my friends, uninvited, when they were having a chill out. Uneducated, uncouth, sexist, homophobic assholes. And many faces I recognised over the years from the jungle and d&b nights in Lakota and Club Loco. Some things never change. My opinion isn't based on 'fear of the unknown', nebbesh - I went to those clubs years back in Bristol, and never, ever liked them..... jungle and drum and bass, like the UK garage stuff now, always seemed to draw a darker, harder, nastier crowd and there was invariably a scrap or 10 throughout the night. Hence the reputation.Is there anything uglier than seeing someone brawling when you're out on a night out?
Or seeing someone sliced with a knife?

I don't think there is.

So, apart from having a vehement hatred for jungle and drum and bass as musical genres, I also hate that whole jungle scene. Because it's trouble.

but russ...the music? did we talk about that yet, really?

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

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