Electronic Music 4, The Faster Break

Other than the Chemical Brothers and Crystal Method style of fast breaks, which you can tell by the beats per minute, generally around 140 or 130, there is drum and bass. (Check out "Orange Wedge," or "F*** Up Beats," by the Chemical Brothers, and "High Roller," by the Crystal Method.) Now, we need to do another disambiguation. There were some African UK DNB collectives, the real hot ones being London Elektricity, Goldie and Roni Size with DJ Krush. Check out "Bite the Bullet," or "Temper, Temper," or "Dirty Beats," and I'm looking for the London Elektricity mix I like at the moment. If you grab these tracks, keep in mind that even a mixed-up whitey like me can get a good mad on from these tracks. This is real "kill-whitey," material.

That type of DNB is generally called "Jungle," and I love the stuff I've heard, but that is really not my material. I've never actually met a tribe or clique that works straight from Jungle, and if I do I'd like to hear some news, even if I can't get the actual deal. Another thing to keep in mind about DNB is that it actually started with Ragga and Gabba material in Jamaica, and if you're a real DNB artist, then you are generally a UK native. DNB is UK, with just a couple of exceptions.

The stuff that most people dig in terms of DNB is called "liquid." It runs at right around 220 bpm, or even a titch slower, 210, 202, somewhere in that range. Liquid sounds to my ear - and I am not a liquid-triber - but to my ear a great deal like smooth jazz layered over your basic drop-kick rhythm. I do know that part of the reason they called it liquid is that if you hit a liquid show and you were high, the mix sounded to you like you had water on your eardrums. Anyone I know that really knows the DNB has been into liquid, and just like with trance, I do not get liquid. I've heard some good liquid, and it is great, but again - not my material.

The other kind of DNB after those two is mostly called by people who know it - and I do - tech. If you're trying to disambiguate between say "tech-metal," and tech DNB, most people would say, "techstep," if they knew their stuff, because it's a tech style that uses a two-step rhythm. There is one really big problem with tech, and it is called, "way too busy!!!" Generally you want to run the drum-machine at 240 bpm, or you can program at 120 in half of the usual note values, which generally pleases your drum machine a bit better.

If you are a real virtuouso with tech, you scale your bpm back to just about 230 or so, and you better have some megabucks, because technology is feeble when you are trying to pull that kind of run. The best tech artist is actually not a UK artist, and that is Dieselboy. Dieselboy is really a compiler/producer, and Dieselboy can kick the stuff, but still, TOO BUSY!!!

The best track in terms of tech in my mind is called "Accelerate," originally produced by a collective called Break and then compiled and re-worked by Dieselboy on a compilation called "The Dungeonmaster's Guide." However, "Soldier's Story," by Dieselboy is really more the classic, and there isn't a bad track on that compilation. "Soldier's Story," is pretty warped, and definitely for a special occassion. Gnutella has a couple of the tracks, but they are hard to grab, and it is even hard to special-order the full compilation over the 'Net, although I think the recording is still in limited distribution.

If I had the money to get an expensive drum-machine and some kind of pro-tools setup, I could eat any of the tech out there right now for breakfast, simply by being more minimalist about what got served up in the mix. The other funny thing about tech is that there is almost nothing to it. You set up the drop-kick, and with a good machine you can leave it as a preset, and then you fill a cymbal sound, and then you add some sound effects or some pads as filler. You're done. Except for one part, and this is why tech is not as simple-minded as people want to say, and that is - the Reese-bassline.

We head back to Detroit. There was a guy who used to pull "techno," shows in Detroit, and what that meant was an 808 module, and then another Roland module or two. He would program the machines before the show, the audience would all show up on morphine or quaaludes, and then he would let the program run and tweak the pots all night. That is "techno." It isn't good to be a snob, but that is the true definition of "techno."

Reese came up with a way of using a Roland bass-module and a compressor to create the Reese- bassline. What you hear is a bass patch compressed to the point of near ring-modulation, and then the patch is extended as long as you can and you tweak the pots - but not the compression - to get the bassline to modulate all over the place. Getting a true Reese-bassline is the key to tech, and almost all attempts at doing tech don't even come close to emulating the right sound.

Tech' is part of my material because one of the significant forms of tech is called "E-Sassin," which is a DNB form of Shinobi. Look, I am nuts, and I don't care if you believe a word I say, but this is the reality. I can dance E-Sassin, but with all the smoking and the fatigue I experience I can't go a whole E-Sassin tune at this stage in my life. Even at halftime, doing Shinobi to DNB is not easy, and I work myself up to trying occasionally and end up having to back up off of it.

So we finish up the DNB section by explaining that there is a form of ELM called, "glitch," that is sometimes dance-able, and is sometimes pure ELM. Glitch started because the beats would get off-set when people tried good ideas, and someone said - hey! - leave some of the mistakes in! The style is generally a warp-head style, and the Aphex Twin that is actually good is some of the best glitch material, although there are other good groups like Evol Intent. I won't listen to any Aphex Twin as a rule, but Aphex could hit the glitch better than anyone.

Finally, we are finished with breakbeat music, and we are going to explain a hard fast rule. Period. If you have the breaks, you must know at least one style, and at least some breakdancing. If you cannot breakdance at all, then you don't have the breaks. You can't even make electro. Period. There are people that specialize in breakdancing, and that requires incredible athleticism and dedication, but a DJ or an MC has to be able to at least do a little breakdancing without looking like a total fool. You can't know the breaks unless you can dance the breaks at least some, because you know the breaks in your body.

Well, it is Christmas Eve morning, and I have all sorts of family stuff to do today, but I'll be able to get some good naps in during the day, so I'm planning on staying up for quite a while. I prefer Thanksgiving because of the whole "gratitude," idea, and "New Year's," because of the idea of starting a new year all over again, but Christmas is important because of family, even if my family has me reaching for the best prescription hemmorhoid cream I can get a scrip' for. Alright, I'll be back momentarily, and we'll try to have some more fun.