by Ben Murphy and Carl Loben (Music 781.648 Mur)
Drum & bass music was a tremendous influence on lots of electronic music styles from the 1990s to the present, and the music continues to be made as well. As one of the larger subgenres within electronic dance music (EDM), the story of drum & bass is fascinating, but not so well-known, especially in the United States. But we have a recent book that traces the history of the music through to the present day. It’s called Renegade Snares: The Resistance and Resilience of Drum and Bass by Ben Murphy & Carl Loben, and you can borrow it from Polley.
Murphy and Loben are the perfect authors to take on this project, as both were fans of the music during its development in the early to mid-1990s, and both have been editors of DJ Magazine, a British monthly magazine covering electronic music trends since 1991. They’ve known the scene since it started, and written about it for decades. And I think books like this are especially important today because many people don’t know much about the origins of a lot of EDM styles. So much of EDM, from techno to jungle to drum & bass to dubstep, reminds folks of dance clubs and raves, largely full of affluent white kids spending their nights dancing and trying the latest in laboratory-synthesized recreational chemicals, and these stereotypes have somewhat overshadowed the real history of this music. Take techno music, for example: did you know that it’s generally considered to be a product of black musicians in Detroit, starting with producers Juan Atkins, Kevin Saunderson, and Derrick May, who combined DJ techniques with synthesizers? Or that the relatively recent EDM subgenre of footwork was an innovation of black producers in Chicago, and later some Japanese producers were inspired by their work and developed a parallel Japanese footwork scene? Or that dubstep in the early oughts in the UK was massively influenced by 1980s Jamaican sound system DJ collectives? So too, we will find, that drum & bass music started in working-class black neighborhoods around London.
One of the most important elements of drum & bass music is the “breakbeat,” which is using sampled drums from instrumental passages on records. This kind of work had long been a staple of hip-hop production, and in fact one of the most commonly used breakbeats in hip-hop, the “amen break” from the 1969 tune “Amen, Brother” by the Winstons, became a foundational sample for drum & bass music, too. Chapter 2 of “Renegade Snares” digs deep into the history of the amen break carrying over from hip-hop into EDM styles, where the focus on percussion was even bigger. Where hip-hop producers often slowed down the amen break in their tracks, drum & bass producers sped up the sample, and sometimes add a little distortion to it, making it a hyper, assertive call to the dance floor, or an almost overwhelming rhythmic statement that could elicit a similar kind of hyper energy as the drums in thrash metal music of the same era. In Chapter 3, we learn about breakbeat hardcore, the early 90s antecedent to jungle and drum & bass styles. At the time, these were DIY extensions of EDM music, and early artists were mostly self-releasing their music.
As an aside, while this music was an underground phenomenon, a relatively popular style was also developing using some of the same concepts: big beat. Bands like the Chemical Brothers, Prodigy, and the Crystal Method were all drawing from breakbeat hardcore music, and arguably some of their early 90s records contain moments similar to drum & bass, though usually with somewhat slower tempos than “legit” drum & bass music.
The next few chapters of Renegade Snares cover the development of jungle music, the transitional style between breakbeat and drum & bass. All of these styles are closely related, and the main difference that a lay listener is likely to pick up between breakbeat hardcore and jungle is more emphasis on deep bass parts. Jungle slowly made its way into dance clubs further than breakbeat had gone, likely because of the bass. Small record labels were also important to the distribution of jungle tracks, which carried through to drum & bass artists as well.
It’s interesting reading about some of the ways this music made its way around the UK that differ from the way things have worked in the US. As mentioned in Chapter 6, pirate radio stations were an essential part of sharing these new musical forms—airplay on pirate radio could drum up interest for music before it could be found in record stores or dance clubs. Indeed, pirate radio could create demand for records and being featured in clubs! In the UK, these stations formed a whole network of information and art-sharing that could happen without the financial backing needed for most mainstream music. Perhaps the closest thing we had to this in the United States was tape trading in the 80s, but I can only imagine the extra immediacy and sense of community these radio stations nurtured in the 90s.
In the US, the terms “Jungle” and “drum & bass” are used pretty much interchangeably, too, so it’s nice to get a sense of the differences between them through this book. As the book progresses, specific artists who became known for drum & bass music, such as Goldie and Roni Size are highlighted, as are transitional artists like the Omni Trio, whose “Renegade Snares” tune is the inspiration for the title of this book. They are similar styles, and the sense I get from the book is that “drum & bass” can be considered a kind of refinement or evolution of jungle approaches that introduces strategic jazz and ambient sounds, and keeps pushing the tempos faster and faster (although there is “ambient jungle” and jazz-infused jungle, too).
Later sections of the book highlight the spread of this music around the rest of the world, and new genres that are inspired by drum & bass approaches, such as footwork and dubstep. The high-speed breakbeats and deep bass this music unlocked in the 90s has enjoyed several resurgences in popularity filtered through these newer styles. And it’s fun to read about how all kinds of styles within EDM, classic and new, from all over the world, continue to cross over into one another in fresh new ways right up to the present day. A great book for finding your way into this rewarding underground genre.
(If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try Join the Future: Bleep Techno and the Birth of British Bass Music by Matt Anniss, or DJ Culture in the Mix: Power, Technology and Social Change in Electronic Dance Music by Bernardo Attias.)
( publisher’s official Renegade Snares web site )
Recommended
by Scott S.
Polley Music Library
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