In your opinion, is drum & bass still tune focused?

Cat Gas

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I was just reading this about hospital, and they said they focused on making albums as opposed to making dubplates. (essentially.)

So that made me think, in this modern day and age, is drum and bass still focused on making tunes, and if you're tune is good, then you can get it out, or is it more if you have a whole collection of tunes, not just a few bangers, then that's the only way you can get your stuff played out?

In your opinion, I don't want to say anything stupid.
 
Depends if you're talking about a cohesive album or an album of 'tunes' which are two completely different things.

You can still have an album of 10 'tunes' that are bangers and will do damage on the dancefloor, but I wouldn't imagine a cohesive ALBUM in the true sense of the word would have the same effect. Unless you went down the Sabre route and wrote an album then did a disc with club mixes, which has an impact in both ways.

The scene is driven by 'tunes' traditionally, but it doesn't stop artists branching out and exploring their creative imagination. I just (personally) wouldn't expect (for instance) the Netsky album to be anything more than a collection of 10 dnb tunes (it'd be great if I was proven wrong). Although they're bound to be greatly produced and brilliant in their own right, it wouldn't have made a difference if they were released 5 seperate times on 12" or as one whole album 5x12" - if that makes sense.

Regardless I'm still looking forward to hearing it because the guy is clearly a talent and will have a lot of time to develop as he's only about 13 or summin.

I think with a label like hospital they've cracked it in the sense that they've got wide mainstream appeal whilst still demanding respect from righteous jungalists none the less - and albums are a much more viable commodity for them as it allows both sides to purchase and participate in the development of the label/scene.

Just my overly analytical 2 cents anyway :rinsed:
 
I think to make it as an artist these days you can't be a one hit wonder. Riisu words are wise, and I do believe yltht hospital are at the forefront of this revolution. They attract new audiences aswell as keeping the old ones especially with tunes like warehouse and 88mph, if u think these tune are being played by spectrasoul for example and on the other side of the coon uve got dj Escape rinsing the Netsky tunes! Which at the end of the day it all boils down to the management of the artists, and chris and tony down at hospital know what they are doing with the calibre of artists in their rooster
 
Its true Hospital gets a lot more attention by releasing a lot of albums, but I think its generally true that the best tunes are released seperately. Im not a big fan of any Hospital albums, I could only pick 2 or 3 decent tunes out of one (Crash, Bang, Wallop and Sick Music are the exceptions :D Sick Music 2 was a massive let down however, not a single tune I like), whereas their individual releases tend to be top quality.
 
No doubt its as healthy as it can be, however i do find the guys who are getting big in the game production wise are becoming overly ananly retetentive as to adding weird noise swoops and bizarre percussive bullspit which is great in parts, but the groove and soul has been missed lately, need to keep the heads noddong imo
 
riisu does raise some valid points... but at the end of the day (for me anyway), drum and bass is an evolutionary music (not just specific to dnb i might add) ie the tunes keep on coming, and the sets grow with it.. so what was top of your box a month ago, is now in the middle/trailing off section and eventualy only get brought out for special mixes... hope that made sense, i am lean as a motherfucker!

this is the way i like the 'scene' to be aswell... I'm always on the hunt for that next big one!

and in answer to the actual question, no, it doesn't matter if your a one hit wonder or can orchestrate a beautifully composed album... if your tunes a banger, it's bound to get label interst!

/rant
 
I think to make it as an artist these days you can't be a one hit wonder. Riisu words are wise, and I do believe yltht hospital are at the forefront of this revolution. They attract new audiences aswell as keeping the old ones especially with tunes like warehouse and 88mph, if u think these tune are being played by spectrasoul for example and on the other side of the coon uve got dj Escape rinsing the Netsky tunes! Which at the end of the day it all boils down to the management of the artists, and chris and tony down at hospital know what they are doing with the calibre of artists in their rooster

Disagree, not 100% but didn't Interface come completely out of the blue with 'Get Lo'? And i know a hell of a lot of DJ's with that in their bag! Good to see he has followed it up eventually though with Bright Lights!
 
I would say that, these days. It's hard to get just one tune released.

better a double sided rather than one artist on one side and another on the flip.

Even with digital labels too.

might be wrong tho
 
Disagree, not 100% but didn't Interface come completely out of the blue with 'Get Lo'? And i know a hell of a lot of DJ's with that in their bag! Good to see he has followed it up eventually though with Bright Lights!

Nah interface dud a collab with die first, and has a few more lined up.
 
i fuckin hope its still tune focused cos i havent got an albums worth of material ready yet!!!
 
well .... i would say bits of bolth . but if i had to lean one way id say tune . all though i have seen the album kinda take over in the past year or so . but the love thats put in to just one dub plate to be thrown out in the world is what its about if you produce dnb i think no matter how big you are you need to put out dubs all the time , an album should be like a bigger scale thing or just more flash put in to it cuz shit on a album with 12 tunes we all know we will only drop a hand full off the album and the rest are kinda there to make up the album. i think making release with 2 tunes a side and a flip side is more the root of this whole thing. not that the album releases are not important it just seems that if it turned in to all ways being a album thing we would not have the joy of digging for good dubs. some cats aint got no album but they got 4 or 5 tracks out that fucking bang. i guess we are forced to move with the times but its got to be about the tune and after all if a tune dose good on a album it can be released as a single and still sell cuz people want that dub you know the single . so i think i will all ways be about the tune but as a producer i think a album can only help you push you tunes.

dont stop making tunes dubs make the world turn .... but you gotta make a album from time to time to keep with the time

LONG LIVE DRUM&BASS MUSIC
SICKorWELL

America sucks every time some one asks what kinda music i do , i say DRUM&BASS LIFES MUSIC , and they say o i use to play the drums.. LOL!!
 
interface had that typhoon thing long before get lo (was a banger aswell, played by roni size and released on chronic..) and netsky just turned 20.

just my little corrections. apart from that. good thread, although i think that not that much has changed, apart from the diversification of drum and bass which cumulated in more albums being released because you can now do a "cohesive" album in a better way - ie more different styles of music with dubstep and house threwn in aswell - than lets say back in 2001.
 
Hospital have been focused on albums for a while now, but thats just the way they manage and package their artists' output.

Having said that, any tune which raises eyebrows will still draw attention from the scene if it is good enough. There have been plenty of one-hit wonders out there...
 
drum and bass will always be tune based due to its nature as tunes are usually heard at a dance and spread by word of mouth. on a different note has anyone noticed that a lot of songs have nothing about them whatsoever and need a bit of heart involved (proper generalising there)
 
Disagree, not 100% but didn't Interface come completely out of the blue with 'Get Lo'? And i know a hell of a lot of DJ's with that in their bag! Good to see he has followed it up eventually though with Bright Lights!


Yeah but then again.. i bet you interface has made quite a few tunes that he has sent out. but there not really known to the public. but they gradually given him some attention and reputation before he came up with get lo..

---------- Post added at 12:38 ---------- Previous post was at 12:16 ----------

interface did a tune with die on his 'skate or die' ep. also, netsky is 13? wtf?


naa, hes like 18 or summin..??
 
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