DUBSTEP AUSTRALIA
Featuring Current Dubstep Events in Australia.
Featuring Current Dubstep Events in Australia.
Information
Events
3 past eventsSee All
- DUB TRAIN
RAILWAY HOTEL
Friday, May 1 at 7:00pm - KROMESTAR (UK) DUBSTEP
Bar Open
Friday, April 3 at 10:00pm - WATTHZ
ROSEMOUNT HOTEL
Friday, March 20 at 9:00pm
Photos
4 of 191 photosSee All
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Links
DUBSTEP AUSTRALIA
JoinBasic Info
Contact Info
- Email:
- Website:
- http://myspace.com/dubstepaustralia
- Office:
- http://www.lrrecords.com.au/site/
- Location:
- Fremantle, Australia
Recent News
- News:
- THE HISTORY OF THE GENRE
The interesting thing about modern music is that its history is usually very well documented. We don't need to rely on embellished myth and legend to trace the roots of each genre, because the people who created it, championed it and labelled it are usually still involved in the scene to one extent or another. And dubstep is no exception.
It's widely accepted that dubstep's origins lie in the productions of artists like Zed Bias from 1999 onwards. Garage tracks in those days often featured more instrumental and slightly darker B-sides, and it was from this sound that the club night Forward» came about. Based first in Soho then East London, it was in conjunction with this event that the word 'dubstep' was first used Another key factor in the development of any new sound is a focal point, and in modern music this is often a record shop. Big Apple records in Croydon was the hub in question for dubstep, and some of the leading lights in the current scene, such as Skream and Hatcha, even worked there themselves. As with many genres, this enabled the scene to develop an identity very quickly, as the artists shared tracks and ideas, and generally began to encourage and outdo each other on a weekly basis. All of which just goes to show that one of the best ways to get good at any style of music is to seek out other people who are good at it and spend plenty of time collaborating and creating healthy rivalry.
Moving forward a few years, as grime was establishing itself as the UK urban genre to watch, a number of grime DJs began to play dubstep tracks, and even to include some othem on grime compilations. All of which drew more attention to the growing scene, even to the point where many outside the scene began to confuse the two styles
Two worlds collide:
But there was another effect. As the two scenes became associated, so too did the artists and the sounds, with grime DJs appearing at Forward», and the newer night, DMZ, becoming the place to be, thanks to promotion on dubstep forums. Consequently, in recent years dubstep has quietly gained a foothold and can now be found in TV shows such as Dubplate Drama and Skins, on national Radio 1 thanks to DJ Mary Anne Hobbs, and even in a few films. And as the scene has become distinct from other urban genres, its producers and DJs have gained the confidence and distinction to begin breaking their own moulds and pulling other influences back in from genres they previously tried to distance themselves from. They now have the freedom to ignore previously established rules of arrangement in a way that very few genres do.
The key to understanding a sound is understanding its roots and influences, and its very nature means that dubstep has been exposed to influences from a variety of genres, each of which is itself influenced by other urban styles. So all the techniques of these sounds have a relevance to dubstep production, and many of the key players will have moved between styles as their scenes progressed. So to really understand dubstep, you should also explore the darker side of garage, grime and 2-step.
The power of online communities:
When tracing the roots of urban music the first thing you notice is how long it used to take for new styles
and genres to gai n momentum. Back in the early days of hip-hop and reggae, for example, it could take years
for styles to spread. And even wm early house and drum 'n' bass it coulc -m a long time for genres to take
hold and build an identity outside of one or two key club nights in certain towns and cities, but the internet
has changed all of that. Starting with some key drum 'n' bass portals, urban music, particularly in the UK,
has developed a huge and influential online presence. And in the dubstep scene, sites like Dubstep Forum
can take a great deal of credit for enabling dubstep nights to gain notoriety and build a buzz around new
artists and their music. This has helped relatively unknown names gain attention quickly as people all
over the globe swap tracks and ideas. Online instant messaging,particularly AIM, facilitates the fast transfer of tunes, enabling dubstep to establish a presence in the US in a short space of time, and US dubstep DJs
such as Joe Nice to keep in close contact and swap tracks with their UK DJ friends.
Computer Music August 2008
WRECK UP A VERSION!!!
Dubstep: the story so far
Back in the early 2000s, dubstep was being made by just a handful of producers based in a couple of micro-centers: Sheffield, Leicester and the concrete-coated suburbs of south-west London. They used free PC software like Fruity Loops or PlayStation's music-making software Music 2000 (the same stuff So Solid Crew used to record their first album - the story goes that they took the memory card in to be mastered) and made their own wonky versions of dark garage records by producers like EI-B, Benny III and Wookie who were themselves expanding and extending the edges of there shiny, champagne-bubbling' 2-Step garage scene.
The dubstep story quickly zooms into Big Apple, the Surrey Street, Croydon record shop owned by John Kennedy. Behind the counter downstairs was Hatcha, who'd been buying records from the shop since the age of ten. It was Hatcha, according to Arthur 'Artwork' Smith, who first coined the term dubstep. "Benny III used to come in the shop. Back in the early garage days he was trying to make garage but he was putting the snare on the wrong beat, on the three beat. He was making dub reggae garage. We were like 'this is weird' but Hatcha loved it and called it dubstep. It was very dubby, but it's WASN’T 2-Step. It was Benny III that started it, without a doubt."
For a long time, it was the other music that developed at the same time - grime - that appeared to be propelled with rocket fuel. In bedrooms and small producer-led clubs countrywide (Oris Jay and Lombardo provided key non-Croydon hubs along with Search and Destroy in east London) something else was happening, and for a while, the two sounds overlapped massively. In 2004 when Rephlex Records released the nattily titled Grime, it contained music by MarkOne, Plastician and Slaughter Mob. The follow-up Grime 2 featured Kode9, Digital Mystikz and Loefah, not the latest bar-spitting boy from Bow. Dubstep producers made music for radio, for MCs to spit over, or for the club-night FWD» with little apparent thought for fame or the future. Who needs the future when you're making five versions of it a day on your PC, helped along with a few cans of Stella or a small bag of weed?
In January 2006 everything changed - or more accurately, everything began to change. On 10* January one-time NME journalist Mary Anne Hobbs invited a group of producers onto her 2am midweek show for a dubstep special. Mala, Skream, Kode9 and Space Ape, Vex'd, Hatcha, Loefah and Sgt Pokes and Distance all played micro-sets their own tunes (apart from Hatcha, a rare DJ-not-producer, who played Benga, Coki, Skream and Digital Mystikz). The show remains the most downloaded of Hobbs' shows, and was spread worldwide by barefiles.com, a site run by teenage south Londoner 'Deapoh'. The rest is increasingly well-documented history - Croydon's entry on Wikipedia even includes a short history of dubstep under the 'culture' section. Since 2006 hundreds of clubs, labels and fansites have been started, boosted by the DIY ethic that runs deep in the genetics of the scene. People who started as fans have become DJs, producers, photographers, bloggers, T-shirt designers, promoters and compilers, documenting and adding to the world of dubstep simply because they want to.
New York DJ Joe Nice's one-time assertion that dubstep is defined by "bass, space and place" doesn't even cover it any more: in 2008 it is more about an association with the clubs, radio stations or labels surrounding the music than any specifics of genre or sound. Just take tracks as varied as the modernist 2-Step soul of Geoim's 'Reminissin", the percussive snap of Goth Trad's 'Genesis' or Ikonika's hyper-bleep anthem 'Please'. Dubstep is a broad church powered by more than just molecule-shaking basslines (though clearly it's got those too) where the souk-soaked eccentricities of Shackleton are as dubstep as Benga's electrocuted funk or as Tes La Rok's reggae refix of 'Round The World Girls'. So far, so widescreen.
"What drew us into dubstep," says Search N Destroy's Paul Prior, "was the fact you could do pretty much anything with it. There were so many different vibes and that was just so inspiring. There's something for everyone, no matter what music you're into."
Outside of the confines of this compilation there's a whole world of music that reinforces the mind-boggling sonic space between dubstep artists. Interested parties need only check the mind-bending sonic disturbance of Coki's 'Spongebob', Pinch's deep techno styles, Caspa and Rusko's party-centric low-end destruction, Boxcutter's experimental electronics or Mala tunes like 'Bury Da Bwoy' for evidence, and for some startlingly diverse music. More than anything, dubstep is just another period of accumulated creativity: all those years collectively listening to jungle or garage or lovers rock or punk or jazz or blues, rolled up and turned into this avalanche of rhythm and sub-bass, and in turn, dubstep will prove the grounding for something different in the future. It's part of a bigger picture, part of a lineage of English music that goes back decades, if not centuries. But for the moment, it just sounds... deep.
Before the dance:
The question of what precisely predated dubstep is a murky one. As with all of the UK's many hybrid sounds, there's no single path to the current day, more a twisted tangle of a number of individual routes that began to converge at some unidentified point across the globe. Reggae, UK garage, hardcore and '80s soul all have their DMA in the mix but one thing is for sure - jungle provided a blueprint for all the street-up musical scenes that followed, and dubstep is no exception.
Peter 'Loefah' Livingston, whose mix of Search And Destroy's 'Candyfloss' became one of the biggest tunes of 2006, got heavily into jungle and hardcore as a 14-year-old at Dalston's Labyrinth club. "I was into jungle when I was quite young. One of the things I loved about it was that sense of community. All those people you didn't know were there for the same thing as you, were on the same vibe as you. It was just about a dark sweaty room with loud music and people enjoying it."
In March 2005, DMZ's bi-monthly night at Mass in Brixton was launched by Digital Mystikz (Mala and Coki), Loefah and their MC Sgt Pokes. They had all been hardcore fans of Goldie's mid '90s drum 'n' bass club Metalheadz. "It wasn't odd to see mid-twenties middle-class white people. It was a mix-up," says Loefah. "There were 30-year-old people from Peckham. You'd always see this guy with dreads, the sound engineer, always checking j the system with his tool belt. It was proper. They cared about the sound. It was always music first."
A whole host of individuals emerged from their drum 'n' bass baptism to make their mark as DJs, MCs, promoters and producers in the subsequent 2-Step scene, which in turn seeded a creative, invent-your-own-sound idea in a new generation. And from there, it's an increasingly well-told history.
In the beginning there was Big Apple:
John Kennedy's Big Apple record shop was located on Surrey Street, East Croydon. It stocked house and drum 'n' bass over two floors and became a centrepoint for local artists, including Hatcha (who used to come straight after school to buy drum 'n' bass records from Hijak, who used to run the jungle floor), Benga, Skream, Benny III, N-Type, Coki, Mala, Loefah and Chef. Arthur 'Artwork' Smith had his studio, where he recorded with Danny Harrison as Menta and D&D, upstairs from the shop. "When Benga and Skream came [into the shop] they'd sit with us in the studio. We'd be making Menta tunes and they'd be hanging out. We had our own little club up there. It's a wicked little place to go if you're that age - a record shop with a recording studio upstairs."
Big Apple also provided a practical link for the frequently underage producers. Arthur: "There were no dubstep clubs in Croydon. The music was born for radio and to be played at FWD». That was a big outing on Friday nights. We'd hire limos because they were cheaper than minibuses. There were 15 or 20 of us every week, in four dodgy white limos."
Subs and dubs: soundsystem culture and dubstep:
Soundsystem culture is at the heart of dubstep. Listen on your laptop and like the sonic version of an iceberg, nine-tenths of the tune will be inaccessible, lost underneath a pair of tinny speakers. Accordingly, there are a handful of soundsystems that are almost as well known as the DJs: the much-loved Funktion 1 system at Plastic People; the 15K Gramps system in Brighton and the awesome, fearsome Iration Steppas system in Leeds which shoots the kind of high-pressure sound out of it's cones that could burst eardrums and knock over the weak or indisposed.
And then there are dubplates, the DJ's black gold and another piece of Jamaican heritage. Everyone has their bag of dubs, their 10" records with titles scrawled in thick black marker pen, in varying degrees of batteredness. Vinyl culture acts as quality control -at £30 a pop for a record with a limited lifespan, producers will only cut tunes they really believe in. Dubs also equal exclusivity. If you don't have a dub of an unreleased tune, you can't play it.
Benga: "I like the fact that people only hear me in raves. People are like 'can I hear this record or that record?' so I tell them where I'm playing - and then I see them there."
As in reggae culture, cutting houses are a vital part of the process. Whilst Transition is a hub for this generation of dub-cutters, it was preceded by Tottenham's Music House. "It's important for people to realize the crucial part played by Music House in the development of dance music from the '70s onwards," says Transition's Jason Goz. "It was Music House that inspired me to buy that vanload of Neumann lathe parts all those years ago."
A DUBSTEP LOWDOWN
Where hip hop had it's four pillars - b-boying, rapping, graf and DJing - dubstep has It's own. Here's the downlow on influential nights and MCs plus the basics on a radio station, a cutting house and an internet forum.
The clubs
FWD»
FWD> began life as a producer-led hang-out and helped incubate major talent including Skream, Benga and super sharp resident Youngsta. Recently revitalized line-ups to include a regular Bristol take-over. Part of the family that runs Tempa records.
DMZ - London and Leeds
People organize their lives around the dates for this gold-standard bi-monthly - and that includes DJs who aren't playing. Don't forget your earplugs.
Dubpressure
Bristol may be the second city of dubstep, with Pinch's Subloaded and a swathe of smaller events, but Brighton has the mighty Cramps soundsystem and this obsessive-run night.
Who's blessing mic?
Sgt Pokes
DMZ's mic-man has transformed the role of MCing from grime style spitting of bars back to its original role - as host of the party. Pokes is the king of comedy, commentary and verbal gems: 'Goth Trad! How'd you say 'fucking hell' in Japanese?'
Crazy D
Stalwart MC started out in UK garage. Hear the phrases 'woah wo woah' and 'warm and easy!' and you'll know D's on mic.
Flowdan
Ex-Roll Deep member is the missing link between dubstep and grime, regularly appearing at FWD» and on records with The Bug.
Jukali
Dub War's dread-wearing resident MC.
Warrior Queen
You won't see the gyal like Annette Henry on the mic at clubs but you're guaranteed to hear her raw tones on tracks like 'Poison Dart' and 'Make Me'
AIR(WAVES) MAX
A short history of Rinse FM
As an original pirate, Rinse FM's roots are necessarily obscured. It first broadcast one Carnival weekend in the mid '90s after founders Geeneus, Slimzee, Wiley and a handful of others decided to start their own station. A whole swathe of gold standard artists have passed through their East London doors including Wiley, Dizzee, Kode9, Skream and Youngsta. The big daddy pirate helped spread dubstep internationally. Out to Rinse!
I get my s**t cut at Transition
Back in 1998 Jason Goz started Transition, the Forest Hill mastering studios that have become as important to dubstep as The Music House was to drum 'n' bass. "I started Transition from scratch, with a thirty minute lesson on what not to do and six months cutting plates for myself before I opened the doors." Everyone from Mala to American Matty G have picked up their dubs from Transition - and probably pocketed one of their infamous stickers, too.
The boom click
Back in October 2005 a Croatian known as Dubway started the dubstepforum after the tight-knit forum on dubplate.net disappeared without any warning. There were around 100 members. The transmission of Mary Anne Hobbs' Dubstep Warz show tripled membership
within a month of broadcast and by October 2007 they had over 10,000 registered members. Now it's truly international: only half of the forum's 15,000+ members (with another 300 signing up each week) are in the UK.
Emma Warren
Soul Jazz Records
“No matter what the people say…These sounds lead the way
…it’s the order of the day from your boss deejay.’’
-King Stitt, “Fire Corner”
“Dub-verb, to make space.”
-Coldcut A-Z
Dubstep Radio Links>>>
Rinse FM:
http://www.rinse.fm/
FOB SHOW:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=8845975139&ref=share
CYBA Radio:
http://www.myspace.com/cybaradio
Dubstep Downunder on Sub.FM:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=79923420505&ref=share
LURK FM DUBSTEP RADIO: www.lurkfm.com:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=42778474243&ref=share
International Dubstep Links>>>
Dubstep Matterz:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=63174666248&ref=mf
Bassweight Recordings:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=28806180722&ref=share
LEICESTER DUBSTEP:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2485296103&ref=ts
KEEP DUBSTEP UNDERGROUND !:
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=57840126470&ref=nf
DUBSTEP nerdz:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2251313056&ref=ts
Blakstarline Dubsteppers:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=7186616270&ref=ts
Dubstep Samurai's and Geisha's:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=51828863106
BaSs FaCe:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=55740878381
I BET I CAN FIND 10000 PEOPLE WHO LIKE DUBSTEP:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=44635804694
Dubstep Vinyl Sales>>>
Kaizen Bear Records:
http://www.kaizenrecords.com/
Mills Records Fremantle:
http://www.mills.com.au
Australian Dubstep Links>>>
Sub Continental Dub:
http://www.subcontinentaldub.com/
Australian Dubstep:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=9951097342#/group.php?gid=17981997280&ref=ts
Perth Dubsteppers:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=51533304563&ref=ts#/group.php?gid=6473531061&ref=ts
Dank Morass:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=9951097342#/group.php?gid=23369119057&ref=ts
Void Dubstep:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=9951097342#/profile.php?id=1377151858&ref=ts
Wobble:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6424314419
Subbass:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=24564956489
Heavyinnit:
http://www.myspace.com/heavyinnit
Illegal Value:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=21433198469&ref=share
SLS and the Bassline Bitches Facebook Dub-Off:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=49033790919&ref=share
Shakedown Productions:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=11463409837
Australian Dubstep Producer Crew>>>
DJ SPINFX:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/DJ-SPINFX/59849233808?ref=ts
Westernsynthetics:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Westernsynthetics/8000469630?ref=s
DUBOTIC:
http://www.myspace.com/dubotic
Proximity Effect:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=260764875
Garage Pressure:
http://www.myspace.com/garagepressure
DIN SELEKTA:
http://www.myspace.com/dinselekta
DYSPHEMIC:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=20773609549
HARMONIC 313:
http://www.myspace.com/officialmarkpritchard
Thesis:
http://www.myspace.com/thesisproductions
EBC:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/EBC/93013035627?ref=mf
RITUAL:
http://www.myspace.com/ritualconsciousrebel
KITO:
http://www.myspace.com/thisiskito
SHOCKONE:
http://www.myspace.com/shockonemusic
HIGH ROLLER:
http://www.myspace.com/highrollerdubstep
FORENZIK:
http://www.myspace.com/forenzik3
REKAB:
http://www.myspace.com/rekabbaker
DEVO:
http://www.myspace.com/devodj
VISHNU:
http://www.myspace.com/djvishnu
(DUBSTEP AU) Associated Sites>>>
Little Rascal Records:
http://www.lrrecords.com.au/site/
sub-bassmusic:
http://www.sub-bassmusic.com
UNDADOWN SOUND:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=70996804401&ref=share
Dubstep Downloads:
http://www.dubstepdownloads.com
THE INTERNATIONAL DUBSTEP STARLINER!!!:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=134409930343&ref=ts
Western Australian Electronic Music Producer Posse :
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=9951097342&ref=ts
Mary Anne Hobbs Apreciation Society:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=9584551002&ref=ts