Yo. Happy fricken 2016, peeps!
This is one of those rare “not a label mix” posts as a belated holiday season gift for you all. The last one I did was waaay back in 2014. This month’s mix is a personal favourite of mine – a set I did live, like, for real, in 2003 in a teensy tiny club in Christchurch, New Zealand, of all places, the name of which I forget but I’m sure it was an animal of some kind. Definitely not a turtle or a puffin. All ten people on the dancefloor were having a good time, believe you me, and no fisticuffs broke out. I presume due to the sheer skill of the DJ. The place smelled strongly of stale shit-NZ-beer and students.
What I love most about this selection is that it perfectly encapsulates my own personal memories of that late-90s, early-2000s style of DnB, which was ‘my era’ from both a raving and tunes perspective when I was all adorable and shiny and chrome… before Pendulum apparently ruined everything with the release of Hold Your Colour.
I joke of course.
Not really 
Ok I do.
Love you, Pendeez! If you bookend an entire era of music that’s probably a good indication you’re doing it right…
The late 90s / early-2000s was when DnB was recovering from its then-recent attempts to socially cleanse the scene of anything remotely female, and the sound was reincorporating earlier influences again. Jazz-step suddenly returned as ‘Liquid’ and tech-step was re-imagined as ‘Neurofunk’. Oldskool hardcore stabs and breakbeats were back as if they’d never been usurped by filtered Reese basslines and squelchy stuff at all. It was an immensely rich and evolving time for drum and bass music.
The mix is complete and unashamed anthem-bashing, but what anthems they are! From all time tease-classics like The Nine, Messiah, Titan and Alien Girl, through to personal top Bad Company tunes Nitrous and Flashback (Tumpa). The Total Science remix of Champion Sound is probably my top 1 favourite track of all time – I vividly recall going mental to this when I heard it for the first time at a Grooverider gig. To this day I still get caught ‘singing’ the breakdown when Champion Sound comes on at raves. An utterly epic and wonderful hands in the air classic.
So, with love, from me to you. Happy new year peeps. New actual real blog post coming soon – it’s gonna be jungle-tastic.
Oh by the way, you can now get all of the blog mixes sent to your phone with no effort if you subscribe to the podcast. It’s taken me two years to figure this shit out.
John B – Up All Night rmx
Mosus and Killjoy – I Like it Rough
Marcus Intalex and ST Files – Barracuda
Tech Itch & Kemal – The Calling
Keaton & Hive – The Plague
> Q Project – Champion Sound (Total Science Remix)
Ed Rush, Optical, & Fierce – Alien Girl
Dillinja – Thugged Out Bitch
> Bad Company – The Nine
Dillinja – Aint Too Loud
Bad Company – More Fire
Dom & Roland – Dynamo
Bad Company – Nitrous
Distorted Minds – Warriors
Distorted Minds – Fight Club
Simon Bassline Smith and Drumsound – Fallin’
> Trace and Ryme Tyme – Move VIP
Concord Dawn – Morning Light
Raiden – All Out War
Dillinja – Twist Em Out
Bad Company & Trace – Flashback (Tumpa)
DJ Marky and XRS – Closer
J Majik – The Lizard
Ram Trilogy – Titan
Konflict – Messiah
Ram Trilogy – Beast Man
DJ Zinc – Super Sharp Shooter Remix
Here come the drums 