chicago juke: dj nate, dj rashad [R.I.P. 2014], leatherface aka kaptain cadillac, dj roc &c &c

i've been sleeping on this: only became increasingly aware of it over the past couple of years, mostly because it's a huge influence on the night slugs crew here in london (girl unit, jam city, bok bok, l-vis 1990, manara, ikonika), and it both shows in their own productions and in what they dj. then i got sent a few compilations and EPs and heard a few mixes by the artists in the title. dj nate's da trak genious is the one that's most blown me away - this fucking track is so so so beautiful:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTkRyfv6gHg

but the entire album is wall-to-wall vibes, snatches of soul and hip-hop and r&b pitched up, pitched down, set to those amazing stuttering beats.

so i) school me on what i've missed all these years, ii) talk about the stuff just coming out, iii) &c &c.

oh yeah and footworking is pretty hard right?

so these guys are like the uk diplo right?

'the night slugs crew' i mean obviously

i find it too hard to keep up - i thought those guys played funky?

oh god they would be so offended at that. they don't make juke, it's just an influence that you can hear now and again. sometimes they play juke (sometimes house, funky, r&b, whatever) but that's not any more diploesque than any uk dj playing music from elsewhere, it's not like juke is their selling point (though carving out there own distinct aesthetic IS).

Given Diplo's own actual productions are increasingly Night Slugs-ish that comparison is more accurate every day.

the london diplo seems more accurate.

that's bullshit, and doesn't even make sense w/r/t the practice of calling someone "the uk version of x", but this is a thread about juke, so does anyone actually have comments on that rather than pursuing some weird anti-nightslugs snark vendetta?

xp

My comment was more about diplo really.

"poetry" is fantastic. I really like dj nate but don't know the other guys you mention very well.

Nate isn't even part of the scene. It's RP Boo, DJ Rashad, DJ Spinn, DJ Roc, Traxxman etc etc.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGPbBvujC10&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4raxoN1ZeX0&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02oPbTa-jUI

this stuff is big w/ chicago teens. the dude who wrote about this stuff for the wire is a friend of mine

Fidget House ?

/braggin

deej you LIVE there, i figured you'd know about it all (and was hoping you'd be in here at some point)

Nate isn't even part of the scene

yeah i heard something vaguely about this: in what way is he not part of the scene/why is he being picked up on, or packaged as, part of it?

i like all the artists i've heard but he reeeeeally stands out

"poetry" is really nice

these are some of the other dj nate trax that stand out on the album

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORf_acLEV5k

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

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lFALsSjM1wQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ITvdb3m9vLw

and "call me when you're sober" - the only version of which on youtube is this amazing girl

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9PDtmEiAuQ

haha what - looking for that on youtube reveals that the source material for "call me when you're sober" is EVANESCENCE!

lol yep

Hence the title.

yeah i just didn't know that evanescence had a song called that

Ooops neither did I it was a lame gag about needing to be drunk to listen to Evanescence.

looool

so i also realised that i didn't know where the "poetry" sample was from and it's a random danity kane ballad off an album that i apparently love but didn't recognise

i have trouble listening to this stuff. it reminds me of trying to get into acardipane or lory d or stuff like that. yes, it is incredibly offbeat, put i find just about everything involved aesthetically off-putting. it's sort of like certain types of internet-derived conceptual art, where yes, you do get this incredible sense of invention and "wrongness" about it but then there's not really any ear candy there to draw you back.

er i meant "eye candy", hopefully that visual art metaphor isn't too strained.

when i hear music like footwork i feel the same way i feel when i see art like this

imo its not stuff i would pay for & play out
its cool & weird but its like ... super-functional music for the ppl who make it / primarily consume it. not that im against britishers spending their hard earned 'pounds' to help a kid in inner city chi make a few bucks instead of that money going to dubstep dj dark shadows of nottingham or w/e (made that name up)

i do like how it functions in its main environment tho ... just have trouble listening to it w/out looking at kids doing some crazy footwork ish to it. its like, theres no purpose beyond that, its not pop music, etc

not that im against britishers spending their hard earned 'pounds' to help a kid in inner city chi make a few bucks instead of that money going to dubstep dj dark shadows of nottingham or w/e

^^this is classic

heh heh

so is this basically made to do footwork routines too, like those amped-up hip hop / pop dance cheerleading mashups?

or is it more "listenable" than that, like these kids might bump this stuff in their bedroom while studying?

i can only imagine ppl who actually footwork, or produce footwork music, or dudes who read The Wire, actually listening to this while chilling in their bedrooms
also internet dudes like us 'making sense of a musical phenomenon'
this stuff is ime separate even from ghetto house targeted at dance parties that arent related to footworking
but i dont know as well as dave quam i shd ask him

i mean, 'the kids' like, uh, kanye west & waka flocka flame

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uiGpv-UeiDI

its cool & weird but its like ... super-functional music for the ppl who make it / primarily consume it.

i do like how it functions in its main environment tho ... just have trouble listening to it w/out looking at kids doing some crazy footwork ish to it. its like, theres no purpose beyond that, its not pop music, etc

you could say the same thing about baltimore club "bmore gutter music" was dropped - by hollertronix, no less. now there's bmore breaks all over top 40 like wtf

are there

& no, baltimore club was made for dancing by ppl at clubs. "OMG u could say the same thing about house music!!" not really

it is super-functional music for the ppl who make it / primarily consume it, but we already saw a single from the UK which showed footwork influences, I can see this music going further.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWfiog1Ure4

anyway, I do like how it functions in its main environment too, I'd prefer it to stay like this to be honest, when things go global the energy dissipates too.

it's functional music => it works well in clubs => djs from other countries play it in clubs => and here we are with some albums getting released (and the dj nate in particular is pretty conducive to non-club listening)

yeah the dj nate album is pretty nice around the house listening music imo, don't even really think of it as dance music half as much as instrumental hip hop. but i'm not crazy about the rest of the stuff been posted itt so far, which seems much more dependent on context, or knowing what footwork is & how to do it.

& no, baltimore club was made for dancing by ppl at clubs. "OMG u could say the same thing about house music!!" not really

i think we should explore this statement

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

jurr

http://www.youtube.com/user/ghettotekz

This youtube channel is amazing.

i like listening to this stuff apart from watching crazy footwork videos or whatever, but it gets a little headache-inducing after a few tracks. doesn't surprise me at all that it appeals to people who fall for other high-bpm beat music (d&b, dubstep, baltimore, etc).

listening to this now: http://www.thefader.com/2010/11/04/stream-%CE%BC-ziqs-footwork-mix/

i'm sorry but goon squad absolutely kill it in the above video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=be1o2EuOKIA

^this is the footwork track to rope in noise dudes/drone mongos/Wire subscriber asshats like me

rilly tho it's one of the most... extraordinary things I've heard all year - it's on the Bangs & Works comp that Planet Mu are putting out

I meant to post in this but when I was reading it before it was on my phone in a caravan :/

WARNING: THIS IS THE GREATEST VIDEO EVER POSTED TO THE INTERNET.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qjdLcwjJJ18

npr streaming the 'bangs & works' comp, with a little article on it.

so [night slugs] are like the uk diplo right?

― i feed these skreets (tpp), Saturday, October 2, 2010 4:29 AM (2 months ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

:) Thank you for creating a phrase that captures my contempt of Night Slugs.

i decided today this stuff's not even music

http://vimeo.com/15819811

I've decide that this is just about the most depressing noise I've ever heard.

j/k i really like dj spinn and dj rashad but a lot of this stuff i'm just having a lot of trouble getting into ...

super sick: http://soundcloud.com/ghettophiles/joey-beltram-energy-flash-dj-rashad-xtc-juke-remix

super sick: http://soundcloud.com/ghettophiles/joey-beltram-energy-flash-dj-rashad-xtc-juke-remix

whoops

i still think its hilar that i posted about this on ilx like three yrs ago & its just now suddenly a big deal
not that im saying was ahead of the curve -- i just think its lol how 'the curve' exists at all considering how long this stuff has been around.

i know uk ppl misunderstanding us music is sorta the origins of rave & all but man i was at 'the club' tonite (obv, its now 5am) and for the last hour the dudes descended from relatively populist house-dance rmxes to fukkin dubstep tracks that ppl stomp around drunkenly to. it was the most unbearable shit. i can just envision the dj rolling his eyes while playing actually-listenable music just so he can get to the 'challenging' dubstep tracks that only he understands **i cram to understand** this mindset

Were they actually the juke-inspired dubstep tunes?

"Footcrab" is dire IMO. Conversely Ramadanman's "Work Dem" is really good!

deej it's only now "a big deal" for the UK ppl that are into it because everyone has only just heard it! Most of the stuff that is being talked about here - certainly Nate and Roc - didn't get any sort of promotion outside of Chicago until Planet Mu compiled it

of the earlier juke dudes I think you'll have been able to find pockets of fandom in the UK but not sure if any of them come over to play, save for DJ Funk maybe? So it kind of limits how much you can engage with it as a form

Does anyone else kind of get the feeling that a lot of the recent interest in juke is just middle-class producers and music journalists doing a quasi-anthropological search for 'authentic' new music from Chicago ghettos and whathaveyou? It's not that I refuse to believe that this music can be good in and of itself, but I can't help but have a suspicion that a lot of what you get on FACT or whatever is white dudes from London searching for the perceived authenticity of new music by young black urban producers and getting off on how foreign sounding and authentic it sounds. I don`t know but sometimes I get a very outsider looking in and (and possibly co-opting) vibe from it.

I haven't really been following it much, so who am I to run my mouth, etc. etc.

yeah but that's the same old strawman argument we used for baile funk

Or kwaito or kudoro or whatever the shanty house flavor of the month is.

not sure why "outsider looking in" is supposed to be a bad thing in this instance

calling out people for getting into music for cred is tired at this point - especially in regard to dance music, no? growing up around dc and bmore i had this problem re: club music over the past few years and eventually got over it. poor white dudes, they're just supposed to sit around playing guitars and tubas all day? from what i've seen of the nightslugs crew and associated community they aren't at all disingenuous (or as socioeconomically status quo as some may think) vs just being into music seeing what they can make out of it and sure, getting off on how foreign sounding it is. people worrying about whether or not they're allowed to like or use a sound because they weren't born in a particular place or of a particular color aren't getting much done.

back on subject - rashad did ps1 this summer and it was really awkward for a while and super-necessary that he brought some footwork guys along to warm the crowd up. it was my first time doing ps1 and hadn't taken into account that it'd be a lot of people not specifically there for the music.

Reluctant to weigh in here as I'm way out of my comfort zone. Things like the DJ Nate album and some of the tracks off Bangs and Works (e.g. DJ Trouble) completely work for me in a home listening context; I don't think the "armchair anthropologist" criticisms have anything to go on because this music is easily appreciable without any knowledge of context for anyone who digs the post-Dilla/Burial or w/e late-night-beats aesthetic. (So it makes a lot of sense that Nate et al aren't considered part of the juke scene, as suggested way upthread)

The clubbier music doesn't do much for me but I'm among the least likely target audience for that so my opinion is irrelevant.

is it wrong to say that i prefer girl unit's IRL to any footwork tracks i've heard? when it doesn't sound like ghetto house, footwork sounds really off-putting to me.

Does anyone else kind of get the feeling that a lot of the recent interest in juke is just middle-class producers and music journalists doing a quasi-anthropological search for 'authentic' new music from Chicago ghettos and whathaveyou?

This is just lame... most of this music would not be heard by anyone outside its own scene were it not for people like Paradinas putting it out. This sort of curatorial outsider approach is a crucial part of how pop music works, complaining about it is like complaining about the stuff that John Peel played. What's wrong with accepting that people want to bring this stuff to a wider audience because they LIKE it? I'd be fucking overjoyed if a hip NYC tastemaker decided he wanted to put out a UK funky compilation.

Same goes for zinging Diplo really - in Pon De Floor he's been at least partially responsible for one of the best bangers of the last couple of years.

That said, I don't think UK types mixing this music with their own stuff (dubstep, funky, whatever) really works. If only because the genres have totally different genres to momentum that go against the grain of one another - juke stutters, funky gallops, dubstep lurches forward or backward or stops dead whenever it feels like it - they're not really elements that sit well with one another.

night slugs is great for doing at least two of those three things on each gtrack

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iB_4VO3ibug

love juke though not all of it 'works' - imo the best stuff is when virtually everything is rhythmic. when producers try to make it a bit more 'musical' or mellow etc im not sure the old breaks/samples sit that neatly on top of what theyre doing rhythmically. might grow on me though. what i find weird/interesting is the contrast between what you get on bangs and works for example and the podcasts from xlr8r and fact that spinn and rashad have done - those are much more housier (?)/old school ghetto house/tech sounding.

the whole anthropology thing i think is understandable but a bit specious. journalists/djs/producers etc are just excited about this, even if it isnt 'new' to everyone. seems no diff from how bmore club was discovered years after it had been around. who cares anyway, its not like juke/footwork is 'dead' is it? its still going.

night slugs is great ropey for doing at least two of those three things on each track

(last line xpost obv)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whlVi0QobNI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlVgU0YKrTQ

seems no diff from how bmore club was discovered years after it had been around. \

― titchy (titchyschneiderMk2), Sunday, December 12, 2010 7:09 PM (31 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

think of all the great music that 'discovery' caused

ive got nothing

the word 'discovery' itself is hilarious to me. like "christopher columbus discovered america" kind of shit

i discovered chicago juke itt

is there some sort of protocol white middle class labels/promoters should follow if they become aware of an artist/scene and want to popularize it?

im in favor of juke producers making lots of money out of this fwiw

less in favor of them giving lots of money to brits doing lame versions to play side by side with dubstep songs

how are they giving money to brits?

im assuming that brit will start making their own juke songs or 'juke-influenced' songs

even in the event that happens, it's hardly the same as 'giving money', and i doubt any uk faux-juke producers are going to be swimming in cash

labels releasing juke primers will directly remunerate the original innovators tho

I'm kind of loling here at the idea of Night Slugs or Planet Mu making lots of money of this stuff. deej do you have some kind of cultural tie to juke that affords you gatekeeper status? do you buy the vinyls/mp3s on a weekly basis and go to the club nights?

what are you even talking about

i think deej was saying he knew this shit years ago and is kinda lol that some uk bros are suddenly omg juke gotta catch em all

not just that i knew it, its just funny that its treated like a huge discovery & i dont really see any exciting new music being created from this discovery. im glad that yall are helping it to sell other places

i dunno

i like that girl unit track enough tho i had no idea about its supposed lineage

is there a helpful video of british ppl showing me how to dance to footcrab

was just wondering if you have an actual stake in the music, since you live in Chicago and seem so worried about it being diluted or something. not trying to zing

of course he doesn't

this is ILM

im not worried about it, i just cant imagine what kind of good music would come from this 'dilution.' as it is, juke is marginal music in the states & exists for ppl who like to footwork. its cool & interesting & not really ever going to crossover (unless it does in this sorta juke -> nightslugs -> diplo -> lil jon -> one pop hit produced for random R&B singer with slight affect of juke drums kind of path, like the reverse-BAPE thing where japanese people only started wearing BAPES once american rappers did).

its not the same as the way house music worked in the u.s., where it crossed over from underground to the pop charts. its perma-niche like b-more club. the crowd that gets into this stuff in the uk (and music spotters from the u.s. into dubstep) has some vested interest in a narrative about sonic 'progress' that doesnt actually relate to crossover

i dont have a stake in it but im not trying to 'protect' it i just dont think that this is particularly exciting news & is kinda lol

i still think its hilar that i posted about this on ilx like three yrs ago & its just now suddenly a big deal
not that im saying was ahead of the curve -- i just think its lol how 'the curve' exists at all considering how long this stuff has been around.

― lotta diamonds ... but prolly more display names (deej), Sunday, 12 December 2010 11:03 (Yesterday) Bookmark

deej refers to the concept of a curve - the latency between juke originating and actually being noticed

however, even tho he was aware of juke years ago, ie not subject to 'the curve', he wasn't 'ahead of the curve'

this is amusing to him

brits discover new local dance form; integrate it into whatever IDM is being called at that time; no one outside that scene cares.

the thing is juke was 'noticed' earlier, its just who it is now being noticed by that makes this newsworthy

i admit im being kind of harsh here on dubstep / night slugs etc. & i recognize that this stuff matters to lots of people -- i just think its a bit critically overhyped

i mean mix this in w/ my general rmde about the echo chamber of criticism etc

the crowd that gets into this stuff in the uk (and music spotters from the u.s. into dubstep) has some vested interest in a narrative about sonic 'progress' that doesnt actually relate to crossover

― lotta diamonds ... but prolly more display names (deej), Monday, 13 December 2010 02:16 (1 minute ago) Bookmark

this is rather imputing motives to ppl u don't know

i mean there is some notion about 'progress' in the 'nuum' and related ideas which probably have a little bit of influence on the way producers think nowadays

syncretism has always been an element of that -- detroit, belgian hardcore, timabaland all influenced uk scenes

so obviously it has nothing to do with a crossover of those localized scenes in other places, tho by a side-effect it may introduce ppl to them -- eg uk person starting a thread about a 3+ yr old us microgenre learnt of via uk productions

the thing is juke was 'noticed' earlier, its just who it is now being noticed by that makes this newsworthy

― lotta diamonds ... but prolly more display names (deej), Monday, 13 December 2010 02:21 (3 minutes ago)

so juke has previously been noticed by other ppl, but nobody noticed those ppl while they were noticing it?

like the reverse-BAPE thing where japanese people only started wearing BAPES once american rappers did).

it's not really relevant to your point but you got that backwards deej

why would someone wish to believe that japanese people only started wearing BAPES once american rappers did?

like the reverse-BAPE thing where japanese people only started wearing BAPES once american rappers did).

it's not really relevant to your point but you got that backwards deej

― moonship journey to baja, Sunday, December 12, 2010 8:32 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark

my understanding was that japanese ppl made bapes but they werent selling outside of fashion world folks, but once american rappers started wearing them japanese rap fans did too, because american rappers were

so juke has previously been noticed by other ppl, but nobody noticed those ppl while they were noticing it?

― salvia divanorum (nakhchivan), Sunday, December 12, 2010 8:29 PM (24 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

the uk is not the center of the world

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2202574862

what is the chicago tribune's circulation vs. the wire's

the uk is not the center of the world

― lotta diamonds ... but prolly more display names (deej), Monday, 13 December 2010 02:54 (14 minutes ago)

pretty sure it is [via gmt]

schooled by science

so juke has previously been noticed by other ppl, but nobody noticed those ppl while they were noticing it?

― salvia divanorum (nakhchivan), Sunday, December 12, 2010 8:29 PM (24 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

the uk is not the center of the world

― lotta diamonds ... but prolly more display names (deej), Sunday, December 12, 2010 9:54 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark

.....

this stuff is big w/ chicago teens. the dude who wrote about this stuff for the wire is a friend of mine

― HOW I FOLD MY BANDANA (deej), Saturday, October 2, 2010 4:22 PM (2 months ago) Bookmark

are you talking quam? if so then you'd realize one of the biggest proponents of footwork in the media lately is out of chicago - that and combined with the fact that a lot of nightslugs and associated (since that seems to be what's referred to by "uk") are actually stateside it seems the calling out of the uk on this for whatever reason doesn't hold.

if chicagoans think the newsworthiness of their own noticing of juke went sadly unnoticed, it's imperative they pay no notice to limey fuxx whose noticing of juke has become sadly newsworthy

hes a proponent of 'getting it right' afaik -- like i said im ok with / supportive of these guys getting a larger audience, im just reasoning that there wont be much worthwhile music to come from this exposure

FWIW Night Slugs seems more on a bmore tip by and large - the current crop of juke-inspired dubstep tunes feels a bit separate to that (though obv the general aesthetic is pretty indistinguishable and it wouldn't have shocked me to see those tunes being released on Night Slugs).

bmore? really?

to the extent that there is a recurrent trend, and heavily filtered through all their other influences obv.

you could say uk funky as well but I'm trying to avoid discussions of that issue.

Well, Baltimore filtered through Diplo maybe.

And Lex can't get all huffy about that, Bok Bok has put in serious amounts of time on the Hollerboard.

He and Manara used to call themselves Faggatronix for chrissakes. They were intentionally parodying that whole aesthetic.

They picked up the whole chiptune influence from back when it was first starting to get mixed in with dubstep, threw some grime sounding basslines overtop of some electrohouse and voila: Night Slugs. I honestly admire their work ethic and their ability to promote themselves.

Bok Bok has put in serious amounts of time on the Hollerboard.

i have no horse in this race & don't listen to any of this stuff but lol @ this phrase

Well, go check his post count. I am that big a nerd.

ha, i believe you -- i just think "put in serious amounts of time on the Hollerboard" is hilarious, sorry

I don't know, how else do you market music to blog DJs?

A lot of music that gets played in my town might as well have just had a program that reads XML feeds and beatmatches the songs as an actual DJ behind the screen. Its the most trite paint by numbers scene I can think of. And I spent a couple years inside so I guess I should know.

"X has put in serious amounts of time on the Hollerboard" is a decent display name IMO.

for deej it would actually be true

thats a shipley zing you fucked up son

im the sage francis board, Al is the hollerboard. 5 yard penalty

for the last hour the dudes descended from relatively populist house-dance rmxes to fukkin dubstep tracks that ppl stomp around drunkenly to.

haha this is why so many of the djs and producers i know in london set up their own nights. it's obvious that a lot of ilm people have a fixed, set idea of what night slugs and its many affiliates are about - the white middle-class thing is frankly hilarious - but, y'know, remember you're as far away from them as non-chicagoans are from juke.

the thing is juke was 'noticed' earlier, its just who it is now being noticed by that makes this newsworthy

― lotta diamonds ... but prolly more display names (deej), Monday, 13 December 2010 02:21 (7 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

ie people who run record labels/actually make it available to buy; people who play it out at club nights/actually make it available to dance to? Don't really think it's unreasonable that their input might be considered more valuable than, idk, someone on Dissensus or wherever spending his evenings clicking through Youtube links

Lex what do you think of "Footcrab".

i think it's boring

i saw it getting raved about before i heard it and was so underwhelmed when i heard it

also, it's no better when you actually hear it in a club

Oh good I was worried you were gonna defend it.

I don't know why people are talking about Night Slugs in this thread tbh.

brits discover new local dance form; integrate it into whatever IDM is being called at that time; no one outside that scene cares.

the thing is juke was 'noticed' earlier, its just who it is now being noticed by that makes this newsworthy

Deej you are falling over yourself to appear clued-up and showing your cluelessness in the process. IDM has nothing to do with this scene, even in scare quotes - post-dubstep is another matter but isn't relevant here. But Night Slugs isn't really the important label here, it's Planet Mu and Mike Paradinas, who *is* IDM but as far as I know he's not even trying to make juke himself.

I think of Night Slugs and affiliates as basically magpie-ish - people with very good record collections who like a lot of stuff, want to play it out and throw a lot of different elements into their aesthetic - 2-step, funky, rnb, juke, dubstep, Baltimore, early 90s pop house, South African house, grime... and that's just going on the sets I've heard. So their sets can go all over the place in terms of beats in particular, they're not actually that dissimilar to Diplo in those terms but not as ostentatiously "global". Lex that's fair, no?

Also "Footcrab" is a fucking horrible word.

it sounds like something that would put you permanently out of work

or maybe that's crabfoot idk

yeah, though w/night slugs i'd probably say that their old booty bass and ghetto house influences are more important than any contemporary genre - and while as a label it can seem magpie-ish, i don't think any specific producer really is - and it's what links their seemingly disparate sounds that's more important. i know bok bok's tended to go with the "just call it HOUSE" line recently w/r/t there still not being a proper genre name for them (admittedly this makes a ton more sense re: his dj sets than his productions)

actually yeah the stuff the NS crew grew up on is a way better summation of what they're about than the stuff that's within their orbit now. grime, booty bass, ghettotech, r&b, 90s house.

Actually the Night Slugs stuff I actually like is the stuff that edges much closer to straight house. I don't think they need a genre name because it's not actually a genre, there's too much variance in the beats.

post-dubstep is another matter but isn't relevant here.

Uhhh, wrong Matt, juke-inspired post-dubstep is pretty much that whole scene's big new development of 2010.

(give or take james blake stannery)

This is by far the best example (though it's not like it's a field crowded with classics):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utvgs27fT4U

I was actually talking about the floatier end of post-dubstep - Subeena, James Blake, Mt Kimbie etc. But yeah point taken about Ramadanman, although I think of him as dubstep proper even when he isn't.

just a quick question: has there ever been a worse name for a dubstep artist than Ramadanman? is he the standard bearer?

He's increasingly recording as Pearson Sound now so maybe he agrees. Possibly overcompensating, seeing as Pearson Sound sounds like one of those places audiophiles go to buy very expensive hi-fi systems.

Apparently he's phasing out the name in favour of Pearson Sound. Good move. ha ha xpost.

I was actually talking about the floatier end of post-dubstep - Subeena, James Blake, Mt Kimbie etc. But yeah point taken about Ramadanman, although I think of him as dubstep proper even when he isn't.

I think that the notion of IDM tendencies and dancefloor tendencies being obviously separate from one another is dead and buried at this point if it ever really was true - and it's relevant that ultimately the single most important IDM in terms of longterm impact is probably early Black Dog, which was still dancefloor friendly, albeit fitfully so . The spectre of IDM is much more diffuse nowadays, and rarely inhabits anything fully, more typically relationally.

yeah ramadanman reaaaaaally doesn't like that name (and nor should he)

ha xps

I think what deej was going for there was 'lol dubstep is just IDM with a different name you stupid Brits with your several genres' but I for one didn't greatly care to engage with that

ramadanman prob thought he was being hilarious when he came up with his name.

not just that i knew it, its just funny that its treated like a huge discovery & i dont really see any exciting new music being created from this discovery. im glad that yall are helping it to sell other places

its not about new exciting music being 'created' from this 'discovery' (though if anything like that does happen its prob going to take a while before the uk regurgitation of juke becomes its own thing rather than a weird knockoff/tribute version of it), its just about these guys getting a bit more attention, maybe a bit more cash, and maybe some more bookings around the world. i mean, what do people want labels to do? only sign up artists from a scene that has only just come into existence and reject it if its been going more than a few days? if i had heard this 3-4 years ago i still would have been interested in it. it just so happens that even if it is belated, now theres a bit more attention being given to this stuff (for better worse, but hopefully better) than there was previously, where it wasnt even particularly well known outside chicago, as far as i know. anyway, much rather someone like mike paradinas/planet mu getting behind this than someone like diplo (who has created some real bangers yes, but still deserves some suspicion). dont see how its any diff from when house/techno was newish and you had comps 'introducing' those sounds. in a way its kinda cool that for all the 'nothing stays local' anymore fearmongering about the net, this stufff has only just started getting an international foothold.

anyone know if mike p was into juke pre-footcrab (which is quite tepid btw and suffers from those synths being too nice and tasteful - not even halfway as invigorating drumwise compared to juke proper)? did he know about it already or did that just send him hurtling towards it?

its just funny that its treated like a huge discovery

lord forgive us for not being up on all regional genres from the day they were created

I think what deej was going for there was 'lol dubstep is just IDM with a different name you stupid Brits with your several genres' but I for one didn't greatly care to engage with that

yeah the word "dubstep" gets thrown around as a strawman so much (cf whiney's "i don't believe anyone really listens to dubstep" steez - pretty much why i can't take him seriously as a critic). irony is that i never bloody liked it much in the first place - i'm just not so allergic to it that i have to tar either the stuff that's come after it or its pop moves like "katy on a mission" with some Serious-Faced Strawman brush.

True, there are other reasons to tar "Katy On A Mission" </kneejerk tim>

I thought "Watch My Feet" was the moment people discovered juke anyways.

most ppl viewed watch my feet as a novelty record afaik

i thought juke was a regional hip-hop subgenre when "watch my feet" came out (à la hyphy or jerk or whatever) - even keke palmer had a footworking song on her album! i didn't realise until last year that it was more of a club genre that isn't particularly mc-based.

btw footcrab and dumbshit become 10 times more impressive if you play them pitched up.

anyone know if mike p was into juke pre-footcrab

pretty certain he was yeah - I don't think he discovered it for himself in any especially privileged way (ie fanboy on the internet) but I seem to recall reading that he's been bugging out on footwork for the best part of a couple of years maybe. I mean if you try and think how long it actually takes to put something like the Nate album together, from first point of contact (NB one of Mike's colleagues described Nate as "a nightmare" to work with lol), I'd assume it was in the works since before the start of this year... could be wrong tho

Yeah here we go http://blog.bleep.com/2010/08/12/mike-paradinas-introduces-juke-house/

that mix thats linked on that page is seriously good. one of the best ive heard actually.

in the comments someone says theres some european juke djs/producers called nightmare juke squad. sounds like horrorcore. though id rather hear some european guys take juke into more of a gabba type direction than dubstep producers remoulding it into the (somewhat boring) dubstep aesthetic.

joy orbison is a much more annoying name than ramadanman imo

they should both have 'lol!' at the end of their names

i thought juke was a regional hip-hop subgenre when "watch my feet" came out (à la hyphy or jerk or whatever) - even keke palmer had a footworking song on her album! i didn't realise until last year that it was more of a club genre that isn't particularly mc-based.

― lex lex lex lex lex on the track BOW (lex pretend), Monday, December 13, 2010 5:16 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

juke isnt really a club genre as much as it is a genre for kids under 21 who cant get into club, fyi

& yes i was just doing the lol dubstep = idm thing

also whiney's wrong that 'no one listens to dubstep,' of course, but thats exactly the problem

this tarring of all the different strands of dubstep with the same boring brush is a bigger problem

shame its only dubstep guys that seem to have picked up on this - would much rather hear grime producers respond to juke.

Real talk.

dubstep isn't IDM, it's trip hop for the 10s

lol i thought that was disco edits

another uk version of juke (and it's 160 bpm...those ramadanman tracks talked about up thread slow it down to 130ish): http://oomk.tumblr.com/post/2190370393/zomby-digital-rain-we-want-moah

i'm totally unsurprised that dubstep producers would gravitate towards this stuff. beat-wise, there are more similarities than differences...the syncopation/sense of clave in the drums, high bpm with half-time backbeats, etc.

close, deej. disco edits are the big beat of the 10s.

dubstep isn't IDM, it's trip hop for the 10s

maybe, but trip hop for the 10s >>>> trip hop for the 90s

trip-hop was awesome and "trip-hop for the 10s" is nothing but a positive

yes and no

prefer trip hop from the 90s -- at least tried to sound vaguely sexxy

exception: that jamie woon track (original version) is still my shit

of interest to people into that jamie woon track: creep ft. romy madley croft (from the xx) - days

sexiest dubstep track was flylo + thom yorke

the thing abt the jamie woon track of course is that it doesnt sound like dubstep at all

nor does james blake, mt kimbie, etc etc

dubsteps a lot of different things. some of it's the trip hop of the 10s, some of it is the drum n bass, some of it the electro and some of it the detroit techno.

^

(that jamie woon track is basically 'burial doing pop/house' to me)

"dubstep" as a single central thing pretty much doesn't exist as it did 4-5 years ago, and there are a bunch of rather interesting reasons for that - but anyway, saying "[x] sounds like dubstep" in 2010 doesn't really tell me much about what that thing sounds like.

indeed non-londoners cottoning on to dubstep in 2010 could be compared to non-chicagoans cottoning on to juke in 2010

dubstep iirc basically describes any awkward stilted song w jabbing bass frequencies that stoners listen to. the clumsier the rhythm the more 'dubstep influence'

can we consider my trolling here 'argument trolling' & not 'personal beef' trolling? just fyi

disprove me of my stereotypes

deej i'm guessing you don't like the whole flylo/brainfeeder beat scene either?

i am familiar with dubstep stoner listener stereotypes, we've had them here for years. they're lame. tarring every kind of music that's vaguely linked to the genre with that brush is just inaccurate though.

the gist of my post was the slow, uncomfortable rhythmic aspects. it's anti-house, that way, mad masculine. i think hip hop production has done a better job of bringing together (& often playing off) masculine & feminine, this stuff always feels weighted on the male side of that equation

ignore the stoner stereotype for a moment & just throw me some traxx that are dubstep-qua-dubstep, but dont strike you as stereotypically clumsy, rhythmically

sorry if this is remedial ilx shit -- we can bypass this if its been done before.
i also wont be able to check youtubes etc til i get home from work

"dubstep qua dubstep" - do you mean dubstep from back in the day (which i'm not an expert on and only have a vague liking for) or, like, various iterations of it now?

ARE YOU A TRIPSTER?!?!?! OMG WTF LOL

just throw me some traxx that are dubstep-qua-dubstep, but dont strike you as stereotypically clumsy, rhythmically

Pinch - Qawwali
Mala - Left Leg Out
Toasty - Splash
Mala - Change / Forgive
the Silkie album
Monkeysteak - Lighthouse Dub (Pinch Remix)

Although maybe none of these are exactly dubstep-qua-dubstep, which if interpreted narrowly basically means the space between Benga, Leofah, Distance and Skream.

by "clumsy" i don't know if you mean the unquantized thing or the big-beat heaviness of some dubstep shit (which i hate).

but 'cmyk' is pretty straightforward rhythmically and not overly dude-ish:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tQoQirZwxE4

and i could see this working on a dancefloor here, maybe:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f0phGzrcTEE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDuznqhS6tQ

i think you can call a (relatively) old mala track and/or one of the first tracks pinch every produced "dubstep-qua-dubstep".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8VrEkkI-y0w

^^ feminine pressure

pretty sure that 2562 track will read as very 'clumsy' to deej

dubstep from a few years back -

geiom ft. marita - reminissin'
pangaea - router
mr lager ft. alys be - tell me
mala - alicia
benga - e trips
benga & coki - night

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBp0EyMhCwE

wait but this is a FOOTWORK thread

i am throwing out dubstep tracks that sound not rhythmically masculine, and if we're reading "masculine" as "not deep house" then at least no more masculine than footwork!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRnYY-sn1Rw

that's not a typo

rhythmically complex but NOT rhythmically masculine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3epmUGyBUf8

okay that's a bit masculine

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5nK-sN_DDfk

ok pretty much disqualifies itself

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEjVC-zEbeM

pretty good except for the 4/4 part

posting in former juke-turned-dubstep thread that it seems sort of backwards to be making a point of forcing arguably progressive/forward-thinking/whachawannacallit music into a masculine/feminine duality

not to speak for deej, but i think he might be asking for dubstep could conceivably work in a u.s. club, i.e. not too abstract, aggressive, or strictly-for-the-heads nerdy?

why?

making a point of forcing arguably progressive/forward-thinking/whachawannacallit music into a masculine/feminine duality

I can see the issue with dualities but don't see why this would be more true of arguably progressive/forward-thinking/whachawannacallit music than anything else, can you elaborate please marc.

i think he might be asking for dubstep could conceivably work in a u.s. club, i.e. not too abstract, aggressive, or strictly-for-the-heads nerdy?

ok, didn't get that too clearly

I can see the issue with dualities but don't see why this would be more true of arguably progressive/forward-thinking/whachawannacallit music than anything else

i recognize it's probably just my opinion but using traditional heteronormative classifications for a lot of things comes off as antiquated to me - wherein applying these to anything progressive (can i take this wording back yet?) and whatnot seems especially at odds. though i realize there's already a long history of referring to characteristics like abstractedness as masculine. carry on.

back to clubbiness - it's frustrating how much crossover potential implied as a form of validity keeps coming up in this thread, but anyway i don't see why dubstep couldn't work in a club - but i'm under the impression most anything will work in a club. make it loud and throw some lights on and provide alcohol and aside from the wanting to hear something familiar, club-goers on the whole don't care do they?

the only time i've heard dubstep in the us to a non-head audience was kingdom, jubilee, egyptrixx, cubic zirconia, and some other dude downstairs at webster hall over the summer. it wasn't an "in the know" audience at all - hang-arounds from the hardcore band reunion show beforehand, local friends supporting, and curious normal-clubgoers walking in from the other room. it wasn't all dubstep but of course some tracks got in alongside all of the otherness that also isn't in much of a pop-friendly format. everyone had a great time for all of the lights/alcohol/don't care reasons above.

...and the fog machine (i hate fog machines)

(and also that was just the downstairs room and not megaclub-y at all)

quam just linked to this "prog juke" track by dj tmo

is this heading anywhere towards the wanting it to sound more like gabba someone mentioned?

Marc the issue I have is that it sounds like you're equating abstraction with progression (your desire to withdraw that term is noted though) which strikes me as more loaded than talking about stuff in terms of masculinity or femininity. But I'd disagree with your general point anyway not just because i'm loathe to use terms like "progressive": if we're talking about music doing something new, interesting, noteworthy etc there's no reason that this can't be done in the context of sonics that tend to code "masculine" (say, assaultive grooves) or "feminine" (say, singalong choruses).

As a general rule it's not any particular description of music that is outmoded, it's the chains of equivalence between those descriptions.

it sounds like you're equating abstraction with progression

yeah not all, was just up on the specific use of m/f but doubt that'll get anywhere in here.

okay tim if that's right then how do you work around "but that's what girls like" type of arguments

That's a chain of equivalence right there (albeit one that is also a truism): "feminine sonics" => "girls like this".

Arguably if we're talking "heteronormative" wouldn't it be boys who would like music that sounds female?

Anyway whether saying "but that's what girls like" is a bad thing or not depends on the context I would have thought? I don't even know the implication of its usage in isolation.

Maybe a different example would be illuminating:

If you describe something as "gay music", it might be:

1) music made by gay people
2) music that sounds like gay people
3) music that is liked by gay people

Now all three might apply, but alternatively only one or two of these things might be true, e.g Antony and the Johnsons is gay performer, who also sounds gay, but his fanbase probably isn't especially gay.

Whereas Kylie is someone who has a massive gay fanbase but is not a gay male obviously: to the extent that her music "sounds gay", is it because the music directly expresses qualities we associate with gayness, or is it that her music sounds like stuff we associate with gay fanbases? Probably a bit of both.

It's easy and (for the sake of convenience) not obviously wrongheaded to simply collapse these distinctions, but I hope my general point, being that such categories aren't exactly monolithic, is clear.

regardless of whether this choppy bass futurism is ripe/appropriate for being assigned a gender, i think e.g. rustie & deej have different ideas about what it shld be aiming for, & therefore i'm just guessing, but maybe deej isn't going to come round to this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JlUY9BNl7lY

Re: dubstep being unsexy triphop.

http://www.factmag.com/2010/12/09/stream-juke-lynchpin-dj-rashads-new-album-just-a-taste/

In the spirit of the thread, new Rashad album up for streaming.

i was kinda hoping to be able to read "deej reacts to dubstep" over my lunch break. maybe that should be a separate thread?

lol no i like it in this one

i didnt get a chance to listen last nite

i really want to know what you think of martyn, 2562, shed and other detroit techno dubsteppers

prolly not much but still, bid for blab and all that.

come on deej

listen to some dubstep

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:(

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RG0AremvLck

:)

I've not been on the boards long enough to know what a deej is or why we want to feed him dubstep in a juke thread but I'm guessing he's American and loves hip-hop dispite its many cliche's in 2010 and we wanna win him over with some killer UK material! I'm all up for that kind of fun and games. Have some Guido...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWcdwq2URSU

i love 'wut' so much and feel bad for the snarky 'uk diplo' post. it's a valid comparison in relation to the b-more thing but until bok bok appears in a cunty blackberry ad i'll withhold judgement.

back on topic: i tried to listen to the dj nate album on the bus and it made me feel a bit ill. the rhythms didn't add up! #gettingold

gonna get into this stuff this weekend

I would just like to point out that that DJ Rashad album I posted upthread is absolutely A++ high quality.

"the rhythms didn't add up"

i feel like this sometimes. its also weird hearing these hard stuttering beats with a romantic vocal sample on top of it. the moods dont fit.

The last Rashad record is immense, I'm addicted to the Gil Scott Heron 'Home Is Where The Hatred Is' sampling/remixing 'I'm Gone' at the moment, the bass is ridic.

The DJ Spinn 12" that just came out on Planet Mu is seriously good.

I just saw this vid today too lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTGP5M3Z9u8

^yeah it's great

not that it's more than like 25% a juke record but did you get the Murderbot album yet...? I'm p sure I like it on some level, it just might need a few more listens before I figure out how superficial of one

I've not heard the record yet no, I've never been that into Murderbot but I dig the track in the video so I'll have to check it out at some point.

I didn't really like the way Rashad flips his samples, sounds lazy - like on the Grace release, the way he uses Roy Ayers - You Send Me. You can't really lose with a sample like that anyway, I mean - we're talking 24 carat gold, but Rashad doesn't really add much. Then again, what it does do is make a Roy Ayers track footwork-able, it's about function?

I'm just looking forward to an RP Boo release.

not strictly footwork but worth a listen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4n2miFAn7M

i just picked up 15 early house/rave 12"s from murderbot on discogs.

yeah i cant decide how i feel about the rashad ghettophiles albums either. its cool to hear those samples in a footwork setting, cos that by default makes it diff/fresh than if it was just some hip hop producer looping them up for the millionth time, but imo he doesnt really do enough to them to make them feel totally integrated into the beat. it feels weird, like the samples running normally then the beat comes into take it off course. after a while you get used to it but im still not totally into the juke tracks that sample old soul/funk songs so liberally. sometimes it just sounds awkward too! like that dj spinn ep on planet mu, i think he samples a stevie song, and it just sounds weird to hear that kind of material made into footwork lol.

although... seeing kids dancing to some of those tracks and hearing it as they would on a big system in a big hall kinda changed my mind a bit.

http://blissout.blogspot.com/2011/04/proof-that-jukefootwork-best-bits-of-it.html#links

dont get this. surely if someone remixed an old house or techno tune or even garage tune into a textbook (which is what these tracks are) footwork track you could come to the same conclusion.

theres something a bit 'dated' i think about the chrissy murderbot album. i know hes drawing on a lot of old stuff he loved, so the references are all very clear, but it just feels a bit hollertronix-y. its fun though, i keep singing the vibe is so right. had hoped for more stuff as classy as bussin down though.

not chicago but any of u been feelin this juke- related release?

http://www.planet.mu/image/discography/ZIQ307_Machinedrum_Rooms.jpg?size=E382x382

bunch of my friends who are into that sort of thing are going pretty nuts about it & tho it's not 100% my kind of thing usually its undeniably really creative and adventurous. so many beats so much going on so much to play with

I haven't had time to give it a good listen but i like what i've heard. The Alarma EP he just put out on LuckyMe is pretty fun though. It's got a remix of "Love King" on it.

who gives a shit about boring IDM-ified juke

ok im being cruel, its not shit

but it is a bit boring

why listen to machinedrum when dj diamond has an album on planet mu coming

Well clearly Planet Mu think they both have their merits

seriously, no, its cool that both those things are on the same label

and machine drum isnt crap

it just seemed a bit muzaky to me when i heard it on the labels website is all

not feeling this. the chrissy murderbot record, on the other hand, is really fun.

the chrissy record is cool and sort of lodged itself in my head more than i expected it to but its a bit too lightweight and well, silly, though maybe thats just cos it was going for such an early 90sish vibe, idk. bit all over the place.

it is very silly.

it's weird, these machinedrum tracks sound as sterile as i remember his '04 glitch-hop stuff sounding, but the sepalcure records are really lush. must be due to the other guy.

will investigate dj diamond & chrissy murderbot albumes

chrissy murderbot album is good though if you're going to get anything with that vibe you may as well go for toddla t.

was gonna listen to the machinedrum but i think i lost my promo :/

all juke is pretty "idm" 2 me

really like the last song, maybe the least footwork-ey though?

some parts of the murderbot album are good silly and some parts are bad silly

reverend otm

the bad silly parts remind me of (bad/old) diplo

sterile is a good way to describe machinedrum

that Machinedrum record isn't rly 'IDMified' in any meaningful way imo, other than what's obviously gonna be projected onto it considering what he spent most of the last decade making

I think it's good, sometimes, v good, on a basic level but it does essentially feel (to me) that he wrote a laundry list of dance genres he was feeling and then had a go at making them

need to listen to DJ Diamond more but I'm fairly sure I prefer it to Machinedrum, all that said

diamonds album is>>>

however i now think the murderbot album is one of those albums thats trying so hard to be FUN that it actually isnt as much fun as it wants to be

Enjoying the DJ Diamond album, sounds fairly straight down the line Juke, but very well done. Anyone else?

feel like there's some cool detroit techno sounding synths on "flight muzik" that lift it above the rest imo

machinedrum sort of a simultaneous update on both squarepusher and burial

sorry for the redundant "both"

love this set, esp the first three tracks and the steve reich sandwich: http://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/41502

Who, outside of the Chicago DJs, is making footwork music ATM? I can only really think of Africa Hitech and Sully. Must be others? I'm not too up with this kind of stuff, but it interests me.

some uk producers have done stuff influenced by it but im struggling with examples

I just realised this Sully album I've been caning for the last couple of weeks was actually produced by an old mate I used to hang with a few years ago. Quite rare for the North Herts area...

machinedrum, this guy munchi, nguzunguzu, addison groove, etc

addison groove!!

I like the Sully album but I take it that's not what you're referring to wrt his footwork productions

right...?

hm? There is quite a bit of footwork in the second half of the album. i can't believe it's the same guy i used to know - he used to play guitar in a true black metal band and now he's making this stuff...!

i don't think dudes who are not from chicago can credibly be said to produce footwork tracks

yeh dude and no one outside of bronx can credibly make hip hop.

excellent analogy

fake juke (or "footwork-inspired") tracks can be good too.

oh absolutely, machinedrum's "room(s)" is like a daily listen for me right now and if i had to make a top 10 tracks of the last two years there would for sure be at least one if not two or three addison groove tracks (mind you, he has a total of eight tracks released)

but i think that to say that addison groove is "making chicago juke" or "making footwork tracks" is not true to either chicago juke or addison groove

i don't think it's that untrue https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2e31Cdk1ijk

add chrissy murderbot to the encyclopedia of ersatz footwork

See, I understand the OG footwork stuff is pretty righteous and whatnot, but even aficionados will admit that much of the tacky/brutal aspects can get a bit wearisome after a while. I kind of like the more polished takes that are starting to creep into the work of external producers.

yeh dude and no one outside of bronx can credibly make hip hop.

― historyyy (prettylikealaindelon), Wednesday, 31 August 2011 14:54 (50 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

excellent analogy

― mr peabody (moonship journey to baja), Wednesday, 31 August 2011 15:09 (34 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

think the point is more that if this production style starts to get proper global recognition outside of nerd circles (and I'm not saying it will), then if the consensus wants it to get called footwork then that's what it'll get called

would've thought that was obvious. Saying it ain't footwork if it doesn't come from Chicago is like saying it ain't dubstep unless it's from South London or something.

it seems like there are only a few options when outsiders get inspired by a regional scene like this:

1) they cop the style really hard and make music that passes as authentic/integrate themselves into the scene

2) they take some of the ideas and do a watered-down, shittier interpretation

3) they take some of the ideas and make something that is different but actually good in its own right

has anyone not from chicago done #1

there are ppl from chicago doing # 2 certainly

would've thought that was obvious. Saying it ain't footwork if it doesn't come from Chicago is like saying it ain't dubstep unless it's from South London or something.

no, it's not

has anyone not from chicago done #1

not that i know of, but it's certainly happened with other scenes (thinking of new orleans, certain jazz & latin music, etc)

yes and that may happen in the future too

with chicago juke / footwork too

it's a bit like arguing that diplo is making "baile funk". i mean, i guess you can argue that if you want, but there's not really any point in learning anything about favelas or brazil because that's not going to tell you anything about diplo, whereas it will tell you quite a bit about actual funk carioca

same with calling addison groove or machinedrum footwork

footcrab was totally overrated looking back on it now

dumb shit is a bit better

he did a good thing in bringing it to ppl's attention though

"Dumbshit" is alright, but "Footcrab" (and "Fuk Tha 101") are way more fun. Rly tho the best fake juke track by some distance is

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYFYAa8iOBg

Hmmm.... I guess this hinges on whether you consider footwork to be exclusive to Chicago or not. I'd find it hard to parse if a UK producer were said to be making "Chicago Juke", absolutely, but without the geographical signifier footwork has a very specific sound and I don't see why someone from out of Chicago couldn't be said to make it. This is starting to get like a conversation about champagne and sparkling wine.

xpost - I agree 'work them' is a fantastic track.

re: champagne and sparkling wine - similar but perhaps there is nothing as tangible as a grape to work with in this discussion.

I think there's enough of a sonic difference between Chicago Juke dudes and non Chicago Juke dudes to make a distinction that's not strictly geographical. Like, even something like footcrab would stand out from a list of DJ Rashad tracks, or whatever.

i think that to say that addison groove is "making chicago juke" or "making footwork tracks" is not true to either chicago juke or addison groove

― mr peabody (moonship journey to baja), Wednesday, August 31, 2011 10:15 AM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

OTM. Plus, Addison Groove = <3

I have to step in here with the Champagne / sparkling wine comparison (I do wine for a living)... Champagne is Champagne because of the particularities of soil, climate, luminosity, weather patterns, ambient yeasts, etc, etc; i.e., it's of a specific place, and by definition cannot be made (or replicated) anywhere else on earth. This is the crux of meaningful wine, its "somewhereness"; no amount of technical copying or procedural mimicry can give it a sense of place other than that of where it's grown, unless it's heavily manipulated in the cellar, in which case it doesn't have a sense of place at all but just a sense of heavy-handed authorship/sculpting...

This is obviously different from music and musicians' places of origin in ways I don't think I need to elaborate, but the way I understand it, footwork is (at this point) very much rooted (pun intended) in Chicago, so I don't see why it's wrong to be suspicious of the notion that it can be made elsewhere in lumped right on in with what's happening there. I think we would all agree that music nearly always has a sense of place (and time); it's hard to articulate, but we as sensitive listeners recognize it.

Also, I hate to be Mr. Hi-Fi Bore yet again, but how many ITT who aren't much impressed with, say, the Machinedrum record or the DJ Diamond record have only heard soundclips from the Planet Mu website, or YouTube videos, or other similarly fidelity-compromised outlets? I mean shit, this music gets so much of its energy and propulsion and vitality from BASS (I feel like Captain Obvious pointing that out)! It just sounds like skittery pitter-patter without that, and definitely not exciting... There are certain styles of music that I feel just cannot be properly evaluated on small systems.

yeah, juke is compared to grime a lot but juke sounds better on a big system, or makes better use of it at least - the bass is quite big and deep which might surprise some people and a lot of the tracks dont sound complete unless you hear the bass really. a lot of juke is actually based around the bass.

and it has a lot of naked sub bass, not doubled with mid-range synths or anything

It's like complaining about a big, brothy, aromatic soup being bland when you're drinking it out of a straw in a closed container.

Lovin Chrissy Murderbot and Machinedrum so far - although I only bought these yesterday, so.

How does the DJ Diamond record compare with the DJ Roc album, DJ Spinn and the Bangs & Works comp (these are the only proper footwork releases I have along with Man I Do It by DJ Spinn FTR), is it markedly different or a departure from that kind of thing??

diamonds album is the best 'artist' (or producer) album so far

bangs and works is the best prob but thats a comp so...

but in order id say its

diamond, roc, then nate (who i like some of, but who also sometimes sounds like he has little idea of what hes doing exactly). not included the two rashad albums just cos while theyre good they dont really feel substantial enough and i think rashad has better tracks not included on those two.

if you like any/all of those I can't see you not liking it - he has most of the same tricks and weird production signifiers as Roc and Nate

I also have a CD of his from I think 2009 that DJ Slugo put out - afaict it's the only other DJ Diamond thing available to buy right now - it's like a 40-track mix, not as batshit rhythm-wise as the stuff on the artist album but still v densely edited/looped/whatever

rashad has some other albums too from 2009 or so which are cool but i think mu would do a better job of putting an album out from him

I guess I find most proper footwork stuff "interesting" rather than something I could sit and enjoy outside of a dancing context. A lot of it's done in Fruityloops I understand, and you can tell. What it reminds me of mostly were the earliest tracks my friend and I used to make in the mid 90s using tracker modules - uncanny really, down to the pitched and sampled vocals and frantic beats. It's kind of a tacky, underproduced sound, but I'm waiting for someone to come along and polish it up - no doubt to major complaints from OG fans - which I guess is what Machinedrum's done recently.

i wouldnt mind the polishing up, that would be good, but machine drum seems to do that within a totally diff context, one that seems to take out all the ruffness of juke and the hip hop attitude and energy etc. footwork right now seems to be in a kind of mid/late 80s rap phase. im waiting for its version of 90s hip hop come in, when it progresses a bit more and the producers get better. not sure if that will happen though as it doesnt seem like a genre thats really moving forward as such, it just is.

It's kind of a tacky, underproduced sound,

this is a big part of the appeal to me. also a lot of the drums sound unquantized to me.

I get the rap comparison, but I also hear a lot of parallels with gabba and nosebleed - a lot of ideas that have been abandoned since those days. Agreed - polish shouldn't be about smoothing things down - if someone were to progress the sound it'd need to retain, perhaps amp up, the adrenaline of the circle.

not sure if that will happen though as it doesnt seem like a genre thats really moving forward as such, it just is.

Give it a break - Bangs and Works only came out less than a year ago, and already we're seeing external producers (Africa Hitech, Chrissy, Machinedrum, Sully) taking it on as key influence. Definitely see this going forwards - people adding vocals, bigger production. Only a matter of time till a footwork-inspired track gets in the charts I reckon.

It's really hard for me to even think of the Machinedrum record as a footwork record. Obviously, I see the elements in it that prompt the comparisons (not to mention its context, record label, etc), but it feels totally different. I like it because it doesn't feel like he's being overly reverential/cautious and trying to make "real" footwork, but nor is it so "IDM-fied" that it feels completely abstracted. I don't get people calling it sterile; there's some real rush-y fiery stuff on it, and some moments of real emotional beauty ("Come1" in particular). I started a thread on it a little while ago, actually:

Machinedrum: Room(s)

the Dude Off 59th Street & Discovery mixes by RP Boo are some of the best footwork releases imo - still haven't heard anything as amazing as Freezaburn or Heavy Heat from anyone else making footwork.

I wouldn't compare Machinedrum's stuff to the actual footwork music. Not worth getting bogged down in that argument. That's like comparing Squarepusher and Aphex to Goldie etc. It's footwork-inspired electronica and leave it at that.

"Give it a break"

i love this stuff, but isnt it older than we think it is? cos yeah mu picking it up has alerted other producers to footwork, but as far as within the scene/city, i dont think its news anymore, its been going as is for a while now. dont think its on the wane or anything (im not close enough to know though), but i think maybe cos its so small, its hard to tell if there are new guys coming in who could progress it. then again the bangs and works comp seemed to have plenty of names on there so maybe theres more fresh blood than im thinking.

can we stop talking about that bloody machine drum record w/r/t footwork cos thats like including aphex or BOC in a convo about hip hop beats/production in the late 90s.

Haha, sorry "Give it a break" wasn't meant in any aggressive way. But it's only just starting to break out of its own scene-based and largely functional form. The question is, will it do a dubstep - itself at first a very insular scene which went off-the-scale in commerciality over several years?

rp boo - discovery
rp boo - 2008

no way, it will never do a dubstep. this stuff, and i hate using this phrase cos its loaded, but i think footwork is prob too 'black' to really do a dubstep. dubstep went worldwide and mainstream cos its racially much more neutral. footwork is like grime, in this current climate, its just too hard and street to really crossover. and if i can be selfish, i dont think i want it to do a dubstep actually. if this was the mid 90s, it would have more chance to do a dubstep. or a jungle/drum n bass, rather (which is what its closer to sonically in some ways, though i know you werent talking about how it actually sounds, but jungle somehow managed to get mainstream plaudits/chart action despite being as hard as it was).

then again, if someone from UK BASS (ugh) could work some footwork into a poppy song, i dont see why it wouldnt enter the charts. but the chicago guys arent really finessed enough from what ive heard so far to do that on their own. but if benga or skream or someone did a footwork type banger it could prob do alright. im okay with that not happening for a while yet though.

then again, if someone from UK BASS (ugh) could work some footwork into a poppy song,

This is what I mean - I don't think it's inconceivable at all. Chrissy's sound is already designed for full on party-styles. I mean, the OG dubstep was about 12 guys nodding under hoods in a pitch-black room, and look where that went.

chrissys stuff is a bit silly though (as already noted upthread), its almost like meta party music, more about how its in love with party music than actually just BEING party music, if that makes sense. or maybe im creating false binaries. and iirc, the main party-hearty songs on chrissys album werent the footwork-y ones, they were the ones that were more like 90s mashups.

og dubstep like idk, horsepower is soft to me lol. i do love golden nugget, but all that dubby garage stuff was pretty boring. footwork is like grime, prob just too weird and hard and lo-fi for people to place right now. and rhythmically people are going to be confused by it. speaking of lo fi, the 1st song on flight muzik sounds like a really poor bit rate mp3!

although, if you told me in 2004 that dubstep would be massive, i prob wouldnt have believe you, so whos to say. but back then we all thought grime would blow, not dubstep lol.

og dubstep like idk, horsepower is soft to me lol. i do love golden nugget, but all that dubby garage stuff was pretty boring.

We've agreed on this in the past IIRC. I remember being convinced there was no commercial worth in dubstep. There was no conceivable way that this slow, unfocused sound could ever reach the charts. But after several major transmutations, it did, and to cut a long story short I had to eat a hat.

Incidentally, titchy, where are you based?

im in london man, wbu?

"if someone were to progress the sound it'd need to retain, perhaps amp up, the adrenaline of the circle."

this is otm btw

I'm in North Herts, work in London.

no way, it will never do a dubstep. this stuff, and i hate using this phrase cos its loaded, but i think footwork is prob too 'black' to really do a dubstep

RONG

i don't think "too black" is any sort of stop-er-er to something crossing over or going super commercial - even grime cited as a reference technically crossed over i mean i first heard about it from mtv, it just didn't stay. like i want to say "UH RAP + HIP-HOP HI?" but it seems too obvious and maybe i'm not getting the suggestion.

Also, I hate to be Mr. Hi-Fi Bore yet again, but how many ITT who aren't much impressed with, say, the Machinedrum record or the DJ Diamond record have only heard soundclips from the Planet Mu website, or YouTube videos, or other similarly fidelity-compromised outlets? I mean shit, this music gets so much of its energy and propulsion and vitality from BASS (I feel like Captain Obvious pointing that out)! It just sounds like skittery pitter-patter without that, and definitely not exciting... There are certain styles of music that I feel just cannot be properly evaluated on small systems.

― Clarke B., Thursday, September 1, 2011 7:42 AM Bookmark

I've been listening to the Machinedrum record on a good system and still think it's boring. I like the DJ Diamond tho.

"like i want to say "UH RAP + HIP-HOP HI?" but it seems too obvious and maybe i'm not getting the suggestion."

rap made its inroads/developed itself in a diff era

plus juke is dance music

it will prob break out as much as ghettotech did

I can def see footwork nights getting popular in the UK - possibly with its own homegrown scene - developing out of disenchanted dubsteppers wanting to hear the next thing. Already so many producers are doing this melting pot thing where they'll try their hand at future garage, funky, dubstep, grime etc - what's stopping footwork creeping in?

audiences who don't have any footwork?

plus juke is dance music

uhm ... you mean it's a kind of techno or something? because disco is "dance music" too.

i think he was making a comparison to hip-hop

sure disco was dance music but it was song based dance music

anyway using disco in this sort of argument is pretty wtf cos dance music hasnt really sounded like 70s disco since ummm the 70s

if juke had a load of 'watch my feets' your disco or even hip hop point could work but juke/footwork isnt that kind of music

so ... is "watch my feet" dance music or song music?

also, song-based ... compared to what?

also footwork IS that kind

oops meant to delete that

anyway the more i think about it the more the comparison seems apt, a small group of regional producers reformatting a popular music to suit the needs of a particular social use for the music

now that is really just the script for the birth of any new genre, but i think it's relevant because the popular musics are related (soul & funk vs hip hop & r+b) and the reformatting method is based on "tape" edits in both cases, though the resulting sound is almost diametrically opposed (super long build and sustain in disco vs super choppy and abrupt in footwork)

also the social use aspect is similar - both have their roots in very functional dancefloor concerns

Bangs & Works 2 out soon according to Boomkat... It'll be interesting to see what's in store.

i've had this mix on my ipod waiting to listen to, although an hour of juke is a lot of juke: http://kidkameleon.com/2011/10/footwork-mix/ (download link seems to be down atm)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8V1zENjmz38

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3p2K4ICZQo

one of chicago's bigger rising rappers has a couple juke rmxes on the youtube. no idea how these qualify as far as quality but they're likely 'authentically' chicago bedroom production deals

"DJ T-Why on the track"

(3 tunes on Bangs & Works Vol. 2, but a ton of just-as-good and even better stuff on his Soundcloud page, each clocking in at 1:34 long (ie. same grid, same tempo, same # of bars--they flow well from one-->next)

http://soundcloud.com/djtwhy

i burned out after the first page. sounds great but that is a relentless amount of juke tracks.

dj nate is great

really digging this comp - much more than the first one.

'Bangs & Works 2' = great, totally overlooked it until very recently, have fallen totally for DJ MC - 'Y Fall', something about the incongruity of the downtempo repeated natural/vocal thing, off against the kung-fu computer game sample swooshing broken rhythm reminds me of great 80s Chicago house moods = double thumbs up.

yeah it's incredible

worst track: dj rashad (cannot even comprehend how he could craft a synth line so cheesy & dinky)

best: girl i wanna hit the boots girl girl i wanna hit the boots throwed--hoes know i'm all about the loot fuck being ya boyfriend girl i wanna hit the boots girl girl i wanna hit the boots girl girl i wanna girl i wan wanna

http://www.tinymixtapes.com/music-review/various-artists-planet-mu-bangs-works-vol-2

When was the last time you experienced Futureshock? I mean really experienced it — affectively, right down to your core. For my part, I got a small dose at the start of the year from James Blake’s self-titled debut. Sure, it had a history; Blake’s indebtedness to dubstep (even bordering on a kind of purism) has been well noted. But that doesn’t change the fact that his clever deployment of both bass and (particularly) space meant that pop sounded different now. This, suddenly, seemed to be the future. And sure enough, it was. So much so, in fact, that the future quickly began to sound dull again: present and, soon enough, altogether past.

Right now, just about everywhere on the planet other than in certain key enclaves in Chicago, footwork seems like the sound of the future. Strictly, it’s a kind of dance music. Or at least “that’s what it is in Chicago’s converted warehouses and rec centers,” as TMT’s Mr P recently put it, “where combatant footworkers form circles and take turns battling, dozens-style, with dazzlingly complex foot patterns.” Outside of such rarefied circles, however, nothing else sounds so Fresh, so New, so Vital, or so Different, even to the point of being Unpalatable — not Unintelligible necessarily, but literally Indecipherable at the level of the body.

In other words, if footwork induces a profound Futureshock, it’s because so many of its listeners simply don’t know what to do with it (yet). This is a sound, after all — a 21st-century audioscience, a mutant manifestation of what Kodwo Eshun calls the Futurhythmachine — that seems to have been spawned in a kind of splendid isolation: proof, finally (Reynolds be praised!), that yes they do still make scenes like they did in the good ol’ days.

By the time Planet Mu’s stellar Bangs & Works Vol. 1 burst onto the Hipster International’s collective radar late last year, the best and most confronting thing about footwork was that they (we?) weren’t immediately hip to it. How could we be? We’d been separated from the scene that birthed it by the tyranny of a cybergeography that seems to give us instant access to any music, any time, any where… but not quite, at least not in the way that a genre like footwork seems to demand. We can’t, after all, dance like this, can we? And when we listen on headphones, it can easily seem as if we’re somehow missing the point. This is Utilitarian music for which many of its listeners are yet to find a utility. Not that its makers give a shit, of course. And nor should they.

And so to Vol. 2, curated again by Brightonian Mike Paradinas, and this time showcasing a bunch of fresh new Chicago talent (Young Smoke, Jlin, DJ MC) as well as many of the stalwarts of the scene (DJ Spinn, DJ Rashad, DJ Clent). It’s good. Very good. Just as likely to be confronting to the uninitiated listener as the first volume and a genuinely exciting addition to the collection of those who have been already following. Like B McGhee, I’m loathe to either describe or theorize it, in a way. It feels like an act of appropriation. Except I’ve got Eshun ringing in my ears.

The following is from his extraordinary (and difficult) book on so-called “Black Atlantic Futurism,” More Brilliant Than The Sun, published back in 1998. “Allegedly at odds with the rock press, dance-press writing also turns its total inability to describe any kind of rhythm into a virtue,” Eshun writes. “You can see that the entire British dance press […] constitutes a colossal machine for maintaining rhythm as an unwritable, ineffable mystery. And this is why Trad dance-music journalism is nothing more than lists and menus, bits and bytes: meager, miserly, mediocre.” We’ve come a long way since 1998, it seems to me, and not just in Britain, but the rhetoric of ineffability — as a kind of magical music-crit get-out-of-jail-free card — remains strong. So here’s me having a go at theorizing footwork anyway. Or rather, here’s how footwork’s been theorizing me.

Divorced from the “streets,” the context, the “battles,” the people, and “scene” that produced it, I can’t shake the feeling that Bangs & Works Vol. 2 is all about time. Not time in the way that the hauntologists and hypnagogues are interested in it; not time as in history, or the lack of it (though, what with footwork’s considerable dependency on samples, there is certainly an element of that going on); but I’m talking about time as in duration: speed, velocity, meter.

Let me be clear. I’m not just saying that footwork is fast. That’s obvious and also not particularly interesting. What I’m saying is that footwork really fucks with your expectations in relation to the divisibility of musical time itself. The jettisoning of house’s reliable 4/4 kick — the one that juke remains wedded to — is key in this respect. With footwork, there’s pulse, yes, but it can be hard as hell to put your finger on. And invariably, the moment you feel like you’ve got it, it’s gone again: like a ghost in the wind. Footwork isn’t just syncopated (like jazz). It doesn’t just stutter (like wonky). And it’s not just that it’s regularly ‘de-quantised’ (also like wonky). Footwork is microscopic. It’s not interested in 4ths or 8ths or even 16ths at all. Footwork’s basic unit of rhythm is the nano.

That, it seems to me, is partly why footworkers dance the way they do. That’s why the somatechnics it draws upon are so fricking small and intricate. And it’s also why Bangs & Works Vol. 2 makes for such a confronting listen. It completely messes with our received notions of musical duration. The relevant markers here aren’t bars or beats; they’re each and every one of those frenetic midi snare hits.

On a track like Traxman’s “Brainwash,” the interruption of the listener’s expectations in relation to meter is so utterly complete that it feels almost as if pulse has been completely discarded. Except it hasn’t. It’s just been reduced. Same with a track like Tha Pope’s “When You” (in spite of the intro) and a whole bunch of others. In other words, despite what your body may be telling you, there’s definitely meaning to this ‘madness.’ It’s just that if you’re looking for a toe-tapping 4/4 or a coma-inducing skank in two, you’re not going to find it here.

There’s a sense in which James Blake and footwork are polar opposites of the same (dis)continuum then. Blake (and The xx and a few other UK post-dubsteppers) are interested in space, whereas Chicago’s footwork scene is interested in compression. And so perhaps it’s not surprising that Blake et al. are all about vinyl, whereas the majority of footwork artists are perfectly happy with a 192 kbps MP3. Where on a release like “Order/Pan,” Blake’s interested to see just how wide he can stretch musical space; Bangs & Works Vol. 2 is mostly an exercise in squeezing it.

It’s fitting in a way. Two Futuremusics, from opposite sides of the Atlantic, both interested in time. This is perhaps the axis on which the battle for our bodies will increasingly be fought. After all, as Eshun puts it, “The bedroom, the party, the dancefloor, the rave: these are the labs where the 21st C nervous systems assemble themselves, the matrices of the Futurhythmachinic Discontinuum.”

01. RP Boo - Heavy Heat
02. Jlin - Erotic Heat
03. DJ Earl - Hit Da Bootz
04. DJ Rashad & Gant-Man - Heaven Sent
05. DJ Metro - Burn Dat Boi
06. DJ Clent - Ball’em Up
07. DJ MC - Y Fall
08. DJ Spinn - Crazy ‘n’ Deranged
09. Traxman - Funky Block
10. DJ Rome - Showtime
11. DJ T-Why - Finished
12. Tha Pope - When You
13. Boylan - Bullet Proof Soul
14. Jlin - Asylum
15. DJ T-Why - Orbits
16. DJ Roc - Get Buck Juice
17. Traxman - Brainwash
18. DJ Clent - DJ Clent #1
19. DJ Metro - Smak My Bitch Up
20. Young Smoke - Space Muzik Pt.3
21. DJ T-Why - Juice
22. DJ Solo - What Have You Done
23. Young Smoke - Psycho War
24. Young Smoke - Wouldn’t Get Far
25. DJ Metro - Tekno Bangz
26. RP Boo - Off Da Hook

id be interested in someone explaining the diff between juke & footwork, i have a group of friends who are really into this stuff (altho moreso the machinedrum-axis than chicago) & call it footwork. i had the impression juke was more clubby/dancey?

i've been listening to tonnes of this stuff lately. something so addictive & unique about the particular way the music jars. it's similar to what that review's getting at but something a friend of mine said about footwork really openned up the way i thought about it: it's basically psychedelic but exclusively through the use of percussion.

i also find the music really engaging, in the sense that it requires a high level of engagement in order to even access it. like, if you listen to it passively (incl even momentarily phasing out) it just sounds like random, grooveless cacophony, but if you get into it you adapt to & figure out the counterintuitive beats. almost like each song is a kind of puzzle you have to make sense of before dancing to

Yeah, I'm totally into this stuff at the moment, so it's good to hear others are. It's a total game-changer and flopson's on the money about having to "engage" with the music. I guess that's the point and the whole difference btwn footwork and juke is that one is club music and the other is functional music for dance battles. As such it's designed to trip dancers over and wrong-side them so they literally have to think with their feet.

I like how the opening RP Boo track sounds so weird but then turns into a sort of Coltrane/Sun Ra style serial jazz thing. I also like the Traxman tune that sounds like badly-cut up electro/synthwave.

i heard this incredible juke remix of "the only thing i would wish for" by angela bofill the other night... really wish i could find it :(

http://www.rhythm-incursions.com/2011/10/07/om-unit-the-phillip-d-kick-experiment-footwork-jungle-vol-3/ seen these yet?

I kinda wish this would become a thing
(mute the first vid)

http://youtubedoubler.com/2Z90

that review seems to take a lot to say "it's pretty fast and broken" ...and of course fresh/new/vital(!)/different. in actual (physical) dance context (rather than just dance music review context) is what footwork brings to the table really that much more than a more-broken/faster (yet tempered) drum n bass? we know that going off 4/4 itself isn't actually new/unique. reviewer says that most listeners just don't know what to do with it (yet) but will they ever, really, is that capability really there, did the 4/4 toe tappers and coma-inducted skankers really ever end up knowing how to dance to breaks or d+b?

so, "shangaan electro"

http://www.okayafrica.com/2012/01/19/wax-on-shangaan-shake-%E2%80%94-dj-rashad-spinn-rp-boo/

http://boomkat.com/vinyl/315207-shangaan-electro-new-wave-dance-music-from-south-africa

Is there a direct link here? (besides the fact that HJ have asked rashad and spinn to contribute to their remix series - I mean, there's also a Demdike Stare installment) Obviously footwork and shangaan share a love of crazy percussion but as far as I know the latter is much more into "proper songs" than the cut-up sample style I've heard on Bangs+Works etc.

i could have put it on the african thread or the dance partisans but went with 'fast electronic dance music' and didn't think to hard about it. we can move it if anyone wants to discuss somewhere else.

There was a bit of discussion in the rolling world music thread when the Shangaan Electro comp came out and a couple of us repped for it in the 2010 poll, but that seems to be all the coverage it's had on ILM.

actually i don't find it nearly as exhilarating as this senegalese stuff (which i think i posted in the african thread):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wj1d4POVWh8

That is fantastic!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6FcWEQhrKw

3 hunna juke remix

cutting edge yall

anyone happen to know where i can find the juked up version of ciara's "get up" that i've heard dj rashad play a few times? guessing it's his own but haven't had any luck tracking it down.

this?:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8u8Cj_ZGO_Q

god, yes. thank you!

haha i prob shoulda been able to find that, huh?

haha your welcome, there are so many tracks that are probably totally obvious that I have not been able to find lol

more footwork recommendations pls! think i've exhausted B&W2 now.

I know DJ Earl has an album coming out, and it reminds me of the slinkier, jazzed-out end of drum'n'bass (Reprazent etc). Lots of soul samples etc... Not really what you'd expect of footwork, but kind of refreshing.

http://soundcloud.com/djearlteckz

funny people are comparing shangaan electro with footwork as that was the connection I made when I first heard of the style - got into both concurrently.

I like this guy
http://liljabba.bandcamp.com/album/swisher

still grappling with this as a genre but really probably listened to these tracks as much as anything in 2011

wish more footwork producers would do that wheezy blurry techno synth thing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hpnff1guVuc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6p-FpZyBP8

from jack to juke - 25 years of ghetto house

http://vimeo.com/36275353

Had a go at making my own footwork track out of vintage ska samples. Not sure I've got the hang of it yet, but thought I'd post it here anyway http://soundcloud.com/doglatin/jukeska

dig it

OMG dj traxman your new album is a treat

I'm loving it too. Also 14tracks.com are doing a footwork comp I wanna check out.

am i tripping or does the first track on the traxman album sample the kalimba from roland p young's "crystal motions"?

footworkin on air

vs

crystal motions

i think the sampled bit is about 4 minutes in

but i don't know, i might be tripping

Oowwwwwwww let there be rock / ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA ROCK ROCK RA RA

the Traxman album kills but ^that bit did make me think of, like, the middle of a Fatboy Slim set from the 90s

and that's a bad thing?

i knew it wouldnt be long before someone says my favorite track on the album is sucky, but i didnt think it would be with one post

xp not particularly no! it's fun when new stuff that is 'cool' accidentally sounds like old stuff that is now 'uncool'

yeah, definitely, and anyway I think Fatboy Slim was/ is a good, fun party DJ if you can ignore his rather embarrassing excesses. Dance music history is cyclical, not linear!

i would think its more in the tradition of lil jon

why is black people never allowed to rock

Feels like it's gone a bit quiet from the footwork camp of late (other than Traxman of course)... What am I missing?

Rashad has an album on the way pretty soon I think.

This mix is fire and has plenty of stuff from it.

http://soundcloud.com/djrashadteklife/rashad-spinn-we-trippy-mane

The new Rashad stuff is off the chain

that mix is dope.

this is my first post here so I'd might as well make it count!

"Feels like it's gone a bit quiet from the footwork camp of late (other than Traxman of course)... What am I missing?"

there's all kinds of comps and stuff out now that you should be listening to!

http://japanesemutationbootyism.bandcamp.com/album/japanese-juke-footworks-compilation - the japanese are getting more and more interested in juke. this is a phenomenal comp that covers pretty much all areas of the sound from two and a half min retrigger masturbation sessions to far more abstract works. I can't seem to shake the question of if they realize the kind of music they're making in my mind. yes a lot of it is good but the whole thing seems like a chinese room argument in music.

http://sabacanrecords.bandcamp.com/album/fa-fa-chronicle - more jap juke. everything guchon does /everything on that label is worth listening to by the way; he's been in the game for a while now.

http://dubpornrecordscollection.com/album/belly-a-footwork-compilation - a belly inspired comp

http://radology.bandcamp.com/album/province - some russian cats who instantly took to the sound. if you enjoy this at all I highly suggest grabbing vtgnike's album "Sueta Nebitiya"

http://post-religion.bandcamp.com/album/c-h-o-r-i-z-o-ep - juke for kids who identify with net art.

those are all the recent free comps that come to mind. a lot of the people on those comps have tons of free tunes laying around if you look.

not chicago people to look into:

Andrew Juke
Broken Fingers
Damscray
Dream Continuum (supergroup of machinedrum and om unit aka phillip d kick)
Film4D2
Guchon
Hayato6go
Juke Ellington
Leatherface
LiL JaBBA (can't stress this guy enough)
Machinedrum
Noms
Satanicpornocultshop
Side9000
Skimatix
Vtgnike
Wheez-Ie
X-Man

hope that helps~

cool post

nohighs = Dave?

dave quam? no, too hipster-ish.

ahah who is dave and how do I remind you guys of him

Thanks for this nohighs! Fuckin' awesome

I decided to gamble on a 14tracks.com compilation called footwork diffusion - it's not a strictly footwork comp but I'm impressed with a good bunch of the tracks so far.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pT1yV7axOsA

dave quam? no, too hipster-ish.

ha, i had the same thought.

for more non-chicago juke stuff, i liked munchi's 'rotterdam juke' EP from last year, and here's a nice pair of tracks from a local dude: http://goldendonna.bandcamp.com/

I've been Instapapering what little things people have written about footwork and I'm pretty much finding that as soon as a writer namechecks Burial, it's dropping the ball

WTF has Burial got to do with footwork? It's Dilla people generally tend to namecheck in these things, I thought?

lol

WTF has Burial got to do with footwork?

I'm saying!

burial is probably closer to "footwork" than dilla if you count machinedrum etc as "footwork"

let's not

(and yeah, I don't really see what Dilla has to do with things either)

agreed

I'm saying too!

i don't know, i mean i've never read that anywhere but it makes sense to me, more than burial. feel like maybe it was rev (?) said he doesn't like jd beats because of the way they lurch & a lot of footwork stuff has the same quality

Footwork's lurch is totally different from the Dilla lurch tho. Dilla's comes from lack of quantization, footwork's comes from 3-based rhythms that often don't resolve themselves by the next down beat, if that makes sense.

o ya that totally makes sense

like

|X  X  X  X  X  X  X  X  X  X  X |
|1   2   3   4   1   2   3   4   |

there's another one too, though, that dilla also does, those like -- abrupt spaces -- in beats, not going to find an example right now but maybe soon, i know some tracks on b&w do it for sure

not that im against britishers spending their hard earned 'pounds' to help a kid in inner city chi make a few bucks instead of that money going to dubstep dj dark shadows of nottingham or w/e

^^this is classic

― waka flocka flame judi dench (J0rdan S.), Saturday, 2 October 2010 21:03 (1 year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

not sure what rhythm you're trying to notate there rev?

a lot of the chi footwork i've heard feels unquantized & triggered by hand, but in a totally different way than dilla.

also i feel like drum & bass is the reference point for most of the articles/reviews i've seen.

I feel like d&b only gets referenced because of the tempo similarity.

Footwork tumbles to me more than it lurches.

tempo & syncopation. i don't think it's actually all that similar, but can see why it appeals to old d&b heads.

http://soundcloud.com/dj-reverend-dollars/untitled

^this rhythm, although i didn't notate the claps

if you syncopate this you end up with footwork

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=leEirSsS8T8&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PL9B6EAC0148DDDCD5

Yeah, basically. I think the footwork-Burial/footwork-dnb thing is just down to that certain strain of British dance head who wants to force developments in US beat music into UK narratives where they don't belong. It's the "Timbaland is just ripping off drum n bass!" thing all over again.

very interesting theory to me someone who hates british people & music

lol

The new DJ Rashad album has the "Amen" break right in there, so the connection to drum n bass is a little less than tenuous.

Drum'n'bass and Dilla I can understand at a push why they might be compared to footwork, but Burial is like the polar opposite.

yeah but i think the amen breaks only started showing up recently ... not that the footwork dudes weren't aware of amen breaks but that i'm sure they have the same "lol drum n bass" reaction most other people did until recently

this is up there w/ the original "is dj assault influenced by jungle?!?" when really its more like he was making sped-up techno / miami bass hybrids and was aware of jungle

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-BkOlkXq8h8&feature=youtube_gdata_player

for more non-chicago juke stuff, i liked munchi's 'rotterdam juke' EP from last year

can we not needlessly bring burial and far more importantly, dilla into this?

in other news, the new world wide juke comp came out today. they're all free so grab them here http://worldwidejuke.com/

i dunno man that looks kinda commercial for my taste i try to keep it on the underground tip

idk man earl and guchon on the same comp

Can't tell if tlg's response is meant to be serious or not, but these are most appreciated in this camp. thanks again nohighs

fwiw:

The Guardian!: It sounds dark and messy, like the brooding urban soundtrack of Burial reimagined for a city with faster, meaner streets.

Chicago Reader: The forefathers of footwork music may be Green Velvet and Gant-Man, but it's got more in common with Aphex Twin or Burial.

in reference to?

chi reader compares everything to aphex twin

^this rhythm, although i didn't notate the claps

ah gotcha, sure. props for the audio illustration.

speaking of rhythms, i haven't heard anyone talk about this specifically but it's interesting that a lot of footwork producers have started flattening out the dotted 8th/dotted 8th/8th rhythms into quarter note triplets.

sorry if that sounds overly technical, but like this track starts out with the first rhythm and then shifts into using all triplets:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S3bBzyLasgA

there's an interview in the new Wire with Traxman talking about his love of Dilla fwiw

:-D

dilla ftw

http://image.spreadshirt.com/image-server/v1/products/19244844/views/1,width=178,height=178,interlace=true/j-dilla-changed-my-life-hoodies.png

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4EEziGpjhJY

everyone in bootytune are real friendly and great at what they do. it's good to see them getting around

DJ Rashad - TEKLIFE Vol. 1: Welcome to the Chi

Is out now on soem of the usual download shops, really hope some of it hits wax at some point.

I'm listening to it now and frankly, it's the best chi footwork album I've heard by far. But i'm also loving the non-chi stuff nohighs posted earlier. That Neuport thing manages to tap into a (dare I say) chillwave vibe that is hinted at in a lot of footwork stuff - the pressure cooker feel of being high on caffeine when you're goddamned knackered to fuck. As for the junglefoot sound of Dream Continuum, well it's the crossover EP I've been waiting for. Extremely excited about this music again - more recommendations welcome!

new world wide juke came out yesterday

just popping in to say that I can't stress how incredible the last half of this album is (although the entire thing is phenomenal but in completely different regards). especially いい生活と言おうとして、噛む.

that's it really

this new rashad album is really something, huh?

the pressure cooker feel of being high on caffeine when you're goddamned knackered to fuck

http://media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m4es3q9XVN1ro1gr3.gif

http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m3fqzmNiog1qcdvcmo1_500.gif

I seem to have accumulated a lot of footwork the past couple of years, but almost never play any of it.

Got to play out my first all-footwork set last night. Sounded great on a big system. Sully played too, and while yes he's a mate, his set was terrific.

do i just not know enough about juke or is the dj rashad album kind of unprecedented?? like, 80+ minutes with tons of songs that are 5+ minutes. and they really feel like songs more than tracks. not to sound rockist but it feels elevated.

in any case it's amazing

It's the most solid/accomplished/listenable chi footwork release I've heard - not sure about songs, but on its way to greatness

i can't fucking even with that album. album of the year #realtalk

Listening to it again now. Yep, it's fucking ace. The jarring nature of footwork just dissipates by around the time We Trippy Mane comes on, and it really starts sounding like a perfect cross between full throttle dance and experimental lo-tech electronica.

Actually the whole section frok We Trippy through Fly Spray is completely unfuckwithable.

this takes some pretty amazing left turns, have to take my hat off to rashad

bit.ly/LR7vmc

my review and you can stream the record! :)

Thank you based bitly

http://www.spin.com/reviews/dj-rashad-teklife-vol-1-welcome-chi-lit-city

Enjoyed that review, still playing this album. Maybe the first footwork album I can happily play front to back more than a few times with no skipping.

(one for the sticker, yes I know)

wait is comparing footwork to black dice any more or less corny than comparing it to dubstep

Iconoclastic rapper-producer DJ Quik wanted his tenth album to sound like missing tapes from funk-soaked 1991. Instead, it's from an incredible year that never existed, blending baroque '80s roller jams, velvety '90s slow-rides, contemporary Dam-Funk swooshwave, and a breakdown with the late P-Funk guitarist Garry Shider. For every vintage Quik banger, there's a rhythmically unique implosion of backmasked "Paul Revere" drums and Madvillainous drone ("Poppin'"). Lyrically, he's back to his old tricks - shitting on haters, shouting out himself, somehow rhyming "orange" and having "diamonds like kablooie."

that quik review was kinda great

Why do white people criticize one another for being white?

jeez is that a review or a thinkpiece whiney

great review

thanks flop and dog lat. thanks, i think, late great!

it looks awesome and it's always good to see people pushing the boundaries of the capsule review

wish i had the motivation to read it but ALL I DO IS SMOKE TREES ALL I DO IS SMOKE TREES ALL I DO IS SMOKE TREES

<3

"trap bakk"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i think 'twitter' is my fav so far

Whew, just got back from a seeing (among others) Spinn and Rashad, which was pretty really great.

Guys - I'm so Teklife, I'm so Teklife, I'm so Teklife....

I would love to see Rashad and Spinn, could be on the top of my list right now.

do they beatmatch like dance djs or slam between cuts like hip hop djs?

beatmatchin

wow

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0hTcg695rE

bamp

I wandered off from juke, is there anything new I should be aware of

am i mental or does dj clent's 'dj clent #1' sample sun city girls?

Saw Rashad & Spinn the other weekend, its was fucking ace. Love the Rashad album too, its maybe my favourite of the year so far.

http://vimeo.com/43042667

(dj footmerc - gregory hines discovers distal + machinedrum)

did this footwork-y remix awhile back, out today:
http://soundcloud.com/chantssound/phone-tag

Will take a listen. Btw Jordan I never said how much I enjoyed Chants, it's pretty awesome. Been popping up on shuffle a fair bit but I still need to listen to it through properly.

thanks man! <3

oops apparently i posted that prematurely, had to take it down for a bit

The DJ Rashad album is also one of my favorite albums of the year thus far but I really wish they would release a physical. Is anyone here going to Juke Fest 2012 at Smartbar (http://smartbarchicago.com/juke-fest-2012) and can help me get in as I am only 20?

whoa. wish i could go to that (ie 'wish i wasn't so lazy about driving 2.5 hours and going to shows in general').

my ersatz footwork track is back up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6F1bF3ZbegM

Can't stop listening to this fella.

now what? I'm still quite enjoying the junglefoot hybrid stuff, as well as Rashad, but there's not that much replay value on a lot of juke I guess...

Not sure I've heard a better album than the DJ Rashad this year/decade. Damn.

"DANCE FU" on netflix directed by cedric the entertainer + starring kel of kenan and... is absolutely terrible but i pretty much died at his nickname being "chicago" and it having FOOTWORK BATTLES, there was even actual footwork played when they didn't just show some people dancing and replaced the tracks with trap

http://www.mixcloud.com/doglatin/dj-dog-latin-icklefoot-mix-footwork/

a quick footwork mix I made a couple of months back...

The Young Smoke album (Space Zone) that came out today is quite good. Up there with Traxman and Rashad.

I'm listening to it now actually. This is total sci-fi footwork - like a late '70s space shooter in footwork form. WARNING! WARNING! WARNING!

It seems a lot more polished than the Rash and Trax albums, not in a bad way or in a Machinedrummy way, just a bit more fleshed out.

Very very good though so far.

into it

ya

I started a thread on it

http://boomkat.com/downloads/585804-dj-spinn-teklife-vol-2-what-you-need

this thread should have its title amended to incorporate footwork really.

I'm so Teklife/I'm so Teklife/I'm so Teklife/I'm so Teklife

^in my head most days