In a recent comment in an older post, Thirdform sez that Neurofunk is not a completely barren zone
These are his recommends for "stalkerish feverish" killers.
Gloomcore-ish title there! Bass-design is like Jaco as Terminator2
More "pretzel" precisionizm
"The Black Son Empire turns it into a cyborg switched up monster."
"Cusp of gabber" bizniz
It's odd, probably in '95 and '96 and right through into '97, I was following d&B more fanatically than ever - buying a huge number of 12-inches, blagging every compilation and album going, going out to clubs every week.
But (unlike the 92/93/94 stretch) I rarely revisit those tunes.
The pirates tapes I have from '95 onwards, which are plentiful (mostly taped in a frenzy while back in the UK on a trip or vacation) - I never ever play. Nor do I seek and acquire the many pirate sets from post-94 that are out there to be nabbed. (Partly it's cos D+B gets too professional - the nutt-E-ness is gone. But it's also the kind of the tunes in the sets.)
Tune-wise - there's some things from '95, fewer from '96, almost nothing from '97, that I'll pull out (and the ones I do, they'll tend to be on the smoother, more cinematic side of things - or full-length album statements)
So I'll rarely play techstep even though No U Turn et al was absolutely a moment when my faith was floodingly restored. And a phase that resulted in some of best nights out ever in NYC. Not sure why - if I was to put on "Squadron" or "Metropolis" I'm sure it would be as mindblowing as ever. But the urge never comes.
The one tune I probably do give a spin regularly over subsequent years would be "Shadowboxing'" - just IMMENSE.
Then neurofunk is really when most things I loved about ardkore / darkcore / jungle / early artcore - these things just go AWOL. It's like a whole new culture almost. It becomes a form of techno again - but not techno in the Belgian sense, or gloomcore sense.
Perhaps the stuff leading up to neurofunk doesn't appeal because I can tell where it's going - it's a hindsight-taint. Disappointment ahoy!
3 comments:
that last paragraph has me thinking cos neurofunk is not really techno in the detroit purist sense either, maybe there are some vague nods to 2nd wave minimalism but even then there's too much sonic trickery compared to a Jeff Mills or Robert Hood track, which are purposefully spartan. I hear more in common with ACR, Cabaret Voltaire, Front 242 etc. That kind of euro bombast. So in a way it's a reabsorbtion of belgian techno, but winding the clock to a time before Belgian techno. Not consciously of course. But the end product can come out sounding like this.
A lot of the big sharp snare drums in neuro, the rigidity, gives me a very post-punk feel. Almost like 23 Skidoo's coup (one of my favourite whiteboy avant-funk tunes.)
If I were to select three proto-proto techstep/neuro tunes they would probably be as follows:
Sound Corp - Regen Time (part 2/sequel remix) 1992
This is very much gloomy darkside, still very nut-e, but more in the sense of the rave coughed and spat out. or an awol tape pack becoming sentient and taking lsd. You decide. Nothing like it and I don't think there ever will be in the future. Huge psychodelic space arena vibe to it as well, which you only really get with Acardipaine's works from this era.
DJ Fokus - Chill out
Stalkerish darkside, harkening back to Nebula II from a year ago, but more fixated, more militant and with a huge proto-reece bass drop. ardkore souljas hands cocked into pistols, etc. The vocoded chill out voice quite disconcerting. Very much sewage and slime. A multifaceted tune for sure, I don't want to call it 'art' but you know, mindblowing.
Vinyl Conflicts Own - deathrow (1994)
Released on the finsbury park boys Krome and Times' Tearin' vinyl, the rhizomatic Can meets Jah Shaka avant guttersnipe funk convergence you were always waiting for. Huge reverbed, flanged hall of mirror drums with a bassline that is curiously utilitrarian as opposed to overtly tuneful in its execution.
Regen Time I love - don't know the other two, will check 'em out.
Nebula II maybe is a presentiment of neurofunk - it's breakbeat techno, but the breaks have this metallic propulsive quality that is different from the Amen / Think vibe. Very cold tracks. Some of the stuff that most turned my head round in '92 - but vibe-wise not so far from what e.g. Plus 8 were doing then. Nebula II if they stuck with breaks could have been a Photek - or would have obviated the need for Photek.
you should check 93 era radioactive lamb, (gloomy cold idm?) if you're into that kind of vibe. strange strange stuff...
There's a heretical argument to be made that the standardisation of amen itself was the death knell of breakbeats in jungle and necessarily presaged the 2step of neurofunk.
I'm not sure if I would want to go that far, I'm a huge fan of remarc style reversed rhythmic psychedelia, + the dodgy mixdowns — clockwork soulfulness of E.G: roni Size - all the crew big up. But sometimes, when I hear certain British/Euro millennials or Americans (no dis to the junglists out there) I do wonder how they can do all amen sets. Such a thing is fairly incomprehensible to me. That being said, Equinox could get away with doing an all amen set for me, mainly because he really understands the inner mechanics of chopping that beat, it's arts core if you will.
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