Originally Posted By MASA

Mwahaha, no complaint from me, really, was just trying to make a counterpoint :)
... I did call it cheezy yesterday, and I personally like Poirier's refix myself, but.. Yeah. You're one of the local DJs I consistently like listening/dancing to, so... Keep doing what you do :)

Originally Posted By RAWALI

I gotta say though, I'm a sucker for nice female vocals so the subfocus remix, straight up is one of my favs at the moment

Originally Posted By SCREWHEAD

IMO, the problem is that everything has just gotten so incredibly generic.

(Aaaaaaaand here we go, everyone gets to gang up and start calling me the second coming of Pol Pot again because I'm not following the unspoken "you're not allowed to voice an opinion about anything, anyone, any party or any night in "the scene" unless you're stroking the egos of those involved like a 16 year old at her first party on her first hit of E" rule, so if you can't handle criticism without freaking out like Jessi Slaughter, just skip this post and keep living in your little dream world where everyone unconditionally thinks you're awesome and talented just like your mom always used to tell you)

How many DnB DJs play anything different? For the most part, there are three kinds of DnB that everyone in the city sticks to:

1: Sounds Like Pendulum/Subfocus/Camo & Krooked/The Quemist/Concord Dawn/Ill Skillz/Chase & Status
2: Sounds like TC/Clipz/Dillinja/Distorted Minds/Twisted Individual/Roni Size
3: Sounds like Ed Rush & Optical/Phace/Noisia/Calyx/Teebee/Dom & Roland/C4C

Despite there being a ton of DnB DJs, you're raaaaaaaaaaarely ever going to hear anything outside those three. I can't think of anyone that plays any liquid funk anymore, I'm the only one that plays skullstep, my brother is the only person I've heard in ages play that dark, minimal, not-over-produced 1998-sounding stuff.. Occasionally someone will dig into their crate and play some Ragga/jungle.. But that's it!

99% of the time, all you're going to hear when it comes to DnB is one of the three aforementioned categories; nothing but a string of dancefloor smashers that sound exactly the same:



And the same thing applies to breaks/electro; I mean really, other than Bliss, is there any breaks/electro DJ in the whole city that DOESN'T play only sets that sound like a meddly of Deekline and Freestylers? You know, that breaks sound that sounds exactly like Pendulum at 130bpm instead of 174. 200Hz white-noise snare, sidechained bass/lead that ducks the kick..

Everything has become so incredibly generic when it comes to most of the breaks and DnB DJs in the city that it's not really worth booking them, or more than one of them, because all you're going to get are sets that sound exactly the same as each other.

And, also (you can all rejoice now, the moment you've all been waiting for) there's dubstep now that's stepped in. 2002-2006-ish there was DnB and breaks everywhere: Every thursday at Saph, every friday at Blue Dog, parties on friday or saturday night every single weekend, IDJ monthly with good headliners every month and every 4-6 months a major name.. There was a saturation that back then, just like now there's a saturation of dubstep; it's the Next Hot Thing, it draws a crowd, so now instead of a DnB/breaks room at every party, there's a dubstep room. In multi-genre party lineups where you would normaly have seen DnB DJ, now it's a dubstep DJ.

And, much as everyone always gives me shit for it, despite the fact that it is simply my opinion, dubstep is currently falling into the same kind of 3-style niche as DnB:

1 - stuff that's spacey, mellow, with a deep bass, more DUB than STEP
2 - stuff that's dark, hard and aggressive, like Noisia or Black Sun Empire at 140bpm
3 - midrange wobble a-la Rusko and Caspa; music that sounds like it was made by people who idolize Ali G and the gangsta-thug-chav lifestyle

So what do the masses of people in the average "urban" scene consist of?
Is it: People who want to smoke a joint, sit in the corner and chill? People who are into dark, hard music, horror movies, industrial and metal? Or is it people who are into the whole "urban" thing; being an urban soldja, baggy pants, hiphop-without-being-a-gangsta-thug-but-I-still-smoke-my-weed-every-day-and-run-these-streets?

And what are the majority going to want to listen to? Slow, mellow, DUBstep? Music that's dark, hard and aggresive? Or music that has an 'I'm so 'ard mate' British gangsta vibe, where they can show off their awesome new fitted caps, hoodies and baggy pants?

because like you said Charlie; on a slow night, now, there's 100 people. but do ALL those people listen to a variety of electronic music and go out to raves on the regular? Or are they there because the just heard some Dubstep at Picnik and that means that it must be good if it's playing in such a mainstream environment?

Ok, so we don't have dubstep on the radio over here yet, but Snoop is putting together a dubstep mixtape with rap MCs over dubstep beats.. Chase and Status are producing for Britney (and I think Rob Swire of Pendulum already has).. While the stuff that's going to come out of that is probably not going to be typical dubstep, it's going to have the same kinds of sounds and production values.. And since it's been announced, the people who follow those artists (snoop/britney) are obviously going to be looking into what these producers are known for, which means a new influx of people, which is good, but it's an influx of the 'mainstream' crowd, which is good if you want to make a ton of money, but not good if you want to play something that isn't the cheezy wannabe-thug sound they want to hear..

When it comes to multi-genre parties, there's also the problem of promoters not having a fucking clue how to organize a lineup, and DJ egos getting in the way of a proper progression. I can think of at least three people off the top of my head that have booked me for a party and then asked me around when I'd like to play, because 3/4 of the DJs on the lineup are all demanding to play at a particular time or they aren't accepting the booking, then being totally surprised and freaked out that I tell them to put me where they think I'd fit best in the progression.

Egos like that and promoters without the balls to put their foot down and say "This is my party, this is your time slot" end up with a lineup that looks like this:

10:00 - Promoter's best friend that just started mixing two months ago
11:00 - high-energy 160-190bpm DJ
12:00 - 135bpm high-energy electro/breaks
01:00 - high-energy uplifting 160-190bpm DJ
02:00 - high-energy dark/evil/hard 160-190bpm DJ
03:00 - psytrance
04:00 - happy hardcore
05:00 - 135bpm high-energy electro/breaks
06:00 - dubstep
07:00 - high-energy DnB
08:00 and on - more of the promoter's best friend that just started mixing two months ago

No sign of a logical progression, just throwing people together at the time the DJ wants based on how badly the promoter wants them to play the party and how much of an over-inflated ego they have.

But to get back to the main topic of "Why isn't there more breaks and DnB at raves": Change shit up! Evolve! Stop playing the exact same Beatport Top 10 Artists' tunes, do sets that go all over the place and don't stick to one subgenre of DnB/breaks. In your case, do more sets where you mix some Freeform with the DnB, throw in some tunes that slow down for a breakdown and drop in some breaks or dubstep into your set, get to scratching some more (who the fuck does that anymore?).. You've got Serato, so you don't need to crate-dig to get records out; get a ton of acapellas and lay them over tunes - your next tune is only a click/button-press away so you can ride that out.

If DnB is going to make it's presence known again, it's got to step up it's game. The DJs have to start thinking outside of the "I'm going to play nothing but the safe, established dancefloor smashers that everyone else plays" box. Sure, it works for Andy C, but because of that, EVERYONE is trying to sound like that when they mix!

Less generic sets, bring something new to the table, do something no one else does, mix something no one else does.. Stagnation will be the death of the music.

Originally Posted By MASA

But you know, Fred, and PLEASE take this as a constructive rebuttal... You seem to forget that DJs play, or should play, mainly for the crowd. You can't bash on a DJ for wanting to play a dancefloor-friendly tune or a popular anthem if it elicits a crowd response.

Not that a DJ shouldn't try to enlighten peeps by throwing down less well-known tunes, and to be honest, that's usually how I discover new tunes/artists. Hells, I'll be the first to be a bit annoyed when a DJ plays only safe/overplayed tunes. Still, most of my fave local DJs these days know how to keep me on my toes.

So yeah, me and DJ Shao (new kid, though lotsa potential as producer, mixing up genres from DnB to dubstep to breakcore in his tunes) were wondering, looking at a Passeport poster... What the heck is skullstep? :)

Originally Posted By SCREWHEAD

there are too many DJs and not enough time.. When DnB was still new, there weren't many DJs, so everyone would get 2 or 3 hour timeslots..

Originally Posted By MUTANTE

btw, "skullstep"... why ( crying )