- The affair between rave and experimental music has been torrid lately, and few know these star-struck lovers like Anthoney J. Hart. Growing up near London, Hart found success as a pirate radio DJ, and he followed drum & bass for a decade from the mid-'90s. The genre's hardening formulas eventually put him off, and his music as Imaginary Forces stalked into gloomy, noise-cracked landscapes for labels like Entr'acte and Bedouin. Hart says that the "psychedelic" properties of early hardcore are still important to his music. Under the name Basic Rhythm, he's finally facing that influence head-on.
Hart presents his manifesto on the track "Prototype." At the opening, a razor-sharp snare limbers up, while a voice declares, "That old school shit is dead. It ain't no old school, it's the true school." The cascade of percussion that follows sounds like the twisted shrapnel of grime or garage. The one thing Hart's kitchen-sink arrangement lacks is a breakbeat, the implication being that he's trying to capture hardcore's innovative spirit, not ape its sounds.
He enters a crowded field. Raw Trax calls to mind Powell's pulverised bangers, the club refractions of Mark Fell and the odd pert Hessle hybrid. Hart's unique selling point is hinted at in the subtitle of opener "Raw Trax (Weekend Rush)." The track's diva voices and spiky drums, crumpled together and blasted at the speakers, capture the giddy sensation of a rave at full tilt. It's like reliving a night out in a torrent of images, each flying past like a shard of broken mirror.
The album keeps to this breathless pace. One cubist beat collapses into another, some of them with an added wild touch, as with the stepladder vocal in "Raw Basics." The highlight might be "Your Love," whose dubstep-grade bassline wobbles beneath cool blue chords, or "Maintain," which sets grime's sharp attack against slivers of noodly guitar. These moments are successful because Hart gives his fevered beats a cold compress of soul. The album sags when he slacks his duty, as in the muted late pairing of "Get Dark" and "Feel Me."
Still, this minor quibble is forgotten partway through closer "Break It Down (4 Da Kru)," when pummelling claps and chipmunk vox are scoured by a warped bassline. The elements are familiar, but in Hart's hands very little is "old-school" about them.
Tracklist01. Raw Trax (Weekend Rush)
02. Raw Basics
03. Prototype
04. Maintain
05. Your Love
06. Get Dark
07. Feel Me
08. Break It Down (4 Da Kru)