7
Hardcore, jungle, UK garage and the London underground
Unique 3
During 1989, a series of house records emerged that employed breakbeats – the looped segments of solo drums which formed the basis for hip hop, like Frankie Bones’ ‘Bonesbreaks’ series of irreverent cut-ups and Renegade Soundwave’s hypnotic track ‘The Phantom’ – or subsonic, depth-charge basslines, like Unique 3’s stunning piece of bleeping, Yorkshire steel cybernetics, ‘The Theme’.Open in YouTube ↗
The Prodigy
In pop chart terms, the biggest hits were The Prodigy’s ‘Charly’, which featured a sample of a mewling cat from a seventies public information broadcast over crushing polyrhythms; ‘Sesame’s Treet’ by Smart Es, a novelty record that set the theme from the American children’s television show to a hardcore beat; and Altern-8’s ‘Activ-8’, with its comical, druggy refrain recited by a three-year-old: ‘Nice one, top one, get sorted!’ Hardcore was pushing its own limits, going ever further out there: the helium bubble of double-speed disco divas, accelerated piano riffs and breakneck drum loops formed a homology with an increase in amphetamine use and a perceived decrease in the quality of Ecstasy.Open in YouTube ↗
Altern-8
In pop chart terms, the biggest hits were The Prodigy’s ‘Charly’, which featured a sample of a mewling cat from a seventies public information broadcast over crushing polyrhythms; ‘Sesame’s Treet’ by Smart Es, a novelty record that set the theme from the American children’s television show to a hardcore beat; and Altern-8’s ‘Activ-8’, with its comical, druggy refrain recited by a three-year-old: ‘Nice one, top one, get sorted!’ Hardcore was pushing its own limits, going ever further out there: the helium bubble of double-speed disco divas, accelerated piano riffs and breakneck drum loops formed a homology with an increase in amphetamine use and a perceived decrease in the quality of Ecstasy.Open in YouTube ↗
Two Fingers & James T Kirk
Two Fingers and James T Kirk, Junglist, 1995Open in Goodreads ↗
James Brown
Chambers says he adapted the record’s title from James Brown’s album Jungle Groove, although the word was already part of the vernacular of rave MCs like Rat Pack.Open in YouTube ↗
Metalheads
One turning point was a devastating track called ‘Terminator’ by Metalheads, alias Goldie, with its shredded, snake-like drum loop that contorted and writhed around the speakers.Open in YouTube ↗
The Prodigy
While The Prodigy, with a thrilling live show and virtuoso programming skills, were turning their apocalyptic hardcore into a belligerent strain of electronic rock’n’roll – Music For the Jilted Generation, as their second album was titled – jungle producers were refining breakbeats into a polyrhythmic blend of influences from house, hardcore, reggae, hip hop, soul, ambient music and techno; a melting pot of urban styles which Fabio and Grooverider had envisaged five years previously.Open in YouTube ↗
Goldie
The urge to retain control intensified as the economics of the scene began to change during 1994 and 1995, when a number of key producers were offered album deals with dance subsidiaries of major record labels, beginning with Goldie, who went on to sell 100,000 copies of his debut album, Timeless, and become an international star.Open in YouTube ↗
Sex Pistols
Their manager even compared them to the Sex Pistols, whose ‘Anarchy in the UK’ tour in 1976 was halted amid a nationwide outcry after the iconoclastic punks swore on a live television show.Open in YouTube ↗
Burial
Some of it also seemed to be intentionally mournful, almost haunted, like Burial’s album Untrue, which sounded like an elegy for the lost euphoria and shattered utopianism of the rave era.Open in YouTube ↗