Manix mix of reinforced golden era classics plus news of forthcoming manix lp in a "new old" style, two tracks from which appear in the mix:

"I wanted to mark our 20th year as a label with a special release so originally I was gonna do a 4 track EP but as I got into doing it the memories inspired a 12 track album. I dug out the Akia S950 sampler, my Atari ST1040 and a box of old breaks and focused on the real feel good factor, the 150BPM hardcore/rave sound of Reinforced and Manix. I also did two tracks inspired by the earlier Chicago house sound"



[this is actually the later - 94? - remix on Enforcers vol something or other - done by rufige cru i i rc]

two contenders for the "when i was a yout" source:



now that one has the melody alright, but this one has "the when i was a yout i used to bun collie weed in a rizzla" bit (coming in quite late in the song, around the 3 minute 10 second mark)



cheers to john eden, ed torpey and craig allen for droppin knowledge

as for the jungalistic hardcore tune that sampled it, various contenders here --
Nu-Matic's "Hard Times", Prodigy's "Fire", A-Sides's "Burn Cali Weed", but I think this one, Order 2 Move, "Rizla Bass" on the Boogie Beat label is the one I'm thinking of, although in my memory it's more skanky 'n' rootical and less rushy (perhaps a different, later remix?)

from retro-rave to jungle-nostalgia



tip courtesy Matos

now which roots reggae classic does that "when I was a yout'" bit come from? Something about "smoke collie weed inna" something or other. Lynval Thompson? And what was the early jungle tune based around a sample of it?

"this geezer's a nutter i'm telling ya"

FMB Crew on Lightning FM February 12 1993

part one

part two

part three

part four aka THE WARM UP

part five aka THE MADNESS

(part five as partially transcribed in the pirate radio chapter of Energy Flash)

"crispy like a crouton"

crikey, retro-rave



amazing attention to detail with the clothes, hair, dance moves etc

if only they'd done as good a timewarp job with the music eh!

i guess they are aiming for a Magnetic Man/"I Need Air" crossover

it's growing on me

(tip courtesy of Cybore aka Mr Woebot)

P.S. "uncensored version "at the band's own site, although I can't tell the difference myself

P.P.S. what i don't get though, is if Chase & Status are from London why are all the bods in their vid Mancunian? Why not an orbital rave or Labrynth-style East End warehouse party? As D&B-ers they should be a bit more regionally patriotic, I think, rather than go along with the 24 Hour Party People/Madchester-as-cradle-of-rave version of history.

much frothed-over funky tune regarded as one of the year's best by Those Who Know (i.e. finney and pals)

tuff beats

but why oh why (i find myself wondering, not for the first time) do funky-producer man dem go in for the pre-set keyboard sounds?

in this case: the cliche house organ pulse (very "plastic dreams", early 90s*) and then the sort of sci-fi/doomy synth fanfares that are frankly ungainly

it's a serious question--funky house producers don't seem concerned about "sound design" (never totally sure what people mean by this term, i guess "coming up with individualised, finely-tweaked timbres"), whereas that is a central, overriding-all-other-considerations thing for your postdubsteppers and Germans mnml types... customising your timbral palette so that it's not off-the-peg

funky guys, in contrast, they're all about the groove and the drum sounds and the density-yet-fluency of the beats -- the other elements in the track have this paint-by-numbers quality... or more precisely, it's straight out of the paint tube no mixing up the colors to get subtle shades and idiosyncratic hues

* rather a lot of this jizzed-over House Girls CD sounds - in all honesty -- like subpar UK house music from 1991. right?

2 Bad Mice are one of the absolute foundations of hardcore and jungle, an outfit as innovative and as important as 4 Hero. The house band of the Moving Shadow label, they were actually 3 not 2 of them: Sean O'Keeffe, Simon Colebrooke, and Shadow label boss Rob Playford, And they had an alter-ego identity as Kaotic Chemistry whose output was just as creative and influential as the 2 Bad Mice material. 2 Bad Mice's most famous tunes are "Bombscare", "Waremouse", and their remix of Moving Shadow act Blame's "Music Takes You". All three tracks were crucial for bringing a boombastic hip hop vibe into UK rave, starting the process that would lead to jungle. "Music Takes You" features a squelchy scratch-riff that slots right next to the Morse Code keyboard stab and piano vamps, while staccato blasts of sped-up diva samples sound like Minnie Mouse having an orgasm. "Waremouse" is radically minimal, just seismic bass and machine-gun snares, while the equally stripped down "Bombscare" used the sound of a suspect device detonating to make ravefloors shake with nervy excitement. It became one of the biggest anthems of the rave era, selling tens of thousands of copies on both sides of the Atlantic. Kaotic Chemistry, meanwhile, pioneered darkside on the LSD EP, a cheeky celebration of polydrug naughtiness with tracks like "Space Cakes", "LSD", "Drum Trip II", and "Illegal Subs", a pun on both illegal substances and sub-bass levels so punishing they should be outlawed. (A latter remix EP added "Vitamin K"). Widely played on the pirates all through 1992 and into '93, "Illegal Subs" paid tribute to the rave nation by sampling a Nation of Islam orator who hails her African-American audience as "the people of chemistry... of physics... of music... of civilization.... of rhythm". Sonic highlights of the EP included the frenzied percussive carousel of "Drum Trip II" and the eerie jitter of "Space Cakes". Then came 2 Bad Mice's darker-than-thou Underworld EP, featuring dense slabs of menacing minimalism like "Tribal Revival", "Pitch Black" and "Mass Confusion". Eventually the trio went off in separate directions with O'Keeffe recording as Deep Blue (of "Helicopter Tune" fame) and Playford becoming Goldie's right-hand man. But they left behind a compact but crucial legacy of tunes that rocked dancefloors worldwide but also pushed the music forward and opened up the future for jungle and drum & bass. So all hail the Mighty Mice.

"here comes the jungle"

eye-openingly protean set from fabio & grooverider in 1992 - a 3 hour guest show on Kiss FM, their first appearance on the station--today (oh wonders of the web!) hosted by 2 Bad Mice at their ardkival trove of a website

"one of those dark white labels coming out of London right now"