2009 saw UK dance music sport more colour than it had in a long time.
Much was made of Joker, Gemmy and Guido’s ‘purple’ sound, which owed much of its aesthetic to pitch-bent West Coast hip-hop, woozy soul music and 8-bit computer game programmers (Gemmy cites this format as a particular inspiration on the way he makes his synths “sing”). I didn’t find Hudson Mohawke’s debut album that enjoyable, but it was perhaps the most high-definition, colour-saturated release of the year – turning the neon of its synths into a kind of piercing pollutant.
Colour highlights of the year for me included the rapid fluo-garage of Brackles and Shortstuff, Ikonika’s woozy sandslides, Greena’s loping synths, the Terror Danjah revival, Bok Bok’s robo-funk remix of Jinder, Fantastic Mr Fox’s Sketches EP (inc. Sbtrkt remix), and the analog nightmares that were Kode 9′s ‘Black Sun’ and James Blake’s remix of Untold’s ‘Stop What You’re Doing’. It’s telling that when California’s Dam-Funk brought his synth-led space boogie to London’s Plastic People, most of the above attended. As Bok Bok puts it: “it’s been the year of the neon synths.”
US R’n'B has always been an influence on 2step, bassline house and grime, but it was 2009 that the genre started to show its face in dubstep – or at least, this post-everything UK dance scene where even the lines between house and dubstep aren’t clear. Present in the productions of Deadboy and Joy Orbison and the DJ sets of Ikonika, Jackmaster and more, it’s a trend that should continue to gather steam with Deadboy’s forthcoming remixes of Ashanti and Cassie and Skream’s next album, which features a stunning collaboration with Jazmine Sullivan.
The producers that weren’t stepping up their colour were switching up their production: Untold’s ‘Anaconda’, ‘Flexible’ and Gonna Work Out Fine used drum patterns, rather than overwhelming sub-bass or mid-range, to stop dancefloors in their tracks, while Pearson Sound’s ‘Wad’ was a minimal masterpiece, using little more than drums and cut-up vocals to ignite crowds. Baltimore man Karizma’s percussive shufflers became touchstones amongst the UK DJs who knew.
Speaking of minimal, the second half of this year has seen a firm techno revival at Plastic People. Ame’s ‘Rej’ went off like an anthem when Cooly G played it at Beyond, and Ben UFO’s been sneaking Omar-S, Jus Ed and more into his sets – likewise Geeneus with Dubfire and John Tejada, and Joker with Claude VonStroke. Rinse FM’s Braiden has favoured a house and techno DJing style for a while, and that tendency became reflected more and more in his setlists as the year went on. Wonder – a grime touchstone whose ‘sino’ productions are revered by Kode 9 and more – now plays strictly ‘tech house / minimal’ off Ableton, while Funky House king Marcus Nasty recently spoke about people “jumping ship to minimal” en masse.
The return of tech-house and minimal is – obviously – a knock-on effect of Funky’s popularity, a genre that continues to grow in influence. Untold, Ramadanman, Bok Bok and more dropped the tempo of their tracks so that they could mix them easily with both 140bpm garage and dubstep, and 130bpm house, resulting in one of the year’s buzz phrases, “dropping the tempo and upping the groove.” Slower, more swing-focused tracks in the latter part of the year from Kowton, Dusk and Blackdown and Joy Orbison is where you’ll find the results.
In the actual Funky scene itself, the big figures got bigger: Roska became one of the world’s most in-demand remixers, Cooly G one of its most in-demand interviewees, and for me there are very few DJs better than Scratcha DVA and Marcus Nasty. Crazy Cousinz’ new double-pack EP proved they were no two-hit wonders (not that it should have been in doubt after their remix of Shontelle’s ‘T Shirt’), while everything Ill Blu or R1 Ryders touched seem to be pretty close to gold. Skank tracks came and went, and generally the scene seems to be stronger for seeing them off.
The producer who, for me, still stands head and shoulders above the rest is Zomby, a man who seems to exist completely outside of trends, and produced much of the year’s most haunting, beautiful music. Singles ‘Tarantula’ and ‘Digital Flora’ were delicate techno tracks that broke down and reformed in real time, while One Foot Ahead of the Other, his mini-album for Ramp, featured faster, paranoid treble jams that seem to stare out in every direction like some inverse kaleidoscope.
If that’s not enough, there’s his brilliantly synthetic remix of Animal Collective’s ‘Summertime Clothes’ and some stunning unreleased dubplates doing the rounds on YouTube and radio show rips: check ‘Aquarium’, ‘Ghosts of Lovers Past’ and ‘Earthbound’ for starters.
Darkstar weren’t as prolific as Zomby, but equally care nothing for trends, denouncing dubstep’s influence on them in various interviews, and releasing two of the year’s best tracks in 2step lament ‘Aidy’s Girl’s a Computer’ and a cover of Radiohead’s ‘Videotape’. Their debut album, due next year, should be fantastic – as should their labelmate Ikonika’s.
Plenty more happened this year – shouts to Elijah and Skilliam, Oneman, Jackmaster and the rest of the Numbers circle, L-Vis 1990, Mosca, Jam City, SRC, Highpoint Lowlife, Ramp Recordings, Rustie, Actress, Lone, Roll Deep, Geiom, No Hats No Hoods, Kingdom, Pangaea, Deep Teknologi, Mount Kimbie and many more for amazing music – but there’s no point going on all day. Hopefully next year sees even more wild developments in this undefined, mostly untempered music scene, and the promised albums live up to their potential.
Tom Lea