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Grime / Dubstep

Grime / Dubstep

Grime / Dubstep

by Martin Clark, posted May 4, 2011

Right now, a fierce debate is raging amongst critics and fans of the bassier side of things-- some call it "post-dubstep" while others call it "bass music" or refer to it by tempo ("130bpm"). Everyone is trying to avoid giving it a name, but are these emerging sounds the real deal or the emperors' new clothes? It's perhaps easier to say what post-dubstep/130bpm/bass music isn't than what it is. It isn't grime, either in its pop, instrumental underground, or MC-lead variants. It isn't dubstep, in either of its remaining dominant styles-- wobbly brostep and eyes-down halfstep. And it isn't house & funky, though this movement has had a massive catalytic effect on our as-yet-unnamed/defined genre.

So what is it? So wide is the musical reach of the acts in question, it's only meaningful to mention broad clusters of artists heading in shared directions rather than describing them as part of a greater whole. So you can point to the commonalities of James Blake, Jamie Woon, Mount Kimbie, and Darkstar in the way they use full vocals in prominent-but-interesting ways, yet have ties back into percussive, bass-lead music. Similarly, for takes on the space between earlier dubstep, garage, and house & funky, there's a long list of camps, including Oneman's 502 (Jay Weed, Teeth, Fis-T, Visionist), Loefah's Swamp81 (Boddika/Instra:mental, Addison Groove, "Sicko Cell", Funk Bias, Falty DL), Hyperdub (Kode9, Burial, Ikonika, Scratcha DVA, Cooly G, Zomby, LV), Hessle Audio (Ben UFO, Ramadanman, Joe, Blawan, Peverelist and by association, Joy Orbison), Night Slugs (Bok Bok, L-Vis 1990, Jam City, Mosca, Girl Unit), Numbers (Jackmaster, Deadboy, Jacques Greene, Slackk), Blunted Robots (Brackles, Martin Kemp, Shortstuff, Mickey Pearce, Dark Sky), and L2S (Whistla, Clueless, Submerse and other 'future garage' artists). France has its own thriving contingent via Canblaster, Bombanou, and French Fries that seem as enthralled with the emotive broad strokes of Daft Punk and Basement Jaxx's finer moments as they do with London pirate culture. Breach, Doc Daneeka, and Julio Bashmore should probably get a mention, as should Braiden's electro tweaks. Moving further into experimentalism and synth jams finds you with acts like Damu, Brey, Original Face, Walton, Kidnap Kid, Melee, SBTRKT, and Logos. With Swamp81's Addison Groove, whose "Footcrab" introduced the long since-thriving juke scene to this arena, it's a simple matter of some 30 bpm and you're in footwork territory-- an influence you can hear across the board at 130bpm now.

As the sprawling list above shows, well-meaning attempts to loosely define the ground we're covering here are somewhat futile and almost certainly flawed. This is not one genre. However, given the links, interaction, and free-flowing ideas between different waters of this archipelago of creativity, you can't dismiss all these acts as unrelated, solitary individuals either. So we return to the issue in question: Is this the real deal or no deal whatsoever?

The case for the prosecution begins with the thorny question of genre. Any collection of acts that starts at James Blake and ends in DJ Rashad is almost certainly not a single genre. So why does it even matter whether it's a genre at all? Well, if there's one thing genres are good at, it's unity of purpose and building fresh new ideas from that unity. If all we're seeing a collection of disparate individuals pulling in separate directions, we may see some interesting results but there's unlikely to be any collective momentum gathered nor shared emotional experiences forged around a few massive anthems. Nor would we see fans falling head over heels for it, as they did with recent great scenes like UK garage, jungle, dubstep, or grime. Critics also like to explicitly or implicitly raise the issue that the continuum of those previous pirate-radio scenes were mostly working class phenomena, while this new movement isn't and therefore couldn't possibly be as great.

Another criticism of this sphere is that many of its artists act in near-indistinguishable proximity to other scenes; where once there was the pirate-driven rudeness that runs through dubstep, UK funky, and UK garage, suddenly there's just house-- often of the most safe, trad, tepid kind. That's not to make a value judgement about house, but if what you're doing is making so-so examples of a genre that started in the mid 1980s, it's hard to claim you're the new thing.

The genre-proximity issue, detractors complain, extends beyond just the influence of house. Firstly, the genre in question only exists in the form it does because of brostep and a need to make something less moronic. But what are its unique elements? If you take out the house flavors, juke vox chops, eski synths, R&B-diva samples, and dubstep bass pressure, which bits uniquely pertain to this not-genre? This criticism leads to the conclusion that what we're currently seeing is in fact just what Kode9 called a "holding pattern" for the next big thing, the palate cleanser between meals, musical "sorbet" if you will. And while sorbet's nice, you probably wouldn't want to eat an entire meal of it.

The case for the defense begins simply-- stuff your preconceptions. No, it isn't one whole genre, but so what? The music being made by these acts in 2011 is amazing-- as good or better than many of the genres it shares borders with. From Girl Unit's "Wut" to Kode9's "Love Is the Drug" via Mickey Pearce's refix of Redlight, Teeth's "Shawty" to Ms Dynamite and Dark Sky's refix of Nelly Furtado and Timbaland. Joy Orbison's new dub "Ellipsis" loops the phrase "we just used to like... do our own thing," evoking memories of simpler, carefree times before a set of rave-esque pianos complete the audio nostalgia. It's as if to say, "Let's not over think this one, just come with us." Because the ability to mix coherently between the best of UK funky, house, grime, juke, kwaito, jungle, and electro while still nominally looking like bass-led rude pirate house is a wonderfully rare moment of creativity and freedom-- the kind of freedom people find in the most fruitful-but-fleeting moments of great genres. Put in simple, indivisible terms: this stuff is really, really fun right now.

Yes, criticisms about parts of the genre being too safe are valid. But many genres, scenes, or movements contain sections of mediocre work and should be seen for what they are and avoided. But to judge our broad collection of "bass" artists in question by their best work is to see what quality is being produced-- as good as UK funky or grime in 2011 and far better, on the whole, than dubstep (unless you find LFO modulation, screaming infantile synth-fits, and utterly predictable large dynamic range changes an original idea).

Does this not-scene have one unique idea that is undeniably its own? Probably not. But nor would you expect a series of broad, interconnected collectives to have one common idea. In an era of rapid, Internet-catalyzed exchange of ideas, perhaps we should embrace the possibility of a broader, distributed idea of how a scene or movement can self-organize?

And does it matter that it might not be a predominantly working-class movement, making it prone to over-emphasizing serious, "sophisticated" elements and leaving out the rude flavors? Not remotely if the music holds its own on the ruff-o-meter, not least because records like Mickey Pearce's Ms Dynamite refix is more than rude enough and many of the working-class-dominated pirate scenes in London couldn't be less rude if they tried nowadays, with a vein of musical conservatism running through the parts of road-rap trying to be U.S. rap, grime trying to be chart pop, or parts of UK funky trying to be "sophisticated" minimal and trad U.S. house.

So who's right? Unsatisfyingly, both camps have a strong case, but I'd strongly urge anyone to avoid writing this entire space off on ideological grounds unless you've first listened and danced to some of its finest proponents. Preferably somewhere quite loud.

LV and Joshua Idehen's Routes LP is out in May on Martin Clark's Keysound Recordings.

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