Originally an outgrowth of the United Kingdom breakbeat hardcore and rave scene, it came into being once humans mixed reggae basslines with sped-up hip hop breakbeats. Pioneers like Fabio, Grooverider, Andy C, Roni Size, DJ SS, Brockie, Mickey Finn, Kenny Ken, Goldie, Velocity and other DJs quickly became the stars of drum & bass, so however known as jungle.

No always accepted semantic distinction between a terms "jungle" & "drum and bass". A bit of associate "jungle" by owning older poop from either a foremost half of a Nineties, & watch drum & bass when in essence succeeding jungle sustaining the recently, post-techstep developments. Others utilise jungle as a tachygraphy for ragga jungle, a specific sub-genre inside the wide realm of drum & bass. In the USA, the conjunctive term "Jungle Drum and Bass" (JDB) has a few popularity, however is non far flung elsewhere. Probably a widest held viewpoint is that a terms come only synonymous & interchangeable: drum & bass is jungle, & jungle is drum & bass - although numbers of drum & bass or even jungle fans may debate this belief.

History

Beginnings in the UK
Early jungle was an offshoot of rave (US readers could believe of this when techno music but "rave" is very different from a stripped-stripped Detroit "techno" healthy) music that focused on the breakbeat. Although jungle music originated largely in Britain's Afro-Caribbean communities, it benefited from either a diverse influences of several racial & ethnic groups, typically brought together in the inclusive ecstasy-fueled atmosphere of the Acid House raves which exploded in popularity in the late eighties. A subculture which produced jungle remains one of a virtually all racially-mixed musical cultures, & a proliferation of sub-genres inside drum & bass typically proceeds from either the adoption of unexpected musical elements. A influence of Jamaican healthy-rules culture may be incurred in the apply of basslines from either Dub and Reggae music, alongside the convenient breakbeats from either hip-hop and Funk, alongside many production techniques borrowed from either House and Techno music.

When a speed of hardcore accelerated, a complex nature & severity of a sampled funk breakbeats led to a adoption of basslines which got less around park by owning the elementary system of home & techno music than by using the complex phrasings of dub and hip-hop. Bit by bit, a bass & drum elements began to dominate to a music &, conjunct by having the increase around speed, jungle became incompatible using home & techno & began to produce its have separate identity. This transonic identity became extremely-distinctive for two a depth of its bass & a increasingly-complex, rapid-fire breakbeat percussion. Freshly techniques of drum sampling & layering were developed by jungle producers to achieve these results, ensuant within a revolve around the involution of drum production that continues to define the music. When a influences of reggae & dub became additional large, a healthy of jungle began to choose in an urban healthy which wwhen heavy influenced by ragga & dancehall music likewise as hip-hop, typically incorporating a distinctive vocals & mc chants one styles of music.

Even so, when a early 90 saw jungle break out from either its underground roots & commence to win popularity by having a general British public, numerous producers attempted to expand a influences of a music beyond the domination of ragga-depending sounds. By 1995, a counter movement to the ragga style was emerging, dubbed "intelligent" jungle by the music click, & embodied by LTJ Bukem and his Good Looking label. the select few say that the move to intelligent jungle was a conscious & conjunct reaction by top DJs & producers against a culture that was becoming tinged by owning "gangsta" & violent elements, & stereotypical sustaining a recognizable production techniques of the ragga-influenced producers. Intelligent jungle maintained a uptempo breakbeat percussiin, however focused on further atmospherical sounds & warmly, deep basslines all over vocals or even samples which typically originated from either Soul or Jazz music. From either this period of time in, jungle would maintain the unity of the relatively-microscopic musical culture, however a single characterized by a competing class action of stylistic influences. Although numerous DJs st& specialised around distinctive sub-genres inside jungle & drum & bass, a majority of creative person in a genre remain attached via record labels, cases and radio shows.

Early Pioneers

Early heroes of dnb music include A Guy Called Gerald (seminal track "28 Gun Bad Boy") & 4hero ("Mr Kirk's Nightmare") who later on developed their have styles, allowing a drum & bass mainstream. Around counterpoint, producers like Remarc, Mickey Finn, Goldie and Omni Trio continue to be active inside a genre. A majority of the early producers & DJs however garden truck & play inside now's scene, forming something of the jungle 'old guard'.

Jungle to drum and bass
At the equivalent instance that intelligent jungle appeared, a ragga jungle healthy mutated into a extra stripped-stripped, firm percussive style called Hardstep. At the same time, certain producers developed when other hiphop & funk influenced sister style called Jump-Up, which was exemplified by artists such as Mickey Finn and Aphrodite (with their Urban Takeover label), and a releases on the Ganja Kru's True Playaz label). Outside these genres, which became a virtually all popular styles, sir thomas more creative person pushed a smoother, dubby style of music which got more around commons using the jazzy & soulful interests of intelligent jungle. Records therein style were typically known as rollers.

Across 1996, Hardstep & Go for it Higher sounds were super popular within clubs and at raves, wherewhen Intelligent jungle was pushing the healthy which was considered sir thomas more accessible to the at home auditor, ensuant in the popularity of the style sustaining mainstream music magazines, as Video album releases by 4 Hero and Goldie were more readily-available than a underground dubplates which characterized a club-depending styles. Stylistically, drum & bass began to adopt an ever supplementary diverse range of influences, crossbreeding by having several more forms of danceroom music to make the series of crossed sounds. Around 1997, the healthy which was influenced per double-bass operate of jazzman come to the forefront, producing a foul, accessible style which achieved mainstream profits for creative person like Roni Size and Reprazent. A class action's Up to date Forms album won a UK's Mercury Prize, & their innovative survive b& helped drum and bass to break away from a DJ circuit, winning plaudit for performances at music festivals and in tv show.

As much as this instance, drum & bass too sealed it popularity by winning the Friday nighttime slot in Radio One, the BBC's flagship radio station. At first bestowed by the revolving groups of jungle guiding light, hosted by MC Navigator, a station in time secured the presenting services of Fabio and Grooverider, two of the oldest & virtually all-respected DJs in the scene.

The birth of techstep

As the lightly healthy of drum & bass began to convert the musical mainstream, numerous producers continued to operate on the other prevent of the spectrum, consequent around a series of releases which highlighted a dark, technical indicator healthy which drew other influence from either Techno and the soundscapes of science fiction and anime films. This style was championed per labels Emotif & No U-Turn, and creative person such as Trace, Ed Rush and Optical, and Dom and Roland, and is ordinarily known as techstep. Techstep focused intensely in studio production & applied newly techniques of healthy generation & processing to older jungle appraoches. Self-consciously underground, & lacking a accessible influences of good deal more drum & bass, techstep is deeply atmospherical, typically characterised by sinister or even science-fiction themes, cold & complex percussion, & dark, distorted basslines.

When the Nineties drew to a close, drum & bass withdrew from either mainstream popularity & concentrated inside sounds which were popular in clubs, like than in mainstream radio. Techstep come to dominate a drum & bass genre, sustaining creative person rather Konflict and Bad Company amongst the virtually all seeable. When period went inside, techstep was becoming supplementary minimum, & more & more dark within tone, and a foul, commercial appeal represented by Roni Size back in 1997 was waning. Nevertheless, 2000 saw an increasing movement to "bring the fun back into drum and bass", heralded per chart profits enjoyed by singles from either Andy C and Shimon (Bodyrock) and Shy FX and T Power (Shake UR Immune system). In the clubs there wwhen the recently revival of rave-oriented sounds, besides as remixes of classic jungle tunes that capitalised in nostalgia & an interest in the origins of the music. Numbers of felt that jungle music experienced weathered a trend lines, then hostility, of the mainstream media (which experienced declared that "Drum and bass is dead" in the late 90s), & that a revival of chart profits indicated that the style was to a higher degree a pass fashion.

Since 2000
Since a revival around popularity around 2000, a drum & bass scene hwhen turn into super diverse, despite its relatively-microscopic size, pertinent in which these are hard to point to any a single subgenre as a dominant style.

Around 2000, Fabio began championing a form he known as Liquid funk, with the compilatiin release of the equivalent title on his Creative Source label. This was characterized by influences from either disco and house, and far flung apply of vocals. Although slow to catch inside at a start, a style grew massively within popularity about 2003-2004, & by 2005 it wwhen established as one of the biggest-selling subgenres in drumnbass, using labels prefer Hospital Records and Soul:R and artists including High Contrast, Calibre, Nu:Tone, Marcus Intalex and Logistics among its main advocator.

A decade as well saw a revival of Jump-Up. Known as "Nu Jump Up", or even pejoratively when Clownstep, this kept a feel of fun & a simplistic, bouncing basslines from either a 1st generation of Go for it Higher, however using tougher, harder production values. Large Nu Go for it Higher creative person include Twisted Individual, Generation Dub, and DJ Hazard.

Gross revenue numbers for 2004 indicate that liquid funk & Nu Go for it Higher combined probably account for the important majority of the drum & bass market.

the time too saw a rise of a style called Dubwise, which returned drum and bass to its reggae-influenced roots, cooperative using modern production techniques which experienced advanced immeasurably since a early times of jungle. Although a dub-influenced healthy was non recently, with hanker been championed by creative person prefer Digital and Spirit, 2003-2004 saw a important increase around its popularity & visibility, by having recently creative person rather Amit at the forefront.

Likewise, when there experienced hanker been the niche dedicated about completely to elaborated drum programming & manipulation, championed per likes of Paradox, the number one half of this decade saw the revival & expansion in the subgenre known diversely when Drumfunk, "Edits", or "Choppage". Major labels include Inperspective and the future wave of creative person in that style include Fanu, Breakage, and Fracture and Nepture.

the newly millennium as well saw a freshly wave of survive drum & bass elastic. A likes of Reprazent and Red Snapper had performed live drum & bass when you took a 1990s, but a re-creation of London Elektricity as a live band focussed renewed interest on the idea, sustaining acts rather The Bays, Keiretsu and Ultra-Violet pursuing this avenue.

The global scene in 2005

A more major development largely occurring since a turn of the millennium is geographical: from either UK-oriented beginnings, drum & bass has firmly established itself worldwide. There are heavy scenes around more English-speaking countries including a USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. These are popular through Europe, especially in The Netherlands. These are likewise popular inside South America. São Paulo is for instance known as a drum & bass Ibiza. Brazilian drum & bass is periodically known as Sambass, although in Venezuela, artists prefer Zardonic, Jimmy Flamante or Cardopusher have created Industrial forms of Drum & bass, and as well Drill N Bass / IDM, mixing also by using latin rhythms such as Salsa or Latin Jazz.

List of notable drum and bass artists

Musicology of drum and bass

There are numbers of views of what is "real" drum & bass when it has numerous scenes & styles inside it, from either impenetrable pounding bass lines to the relaxed vibraphone of Liquid funk. It has been likened sustaining jazz where a hearer may acquire super different sounding music completely coming under the equivalent music genre, because like drum & bass, these are extrthe of an approach, or even the tradition, than a style. When such, so, these are hard to precisely define; still, a as punishment key features can be found.

Defining characteristics

Breakbeats
A breakbeat is what loosely speaking defines the music when drum & bass. The breakbeat, musically speaking, is characterized by an element of syncopation, witharound counterpoint to the straight Four-beat discovered in techno, trance and house.

Several breakbeats come directly sampled or even come produced from either drum fills detected within old soul, funk, blues, & jazz records. A "break" refers to a section of a song after vocals come cut out & the emphasis wear the rhythm & beat. Even so, since a mid-nineties, several producers utilise Two-step or even more break beats programmed from either person drum samples that emulate a sampled funk breaks, however come typically starker & heavily sounding. These are too park to produce drum tracks applying the combination of each techniques.

Particularly most common breakbeats utilized inside drum & bass include:

A "Amen Break", by The Winstons (and its descendent, a tramen) Cold Sweat, Tighten Higher & a "funky drummer", by James Brown Believe, by Lyn Collins Apache, per Incredible Bongo Band Production line, by The Commodores

The collection of the virtually all popular breaks utilized within drum & bass may be listened to at [http://www.btinternet.com/~stigeon/junglebreaks/ this site]

Tempo

Drum & bass is commonly between 160-180 Beats per minute, within direct contrast to more forms of Breakbeat such as Nu skool breaks which maintain a slower pace at around 130-140 Metronome marking. a general upward trend around tempo has been found in the period of the evolution of drum & bass. A earliest Old School rave & breakbeat-descended jungle was around 155-165 M.m., when 21st Century material rarely lessens beneath 170BPM, & typically hits 180BPM.

Importance of drum and bassline elements

A title "drum and bass" should non lead to the assumption that tracks come constructed alone from either these elements. Notwithstanding, it is far & away the virtually all critical features, & ordinarily dominate a mix of a track. A genre wharehouses groovy importance in deep sub-bass which is felt physically up to these are heard. There has too been considerable exploration of different timbres in the bassline region, particularly inside techstep.

Context

Mostly, drum & bass occurs as form of dance music, designed to be heard around clubs. It exhibits the full frequency response and physicality which typically just just can not become fully appreciated in front yard hearing devices. When befits its title, a bass element of a music is particularly pronounced, sustaining the comparitively thin arrangements of Drum & bass tracks allowing for room for basslines that come deeper than virtually all more forms of ballroom music. Consequently, favorite healthy devices is required to fully appreciate Drum & Bass, & nights come typically advertised when featuring uncommonly aloud & bass-impenetrable systems.

Drum & bass is so generally heard vithe a DJ. Becautilize virtually all tracks come designed to become mixed per DJ, their structure often reflects this, by having intro & outro sections designed for the DJ to use spell beat-matching, like than existence designed to exist as heard around entireness by the auditor. A DJ generally mixes between records and then when does'nt to lose a continuous beat. This is typically known as a "mix and blend" style of DJing. Additionally, a DJ might use hip-hop style "scratching"," "double-drops" (where two tracks are synchronized such that both tracks drop at the same time), and "rewinds."

Most mixing points begin or end with the "drop". The drop is the point in a track where a switch of rhythm or bassline occurs and usually follows a recognisable build section and "breakdown". Frequently the drop is used to switch between tracks, layering components of different tunes. Some drops are so popular that the DJ will "rewind" or "reload" by spinning the record back and restarting it at the build. This is a technique which can easily be overused as it breaks the continuity of a set.

DJs are typically accompanied by one or more MCs, drawing on the genre's roots in Hip hop and Reggae/Ragga.

Relationship to other electronic music styles

Recently, smaller scenes within the drum and bass community have developed and the scene as a whole has become much more fractured into specific sub-genres. Some major sub-genres of drum and bass include:

Clownstep Drumfunk (or "Choppage", "Edits") Hardstep Intelligent drum and bass (or "Atmospheric DnB") Jazz step (or Jazz'n'Bass) Jump-Up Jungle Liquid funk Techmospheric Techstep Neurofunk

As with all attempts to classify and categorize music, the above should not be treated as gospel. Many producers release albums which touch into many of the above styles.

Drill and bass, a sub-genre of Intelligent dance music (also known as "IDM"), popularized by Aphex Twin, features many of the same types of rhythms used in drum and bass and is generally focused on complexity in programming and instrumentation. Amongst its main proponents include Squarepusher, Amon Tobin, Boards of Canada, Venetian Snares and many others.

Appearances in the mainstream

Certain drum and bass releases have found mainstream popularity in their own right, almost always material prominently featuring vocals. Perhaps the earliest example was Goldie's Timeless album of 1995, along with Reprazent's New Forms in 1997. More recently, tracks such as Shy FX and T-Power's Shake Your Body gained a UK Top 40 Chart placing. Hive's "Ultrasonic Healthy" was also used on the first "Matrix" soundtrack.

On the other hand, pop music has also occasionally co-opted elements of drum and bass, albeit in watered-down fashion. Examples include Puretone and Girls Aloud. Drum and bass also often appears in advertising and TV.

Key record labels

The following are some of the major labels within drumnbass:

31 Records Black Sun Empire Breakbeat Kaos Certificate 18 Records Commercial Suicide Creative Source Formation Records Full Cycle Recordings Good Looking Organisation Hospital Records Metalheadz Moving Shadow No U-Turn RAM Recordings Reinforced Records Renegade Hardware (part of the Trouble on Vinyl group) Soul:R Subtitles Recordings Suburban Base Records Underfire Recordings V Recordings Violence Recordings Virus Recordings Rinse Proof Records

Accessing drum and bass

Purchasing

Drum and bass is mostly sold in 12-inch vinyl single format, although some albums, compilations and DJ mixes are sold on CD. File downloads are also becoming increasingly available. Purchasing drum and bass can involve searching specialized record shops or using one of many online vinyl, cd and mp3 retailers, such as:

* http://www.atsdigital.com/ * http://www.beatport.com/ * http://www.blazar.net/ * http://bleep.com/ * http://www.breakbeatscience.com * http://www.breakbeat.co.uk/ * http://www.chemical-records.co.uk/ * http://www.defcomstore.co.uk/ * http://www.dogsonacid.com/mp3/ - also on beatport.com * http://www.ganjakru.co.uk/ * http://shop.easyrecords.net/ * http://shop.hospitalrecords.com/ * http://www.imorecords.com/ * http://www.itunes.com/ * http://www.juno.co.uk/ * http://www.karmadownload.com/ * http://www.kinematicrecordings.com/ * http://www.movementradio.com/ * http://www.cc-radio.net/index.php * http://www.darkland-agency.com * http://www.shadybrain.net/ * http://www.strictly-digital.com/ * http://www.tovmusic.com/ * http://www.trackitdown.net/ * http://www.vibrationrecords.com/ * http://www.vitaminic.com/main/electronica_dance/ * http://www.darkland-recordings.net/ * http://www.epitonic.com/ * http://www.exegene.com/ * http://www.karmadownload.com/genre/?Drum%20&%20Bass * http://www.dnbsource.com/ * http://www.redeyerecords.co.uk/ * http://www.rykomusic.com/ (certificate 18) * http://www.movementinsound.co.uk/ * http://www.back2basicsrecords.com * http://www.djdownload.com

Media

The best known drum and bass publication is Knowledge Magazine. Rivals include the longest running drum and bass magazine worldwide ATM Magazine and Canadian-based Rinse Magazine.

The highest profile drum and bass radio show is Fabio and Grooverider on BBC Radio One. The BBC's "urban" station 1Xtra also features the genre heavily, with DJs L Double and Bailey and Flight. The genre has long been supported by pirate radio stations, particularly in London; these days, they are joined by a large, and ever-expanding number, of internet radio stations available globally. In the US, XM Satellite Radio dedicates two hours a day to its drum and bass show, "Pressure", on channel 80 - The Move (XM).

Drum and bass has a strong online presence with many dedicated portals, forums and communities. Some of the largest of these are linked below.

Books

All Crews: Journeys Through Jungle / Drum and Bass Culture by Brian Belle-Fortune (ISBN 0954889703) ''The Rough Guide to Drum 'n' Bass'' by Peter Shapiro and Alexix Maryon (ISBN 1858284333)