'splain this one to me: Renegade Soundwave

Why?

Because Renegade Soundwave were the best.

Because I'm listening to Soundclash right now.

Because friday night at the Madchester/UK club night in Park Slope Brooklyn Tony Fletcher played the RSW Megamix from the Women Respond to Bass.

And so I can ask again, using your imagination, what music fits in with Renegade Soundwave's singles/mixes. I'm talking particularly about the various versions of The Phantom, Ozone Breakdown, Space Gladiator and Probably a Robbery. Discovering Todd Terry opened my eyes a bit, and realizing how much RSW's use of hip-hop was based on Terry's hip-hop/house productions. Pal Joey, who was a hip-hop engineer initially, made sample based funky house music that fits. I've also taken to some of the faster hip-hop from that period, for instance the instrumental of Eric B and Rakim's Juice(Know the Ledge.)

Some of the earlier sample based UK dance stuff like MARRS, Bomb the Bass, S'Express, which I love, just isn't as funky and spacey.

Also, for a total dub neophyte, give me some names. What dub acts do you think Renegade Soundwave listened to? Was there really deep digital dub stuff? Anything that would be approximately like the end of Blue Eyed Boy?

One record clerk recommended Shut Up and Dance when I asked about RSW type stuff a few years ago.

suggestions?

they were the awesomest

my personal faves are 'the phantom', 'ozone breakdown', 'cocaine sex' (particularly the dubs), 'kray twins' (for americans, the opening sample was the theme music to itv's news at ten), 'thunder', 'mash up' (dan, it's actually the banbarra 'shack up' break that they sampled), 'women respond to bass' and the whole of the 'in dub' album. apart from 'kray twins' i still play all of these out quite frequently. i think yr totally otm with the todd terry influence. it was after god's todd's first few 12's hit over here that rsw came out with 'the phantom'.

dan, have you heard 'underneath the arches' by the jackal? it came out on the criminal damage label and was renegade soundwave before they changed their name. it sounds a little dated but as you like 'kray twins', i think you'd dig it. also the 'ohi ho bang bang' 12" which is karl bonnie and holger hiller - it's one of thee most mental sampling records ever created (it tears apart 'ballroom blitz' by the sweet) and has one of my favourite ever videos too. also worth a listen is holger hiller's 'demixed' lp which has some rsw input.

karl bonnie went on to make some pretty crazy techno dub recordsand then seems to have vanished without a trace, while rsw got back together last year (without bonnie) and put out a so so reworking of 'the phantom'.

as for shut up and dance - classic, classic, classic. all the early releases under the suad name, along with rum and black, the ragga twins and nicolette (all suad productions) are immense. they were a massive influence on carl craig who has sampled them frequently (most notably on '4 jazz funk classics' and his piece 12"). suad is maybe not something you want to delve into as it then opens up the whole uk hardcore end of things which is massive oeuvre of music full of delights. forget conceptions of cheesy rave tunes - a lot of these records are as deep and fucked up as you can imagine. it's a whole other thread but one record i think you'd love is 2 bad mice's 'bombscare' ep on moving shadow from '91. the main track is a perennial fave but THEE one is 'ware mouse' which is a cavernous industrial funk dub monster with crazy electronic fx. very sparse, very heavy (the beat is outrageous) it sounds like rsw if they had taken some seriously bad drugs.

Was there really deep digital dub stuff

some of sherwood's tackhead and fats comet productions plough a similar vein but his beats were never as razor sharp as rsw's (i remember reading how they spent three days getting that snare sound on 'cocaine sex'!). some of the late 80's uk digital dub stuff was also fantastic. i would heartily recommend sound iration's 'in dub' lp and zulu warrior's self titled lp on the wau! mr. modo label. they are more in the traditional dub vein but are very, very deep.

of course, then there is all the jamaican digital dancehall that rsw were heavily into. obviouly they were into all the dub masters - tubby, perry etc. but i think their real love was all the prince jammys et al digital stuff. a lot of these productions from around '84 to '86 got pretty out there. i have an addiction to the 'sleng teng' rhythm (i've amassed around 70 versions which is kind of tragic) and some of the freakier dub versions certainly filtered into the rsw sound (the 'cocaine sex' bassline is the 'sleng teng' bassline). i have one version that sounds exactly how you'd imagine sigue sigue sputnik or suicide would sound like if they came from jamaica!

anyway, i could bore for scotland on all this so i had better stop there but i'll post back if any other deep digital dub stuff springs to mind.

It's a mystery (I like John Bush, actually, he's a good writer, but I really did want to replace those two reviews of his!)

Thunder II
Probably a robbery
Kray twins/Cocaine sex/Biting my nails

I have all the albums, but I have found mixes I hadn't heard before. I'm really interested to hear the Lines stuff. I hope Acute does do the reissue; their Metal Urbain reissues have been superb - thank you, Dan!

1. Cocaine Sex (Sub Aqua Overdrive Dub)
2. Biting My Nails (Bassnumb Chapter)
3. The Phantom (remix)
4. Ozone Breakdown
5. Thunder
6. Bacteria
7. Deadly
8. Transition
9. Women Respond to Bass
10. Holgertron
11. Recognise and Respond
12. Transworld Siren
13. Black Eye Boy
14. Ozone Breakdown 90 (Uprising mix)
15. Positive Mindscape

(79:54, chronological AFAIK - contains most of In Dub. Part 2, the non-dub version singles, is coming soon, although I listen to this one much more. These tracks are really astonishing even before you think about when they were produced!)

Armed Audio Warfare is the only subpar thing MBM put out. Everything else is genius.

I don't comprehend how anyone could dislike 99%, Satyricon or Subliminal Sandwich.

(another dead sheep)

Meat Beat Manifesto's initial modus operandi (when they first formed around 1986 or 1987) was to create an album "more extreme than As The Veneer..." apparently. They didn't succeed, but we did eventually get to hear bits and pieces of that work when Sweatbox released the Bark compilation with "Kneel And Buzz", which is that insane proto-Merzbow-doing-hip-hop sounding track. And the early collection Armed Audio Warfare came out in 1990, which had "Kneel And Buzz", "Mr. President", and some of the earliest bits. (Whether the original studio tapes were actually "destroyed in a fire", acc. to the liner notes, is up to you to believe.)

(Sorry, Dan, but i love Armed Audio Warfare.)

But I'm wondering if "Kray Twins" and "Cocaine Sex" were also influenced by As The Veneer as well. The biggest difference between all of them being that you just could not dance to As The Veneer, at least for more than 20 seconds, as it was the loudest most chopped up fucked up "beat"-ish album ever made.

If it wasn't for the also very raucous and Swans like Rema Rema that served as part of RSW's early history (via Ascquith), I would have been convinced.

Depends on your definition of "RSW" and "industrial". If we're talking early RSW, it's not really that far fetched. Gary Asquith's voice is very harrowing back then.. but not in the stereotypical "I'm going to sound like a DEMON on DISTORTION. ROOOOOWWRR" effect that many known industrial/dance bands use. And those beats and sounds do get very very loud at times.

The most "industrial" thing about RSW is their album covers, especially of the early singles... which are amongst the best ever.
That said, "Biting My Nails" pretty much nailed the whole "RSW = industrial" meme in the coffin, if there ever was one to begin with.
Sampling a breakbeat from KC & The Sunshine Band = not industrial, haha.

Also, I don't think anyone should be that confused about people linking RSW to industrial after listening to "Murder Music", "Space Gladiator" and "Kray Twins".

That's because it IS unfinished and incoherent.. it's a compilation. but some of my favorite individual MBM tracks ever are on this compilation... "Kneel and Buzz" being one of them. "Cutman" is great, too.. and didn't that get nicked on a Chemical Brothers mix CD back in the day?

RSW "Blue Eyed Boy" (1989)
Public Enemy "By The Time I Get To Arizona" (1991)

granted, the former only used it occasionally, whereas PE made it the consistent backdrop.

I'm not trying to argue against your points, Spencer.. I'm just giving you my side of what I (very loosely) define as industrial in this context. We're both "right". :)

Why is LFO's "Frequencies" still...

for more rsw talk, or perhaps, bring it back here.

Just wanted to continue listing the vinyl only RSW items.

(one of my faves off the 1st album i have to say)

WHEEL IT OUT! COMING THROUGH!

is it this?

http://www.discogs.com/release/221980

Maybe it's a bootleg edit? I have a bootleg I got at Rock-N-Soul, a place that is mostly hip-hop and disco/house/club classics that has Ozone Breakdown on it.

The funniest thing I got I won on eBay, it was a 7" white label advertised as "Cooking Sex". Sure enough, it says Cooking Sex on it in handwriting, and was on Rhythm King, I'm wondering if they weren't worried about sending it radio stations as Cocaine Sex or something!

I want this:

http://www.discogs.com/release/413655

and wonder if its the same version that ended up on In Dub.

double wow!

danny and gary were well moody. good hats though.

i'd forgotten that "cocaine sex" was promoed as "cooking sex". ha!

i also had no idea that "biting my nails" was a cover. the original is great! a little like a proto cristina.

I have a 7" on Rhythm King stamped "Cooking Sex". I always assumed that was the case but this is the first confirmation I've had that it was for real.

Reminds me of the recent run of SNL skits where they say something that's not dirty but make it sound dirty in context. Like the TV ads for "Sofa King". "Our prices are Sofa King cheap" etc. Similarly the earlier skit about "Cork Soakers" in a winery, where they soak the cork before bottling, and the old lady with no teeth is the best "cork soaker".

wait ppl didn't know "Biting My Nails" was a cover?

so that means you probably haven't seen... THIS:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iaCuOfSnZEs

nope. thats rather fun.

I declare today to be Renegade Soundwave Day

The sound system plays a renegade tune

RSW is more of a saturday night thing.

I love my Saturday night,
It's late Saturday night,
When I met you.

Track starts off with some sort of acid track, sounds hot

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=argUqGBkGGE

Err, my question was meant to be: Does anyone recognize this acid track?

It appears to be none of these: http://www.whosampled.com/Renegade-Soundwave/The-Phantom-%28Turntable-Scratch%29/

Remixer is credited as 'Radical Crew' (only credit on Discogs is this track)

don't know about that sample but those credits are sloppy. That track doesn't sample Area Code's Stone Fox Chase OR Cymande, or Run DMC it samples Royal House's The Chase, which is Todd Terry sampling Stone Fox Chase and Cymande and Run DMC.

Great interview with Gary Asquith here about his younger/punk days:

http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/a-strange-elevation/

interesting stuff, definitely needs a second part re RSW and beyond ...

why oh why have these guys not yet cashed in on the late 80s/early 90s reunion groove !?

i mean seriously.

modern techno toys would mean they could perform live with little effort.

They probably don't get along. They both do stuff with versions of the name. Danny seems to do more straight modern dub type stuff, while Gary's been reissuing and reworking Rema Rema and doing stuff as Renegade Soundmachine. I really wish I was more convincing when emailing Gary going back to the myspace days about the then yet-unreleased Rema Rema stuff.

http://inflammablematerial.bigcartel.com/product/rema-rema-international-scale-7-defiant-pose-8

http://www.discogs.com/Rema-Rema-EntryExit/release/6943617

Where is Karl Bonnie?

They probably don't get along.

i realised this after a bit of research and chat ..

such a shame as they could easily pay off mortgages etc if they hit the reunion trail ..

I just reread Neuromancer for the zillionth time and was thinking about how I like to listen to certain records or bands when reading certain books/comics because it’s a perfect soundtrack and for me the soundtrack to Neuromancer is Soundclash. There’s a lot of dub in the book so RSWs take on decadent industrial digital dub pop always seemed fitting.

i interviewed renegade soundwave but i don't think the piece was very good

after a nudge, i listened to all 4 albums yesterday/today.
yeah, their stuff still hits the spot.
never got the 2cd comp though as not enough non-lp material on it.
now, a comp of their own remixes and their remixes of others would be most appreciated,
but i suspect the chances are somewhat slim.

Gary’s been busy with Rema Rema, movie coming soon. Danny did some production and remixes with Rico Conning and makes radio mixes.

blimey.
did not expect that.
nice to hear that they are still involved with various projects.