Post-Dubstep - The battle to reclaim the original name for the genre I love

As culture continually consumes itself and the music press diversifies through a million blogs, labels like 'post-dubstep' are inevitable. This isn't new - the idea that we are living in a freewheelingly progressive stage of cultural development fuelled by the internet is nothing but an egotistic delusion; punk was born in 1974, and the first usage of 'post-punk' was in 1977, so things moved just as fast in a pre-internet world. However, this precedence doesn't make the vague, hard to define 'post-dubstep' term any less insulting to fans around in the genre's early years.

I feel I can count myself amongst these fans as much as anyone who lived outside London during the birth of dubstep at the turn of the century. In 2005, I left my parochial, scenic hometown for a parochial, scenic campus university, and developed a desire for something more urban. Dubstep satisfied this need, and when I graduated and finally moved to an actual city it became the genre I lived in. The claustrophobic privacy of the beat, the space in the production and the sparse use of vocals all painted a picture of urban decay, graffiti on concrete walls, smashed windows and CCTV, but somehow made it incredibly beautiful. Burial, Benga, Skream, Digital Mystikz and Various Production soundtracked my growth out of my teenage years and transformed the way I saw my surroundings.

This story ended as dubstep exploded sometime around 2009. The fury of the fan of an underground genre as everyone else gets in on the act is well documented, and is a stereotype worth expending a lot of energy in avoiding. Initially this wasn't difficult; it was good to see the music I loved find a wider audience, with more people to talk to about the tunes and bigger crowds creating a more exciting atmosphere at club nights. Soon, however, like a politician corrupted by power, the popularity of dubstep went to its head and things took a turn for the worse. 

Skrillex vs James Blake, as
imagined by Hipster Runoff.

The genre split in two. One strand shot inexorably through Flux Pavillion to the relentlessly noisy Skrillex, and the other built upon the sound of Burial by keeping some subtlety and room for contemplation, producing James Blake as a breakout artist. Frustratingly, it is the former, the intelligent sound of dubstep, that became known as post-dubstep. Here, Skrillex is Blake's nemesis, facing off against him over a dubstep/post-dubstep divide like an electronic music version of Superman and Lex Luthor. This fantasy is brilliantly substantiated by Blake describing the fight for the dirtiest bass in modern dubstep as"almost like a pissing competition" in a Boston Phoenix interview last year, covered hilariously in numerous Hipster Runoff posts. 

Recently, with tongue firmly in cheek, Vice magazine asked if Skrillex was "dubstep's Miles Davis." In this case, though, Skrillex is more like dubstep's Bob Dylan, with Blake's comments an updated version of the heckling of Dylan as 'Judas' when he picked up an electric guitar and turned his back on folk. The big difference with this analogy is that nobody calls Dylan 'folk' anymore. The Judas-shouters got to keep their genre. The only alternative genre name is an American contribution, 'brostep', described by Rusko as 'like someone screaming in your face for an hour'. This has yet to stick over here. I'd like to suggest 'noisestep', 'buttonmashingstep' or 'messstep' as a British alternative.

Followers of underground genres have always had a protective snobbishness about them. A regular of Forward, a pioneering dubstep night, once told me that they moved to a Sunday to keep away the genre's loutish new fans. This, he explained, would allow the regulars to continue to stand still and listen to the music on the phenomenal soundsystem they have at Plastic People, whilst holding their pints and nodding their heads. For them this was infinitely preferable to throwing yourself around as a producer smashes his hand down onto random sampler buttons mapped to a range of squeals whilst glitchy bass makes your own thoughts inaudible. Even if you don't agree with that, you have to agree at the very least that it is a completely different thing, deserving of a completely different genre label.

Like rock and roll, psychedelic, prog, disco, punk, new wave, grunge, indie, garage and grime were the genres that belonged to kids of the 50s to the 90s, dubstep felt like our time. Our time is reflected in the fact that the genre has produced Skrillex, Bassnectar, Flux Pavillion and Funtcase, producers who have raced to the bottom - both in terms of the amount of thought that goes in to their productions and the depths of bass. In an age where integrity drowns in the moats of greedy politicians, is packaged with bankers bonuses, or sacrificed for the political desire for a more unified Europe, the same is happening for the music we love. Fans of dubstep should try to harness the revolutionary spirit of the Occupy movement and fight for subtlety and intellectual input over soul-crushing noise. Skrillex fans don't even have pepper spray - let's claim our genre back.

Introducing at The Hare and Hounds

"Who wants to get silly?" With this, Introducing launch in to Mr Scruff's 'Fish', a song so silly that a chorus that repeats the title over and over again isn't even the silliest part (for us, it's the line 'trout are freshwater fish/And have underwater weapons'). Playing a set of Scruff songs live will inevitably be sillier than working your way through DJ Shadow's Endtroducing - the group toured that in 2010 and we reviewed it here - but it made the night less about witnessing a musical experiment in returning sample-based music to its real-instrument origin, and more about throwing shapes so fluid that they flowed through the floorboards.

Just like the Shadow show, the sounds were perfect, from the guitar that opens 'Spandex Man', to the wobbly bass of 'Sweet Smoke.' All that was beyond their reach were the songs with rapping. Vocals were well dealt with, but an extra dimension could have been created by an emcee that would have enabled them to play 'Jusjus' or the brilliant 'Vibrate.'

First and foremost, though, Introducing are a great band. The songs they draw inspiration from are allowed to take centre stage because of their professionalism and cool showmanship. Their greatest features are crisp bass and a playful improvisation around the songs - including a ragtime break in the introduction to set-closer 'Get A Move On'. This meant that this was a night that reinvigorated Mr Scruff's back catalogue as well as paying homage to it. Even though the songs are more lighthearted than their previous project, Introducing take their duty to the artist that inspired them just as seriously.

Justice at Birmingham Academy

Justice are like an act cobbled together by people keen to give music journalists an easy life. Whether it's the ease of comparing them to that other French electronic music duo, the gift of the heavy metal cross imagery, or the Genesis T-shirt in the On'n'On video making every reviewer bring up prog, there's a lot to write about. This obviousness translates to their music; whilst not quite reaching Skrillex levels of insulting simplicity (I picture him as a frenetic version of Ross Geller playing the keyboard - which someone else has OBVIOUSLY already created) the continuous womp-womp bass and guitar sound hardly carries the complexity of the prog that these people seem to think runs through their sound.

This point is where the Catch-22 of the successful electronic music act arises. Club music is about never, under any circumstances, stopping the party. However much DJs talk about building a vibe and changing the mood throughout their set, it isn't the same as a concert band with hits at the beginning and the end, banter with the audience, and breaks between songs. This works so well in a club because there is a culture of taking a break whenever you like, for as long as you like, and expecting to be able to return to the party much as you left it. With strict curfews and horrific bar queues, this culture doesn't exist in concert venues. At times Justice got repetitive and dull, yet it felt sacrilegious to take a break from the set in a way it never would in a club.

Still, you can't begrudge their success, and it was the components of this success, the standout hits from the debut and new album, that made this an enjoyable night. Genesis is still the best opening music for any act ever. The Party, Waters of Nazareth, DVNO, and D.AN.C.E. are incredible. On'n'On is a great addition. The highlight of the night was where they held the part in Waters of Nazareth where all the sound drops out for absolutely ages, with the lights ups, before letting loose the vocal from the We Are Your Friends remis that launched their careers. Even though it was a party that ended at 10:30, it was still a party.

Something Else We're Looking Forward to

is DJ Format at The Hare and Hounds on Friday 16th March. DJ Format was such a big portion of the music I listened to at University, and I still put If You Can't Join Em, Beat Em right up there. It doesn't say he's bringing D-Sisive or Abdominal, but hopefully there'll be some live emceeing. This'll be a nostalgic one.

Re Introducing

Introducing - the jazz band who formed through a brilliantly successful attempt to play DJ Shadow's Endtroducing with actual instruments - are back in Birmingham with their second project: 'Project Scruff.' With Mr Scruff arguably lacking an entire album of classics the calibre of DJ Shadow's masterwork, they have sensibly opted for picking out the greats. Here's a sneak preview from Village Underground late last year:

Introducing are at the Hare and Hounds on 18th Feb.

Two Facts About The Drums

• Fact 1: One of the Drums is really into puppetry and, after meeting Jim Henson's daughter, worked operating puppets on Sesame Street.

• Fact 2: The Drums are amazing.

Their set opener and set closer from the final date of their UK tour:

Manchester: In The City 2010

An evening that began with a nondescript egg and tomato baguette, but ended with bachanalian scenes at a lock-in. What on earth happened in between? Aside from indie celeb spots of Huw Stephens (not Huw Edwards, as Ben Answering Machine pointed out) and Bez, the closing night of Manchester's new music festival was characterised by meandering between venues, following up tips from passers-by and the Buzz Chart on In The City's own trusty iPhone app. Here are our highlights:

Golden Glow

Manchester scenester extraordinaire Pierre Hall's group offer up laconic sunshine pop with the kind of oohs and lahs that could make you fall in love.

Plank!

The best late 70s/early 80s guitar riffs you never heard, stripped of their dated vocals and put in a blender with post rock stylings. The video above is not to be skipped - the build up is too good. Gathering plaudits from a performance on Marc Riley's 6Music show earlier this year, you have to catch them live.

The Bewitched Hands

Despite one member looking exactly like the rapist from This Is England '86 (not his fault - the series almost definitely has less cultural resonance in their native France) The Bewitched Hands offer up sweet harmony-soaked indie, forming another fleck of foam on the wave being driven by Sufjan Stevens and, more recently, Freelance Whales. Full-on male/female harmonies and tonnes of reverb without any saccharine annoyances? Yes please. Debut album out on the 23rd.

Youthless

Dance craze kicking off @ Youthless. Craig Marchington is to blame. #inthecityless than a minute ago via TweetDeckDan Feeney
danpyt

Put that video and that tweet together and you get a good impression of what went on at Umbro. Manic dancing and shouting only ceased for long enough to say "how the fuck is he getting his bass to do that?!" before the pure energy the band were radiating took over again. Drummer/vocalist Alex Klimovitsky even made an impressive effort to climb on the flimsy looking pipes that run along the ceiling, making this the gig that we were still talking about as we left the pub at 6am.

Yuck

Only popped into the refurbished Band On The Wall briefly, but it was enough to decide that Yuck are lovely. Just lovely.

Dutch Uncles

Ace.

Kisses

The night didn't actually end with LA hipsters Kisses, but White Ring's screaming-and-VNV-Nation-esque deathtrance was too depressing at the time, and is too depressing now. So we're ending with the penultimate band instead.