ah, remember when Pete Tong has announced Plasticman in his show... I thought that Hawtin smoked too much weed. Not long after that show dubstep Plasticman become Plastician.

Looking forward to it. Plastician could steer the Dubstep Allstars series away from their misery.

Dubstep? That defunct genre from the mid 00s that blew up, sold out and then swallowed itself whole? Prompting everyone originally involved to declare it dead? Everyone except Skream, that is...

now only if you quit whining and dug deep enough

Much love and respect to Plastician!

I thought Plastician was still plugging the line that it "evolved"?? Soon as it became narrowed down to half step it was a wrap.

Dubstep is the new trance. Got big, abused a synth (supersaw/wobble), and then everyone who mattered ditched the genre. In its place remained a bunch of pop crap.

big up plastician for his immense contributions to the scene at its birth, but this should be called brostep allstars

Does it bother anyone else when djs try to legitimize brostep my mixing it along with real underground dubstep / uk bass? Skream's the number 1 culprit of that but seems like Plastician has taken a cue as well. If I was j:kenzo or commodo I would be embarrassed and angry to be in the same mix as brostep pop garbage like Dream.

Plastician is a joke these days anyway, inviting Skrillex on rinse ffs. After being one of the original purveyors of the scene, he's doing everything he can to kill it and milk every last penny out of it in the meantime. Absolutely disgusting.

Anyway 1/5 would be a stretch here. Terrible, terrible mix that no true fan of dubstep should get near. Giving this guy more money is just giving him more fuel to kill the genre.

Just want to add if it wasn't clear from my post below that this is terrible and Plastician is a brostep-loving sellout hack.

Also, just noticed the reviewer. Andrew Ryce, showing once again that if you live in an Igloo somewhere in Canada, you're going to be disconnected and clueless about the scene. 3.5/5 is the funniest joke I've heard this year, but I'm sure it will be topped by Ryce's next 5/5 review of some shite pop EP.

@shibbydoo

1. I'm sure you were at FWD in 2001.
2. You haven't actually listened to this have you?

Idiot.

''Does it bother anyone else when djs try to legitimize brostep my mixing it along with real underground dubstep / uk bass? Skream's the number 1 culprit of that but seems like Plastician has taken a cue as well. If I was j:kenzo or commodo I would be embarrassed and angry to be in the same mix as brostep pop garbage like Dream.

Plastician is a joke these days anyway, inviting Skrillex on rinse ffs. After being one of the original purveyors of the scene, he's doing everything he can to kill it and milk every last penny out of it in the meantime. Absolutely disgusting.

Anyway 1/5 would be a stretch here. Terrible, terrible mix that no true fan of dubstep should get near. Giving this guy more money is just giving him more fuel to kill the genre.''


You're an idiot

Lol at all these 1 post accounts coming in to defend this garbage. Go back to UKF kids

@shibbydoo andrew ryce pretty much loves bass music so i dont think he will be giving any pop music 5/5
though he also writes for pitchfork...
if anything hes more inclined to give bass music reviews more polishing than it deserves ie. (starkey/faltydl)

but to be fair this mix isnt awful besides a few missteps into grinding quasi bro stepish tracks its still enjoyable and not pukeworthy so the review is fair in my mind

Previewed some of the tracks online on boomkat. Sounds like every other dubstep CD ever released.

Dubstep is getting awfully tired. Every track sounds the same, no new ideas, MCs acting all hard and shit, and there's no depth in emotion, it's just dark and hard

On the other end of the spectrum we have Burial releasing the same stuff he's been releasing since Day 1. Looped R&B vocals, reverb, atmospherics, 2step, etc.

Anybody ever going to do anything new?

B-b-but thejaguar, can't you see, dubstep is *evolving*. Brostep producers like Dream are keeping the genre fresh. Ignore the fact that 'evolving' looks pretty damn similar to 'commercializing to bleed the genre dry of every penny'. Thats just a funny coincidence. Am I right Plastician?

Like I commented before, you have to dig deeper. I can make the same comments about techno (lame ass attempts by countless producers at making industrial techno and miserably failing at it) and house music (the unnecessary revival of older sounding records without adding anything new to the style) . There's always going to be generic garbage in every genre. I do however agree that the quantity of good dubstep is becoming lesser and lesser.

Listen to some music from Jack Sparrow, Wen, Epoch, V.I.V.E.K., etc. and then tell me if it's the same thing. As far as Burial is concerned, that's his style and he can make whatever the fuck he wants to as long as his tracks are cohesive and are well thought out. No wonder he prefers quality over quantity. Countless producers have tried his style and are still trying to make similar stuff but none have the emotional depth that he has in his music. Would you accuse a producer like say Levon Vincent for making the same shit? In fact he loves deep chords so much that he went as far to intersperse similar sounding chords in 'Speck's Jam' from his other track 'Polar Bear Make....'.

Here's one of my favorite dubstep mixes from last year (Dusk + Blackdown RinseFM - Wen Showcase Mix) -

https://soundcloud.com/w3n/dusk-blackdown-rinsefm-wen-showcase-mix

Nothing short of spellbinding.

As far as Andrew Ryce is concerned, I have to say that he's doing a good enough job - credit where it is due. Plus, he doesn't dick ride Skrillex unlike other Pitchfork writers who these days have to mention Skrillex in any electronic music review and indirectly high-five him.

Dubstep is dead. Embrace the resurgence of UK techno - deep, dark and minimal

lol @ people

a few miles away from the US border on the west coast isn't an "igloo" by the way. and even better, sometimes they let me out of my cage and i get to go to other places

Dubstep will be dead when people stop making it and embracing it. Anyway, most tracks labelled under "dubstep" are mostly mutations of Garage with dub as the backbone (no wonder original developers of the sound talk about jungle all the time). I and I am certainly not talking about brostep. Kode9 views dubstep as a continuation of developments from the time of UK hardcore. So, in effect, elements of dubstep or dubstep itself is not going to die. It's another way to look at it. I personally feel that Burial wrongly gets labelled as a dubstep producer considering he doesn't make much of it - he's all about his garage influences.

Again I leave you with something that has been on repeat since it came out. Feel the bassweight and embrace the good stuff instead of being such a bore. Deep Medi is a force to reckon with. V.I.V.E.K. has started his own SYSTEM Music label so maybe there'll be more output that will be worth checking.

Kahn - Late Night Blues Ft. Rider Shafique

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruyXqgt2m3E

Btw Kahn has been in top form lately and he's definitely going to make a big impact considering his top notch production and he's making music in a variety of genres. I highly recommend that you buy a FLAC/WAV of the above track and play it on proper speakers - not on your laptop speakers. 3:14 gets me every time. Such an amazing exercise in sound design appreciation.

Also,
The current dark techno output coming from UK or anywhere else for that matter is anything but minimal. Maybe a few tracks here and there but for the most of it, minimal is not what comes to my mind. Atmospheric certainly, but not minimal.

Also,
Your favorite techno record shop sells dubstep occasionally as well. It has the new Silkie record on Deep Medi too.

http://hardwax.com/dubstep/

Of course there's still some people doing big things in dubstep (Kahn is a great example), but Dream and Skrillex sure aren't included in that group.

Ryce next time you leave your country you may want to get the maple syrup out of your ears, lest we get more joke reviews like this. I'm eagerly awaiting the latest Skrillex EP review btw. Maybe we can get Plastician as guest reviewer. Is it possible to give 6/5?

Location in most cases has got nothing to do with reviews. We live in the age of internet dammit. Even websites refer other websites' links in their articles (the original article may have been written in some other location). Welcome to the secondhand information age. What matters is that you should trust the source and know the authenticity of it. What I'm trying to arrive at is that people can learn about a scene and appreciate the output without actually being there. If you would know me in real life, you would be highly surprised that I know anything at all about underground electronic music. Let me be more clear to make a point - I've never been to a proper dubstep club/party or for that matter a proper underground electronic music club/party (circumstances, etc. but, I do dream of hearing WK7 aka Shed's The Avalanche on a proper sound system). Yet, the mighty internet provides me valuable info and if I have the interest/passion I can always find relevant authentic info by connecting with similar minded individuals and maybe the artists of the scene as well (skype, facebook, soundcloud are good avenues in case you didn't know). It is a lot of work but it's fun too. So, yeah, that clears the deal with being physically present at some location to appreciate the music. If you are still not happy with this argument, how do you think smaller labels sign artists from different countries to their roster? You think they are personally meeting them every time? All these anonymous artists/groups, how do they circumvent this issue? Something to think about. Performances are one way of spreading the music, but, so are interviews, reviews, facebook, etc. The biggest issue of vinyl vs digital is itself so ironical. Although one can spend good amounts of time on this issue, the proponents of vinyl are using the digital medium to spread awareness, aren't they? Don't get me wrong, I do appreciate vinyl's advantages.

Live reviews - well, in future maybe there will be ways to bypass that issue. One can do reviews of live events based on uploaded videos but it's not the same thing obviously.



The Dream track you are referring to is not brostep. It's not the best dubstep track ever but nothing worth getting riled about. Yes, I'm on your side as far as Skream and Benga's inadequacies are concerned and I hate their brostep-ish output. But, maybe, just maybe, there's a slight chance that the mainstream will take notice of the underground because of them.

Here's something you may or may not like - I don't. But, I get what FlyLo's doing - he's being good to him. Goodness believe it or not goes a long way and maybe, just maybe, Skrillex will change his ways (although I'm as skeptical as you are). Or maybe he hangs out with underground musicians who are cool with him associating with the brostep bs. Grimes or Tokimonsta certainly don't give a fuck as it appears. Grimes likes Justin Bieber too but that's a story for another day.

http://news.beatport.com/blog/2012/07/25/skrillex-talks-skateboarding-getting-arrested-and-hanging-with-flying-lotus/


http://pics.lockerz.com/s/247360045

Also, I liked that he allowed French Fries to release and remix on his label. I think he likes the French, I've seen photos with Club Cheval members as well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtRQ4-WsbfA

Why is Flying Lotus relevant to the issue? Well, he is well respected and in my mind, a top producer. Plus, he did release music on Tectonic once. And I'm sure he's influenced by dubstep as well.

I don't give a fk that this specific Dream song isn't brostep, he's a brostep producer and should be nowhere near a Dubstep Allstars release. It's the same as if Skrillex was on this (I'm sure Plastician is drooling at the thought of the sales that could have potentially brought in, bet he's kicking himself for not having thought of that). The message is more important than the actual song in this case. And the msg in this case is a big middle finger to people who still care about real dubstep

shibbypoo please give it a rest..you are coming across as a wingnut....

If someone wants to have one foot in the ostensible underground and one foot in a pop scene, even if it's solely to make some money (doubt that's the case here), then isn't that fine? Artists needn't starve in order to be artists and no doubt Plastician has paid and will continue to pay his dues. Crossover mixes may be unpalatable to some, but they serve the purpose of gateways into the underground for others. I think what i'm saying is self-evident, don't particularly like dubstep and certainly don't always agree with Mr Ryce, but the level of abuse on this thread bears commenting on, IMHO.

I agree that the track wasn't worth considering on the mix and maybe you are right about Plastician's intentions (and the fact that Tempa has no issues is also worth noting) but, seriously dude, don't take it too personally unless he has conned you or something like that. Chill out and enjoy the good stuff and continue to support the good stuff like you do; there are way too many other important things in life to worry about anyway. And as I mentioned before, it's not a brostep track so not something worth losing sleep over. You may have worked hard in building the scene but what can you do about it? As long as you are able to eat, earn a living and maybe have sex occasionally, you shouldn't be too worried.

I don't get why every grime MC tries to act like hard shit. Lost interest in grime long ago because every song sounds so stupid

Best dubstep shit out there today isn't even dubstep, it's house and techno made by dubstep producers

What a depressing thread.
Elitists poison music.

^^
this