Dubstep
Encyclopedia
Dubstep (ˈ) is a genre of electronic dance music
that originated in south London
, England. Its overall sound has been described as "tightly coiled productions with overwhelming bass lines and reverberant drum patterns, clipped samples, and occasional vocals".
The earliest dubstep releases date back to 1998 and were darker, more experimental, instrumental dub
remixes of 2-step garage
tracks attempting to incorporate the funky elements of breakbeat
, or the dark elements of drum and bass
into 2-step, which featured B-sides of single releases. In 2001, this and other strains of dark garage music began to be showcased and promoted at London's night club Plastic People, at the "Forward" night (sometimes stylized as FWD>>), which went on to be considerably influential to the development of dubstep. The term "dubstep" in reference to a genre of music began to be used by around 2002, by which time stylistic trends used in creating these remixes started to become more noticeable and distinct from 2-step and grime
. It was labels Big Apple, Amunition and Tempa that began circulating the "dubstep" term.
A very early supporter of the sound was BBC Radio 1
DJ John Peel
, who started playing it from 2003 onwards. In 2004, the last year of his show, his listeners voted Distance, Digital Mystikz
and Plastician (formerly Plasticman) in their top 50 for the year. Dubstep started to spread beyond small local scenes in late 2005 and early 2006; many websites devoted to the genre appeared on the internet and aided the growth of the scene, such as dubstepforum, the download site Barefiles and blogs such as gutterbreakz. Simultaneously, the genre was receiving extensive coverage in music magazines such as The Wire
and online publications such as Pitchfork Media
, with a regular feature entitled The Month In: Grime/Dubstep. Interest in dubstep grew significantly after BBC Radio 1 DJ Mary Anne Hobbs
started championing the genre, beginning with a show devoted to it (entitled "Dubstep Warz") in January 2006.
into the South London
-based 2-step garage
sound. These experiments often ended up on the B-side of a white label
or commercial garage release. Dubstep is generally instrumental. Similar to a vocal garage
hybrid - grime
- the genre's feel is commonly dark; tracks frequently use a minor key and can feature dissonant harmonies such as the tritone interval
within a riff
. Other distinguishing features often found are the use of samples, a propulsive, sparse rhythm, and an almost omnipresent sub-bass
. Some dubstep artists have also incorporated a variety of outside influences, from dub-influenced techno
such as Basic Channel
to classical music
or heavy metal
.
, and often shuffled or incorporating tuplet
s. The tempo is nearly always in the range of 138-142 beats per minute, with a clap or snare usually inserted every third beat in a bar. In its early stages, dubstep was often more percussive, with more influences from 2-step drum patterns. A lot of producers were also experimenting with tribal drum samples, an example being Loefah's early release "Truly Dread". Key producers started to experiment with the half-step rhythm, a feature which started to be used more and more and has become a signature of the genre. Similarly, the half-step rhythm also started to dominate grime, and producers started to lose the more complex and jerky rhythms influenced from 2-step, and started to work with more hip-hop influenced beats.
Dubstep rhythms typically do not follow the four-to-the-floor patterns common in many other styles of electronic dance music such as techno and house
but tend to rely on longer percussion loops than the four-bar phrases present in much techno or house. Often, a track's percussion will follow a pattern which when heard alone will appear to be playing at half the tempo of the track; the double-time feel is instead achieved by other elements, usually the bassline.
In an Invisible Jukebox interview with The Wire, Kode9
commented on a DJ MRK1
(formerly Mark One) track, observing that listeners "have internalized the double-time rhythm" and the "track is so empty it makes [the listener] nervous, and you almost fill in the double time yourself, physically, to compensate".
, distortion or filter cutoff. The resulting sound is a timbre
that is punctuated by rhythmic variations in volume, filter cut-off, or distortion. This style of bass is a driving factor in some variations of dubstep, particularly at the more club-friendly end of the spectrum..
similarities to other genres like drum and bass
and UK garage. Typically this would comprise an intro
, a main section (often incorporating a bass drop), a midsection
, a second main section similar to the first (often with another drop), and an outro.
Many early dubstep tracks incorporate one or more "bass drops", a characteristic inherited from drum and bass. Typically, the percussion will pause, often reducing the track to silence, and then resume with more intensity, accompanied by a dominant subbass (often passing portamento
through an entire octave or more, as in the audio example). It is very common for the bass to drop at or very close to 55 seconds into the song, due to the fact that 55 seconds is just over 32 measures at the common tempo of 140 bpm. However, this (or the existence of a bass drop in general) is by no means a completely rigid characteristic, rather a trope; a large portion of seminal tunes from producers like Kode9
and Horsepower Productions
have more experimental song structures which don't rely on a drop for a dynamic peak - and in some instances don't feature a bass drop at all.
Rewinds (or reloads) are another technique used by dubstep DJs. If a song seems to be especially popular, the DJ will 'spin back' the record by hand without lifting the stylus, and play the track in question again. Rewinds are also an important live element in many of dubstep's precursors; the technique originates in dub reggae
soundsystems
, is a standard of most pirate radio stations and is also used at UK garage and jungle nights.
Taking direct cues from Jamaica
's lyrically sparse deejay
and toasting mic styles in the vein of reggae pioneers like U-Roy
, the MC
's role in dubstep's live experience is critically important to its impact.
Notable mainstays in the live experience of the sound are MC Sgt Pokes and MC Crazy D from London, and Juakali
from Trinidad. Production in a studio environment seems to lend itself to more experimentation. Kode9 has collaborated extensively with the Spaceape, who MCs in a dread poet style. Kevin Martin's experiments with the genre are almost exclusively collaborations with MCs such as Warrior Queen
, Flowdan
, and Tippa Irie
. Skream
has also featured Warrior Queen and grime artist JME on his debut album, Skream!
. Plastician, who was one of the first DJ's to mix the sound of grime and dubstep together, has worked with notable grime setup Boy Better Know
as well as renowned Grime MC's such as Wiley, Dizzee Rascal and Lethal Bizzle. He has also released tracks with a dubstep foundation and grime verses over the beats. Coki and Mala of Digital Mystikz
have experimented with abrupt, 16-bar intros and have produced tracks with dub vocalists, and dubstep artist and label co-owner Sam Shackleton
has moved toward productions which fall outside the usual dubstep tempo, and sometimes entirely lack most of the common tropes of the genre.
, Steve Gurley, Oris Jay, and Zed Bias
in 1999-2000. Ammunition Promotions, who run the influential club Forward>> and have managed many proto dubstep record labels (including Tempa, Soulja, Road, Vehicle, Shelflife, Texture, Lifestyle and Bingo), began to use the term "dubstep" to describe this style of music in around 2002. The term's use in a 2002 XLR8R
cover story (featuring Horsepower Productions
on the cover) contributed to it becoming established as the name of the genre.
The club Forward>> was originally held at the Velvet Rooms in London's Soho
and is now running every Thursday at Plastic People in Shoreditch
, east London. Founded in 2001, Forward>> was critical to the development of dubstep, providing the first venue devoted to the sound and an environment in which dubstep producers could premier new music. Around this time, Forward>> was also incubating several other strains of dark garage hybrids, so much so that in the early days of the club the coming together of these strains was referred to as the "Forward>> sound". An online flyer from around this time encapsulated the Forward>> sound as "b-lines to make your chest cavity shudder."
Forward>> also ran a radio show on east London pirate station Rinse FM
, hosted by Kode9
. The original Forward>> line ups included Hatcha, Youngsta, Kode9, Zed Bias, Oris Jay, Slaughter Mob, Jay Da Flex, Slimzee and others, plus regular guests. The line up of residents has changed over the years to include Youngsta, Hatcha, Geeneus and Plastician, with Crazy D as MC/host. Producers including D1, Skream and Benga make regular appearances.
Another crucial element in the early development of dubstep was the Big Apple Records record shop in Croydon
. Key artists such as Hatcha and later Skream worked in the shop (which initially sold early UK Hardcore / Rave, Techno and House and later, garage and drum and bass, but evolved with the emerging dubstep scene in the area), while Digital Mystikz were frequent visitors. El-B, Zed Bias, Horsepower Productions
, Plastician, N Type, Walsh and a young Loefah regularly visited the shop as well. The shop and its record label have since closed down and reopened under the name Mixing Records under new management before closing down again in 2010. The shop's site is currently unused and still stands in the north end of Surrey Street, Croydon.
In an article in The Guardian
, Simon Reynolds examined the idea of any links between the recreational use of ketamine
, a dissociative drug, and the origins of dubstep, writing that a connection "would certainly explain a lot", though also conceding "it could all be just rumour".
s, he drew exclusively from a pool of new South London producers—first Benga and Skream, then also Digital Mystikz and Loefah—to begin a dark, clipped and minimal new direction in dubstep.
At the end of 2003, running independently from the pioneering FWD night, an event called Filthy Dub, co promoted by Plastician, and partner David Carlisle started happening regularly. It was there that Skream, Benga, N Type, Walsh, Chef, Loefah and Cyrus
made their debuts as DJ's. South London collective Digital Mystikz (Mala and Coki), along with labelmates and collaborators Loefah and MC Sgt Pokes soon came into their own, bringing sound system thinking, dub
values, and appreciation of jungle
bass weight to the dubstep scene. Digital Mystikz brought an expanded palette of sounds and influences to the genre, most prominently reggae and dub, as well as orchestral melodies.
After releasing 12-inch single
s on Big Apple, they founded DMZ Records, which has released fourteen 12"s to date. They also began their night DMZ, held every two months in Brixton
, a part of London already strongly associated with reggae. DMZ has showcased new dubstep artists such as Skream, Kode 9, Benga, Pinch
, DJ Youngsta, Hijak, Joe Nice
and Vex'd. DMZ's first anniversary event (at the Mass venue, a converted church) saw fans attending from places as far away as Sweden, the U.S., and Australia, leading to a queue of 600 people at the event. This forced the club to move from its regular 400-capacity space to Mass' main room, an event cited as a pivotal moment in dubstep's history.
In 2004, Richard James
' label, Rephlex, released two compilations that included dubstep tracks - the (perhaps misnamed) Grime and Grime 2. The first featured Plasticman, Mark One and Slaughter Mob, with Kode 9, Loefah and Digital Mystikz appearing on the second. These compilations helped to raise awareness of dubstep at a time when the grime sound was drawing more attention, and Digital Mystikz and Loefah's presence on the second release contributed to the success of their DMZ club night. Soon afterwards, the Independent on Sunday commented on "a whole new sound", at a time when both genres were becoming popular, stating that "grime" and "dubstep" were two names for the same style, which was also known as "sublow", "8-bar" and "eskibeat".
Warrior Dubz
). The show created a new global audience for the scene, after years of exclusively UK underground buzz. Burial
's self-titled album appearing in many critics' "Best of..." lists for the year, notably The Wires Best Album of 2006. The sound was also featured prominently in the soundtrack
for the 2006 sci-fi film Children of Men
, which included Digital Mystikz, Random Trio, Kode 9, Pressure and DJ Pinch. Ammunition also released the first retrospective compilation of the 2000-2004 era of dubstep called The Roots of Dubstep, co-compiled by Ammunition and Blackdown on the Tempa Label.
The sound's first North American ambassador, Baltimore DJ Joe Nice helped kickstart its spread into the continent. Regular Dubstep club nights started appearing in cities like New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Montreal, Houston, and Denver, while Mary Anne Hobbs curated a Dubstep showcase at 2007's Sónar
festival in Barcelona. Non-British artists have also won praise within the larger Dubstep community. The dynamic dubstep scene in Japan is growing quickly despite its cultural and geographical distance from the West. Such DJ/producers as Goth-trad, Hyaku-mado, Ena and Doppelganger are major figures in the Tokyo scene. Joe Nice has played at DMZ, while the fifth installment of Tempa's "Dubstep Allstars" mix series (released in 2007) included tracks by Finnish producer Tes La Rok and Americans JuJu and Matty G. Following on from Rinse FM's pioneering start; three internet based radio station's called SubFM, DubstepFM and DubTerrain started to play the sound exclusively with 24 hour broadcasting featuring show archives and live DJ shows.
Techno artists and DJs began assimilating dubstep into their sets and productions. Shackleton's "Blood On My Hands" was remixed by minimal techno
producer Ricardo Villalobos
(an act reciprocated when Villalobos included a Shackleton mix on his "Vasco" EP) and included on a mix CD by Panoramabar resident Cassy. Ellen Allien
and Apparat
's 2006 song "Metric" (from the Orchestra of Bubbles
album), Modeselektor
's "Godspeed" (from the 2007's Happy Birthday! album, among other tracks on that same album) and Roman Flugel's remix of Riton's "Hammer of Thor" are other examples of dubstep-influenced techno. Berlin's Hard Wax record store (operated by influential dub techno artists Basic Channel) has also championed Shackleton's Skull Disco
label, later broadening its focus to include other dubstep releases.
The summer of 2007 saw dubstep's musical palette expand further, with Benga and Coki
scoring a crossover hit (in a similar manner to Skream's "Midnight Request Line") with the track "Night", which gained widespread play from DJs in a diverse range of genres. BBC Radio 1
DJ Gilles Peterson
named it his record of 2007, and it was also a massive hit in the equally bassline-orientated, but decidedly more four-to-the-floor genre of bassline house
, whilst Burial's late 2007 release Untrue
(which was nominated for the 2008 Nationwide Mercury Music Prize in the UK) incorporated extensive use of heavily manipulated, mostly female, 'girl next door' vocal samples. Burial has spoken at length regarding his intent to reincorporate elements of musical precursors such as 2-step garage and house into his sound.
Much like drum and bass before it, dubstep has started to become incorporated into other media, particularly in the United Kingdom. In 2007, Benga, Skream, and other dubstep producers provided the soundtrack to much of the second series of Dubplate Drama
, which aired on Channel 4
with a soundtrack CD later released on Rinse Recordings
. The sound also featured prominently in the second series of the teen drama Skins
, which also aired on Channel 4 in early 2008.
In the summer of 2008, Mary Anne Hobbs
invited Cyrus, Starkey, Oneman, DJ Chef
, Silkie, Quest, Joker
, Nomad, Kulture and MC Sgt Pokes to the BBC
's Maida Vale
studios for a show called Generation Bass. The show was the evolution from her seminal BBC
Radio 1 Dubstepwarz Show in 2006, and further documented another set of dubstep's producers.
In the autumn of 2008, a limited pressing 12" called "Iron Devil" was released featuring Lee Scratch Perry and Prince Far-I in a dubstep style, including a tune based on the Perry riddim used on reggae hits like "Disco Devil", "Chase The Devil", and "Croaking Lizard". This was the first recorded example of a founder of Jamaican dub style acknowledging dubstep and creating new music in the genre, reinforcing the connection of dubstep to its roots in Jamaican dub reggae at a time when it seemed dubstep was moving away from its reggae underpinnings.
As the genre has spread to become an international rather than UK-centric scene, it has also seen a number of women making headway into the scene in a variety of ways. Alongside Soulja of Ammunition Promotions and Mary Anne Hobbs, an influx of female producers, writers, photographers and DJs all have broken through in the up-til-then male orientated scene. With key 12" releases on Hyperdub
,Immigrant andHotflush Recordings, producers Vaccine, Subeena and Ikonika
have introduced a palette of new sounds and influences to the genre, such as double-time bass drums, 8-bit
video game samples, hand percussion and lushly arranged strings. Mary Anne Hobbs commented that the mood at dubstep nights is less aggressive, or more meditative, leading to a larger female attendance at events than with the genre's precursors, noting "Grime and drum 'n' bass raves tend to be quite aggy. People in dubstep clubs tend to have a more meditative approach, which is inviting to females. You see the female-to-male ratio constantly going up – it’s got the potential to be 40:60".
Journalists Melissa Bradshaw
, Emma Warren, and dubstep documentarian and photographer Georgina Cook
have all had an impact on the cultural importance of the music. Cook's Drumz of the South flickr
page documents the evolution of the scene in a photographic timeline of sorts, and was for a time the only photographic archive of the key events such as the early FWD and DMZ nights in London.
using dubstep sounds; critics observed a dubstep influence in the song "Freakshow", from the 2007 album Blackout, which Tom Ewing described as "built around the 'wobbler' effect that's a genre standby." Benga and Coki's single "Night" still continued to be a popular track on the UK dance chart more than a year after its release in late 2007, still ranking in the top five at the start of April 2008 on Pete Tong
's BBC Radio 1
dance chart list.
However the year 2009 saw the dubstep sound gaining further worldwide recognition, often through the assimilation of elements of the sound into other genres, in a manner similar to drum and bass before it. At the start of the year, UK electronic duo La Roux
put their single "In for the Kill" in the remix hands of Skream
. They then gave remix duties of "I'm Not Your Toy
" to Nero and then again with their single "Bulletproof" being remixed by Zinc
. The same year, London producer Silkie released an influential album City Limits Vol. 1 on the Deep Medi label, using 70s funk and soul reference points, a departure from the familiar strains of dub and UK garage. A key factor in the rise of dubstep in the media was its exposure on video sharing websites, such as YouTube who provide access to many channels dedicated to dubstep, notably UKF Dubstep. The sound also continued to interest the mainstream press with key articles in magazines like Interview
, New York
, and The Wire
, which featured producer Kode9
on its May 2009 cover. XLR8R
put Joker
on the cover of its December 2009 issue. By the end of 2009, The New York Times
, XLR8R
, NME
and The Sunday Times
all reviewed the genre.
In a move foreshadowed by endorsements of the sound from R&B, hip-hop and recently, mainstream figures such as Rihanna
, or Public Enemy's Hank Shocklee
, Snoop Dogg
collaborated with dubstep producers Chase & Status
, providing a vocal for their 'underground anthem' "Eastern Jam". The 2011 Britney Spears track "Hold It Against Me
" was also responsible for promoting dubstep tropes within a mainstream pop audience,. Rihanna
's Rated R
album released such content the very year dubstep saw a spike, containing 3 dubstep tracks. Such events propelled the genre into the biggest radio markets overnight, with considerable airplay. Other hip-hop artists like Xzibit
added their vocals to dubstep instrumental tracks for the mixtape project Mr Grustle & Tha Russian Dubstep LA Embrace The Renaissance Vol. 1 Mixed by Plastician. In summer 2009, female rapper and actress Eve used Benga's "E Trips"; adding her own verses over the beat to create a new tune called "Me N My"; the first single on her album Flirt. The track was co-produced by Benga and hip hop producer Salaam Remi
.
Throughout 2010, dubstep was beginning to hit the pop charts, with "I Need Air
" by Magnetic Man
reaching number 10 in the UK singles chart. This presented a turning point in the popularity of mainstream dubstep amongst UK listeners as it was placed on rotation on BBC Radio 1
. "Katy On a Mission
" by Katy B
(produced by Benga) followed, debuting at number 5 in the UK singles chart, and stayed in the top 10 for five more weeks. In February 2011, Chase & Status
's second album No More Idols
reached No.2 in the UK album chart. On May 1, 2011, Nero's third single "Guilt
" from their album reached number 8 in the Official UK Singles Chart, their highest placing single to date. In April 2011, "dubbox", the industry's first application designed for the mobile creation of dubstep music, was released for the iPhone and reached the Top 25 Best Selling Music Apps in the UK its first week.
In July 2011 DJ Fresh's track "Louder
" (featuring vocals from Kosheen
's Sian Evans
) hit number 1 in the UK singles chart, becoming the first ever dubstep track to achieve this feat. "Louder", backed by its use in an advertising campaign for Lucozade
, managed to remain in the top 10 of the charts for 6 weeks. By mid-August, the UK had a second dubstep number one courtesy of Nero
's "Promises
".
writer Martin Clark has suggested that "well-meaning attempts to loosely define the ground we're covering here are somewhat futile and almost certainly flawed. This is not one genre. However, given the links, interaction, and free-flowing ideas...you can't dismiss all these acts as unrelated..." Such music often references earlier dubstep productions as well as UK Garage
,
2-step, and other froms of underground electronic dance music
. Artists producing music that has been described as post-dubstep have also incorporated elements of ambient music
and early 2000s R&B
. The latter in particular is heavily sampled by two artists described as post-dubstep, Mount Kimbie
, Fantastic Mr Fox and James Blake
. The tempo of music typically characterised as post-dubstep is approximately 130 beats per minute.
The production duo Mount Kimbie
is often associated with the origination of the term post-dubstep. Mount Kimbie's Maybes EP, James Blake's remix of Untold's "Stop What You're Doing" and Joy Orbison
's "Hyph Mngo" can be used as markers in the breaking off of post-dubstep as a distinct sound. The commercial popularity of The xx
, also marked a breakaway and a member of the band, Jamie xx
has released remixes which are considered post-dubstep, including a Gil Scott-Heron
remix album. Other names frequently associated with post-dubstep are Ikonika, 2562
, Cityscape, Deadboy, Martyn
, Floating Points, Pangaea, Ramadanman, Sepalcure, FaltyDL, Pariah, Burial
, The Weeknd
, SBTRKT
, Scuba, Egyptrixx, Shackleton, Starkey, Matthew Thompson, Ital Tek, Ifan Dafydd, Guido, Four Tet
and the U.K. labels Hotflush and Hyperdub
.
and features "robotic fluctuations and metal-esque aggression." According to Simon Reynolds
, as dubstep gained larger audiences and moved from smaller club based venues to outdoor and arena events, sub-sonic content was gradually replaced by distorted bass riffs that function roughly in the same register as the electric guitar
in heavy metal
. Dubstep "purists" have levelled criticisms at brostep because of its preoccupation with "hard" and aggressive sounding timbres. In the UK brostep has been jokingly called "bruvstep" and "mid-range
cack." The English producer Rusko
is credited with being the progenitor of brostep and during an interview on BBC's 1Xtra radio show he commented that: "Brostep is sort of my fault, but now I've started to hate it in a way...It's like someone screaming in your face for an hour...you don't want that."
Electronic dance music
Electronic dance music is electronic music produced primarily for the purposes of use within a nightclub setting, or in an environment that is centered upon dance-based entertainment...
that originated in south London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, England. Its overall sound has been described as "tightly coiled productions with overwhelming bass lines and reverberant drum patterns, clipped samples, and occasional vocals".
The earliest dubstep releases date back to 1998 and were darker, more experimental, instrumental dub
Dub music
Dub is a genre of music which grew out of reggae music in the 1960s, and is commonly considered a subgenre, though it has developed to extend beyond the scope of reggae...
remixes of 2-step garage
2-step garage
2-step garage, or simply 2-step, is a typically English style of modern electronic dance music, and a relatively popular subgenre of UK garage.A transcription of this article is available as a PDF file.-Characteristics:...
tracks attempting to incorporate the funky elements of breakbeat
Breakbeat
In 1992, a new style called "jungalistic hardcore" emerged, and for many ravers it was too funky to dance to. Josh Lawford of Ravescene prophesied that the breakbeat was "the death-knell of rave" because the ever changing drumbeat patterns of breakbeat music didn't allow for the same zoned out,...
, or the dark elements of drum and bass
Drum and bass
Drum and bass is a type of electronic music which emerged in the late 1980s. The genre is characterized by fast breakbeats , with heavy bass and sub-bass lines...
into 2-step, which featured B-sides of single releases. In 2001, this and other strains of dark garage music began to be showcased and promoted at London's night club Plastic People, at the "Forward" night (sometimes stylized as FWD>>), which went on to be considerably influential to the development of dubstep. The term "dubstep" in reference to a genre of music began to be used by around 2002, by which time stylistic trends used in creating these remixes started to become more noticeable and distinct from 2-step and grime
Grime (music)
Grime is a style of music that emerged from Bow, East London, England in the early 2000s, primarily as a development of UK garage, dancehall, and hip hop...
. It was labels Big Apple, Amunition and Tempa that began circulating the "dubstep" term.
A very early supporter of the sound was BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
DJ John Peel
John Peel
John Robert Parker Ravenscroft, OBE , known professionally as John Peel, was an English disc jockey, radio presenter, record producer and journalist. He was the longest-serving of the original BBC Radio 1 DJs, broadcasting regularly from 1967 until his death in 2004...
, who started playing it from 2003 onwards. In 2004, the last year of his show, his listeners voted Distance, Digital Mystikz
Digital Mystikz
Digital Mystikz are a dubstep production duo from the South London suburb of Norwood. Along with Loefah and Sgt. Pokes, they operate the DMZ record label and host the influential bimonthly nightclub DMZ, held at the Mass club complex in Brixton, London...
and Plastician (formerly Plasticman) in their top 50 for the year. Dubstep started to spread beyond small local scenes in late 2005 and early 2006; many websites devoted to the genre appeared on the internet and aided the growth of the scene, such as dubstepforum, the download site Barefiles and blogs such as gutterbreakz. Simultaneously, the genre was receiving extensive coverage in music magazines such as The Wire
The Wire (magazine)
The Wire is a British avant garde music magazine, founded in 1982 by jazz promoter Anthony Wood and journalist Chrissie Murray. The magazine initially concentrated on contemporary jazz and improvised music, but branched out in the early 1990s to various types of experimental music...
and online publications such as Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
, with a regular feature entitled The Month In: Grime/Dubstep. Interest in dubstep grew significantly after BBC Radio 1 DJ Mary Anne Hobbs
Mary Anne Hobbs
Mary Anne Hobbs is an English DJ and music journalist from Garstang, Lancashire. She launched a new Primetime show on Xfm on 9 July 2011-Early career:...
started championing the genre, beginning with a show devoted to it (entitled "Dubstep Warz") in January 2006.
Characteristics
Dubstep's early roots are in the more experimental releases of UK garage producers, seeking to incorporate elements of drum and bassDrum and bass
Drum and bass is a type of electronic music which emerged in the late 1980s. The genre is characterized by fast breakbeats , with heavy bass and sub-bass lines...
into the South London
South London
South London is the southern part of London, England, United Kingdom.According to the 2011 official Boundary Commission for England definition, South London includes the London boroughs of Bexley, Bromley, Croydon, Greenwich, Kingston, Lambeth, Lewisham, Merton, Southwark, Sutton and...
-based 2-step garage
2-step garage
2-step garage, or simply 2-step, is a typically English style of modern electronic dance music, and a relatively popular subgenre of UK garage.A transcription of this article is available as a PDF file.-Characteristics:...
sound. These experiments often ended up on the B-side of a white label
White label
White label records are vinyl records with adhesive plain white labels affixed. Test pressings, usually with Test Pressing written on the label, with catalogue number, artist and recording time or date, are produced in small quantities to evaluate the quality of the disc production...
or commercial garage release. Dubstep is generally instrumental. Similar to a vocal garage
UK garage
UK garage is a genre of electronic dance music originating from the United Kingdom in the early-1990s. UK garage is a descendant of house music which originated in Chicago and New York, United States. UK garage usually features a distinctive syncopated 4/4 percussive rhythm with 'shuffling'...
hybrid - grime
Grime (music)
Grime is a style of music that emerged from Bow, East London, England in the early 2000s, primarily as a development of UK garage, dancehall, and hip hop...
- the genre's feel is commonly dark; tracks frequently use a minor key and can feature dissonant harmonies such as the tritone interval
Tritone
In classical music from Western culture, the tritone |tone]]) is traditionally defined as a musical interval composed of three whole tones. In a chromatic scale, each whole tone can be further divided into two semitones...
within a riff
RIFF
The Resource Interchange File Format is a generic file container format for storing data in tagged chunks. It is primarily used to store multimedia such as sound and video, though it may also be used to store any arbitrary data....
. Other distinguishing features often found are the use of samples, a propulsive, sparse rhythm, and an almost omnipresent sub-bass
Sub-bass
Sub-bass is a term used to describe audible sounds below 90 Hz and extending downward to include the lowest frequency humans can hear, typically 20 Hz. Sound systems often feature one or more subwoofer loudspeakers that are dedicated solely to amplifying sounds in the sub-bass range...
. Some dubstep artists have also incorporated a variety of outside influences, from dub-influenced techno
Techno
Techno is a form of electronic dance music that emerged in Detroit, Michigan in the United States during the mid to late 1980s. The first recorded use of the word techno, in reference to a genre of music, was in 1988...
such as Basic Channel
Basic Channel
Basic Channel is a production team and record label, composed of Moritz Von Oswald and Mark Ernestus, that originated in Berlin, Germany in 1993. The duo released a number of vinyl-only tracks under various aliases, each of which employed their signature brand of dissonant dub techno...
to classical music
Classical music
Classical music is the art music produced in, or rooted in, the traditions of Western liturgical and secular music, encompassing a broad period from roughly the 11th century to present times...
or heavy metal
Heavy metal music
Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in the Midlands of the United Kingdom and the United States...
.
Rhythm
Dubstep rhythms are usually syncopatedSyncopation
In music, syncopation includes a variety of rhythms which are in some way unexpected in that they deviate from the strict succession of regularly spaced strong and weak but also powerful beats in a meter . These include a stress on a normally unstressed beat or a rest where one would normally be...
, and often shuffled or incorporating tuplet
Tuplet
In music a tuplet is "any rhythm that involves dividing the beat into a different number of equal subdivisions from that usually permitted by the...
s. The tempo is nearly always in the range of 138-142 beats per minute, with a clap or snare usually inserted every third beat in a bar. In its early stages, dubstep was often more percussive, with more influences from 2-step drum patterns. A lot of producers were also experimenting with tribal drum samples, an example being Loefah's early release "Truly Dread". Key producers started to experiment with the half-step rhythm, a feature which started to be used more and more and has become a signature of the genre. Similarly, the half-step rhythm also started to dominate grime, and producers started to lose the more complex and jerky rhythms influenced from 2-step, and started to work with more hip-hop influenced beats.
Dubstep rhythms typically do not follow the four-to-the-floor patterns common in many other styles of electronic dance music such as techno and house
House music
House music is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in Chicago, Illinois, United States in the early 1980s. It was initially popularized in mid-1980s discothèques catering to the African-American, Latino American, and gay communities; first in Chicago circa 1984, then in other...
but tend to rely on longer percussion loops than the four-bar phrases present in much techno or house. Often, a track's percussion will follow a pattern which when heard alone will appear to be playing at half the tempo of the track; the double-time feel is instead achieved by other elements, usually the bassline.
In an Invisible Jukebox interview with The Wire, Kode9
Kode9
Kode9 is a London-based electronic music artist, DJ, and owner of the Hyperdub record label. An MC, The Spaceape, is a frequent collaborator...
commented on a DJ MRK1
MRK1
Mark Foster, known as MRK1 , is a dubstep and grime producer from Manchester, England, originally a drum n bass artist. He is known especially for his work with the Virus Syndicate, including MCs Goldfinger and Nika D, which he produces and provides instrumental tracks for, and his fusion of both...
(formerly Mark One) track, observing that listeners "have internalized the double-time rhythm" and the "track is so empty it makes [the listener] nervous, and you almost fill in the double time yourself, physically, to compensate".
Wobble bass
One characteristic of certain strands of dubstep is the wobble bass, where an extended bass note is manipulated rhythmically. This style of bass is typically produced by using a low frequency oscillator to manipulate certain parameters of a synthesizer such as volumeSound pressure
Sound pressure or acoustic pressure is the local pressure deviation from the ambient atmospheric pressure caused by a sound wave. Sound pressure can be measured using a microphone in air and a hydrophone in water...
, distortion or filter cutoff. The resulting sound is a timbre
Timbre
In music, timbre is the quality of a musical note or sound or tone that distinguishes different types of sound production, such as voices and musical instruments, such as string instruments, wind instruments, and percussion instruments. The physical characteristics of sound that determine the...
that is punctuated by rhythmic variations in volume, filter cut-off, or distortion. This style of bass is a driving factor in some variations of dubstep, particularly at the more club-friendly end of the spectrum..
Structure, bass drops, rewinds and MCs
Originally, dubstep releases had some structuralSong structure (popular music)
The structures or musical forms of songs in popular music are typically sectional, repeating forms, such as strophic form. Other common forms include thirty-two-bar form, verse-chorus form, and the twelve bar blues...
similarities to other genres like drum and bass
Drum and bass
Drum and bass is a type of electronic music which emerged in the late 1980s. The genre is characterized by fast breakbeats , with heavy bass and sub-bass lines...
and UK garage. Typically this would comprise an intro
Introduction (music)
In music, the introduction is a passage or section which opens a movement or a separate piece. In popular music this is often abbreviated as intro...
, a main section (often incorporating a bass drop), a midsection
Bridge (music)
In music, especially western popular music, a bridge is a contrasting section which also prepares for the return of the original material section...
, a second main section similar to the first (often with another drop), and an outro.
Many early dubstep tracks incorporate one or more "bass drops", a characteristic inherited from drum and bass. Typically, the percussion will pause, often reducing the track to silence, and then resume with more intensity, accompanied by a dominant subbass (often passing portamento
Portamento
Portamento is a musical term originated from the Italian expression "portamento della voce" , denoting from the beginning of the 17th century a vocal slide between two pitches and its emulation by members of the violin family and certain wind instruments, and is sometimes used...
through an entire octave or more, as in the audio example). It is very common for the bass to drop at or very close to 55 seconds into the song, due to the fact that 55 seconds is just over 32 measures at the common tempo of 140 bpm. However, this (or the existence of a bass drop in general) is by no means a completely rigid characteristic, rather a trope; a large portion of seminal tunes from producers like Kode9
Kode9
Kode9 is a London-based electronic music artist, DJ, and owner of the Hyperdub record label. An MC, The Spaceape, is a frequent collaborator...
and Horsepower Productions
Horsepower Productions
Horsepower Productions are an electronic music duo, initially a trio, who released experimental garage recordings, and helped pioneer the dubstep genre.-Lineup:...
have more experimental song structures which don't rely on a drop for a dynamic peak - and in some instances don't feature a bass drop at all.
Rewinds (or reloads) are another technique used by dubstep DJs. If a song seems to be especially popular, the DJ will 'spin back' the record by hand without lifting the stylus, and play the track in question again. Rewinds are also an important live element in many of dubstep's precursors; the technique originates in dub reggae
Reggae
Reggae is a music genre first developed in Jamaica in the late 1960s. While sometimes used in a broader sense to refer to most types of Jamaican music, the term reggae more properly denotes a particular music style that originated following on the development of ska and rocksteady.Reggae is based...
soundsystems
Sound system (DJ)
A sound system is a group of DJs and engineers contributing and working together as one, playing and producing music.-Origin:The sound system concept originated in the 1950s in Kingston, Jamaica. DJs would load up a truck with a generator, turntables, and huge speakers to set up street parties...
, is a standard of most pirate radio stations and is also used at UK garage and jungle nights.
Taking direct cues from Jamaica
Music of Jamaica
The music of Jamaica includes Jamaican folk music and many popular genres, such as mento, ska, rocksteady, reggae, dub music, dancehall, reggae fusion and related styles. Jamaica's music culture is a fusion of elements from the United States , Africa, and neighboring Caribbean islands such as...
's lyrically sparse deejay
Deejay
A deejay is a reggae or dancehall musician who sings and toasts to an instrumental riddim .Deejays are not to be confused with disc jockeys from other music genres like hip-hop, where they select and play music. Dancehall/reggae DJs who select riddims to play are called selectors...
and toasting mic styles in the vein of reggae pioneers like U-Roy
U-Roy
U-Roy , OD, is a Jamaican musician, also known as The Originator. He is best known as a pioneer of toasting.-Biography:...
, the MC
Master of Ceremonies
A Master of Ceremonies , or compere, is the host of a staged event or similar performance.An MC usually presents performers, speaks to the audience, and generally keeps the event moving....
's role in dubstep's live experience is critically important to its impact.
Notable mainstays in the live experience of the sound are MC Sgt Pokes and MC Crazy D from London, and Juakali
Juakali
Juakali is a singer and MC from Trinidad. He is known primarily for his musical output in the dubstep and reggae genres. Onstage since the age of 14, Juakali started his career as a dancer and, at one stage, a poet. He has released two albums...
from Trinidad. Production in a studio environment seems to lend itself to more experimentation. Kode9 has collaborated extensively with the Spaceape, who MCs in a dread poet style. Kevin Martin's experiments with the genre are almost exclusively collaborations with MCs such as Warrior Queen
Warrior Queen (singer)
Warrior Queen is a vocalist in reggae influenced styles including dub and dubstep. She has collaborated with artists such as The Bug, Sunship, Vex'd, and Skream...
, Flowdan
Roll Deep
Roll Deep are an Urban Music Awards-winning London-based grime music collective. They were founded in 2002, by a group of MCs including Wiley. Roll Deep were also closely associated with Boy Better Know with members in both. Their debut album, In at the Deep End, was released in June 2005...
, and Tippa Irie
Tippa Irie
Tippa Irie is a British reggae singer and DJ from Brixton, South London.He first came to prominence in the early eighties as an MC on the South London reggae soundsystem Saxon Studio International....
. Skream
Skream
Skream is a dubstep producer based in Croydon. One of dubstep's first and most prominent producers, he has played an important role in the genre's development. His debut album Skream! was released in 2006, and was followed up by Outside the Box in 2010...
has also featured Warrior Queen and grime artist JME on his debut album, Skream!
Skream! (album)
Skream! is the self-titled, début album by dubstep producer Skream. It was released in 2006 on Tempa records.-Track listing:# Tortured Soul# Midnight Request Line# Blue Eyez# Auto-Dub# Check It # Stagger# Dutch Flowerz...
. Plastician, who was one of the first DJ's to mix the sound of grime and dubstep together, has worked with notable grime setup Boy Better Know
Boy Better Know
-History:The band and label were established by Jamie Adenuga "Boy Better Know" is a registered trademark, clothing line and Boy Better Know sim cards....
as well as renowned Grime MC's such as Wiley, Dizzee Rascal and Lethal Bizzle. He has also released tracks with a dubstep foundation and grime verses over the beats. Coki and Mala of Digital Mystikz
Digital Mystikz
Digital Mystikz are a dubstep production duo from the South London suburb of Norwood. Along with Loefah and Sgt. Pokes, they operate the DMZ record label and host the influential bimonthly nightclub DMZ, held at the Mass club complex in Brixton, London...
have experimented with abrupt, 16-bar intros and have produced tracks with dub vocalists, and dubstep artist and label co-owner Sam Shackleton
Skull Disco
Skull Disco was an independent dubstep record label, based in London. It was established in 2005 by Sam Shackleton and Laurie "Appleblim" Osborne, and ended in 2008. Releases on the label included African percussion and ethnic samples...
has moved toward productions which fall outside the usual dubstep tempo, and sometimes entirely lack most of the common tropes of the genre.
1999–2002: origins
The sound of dubstep originally came out of productions by El-BEl-B
El-B is a British producer and DJ. He is also noted as a pioneer of the dubstep genre. He runs the Ghost Recordings label and is also part of the duo El-Tuff and the band Groove Chronicles...
, Steve Gurley, Oris Jay, and Zed Bias
Zed Bias
Zed Bias is an English electronic musician who operates within the UK garage and broken beat genres, both as a producer and a DJ. Jones has also released material under the pseudonym Maddslinky, and is half of the Phuturistix duo, as well as other side projects.Zed Bias is best known for his...
in 1999-2000. Ammunition Promotions, who run the influential club Forward>> and have managed many proto dubstep record labels (including Tempa, Soulja, Road, Vehicle, Shelflife, Texture, Lifestyle and Bingo), began to use the term "dubstep" to describe this style of music in around 2002. The term's use in a 2002 XLR8R
XLR8R
XLR8R is a magazine and website thatcovers music, culture, style, and technology. It was founded as anewsprint ‘zine in 1993 by publisher Andrew Smith in Seattle; themagazine currently has offices in San Francisco and New York...
cover story (featuring Horsepower Productions
Horsepower Productions
Horsepower Productions are an electronic music duo, initially a trio, who released experimental garage recordings, and helped pioneer the dubstep genre.-Lineup:...
on the cover) contributed to it becoming established as the name of the genre.
The club Forward>> was originally held at the Velvet Rooms in London's Soho
Soho
Soho is an area of the City of Westminster and part of the West End of London. Long established as an entertainment district, for much of the 20th century Soho had a reputation for sex shops as well as night life and film industry. Since the early 1980s, the area has undergone considerable...
and is now running every Thursday at Plastic People in Shoreditch
Shoreditch
Shoreditch is an area of London within the London Borough of Hackney in England. It is a built-up part of the inner city immediately to the north of the City of London, located east-northeast of Charing Cross.-Etymology:...
, east London. Founded in 2001, Forward>> was critical to the development of dubstep, providing the first venue devoted to the sound and an environment in which dubstep producers could premier new music. Around this time, Forward>> was also incubating several other strains of dark garage hybrids, so much so that in the early days of the club the coming together of these strains was referred to as the "Forward>> sound". An online flyer from around this time encapsulated the Forward>> sound as "b-lines to make your chest cavity shudder."
Forward>> also ran a radio show on east London pirate station Rinse FM
Rinse FM
Rinse FM is a London-based community radio station, licensed for "young people living and/or working within the central,east and south London areas.". The station plays grime, dubstep, UK garage, funky, drum and bass and other genres....
, hosted by Kode9
Kode9
Kode9 is a London-based electronic music artist, DJ, and owner of the Hyperdub record label. An MC, The Spaceape, is a frequent collaborator...
. The original Forward>> line ups included Hatcha, Youngsta, Kode9, Zed Bias, Oris Jay, Slaughter Mob, Jay Da Flex, Slimzee and others, plus regular guests. The line up of residents has changed over the years to include Youngsta, Hatcha, Geeneus and Plastician, with Crazy D as MC/host. Producers including D1, Skream and Benga make regular appearances.
Croydon
Croydon is a town in South London, England, located within the London Borough of Croydon to which it gives its name. It is situated south of Charing Cross...
. Key artists such as Hatcha and later Skream worked in the shop (which initially sold early UK Hardcore / Rave, Techno and House and later, garage and drum and bass, but evolved with the emerging dubstep scene in the area), while Digital Mystikz were frequent visitors. El-B, Zed Bias, Horsepower Productions
Horsepower Productions
Horsepower Productions are an electronic music duo, initially a trio, who released experimental garage recordings, and helped pioneer the dubstep genre.-Lineup:...
, Plastician, N Type, Walsh and a young Loefah regularly visited the shop as well. The shop and its record label have since closed down and reopened under the name Mixing Records under new management before closing down again in 2010. The shop's site is currently unused and still stands in the north end of Surrey Street, Croydon.
In an article in The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
, Simon Reynolds examined the idea of any links between the recreational use of ketamine
Ketamine
Ketamine is a drug used in human and veterinary medicine. Its hydrochloride salt is sold as Ketanest, Ketaset, and Ketalar. Pharmacologically, ketamine is classified as an NMDA receptor antagonist...
, a dissociative drug, and the origins of dubstep, writing that a connection "would certainly explain a lot", though also conceding "it could all be just rumour".
2002–2005: evolution
Throughout 2003, DJ Hatcha pioneered a new direction for dubstep on Rinse FM and through his sets at Forward>>. Playing sets cut to 10" one-off reggae-style dubplateDubplate
A dubplate is an acetate disc – usually 12, 10, or 7 inches in diameter – used in mastering studios for quality control and test recordings before proceeding with the final master, and subsequent pressing of the record to be mass-produced on vinyl. The "dub" in dubplate is an allusion to...
s, he drew exclusively from a pool of new South London producers—first Benga and Skream, then also Digital Mystikz and Loefah—to begin a dark, clipped and minimal new direction in dubstep.
At the end of 2003, running independently from the pioneering FWD night, an event called Filthy Dub, co promoted by Plastician, and partner David Carlisle started happening regularly. It was there that Skream, Benga, N Type, Walsh, Chef, Loefah and Cyrus
Cyrus (dubstep musician)
Jason Flynn is a Dubstep producer hailing from Croydon. He DJ's and produces under the alias Cyrus.-Biography:His rise to notoriety came about in late 2003 when he launched his independent record label RTP or Random Trio Productions. The label provided Cyrus with a platform to push his deep,...
made their debuts as DJ's. South London collective Digital Mystikz (Mala and Coki), along with labelmates and collaborators Loefah and MC Sgt Pokes soon came into their own, bringing sound system thinking, dub
Dub music
Dub is a genre of music which grew out of reggae music in the 1960s, and is commonly considered a subgenre, though it has developed to extend beyond the scope of reggae...
values, and appreciation of jungle
Oldschool jungle
Jungle is a genre of electronic music that incorporates influences from genres including breakbeat hardcore, and reggae/dub/dancehall. There is debate as to whether jungle is a separate genre from drum and bass as many use the terms interchangeably...
bass weight to the dubstep scene. Digital Mystikz brought an expanded palette of sounds and influences to the genre, most prominently reggae and dub, as well as orchestral melodies.
After releasing 12-inch single
12-inch single
The 12-inch single is a type of gramophone record that has wider groove spacing compared to other types of records. This allows for louder levels to be cut on the disc by the cutting engineer, which in turn gives a wider dynamic range, and thus better sound quality...
s on Big Apple, they founded DMZ Records, which has released fourteen 12"s to date. They also began their night DMZ, held every two months in Brixton
Brixton
Brixton is a district in the London Borough of Lambeth in south London, England. It is south south-east of Charing Cross. The area is identified in the London Plan as one of 35 major centres in Greater London....
, a part of London already strongly associated with reggae. DMZ has showcased new dubstep artists such as Skream, Kode 9, Benga, Pinch
Pinch (dubstep musician)
Rob Ellis, better known as Pinch, is a dubstep artist from Bristol, United Kingdom noted for his fusion of styles such as Reggae, World Music, and Dancehall with dubstep. He released his first album, Underwater Dancehall in 2007, on Tectonic records, which he founded...
, DJ Youngsta, Hijak, Joe Nice
Joe Nice
Joe Nice is a dubstep DJ from Baltimore, Maryland. Nice founded New York's irregular Dub War club night, which has hosted performances by British dubstep artists such as Hatcha, Youngsta, Kode9, Mala, and Loefah. He performs regularly in New York, London , and elsewhere...
and Vex'd. DMZ's first anniversary event (at the Mass venue, a converted church) saw fans attending from places as far away as Sweden, the U.S., and Australia, leading to a queue of 600 people at the event. This forced the club to move from its regular 400-capacity space to Mass' main room, an event cited as a pivotal moment in dubstep's history.
In 2004, Richard James
Aphex Twin
Richard David James , best known under the pseudonym Aphex Twin, is an Irish-born electronic musician and composer described as "the most inventive and influential figure in contemporary electronic music"...
' label, Rephlex, released two compilations that included dubstep tracks - the (perhaps misnamed) Grime and Grime 2. The first featured Plasticman, Mark One and Slaughter Mob, with Kode 9, Loefah and Digital Mystikz appearing on the second. These compilations helped to raise awareness of dubstep at a time when the grime sound was drawing more attention, and Digital Mystikz and Loefah's presence on the second release contributed to the success of their DMZ club night. Soon afterwards, the Independent on Sunday commented on "a whole new sound", at a time when both genres were becoming popular, stating that "grime" and "dubstep" were two names for the same style, which was also known as "sublow", "8-bar" and "eskibeat".
2005–2008: growth
In the summer of 2005, Forward>> brought grime DJs to the fore of the line up. Building on the success of Skream's grimey anthem "Midnight Request Line," the hype around the DMZ night and support from online forums (notably dubstepforum.com) and media, the scene gained prominence after former Radio 1 DJ Mary Anne Hobbs gathered top figures from the scene for one show, entitled "Dubstep Warz", (later releasing the compilation albumCompilation album
A compilation album is an album featuring tracks from one or more performers, often culled from a variety of sources The tracks are usually collected according to a common characteristic, such as popularity, genre, source or subject matter...
Warrior Dubz
Warrior Dubz
Warrior Dubz is a dubstep compilation released in 2006 on the Planet Mu label. The album was compiled by Mary Anne Hobbs.-Track listing:#Milanese vs...
). The show created a new global audience for the scene, after years of exclusively UK underground buzz. Burial
Burial (musician)
Burial is the stage name of William Bevan, an electronic musician from London. His music contains elements of dubstep, 2-step garage, ambient and house music. His eponymous debut album was released in 2006 to critical acclaim...
's self-titled album appearing in many critics' "Best of..." lists for the year, notably The Wires Best Album of 2006. The sound was also featured prominently in the soundtrack
Children of Men (soundtracks)
Children of Men had two soundtracks for the film, a film score by British composer John Tavener, and a soundtrack with various popular music acts.-Soundtrack:...
for the 2006 sci-fi film Children of Men
Children of Men
Children of Men is a 2006 science fiction film loosely adapted from P. D. James's 1992 novel The Children of Men, directed by Alfonso Cuarón. In 2027, two decades of human infertility have left society on the brink of collapse. Illegal immigrants seek sanctuary in England, where the last...
, which included Digital Mystikz, Random Trio, Kode 9, Pressure and DJ Pinch. Ammunition also released the first retrospective compilation of the 2000-2004 era of dubstep called The Roots of Dubstep, co-compiled by Ammunition and Blackdown on the Tempa Label.
The sound's first North American ambassador, Baltimore DJ Joe Nice helped kickstart its spread into the continent. Regular Dubstep club nights started appearing in cities like New York, San Francisco, Seattle, Montreal, Houston, and Denver, while Mary Anne Hobbs curated a Dubstep showcase at 2007's Sónar
Sónar
Sónar is an annual three-day music festival held in Barcelona, Spain. It is described officially as a festival of Advanced Music and Multimedia Art. Music is by far the main aspect of the festival....
festival in Barcelona. Non-British artists have also won praise within the larger Dubstep community. The dynamic dubstep scene in Japan is growing quickly despite its cultural and geographical distance from the West. Such DJ/producers as Goth-trad, Hyaku-mado, Ena and Doppelganger are major figures in the Tokyo scene. Joe Nice has played at DMZ, while the fifth installment of Tempa's "Dubstep Allstars" mix series (released in 2007) included tracks by Finnish producer Tes La Rok and Americans JuJu and Matty G. Following on from Rinse FM's pioneering start; three internet based radio station's called SubFM, DubstepFM and DubTerrain started to play the sound exclusively with 24 hour broadcasting featuring show archives and live DJ shows.
Techno artists and DJs began assimilating dubstep into their sets and productions. Shackleton's "Blood On My Hands" was remixed by minimal techno
Minimal techno
Minimal techno is a minimalist sub-genre of techno. It is characterized by a stripped-down aesthetic that exploits the use of repetition, and understated development. This style of dance music production generally adheres to the motto less is more; a principle that has been previously utilized, to...
producer Ricardo Villalobos
Ricardo Villalobos
Ricardo Villalobos is a Chilean-German electronic music producer and DJ. He is well-known for his work in the minimal techno and microhouse genres, and is one of the most significant figures in today's minimal techno scene....
(an act reciprocated when Villalobos included a Shackleton mix on his "Vasco" EP) and included on a mix CD by Panoramabar resident Cassy. Ellen Allien
Ellen Allien
Ellen Allien, born Ellen Fraatz , is a German electronic musician, music producer and founder of BPitch Control music label. She lives in Berlin, Germany. She sings in both German and English. She has said that one of the main inspirations for her music is the culture of reunified Berlin; her...
and Apparat
Apparat (musician)
Apparat is a German electronic musician living in Berlin and was previously a co-owner of Shitkatapult records. Starting out with dance floor-oriented techno, he later started to create ambient music and more recently became "more interested in designing sounds than beats".In 2004, he appeared at...
's 2006 song "Metric" (from the Orchestra of Bubbles
Orchestra of Bubbles
Orchestra of Bubbles is an album by Ellen Allien and Apparat, released in 2006.- Reception :It was named the 48th best album of the decade by Resident Advisor.- Track listing :#"Turbo Dreams" – 4:10#"Way Out" – 3:43#"Retina" – 4:03#"Rotary" – 4:24...
album), Modeselektor
Modeselektor
Modeselektor is an electronic music band formed in Berlin, featuring Gernot Bronsert and Sebastian Szary. The group draws heavily from IDM, glitch, Electro house and hip hop. In an interview the group said regarding their sound: "Happy metal, hard rap, country-ambient, Russian crunk. We don’t like...
's "Godspeed" (from the 2007's Happy Birthday! album, among other tracks on that same album) and Roman Flugel's remix of Riton's "Hammer of Thor" are other examples of dubstep-influenced techno. Berlin's Hard Wax record store (operated by influential dub techno artists Basic Channel) has also championed Shackleton's Skull Disco
Skull Disco
Skull Disco was an independent dubstep record label, based in London. It was established in 2005 by Sam Shackleton and Laurie "Appleblim" Osborne, and ended in 2008. Releases on the label included African percussion and ethnic samples...
label, later broadening its focus to include other dubstep releases.
The summer of 2007 saw dubstep's musical palette expand further, with Benga and Coki
Digital Mystikz
Digital Mystikz are a dubstep production duo from the South London suburb of Norwood. Along with Loefah and Sgt. Pokes, they operate the DMZ record label and host the influential bimonthly nightclub DMZ, held at the Mass club complex in Brixton, London...
scoring a crossover hit (in a similar manner to Skream's "Midnight Request Line") with the track "Night", which gained widespread play from DJs in a diverse range of genres. BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
DJ Gilles Peterson
Gilles Peterson
Gilles Peterson , is a DJ, record collector and record label owner from London, UK. Through his labels Acid Jazz, Talkin' Loud, and latterly Brownswood Recordings, he has been associated with the careers of well-known artists of the 1990s such as Erykah Badu, Roni Size and Jamiroquai...
named it his record of 2007, and it was also a massive hit in the equally bassline-orientated, but decidedly more four-to-the-floor genre of bassline house
Bassline house
Bassline is a type of music related to UK garage that originated from speed garage, and shares characteristics with fellow subgenres dubstep and grime for their emphasis on bass. The style originated in Sheffield around 2002....
, whilst Burial's late 2007 release Untrue
Untrue
Untrue is the second album by the producer known as Burial. It was released on 5 November 2007 as a 13-track Digipack CD and a nine-track 2xLP from which some of the beatless pieces were edited. The album marked a development in Burial's sound; it employed pitch-shifted and time-stretched vocal...
(which was nominated for the 2008 Nationwide Mercury Music Prize in the UK) incorporated extensive use of heavily manipulated, mostly female, 'girl next door' vocal samples. Burial has spoken at length regarding his intent to reincorporate elements of musical precursors such as 2-step garage and house into his sound.
Much like drum and bass before it, dubstep has started to become incorporated into other media, particularly in the United Kingdom. In 2007, Benga, Skream, and other dubstep producers provided the soundtrack to much of the second series of Dubplate Drama
Dubplate Drama
Dubplate Drama is a UK television series which started in 2005.It has run for three series.It has been called "the world's first interactive drama series", since it was letting viewers vote on the outcome of each episode's ending....
, which aired on Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
with a soundtrack CD later released on Rinse Recordings
Rinse FM
Rinse FM is a London-based community radio station, licensed for "young people living and/or working within the central,east and south London areas.". The station plays grime, dubstep, UK garage, funky, drum and bass and other genres....
. The sound also featured prominently in the second series of the teen drama Skins
Skins (TV series)
Skins is a BAFTA award-winning British teen drama that follows a group of teenagers in Bristol, South West England, through the two years of college. The controversial plot line explores issues such as dysfunctional families, mental illness , adolescent sexuality, substance abuse and death...
, which also aired on Channel 4 in early 2008.
In the summer of 2008, Mary Anne Hobbs
Mary Anne Hobbs
Mary Anne Hobbs is an English DJ and music journalist from Garstang, Lancashire. She launched a new Primetime show on Xfm on 9 July 2011-Early career:...
invited Cyrus, Starkey, Oneman, DJ Chef
DJ Chef
DJ Chef is an international DJ from South London. He's been playing records from the age of 11. Known primarily for his involvement in the dubstep scene and being a part of it since its inception, he was featured prominently in a 2008 documentary for BBC Radio 1 by Mary Anne Hobbs called Generation...
, Silkie, Quest, Joker
Joker (musician)
Joker is a UK-based musical artist who creates music in genres such as dubstep and grime. He was named "2009 king of bass music" by XLR8R Magazine and was featured in the September 2009 issue of The Wire magazine. He has contributed to two releases produced by the London-based record company Hyperdub...
, Nomad, Kulture and MC Sgt Pokes to the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
's Maida Vale
Maida Vale Studios
Maida Vale Studios is a complex of seven BBC studios on Delaware Road, Maida Vale, London.It has been used to record thousands of classical music, popular music and drama sessions for BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 2, BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio 4 from 1946 to the present...
studios for a show called Generation Bass. The show was the evolution from her seminal BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
Radio 1 Dubstepwarz Show in 2006, and further documented another set of dubstep's producers.
In the autumn of 2008, a limited pressing 12" called "Iron Devil" was released featuring Lee Scratch Perry and Prince Far-I in a dubstep style, including a tune based on the Perry riddim used on reggae hits like "Disco Devil", "Chase The Devil", and "Croaking Lizard". This was the first recorded example of a founder of Jamaican dub style acknowledging dubstep and creating new music in the genre, reinforcing the connection of dubstep to its roots in Jamaican dub reggae at a time when it seemed dubstep was moving away from its reggae underpinnings.
As the genre has spread to become an international rather than UK-centric scene, it has also seen a number of women making headway into the scene in a variety of ways. Alongside Soulja of Ammunition Promotions and Mary Anne Hobbs, an influx of female producers, writers, photographers and DJs all have broken through in the up-til-then male orientated scene. With key 12" releases on Hyperdub
Hyperdub
Hyperdub is a London-based record label, founded and run by Steve Goodman, aka Kode9.Artists who have released on Hyperdub include label owner Kode9 Hyperdub is a London-based record label, founded and run by Steve Goodman, aka Kode9.Artists who have released on Hyperdub include label owner Kode9...
,Immigrant andHotflush Recordings, producers Vaccine, Subeena and Ikonika
Ikonika
Ikonika is an electronic musician, producer and DJ often associated with Hyperdub Records and the Dubstep genre.Her debut 12", "Please/Simulacrum" was released in 2008 on Hyperdub Records. She has released music on Planet Mu, as well as a remix of DJ Mujava’s "Township Funk", released by Warp...
have introduced a palette of new sounds and influences to the genre, such as double-time bass drums, 8-bit
Chiptune
A chiptune, also known as chip music, is synthesized electronic music often produced with the sound chips of vintage computers and video game consoles, as well as with other methods such as emulation. In the early 1980s, personal computers became cheaper and more accessible than they had previously...
video game samples, hand percussion and lushly arranged strings. Mary Anne Hobbs commented that the mood at dubstep nights is less aggressive, or more meditative, leading to a larger female attendance at events than with the genre's precursors, noting "Grime and drum 'n' bass raves tend to be quite aggy. People in dubstep clubs tend to have a more meditative approach, which is inviting to females. You see the female-to-male ratio constantly going up – it’s got the potential to be 40:60".
Journalists Melissa Bradshaw
Melissa Bradshaw
Melissa Bradshaw is a writer and journalist based in London. Bradshaw is known primarily for her work in music.-Education:During her studies in English at Oxford, Bradshaw was a regular contributor to the university's long-standing newspaper, Cherwell...
, Emma Warren, and dubstep documentarian and photographer Georgina Cook
Georgina Cook
Georgina Cook is an English photographer, artist and writer based in South London.She is known primarily for her music work but also for her use of gritty urban street elements as the subtext to what she documents....
have all had an impact on the cultural importance of the music. Cook's Drumz of the South flickr
Flickr
Flickr is an image hosting and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community that was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005. In addition to being a popular website for users to share and embed personal photographs, the service is widely used by bloggers to...
page documents the evolution of the scene in a photographic timeline of sorts, and was for a time the only photographic archive of the key events such as the early FWD and DMZ nights in London.
Mainstream influence
The influence of dubstep on more commercial or popular genres can be identified as far back as 2007, with artists such as Britney SpearsBritney Spears
Britney Jean Spears is an American recording artist and entertainer. Born in McComb, Mississippi, and raised in Kentwood, Louisiana, Spears began performing as a child, landing acting roles in stage productions and television shows. She signed with Jive Records in 1997 and released her debut album...
using dubstep sounds; critics observed a dubstep influence in the song "Freakshow", from the 2007 album Blackout, which Tom Ewing described as "built around the 'wobbler' effect that's a genre standby." Benga and Coki's single "Night" still continued to be a popular track on the UK dance chart more than a year after its release in late 2007, still ranking in the top five at the start of April 2008 on Pete Tong
Pete Tong
Peter "Pete" Tong is an English DJ who works for BBC Radio 1. He is known worldwide by fans of electronic music for hosting programmes such as Essential Mix and Essential Selection on the radio service, which can be heard through Internet radio streams, for his record label FFRR Records, and for...
's BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
dance chart list.
However the year 2009 saw the dubstep sound gaining further worldwide recognition, often through the assimilation of elements of the sound into other genres, in a manner similar to drum and bass before it. At the start of the year, UK electronic duo La Roux
La Roux
La Roux are an English electropop duo made up of singer, keyboardist, co-writer and co-producer Eleanor Kate Jackson, and co-writer and co-producer Ben Langmaid. Jackson describes their relationship as "very much a half and half sharing situation... not like a singer producer outfit", but also...
put their single "In for the Kill" in the remix hands of Skream
Skream
Skream is a dubstep producer based in Croydon. One of dubstep's first and most prominent producers, he has played an important role in the genre's development. His debut album Skream! was released in 2006, and was followed up by Outside the Box in 2010...
. They then gave remix duties of "I'm Not Your Toy
I'm Not Your Toy
"I'm Not Your Toy" is a song by English electropop duo La Roux from their self-titled debut album, La Roux. Written and produced by Elly Jackson and Ben Langmaid, the song was released as the album's fourth single on 28 September 2009. It is available on CD, 12" and digital formats including two...
" to Nero and then again with their single "Bulletproof" being remixed by Zinc
DJ Zinc
Benjamin Pettit, better known by his stage name DJ Zinc, is a drum and bass / breakstep DJ from the United Kingdom. Zinc is well known for 1995's "Super Sharp Shooter", a hip hop / jungle fusion.-Biography:...
. The same year, London producer Silkie released an influential album City Limits Vol. 1 on the Deep Medi label, using 70s funk and soul reference points, a departure from the familiar strains of dub and UK garage. A key factor in the rise of dubstep in the media was its exposure on video sharing websites, such as YouTube who provide access to many channels dedicated to dubstep, notably UKF Dubstep. The sound also continued to interest the mainstream press with key articles in magazines like Interview
Interview (magazine)
Interview is an American magazine which has the nickname The Crystal Ball Of Pop. It was founded in late 1969 by artist Andy Warhol. The magazine features intimate conversations between some of the world's biggest celebrities, artists, musicians, and creative thinkers...
, New York
New York (magazine)
New York is a weekly magazine principally concerned with the life, culture, politics, and style of New York City. Founded by Milton Glaser and Clay Felker in 1968 as a competitor to The New Yorker, it was brasher and less polite than that magazine, and established itself as a cradle of New...
, and The Wire
The Wire (magazine)
The Wire is a British avant garde music magazine, founded in 1982 by jazz promoter Anthony Wood and journalist Chrissie Murray. The magazine initially concentrated on contemporary jazz and improvised music, but branched out in the early 1990s to various types of experimental music...
, which featured producer Kode9
Kode9
Kode9 is a London-based electronic music artist, DJ, and owner of the Hyperdub record label. An MC, The Spaceape, is a frequent collaborator...
on its May 2009 cover. XLR8R
XLR8R
XLR8R is a magazine and website thatcovers music, culture, style, and technology. It was founded as anewsprint ‘zine in 1993 by publisher Andrew Smith in Seattle; themagazine currently has offices in San Francisco and New York...
put Joker
Joker (musician)
Joker is a UK-based musical artist who creates music in genres such as dubstep and grime. He was named "2009 king of bass music" by XLR8R Magazine and was featured in the September 2009 issue of The Wire magazine. He has contributed to two releases produced by the London-based record company Hyperdub...
on the cover of its December 2009 issue. By the end of 2009, The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, XLR8R
XLR8R
XLR8R is a magazine and website thatcovers music, culture, style, and technology. It was founded as anewsprint ‘zine in 1993 by publisher Andrew Smith in Seattle; themagazine currently has offices in San Francisco and New York...
, NME
NME
The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...
and The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
all reviewed the genre.
In a move foreshadowed by endorsements of the sound from R&B, hip-hop and recently, mainstream figures such as Rihanna
Rihanna
Robyn Rihanna Fenty , better known as simply Rihanna, is a Barbadian recording artist. Born in Saint Michael, Barbados, Rihanna moved to the United States at the age of 16 to pursue a recording career under the guidance of record producer Evan Rogers...
, or Public Enemy's Hank Shocklee
The Bomb Squad
The Bomb Squad is an American hip hop production team, known for their work with the rap group Public Enemy. The Bomb Squad are noted for their dense, distinct, innovative production style, often utilizing dozens of samples on just one track...
, Snoop Dogg
Snoop Dogg
Calvin Cordozar Broadus, Jr. , better known by his stage name Snoop Dogg, is an American rapper, record producer, and actor. Snoop is best known as a rapper in the West Coast hip hop scene, and for being one of Dr. Dre's most notable protégés. Snoop Dogg was a Crip gang member while in high school...
collaborated with dubstep producers Chase & Status
Chase & Status
Chase & Status are an electronic music production duo from London consisting of Saul Milton and Will Kennard. MC Rage & Andy Gangadeen also make up the live band.-2003-2005:...
, providing a vocal for their 'underground anthem' "Eastern Jam". The 2011 Britney Spears track "Hold It Against Me
Hold It Against Me
"Hold It Against Me" is a song by American recording artist Britney Spears, released as the first single from her seventh studio album, Femme Fatale. It was written and produced by Max Martin, Dr. Luke and Billboard, with additional writing by Bonnie McKee. Luke explained that he wanted "Hold It...
" was also responsible for promoting dubstep tropes within a mainstream pop audience,. Rihanna
Rihanna
Robyn Rihanna Fenty , better known as simply Rihanna, is a Barbadian recording artist. Born in Saint Michael, Barbados, Rihanna moved to the United States at the age of 16 to pursue a recording career under the guidance of record producer Evan Rogers...
's Rated R
Rated R (Rihanna album)
Rated R is the fourth studio album by Barbadian recording artist Rihanna, first released November 20, 2009, on Def Jam Recordings. The album is a musical distance from her previous effort Good Girl Gone Bad , which contained up-tempo and ballad-oriented songs, and it heavily incorporated pop and...
album released such content the very year dubstep saw a spike, containing 3 dubstep tracks. Such events propelled the genre into the biggest radio markets overnight, with considerable airplay. Other hip-hop artists like Xzibit
Xzibit
Alvin Nathaniel Joiner , better known by his stage name Xzibit , is an American rapper, actor, and television host. He is known as the host of the MTV show Pimp My Ride, which brought him mainstream success...
added their vocals to dubstep instrumental tracks for the mixtape project Mr Grustle & Tha Russian Dubstep LA Embrace The Renaissance Vol. 1 Mixed by Plastician. In summer 2009, female rapper and actress Eve used Benga's "E Trips"; adding her own verses over the beat to create a new tune called "Me N My"; the first single on her album Flirt. The track was co-produced by Benga and hip hop producer Salaam Remi
Salaam Remi
Salaam Remi Gibbs, better known as Salaam Remi, is a hip hop producer and keyboard player, known for his association with Nas, Amy Winehouse, and his reggae-tinged approach to production...
.
Throughout 2010, dubstep was beginning to hit the pop charts, with "I Need Air
I Need Air
"I Need Air" is the debut single by British electronic music project Magnetic Man released from their debut album Magnetic Man. The single was released in the United Kingdom on 23 July 2010 where it reached number 10; it also charted in Belgium and Denmark. "I Need Air" and its following releases...
" by Magnetic Man
Magnetic Man
Magnetic Man is an electronic music project consisting of dubstep producers and DJs, Benga, Skream and Artwork. The trio first met in the late 1990s at the Big Apple Records store in Croydon, England. They perform using three computers, one playing drum samples, one playing basses and the third...
reaching number 10 in the UK singles chart. This presented a turning point in the popularity of mainstream dubstep amongst UK listeners as it was placed on rotation on BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1
BBC Radio 1 is a British national radio station operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation which also broadcasts internationally, specialising in current popular music and chart hits throughout the day. Radio 1 provides alternative genres after 7:00pm including electronic dance, hip hop, rock...
. "Katy On a Mission
Katy On a Mission
"Katy on a Mission" is a song performed by British recording artist Katy B. It was released by Rinse accompanied by a b-side entitled "Louder" as her debut single and lead single from her forthcoming debut album, On a Mission on 22 August 2010. The song was co-written by Benga, Katy B and Geeneus,...
" by Katy B
Katy B
Kathleen "Katie" Brien, better known as Katy B, is an English singer-songwriter and a graduate of the BRIT School. She is a dubstep, R&B, funky, house and UK garage singer and has also performed under the name Baby Katy. She was born in Peckham, South London...
(produced by Benga) followed, debuting at number 5 in the UK singles chart, and stayed in the top 10 for five more weeks. In February 2011, Chase & Status
Chase & Status
Chase & Status are an electronic music production duo from London consisting of Saul Milton and Will Kennard. MC Rage & Andy Gangadeen also make up the live band.-2003-2005:...
's second album No More Idols
No More Idols
No More Idols is the second album by British production duo Chase & Status, released on 28 January 2011. No More Idols marks the first major full-length release by Chase & Status since their debut album More Than Alot three years prior; a period in which the group signed a major management deal...
reached No.2 in the UK album chart. On May 1, 2011, Nero's third single "Guilt
Guilt (Nero song)
"Guilt" is the third single from English dubstep duo Nero, featuring vocals from frequent collaborator Alana Watson. It was released as a digital download on 22 April 2011 by Chase & Status' record label, MTA Records...
" from their album reached number 8 in the Official UK Singles Chart, their highest placing single to date. In April 2011, "dubbox", the industry's first application designed for the mobile creation of dubstep music, was released for the iPhone and reached the Top 25 Best Selling Music Apps in the UK its first week.
In July 2011 DJ Fresh's track "Louder
Louder (DJ Fresh song)
"Louder" is a song by British Drum and bass producer DJ Fresh. It features vocals from Welsh singer songwriter Sian Evans. The song serves as the theme song for the Lucozade Sport Lite campaign. It was released on July 3, 2011 on Ministry of Sound...
" (featuring vocals from Kosheen
Kosheen
Kosheen are a British trip hop, breakbeat and rock group based in Bristol, England. The trio consists of producers Markee Substance and Darren Decoder , with singer and song writer Sian Evans...
's Sian Evans
Sian Evans
Siân Evans is a Welsh singer/songwriter from Caerphilly, United Kingdom, born October 9, 1973. She is also a member of the band Kosheen where she has found major success across Europe.-Career:...
) hit number 1 in the UK singles chart, becoming the first ever dubstep track to achieve this feat. "Louder", backed by its use in an advertising campaign for Lucozade
Lucozade
Lucozade is an umbrella name for a 6 series of energy and sports drinks, produced by GlaxoSmithKline in Gloucestershire. The former company became part of Beecham and, after the mergers of SmithKline and Beecham in 2000, GlaxoSmithKline....
, managed to remain in the top 10 of the charts for 6 weeks. By mid-August, the UK had a second dubstep number one courtesy of Nero
Nero (band)
Nero are an electronic music act from London, England consisting of Daniel Stephens and Joe Ray. Alana Watson provides vocals on many of the duo's songs, though she is not officially a band member. On 6 December 2010, Nero were announced as nominees for the BBC's Sound of 2011 poll.-History:Nero...
's "Promises
Promises (Nero song)
"Promises" is a song by English electronic duo Nero from their debut album, Welcome Reality. It was released as the fourth single from the album on August 5, 2011. The song debuted at number one on the UK Singles Chart on August 14, becoming the group's first number-one single...
".
Post-dubstep
More recently the term post-dubstep has been used to describe music that combines stylistic features of dubstep with other musical influences.The breadth of styles that have come to be associated with the term post-dub-step preclude it from being a specific musical genre. PitchforkPitchfork Media
Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
writer Martin Clark has suggested that "well-meaning attempts to loosely define the ground we're covering here are somewhat futile and almost certainly flawed. This is not one genre. However, given the links, interaction, and free-flowing ideas...you can't dismiss all these acts as unrelated..." Such music often references earlier dubstep productions as well as UK Garage
UK garage
UK garage is a genre of electronic dance music originating from the United Kingdom in the early-1990s. UK garage is a descendant of house music which originated in Chicago and New York, United States. UK garage usually features a distinctive syncopated 4/4 percussive rhythm with 'shuffling'...
,
2-step, and other froms of underground electronic dance music
Electronic dance music
Electronic dance music is electronic music produced primarily for the purposes of use within a nightclub setting, or in an environment that is centered upon dance-based entertainment...
. Artists producing music that has been described as post-dubstep have also incorporated elements of ambient music
Ambient music
Ambient music is a musical genre that focuses largely on the timbral characteristics of sounds, often organized or performed to evoke an "atmospheric", "visual" or "unobtrusive" quality.- History :...
and early 2000s R&B
Contemporary R&B
Contemporary R&B is a music genre that combines elements of hip hop, soul, R&B and funk.Although the abbreviation “R&B” originates from traditional rhythm and blues music, today the term R&B is most often used to describe a style of African American music originating after the demise of disco in...
. The latter in particular is heavily sampled by two artists described as post-dubstep, Mount Kimbie
Mount Kimbie
Mount Kimbie is a British electronic duo that formed in London, England in 2008. The duo consists of Dominic Maker and Kai Campos. Unlike many other mainstream dubstep artists, their style revolves around guitars, sampling, loops and ambient soundscapes....
, Fantastic Mr Fox and James Blake
James Blake (musician)
James Blake is a British electronic music producer and singer-songwriter from London, UK. On 6 January 2011, Blake was announced as runner-up in BBC's Sound of 2011 poll...
. The tempo of music typically characterised as post-dubstep is approximately 130 beats per minute.
The production duo Mount Kimbie
Mount Kimbie
Mount Kimbie is a British electronic duo that formed in London, England in 2008. The duo consists of Dominic Maker and Kai Campos. Unlike many other mainstream dubstep artists, their style revolves around guitars, sampling, loops and ambient soundscapes....
is often associated with the origination of the term post-dubstep. Mount Kimbie's Maybes EP, James Blake's remix of Untold's "Stop What You're Doing" and Joy Orbison
Joy Orbison
Joy Orbison is a DJ and producer based in London. His style is generally accepted as a coalescence of dubstep, UK funky, UK garage, and house...
's "Hyph Mngo" can be used as markers in the breaking off of post-dubstep as a distinct sound. The commercial popularity of The xx
The xx
The xx are an English indie pop band, formed in London in 2005. The band's members met while studying at Elliott School, the same school that produced Hot Chip, Burial and Four Tet. They became a trio when their second guitarist and keyboardist, Baria Qureshi, departed in late 2009. In September...
, also marked a breakaway and a member of the band, Jamie xx
Jamie xx
Jamie Smith is an English music producer and remix artist, who gained fame both as solo act and as a member of the London-based band The xx....
has released remixes which are considered post-dubstep, including a Gil Scott-Heron
Gil Scott-Heron
Gilbert "Gil" Scott-Heron was an American soul and jazz poet, musician, and author known primarily for his work as a spoken word performer in the 1970s and '80s...
remix album. Other names frequently associated with post-dubstep are Ikonika, 2562
2562 (musician)
Dave Huismans, better known by his stage name as 2562, is a musician from The Hague, Netherlands. Having previously released records of various musical styles under the monikers A Made Up Sound and Dogdaze, Huismans created 2562, under which his output is generally described as dubstep...
, Cityscape, Deadboy, Martyn
Martyn (musician)
Martijn Deykers, known professionally as Martyn, is a Dutch producer and DJ from Eindhoven. He started his career by DJing drum and bass in 1996 but began to include more of a dubstep influence after first hearing Kode9's "Sine of the Dub". He released his first 12" singles in 2005, incorporating...
, Floating Points, Pangaea, Ramadanman, Sepalcure, FaltyDL, Pariah, Burial
Burial (musician)
Burial is the stage name of William Bevan, an electronic musician from London. His music contains elements of dubstep, 2-step garage, ambient and house music. His eponymous debut album was released in 2006 to critical acclaim...
, The Weeknd
The Weeknd
Abel Tesfaye , better known by his stage name The Weeknd is an Ethiopian Canadian singer. Songs recorded under The Weeknd name first leaked in late 2010, though the identity of the individual behind the project was initially unknown.The Weeknd released a nine-song mixtape, House of Balloons, on...
, SBTRKT
SBTRKT
SBTRKT is a musician/producer from London, United Kingdom. SBTRKT began his career as a DJ in the east London club "Plastic People". SBTRKT has remixed songs by artists such as MIA, Radiohead, Modeselektor, Basement Jaxx, Mark Ronson and Underworld, and has released singles, EPs, and a self-titled...
, Scuba, Egyptrixx, Shackleton, Starkey, Matthew Thompson, Ital Tek, Ifan Dafydd, Guido, Four Tet
Four Tet
Kieran Hebden is a post-rock and electronic musician. Hebden first came to prominence as a member of the band Fridge before establishing himself as a solo artist under the moniker of Four Tet....
and the U.K. labels Hotflush and Hyperdub
Hyperdub
Hyperdub is a London-based record label, founded and run by Steve Goodman, aka Kode9.Artists who have released on Hyperdub include label owner Kode9 Hyperdub is a London-based record label, founded and run by Steve Goodman, aka Kode9.Artists who have released on Hyperdub include label owner Kode9...
.
Brostep
Brostep is a post-dubstep trend that has recently received increasing exposure, with the American producer Skrillex becoming something of a figurehead for the scene. In September 2011 a Spin Magazine EDM special referred to brostep as a "lurching and aggressive" variant of dubstep that prevails in the United States. Elsewhere it has been described variously as “dubstep with more anger to it" and "Americanized, garbage dubstep." Unlike traditional dubstep production styles, that emphasise sub-bass content, brostep accentuates the middle registerRegister (music)
In music, a register is the relative "height" or range of a note, set of pitches or pitch classes, melody, part, instrument or group of instruments...
and features "robotic fluctuations and metal-esque aggression." According to Simon Reynolds
Simon Reynolds
Simon Reynolds is an English music critic who is well-known for his writings on electronic dance music and for coining the term "post-rock". Besides electronic dance music, Reynolds has written about a wide range of artists and musical genres, and has written books on post-punk and rock...
, as dubstep gained larger audiences and moved from smaller club based venues to outdoor and arena events, sub-sonic content was gradually replaced by distorted bass riffs that function roughly in the same register as the electric guitar
Electric guitar
An electric guitar is a guitar that uses the principle of direct electromagnetic induction to convert vibrations of its metal strings into electric audio signals. The signal generated by an electric guitar is too weak to drive a loudspeaker, so it is amplified before sending it to a loudspeaker...
in heavy metal
Heavy metal music
Heavy metal is a genre of rock music that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s, largely in the Midlands of the United Kingdom and the United States...
. Dubstep "purists" have levelled criticisms at brostep because of its preoccupation with "hard" and aggressive sounding timbres. In the UK brostep has been jokingly called "bruvstep" and "mid-range
Mid-range speaker
A loudspeaker driver that produces the frequency range from approximately 300–5000 hertz is known as a mid-range.Midrange drivers are usually cone types or, less commonly, dome types, or compression horn drivers...
cack." The English producer Rusko
Rusko (musician)
Christopher Mercer, more commonly known as Rusko, is an English dubstep record producer and DJ who was born on 26 January 1985 in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England.-History:Rusko graduated from Leeds College of Music with a degree in Music Performance...
is credited with being the progenitor of brostep and during an interview on BBC's 1Xtra radio show he commented that: "Brostep is sort of my fault, but now I've started to hate it in a way...It's like someone screaming in your face for an hour...you don't want that."
External links
- GetDarker An online magazine full of interviews, articles, photos from events and videos.
- 10 Years of... Dubstep A week dedicated to the movement by Drowned in SoundDrowned in SoundDrownedinSound.com or DiS is a UK based music webzine financed by artist management company Silentway . The site is an editorially independent music website.-History:...
- The Month In: Grime/Dubstep Columns by Martin Clark on Pitchfork MediaPitchfork MediaPitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...
- BBC Collective dubstep documentary filmed at DMZ 1st Birthday, 2005. Interviews with Mala, Loefah, SkreamSkreamSkream is a dubstep producer based in Croydon. One of dubstep's first and most prominent producers, he has played an important role in the genre's development. His debut album Skream! was released in 2006, and was followed up by Outside the Box in 2010...
, Kode9Kode9Kode9 is a London-based electronic music artist, DJ, and owner of the Hyperdub record label. An MC, The Spaceape, is a frequent collaborator...
, Youngsta...