The first rule of soundcloud.com is to share and share alike. The website is one of the leading places on the Internet for musicians, both bedroom-composing and world-touring, to present their music, to make it available for download (free or purchase), and to comment on each other’s work. The service has proven especially popular with musicians whose music is electronic to begin with, among them Banyek, a Hungarian who put together the Dubstep Is Fun collection written about here earlier this year (disquiet.com). Banyek’s own dubstep emphasizes the former over the latter, the heavy, echoed influence of “dub” over the dance-ready “step.” Case in point is his recently uploaded “Mr. Durden,” a dense molasses-thick dub that makes monotony deliriously attractive. With the exception of two relatively brief breaks, it barely moves from its starting place, a slowly rotating beat that lumbers with a cartoon malevolence:
Original track at soundcloud.com/banyek314. More on Banyek at myspace.com/banyek. More on the Dubstep Is Fun series at bitlabrecords.com/dubstepisfun.
Feels like dubstep is the most popular genre right now on soundcloud… at least according to my subjective view of things… not that I don’t like it. In fact I find the linked song pretty interesting in it’s radical approach to monotony (as you have already noted).
Reminds me very much of work by Scorn…which, of course, predates the term “dubstep” by a good 10 years. Good stuff.
Just for fun…here’s a track exploring monotony in similar ways that I originally recorded back in 2000 or so…even heavier emphasis on the dub…perhaps no step at all…
http://aboombong.bandcamp.com/track/a
And if you are interested…this one has some “step” in it.
http://aboombong.bandcamp.com/track/aboo
Dubstep really is a major force on soundcloud.com currently. I say this too often, and to no avail, but it’s unfortunate that genre tags aren’t (yet) linkable on that service; seems like a natural for something like soundcloud. This song does stand out for its approach — it trusts in the patience of the listener, and feels comfortable being emotionally rather than just seeming emotionally remote.
Scorn is a good comparison. It’s probably just a matter of taste, but the dubstep I listen to the most could easily have been called “illbient” once upon a time.
Good work. @Marc: True, Soundcloud should have genre tag links.
My own quite different electronic music, which should appeal to readers of this website, can be hear at Soundcloud as well: http://soundcloud.com/encym Would love to hear what you think!
Indeed…Illbient was the term …a good chunk of my purchasing described itself that way.