Drum and bass is a genre of electronic dance music characterised by fast breakbeats with heavy bass and sub-bass lines, samples, and synthesizers. The genre grew out of the UK's jungle scene in the 1990s.
Breakbeat hardcore is a music genre that spawned from the UK rave scene during the early 1990s. It combines four-on-the-floor rhythms with breakbeats usually sampled from hip hop. In addition to the inclusion of breakbeats, the genre also features shuffled drum machine patterns, hoover, and other noises originating from new beat and Belgian techno, sounds from acid house and bleep techno, and often upbeat house piano riffs and vocals.
Jungle is a genre of electronic music that developed out of the UK rave scene and sound system culture in the 1990s. Emerging from breakbeat hardcore, the style is characterised by rapid breakbeats, heavily syncopated percussive loops, samples, and synthesised effects, combined with the deep basslines, melodies, and vocal samples found in dub, reggae and dancehall, as well as hip hop and funk. Many producers frequently sampled the "Amen break" or other breakbeats from funk and jazz recordings. Jungle was a direct precursor to the drum and bass genre which emerged in the mid-1990s.
Ambient techno is a subgenre of techno that incorporates the atmospheric textures of ambient music with the rhythmic elements and production of techno. It was pioneered by 1990s electronic artists such as Aphex Twin, Carl Craig, The Orb, The Future Sound of London, the Black Dog, Pete Namlook and Biosphere.
Breakcore is a style and microgenre of electronic dance music that emerged from jungle, hardcore, and drum and bass in the mid-to-late 1990s. It is characterized by very complex and intricate breakbeats and a wide palette of sampling sources played at high tempos.
Hardcore is a genre of electronic dance music that originated in the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany in the early 1990s. It is distinguished by faster tempos and a distorted sawtooth kick, the intensity of the kicks and the synthesized bass, the rhythm and the atmosphere of the themes, the usage of saturation and experimentation close to that of industrial dance music. It would spawn subgenres such as gabber.
4hero are an electronic music group from Dollis Hill, London, comprising producers Mark "Marc Mac" Clair & Denis "Dego" McFarlane. While the band is often cited as 4 Hero or 4-Hero, the name is stylised as 4hero on their albums and website. 4hero are known for being pioneers of breakbeat hardcore, jungle/drum and bass, broken beat and nu jazz music.
Techstep is a dark subgenre of drum and bass that was created in the mid-1990s.
Suburban Base Records is a British breakbeat hardcore, rave and jungle/drum and bass record label. It is based in Romford, Havering, England. It was established by Danny Donnelly and operated in the UK from 1990 to 1997 and in the United States from 1994 to 1997, however, started to release again in 2014.
Darkcore is a music subgenre of breakbeat hardcore in the UK rave scene, that emerged from late 1992. It is recognised as being one of the direct precursors of the genre now known as drum and bass.
Drum and bass is an electronic music genre that originated in the UK rave scene having developed from breakbeat hardcore. The genre would go on to become one of the most popular genres of electronic dance music, becoming international and spawning multiple different derivatives and subgenres.
Don FM was a 1990s London pirate radio station, influential in the development of breakbeat hardcore, jungle and drum and bass music. It was the first jungle pirate station granted a temporary legal license.
Drill 'n' bass is a subgenre of drum and bass which developed in the mid-1990s as IDM artists began experimenting with elements of breakbeat, jungle, and drum and bass music. Artists utilized powerful audio software programs and deployed frenzied, irregular beats that often discouraged dancing. The style was often interpreted as having a lightly parodic relationship with the dance styles that inspired it.
UK garage, abbreviated as UKG, is a genre of electronic dance music which originated in England in the early to mid-1990s. The genre was most clearly inspired by jungle, but also incorporates elements from dance-pop and R&B. It is defined by percussive, shuffled rhythms with syncopated hi-hats, cymbals, and snares, and may include either 4/4 house kick patterns or more irregular "2-step" rhythms. Garage tracks also commonly feature 'chopped up' and time-stretched or pitch-shifted vocal samples complementing the underlying rhythmic structure at a tempo usually around 130 BPM.
Energy Flash: A Journey Through Rave Music and Dance Culture is a book by English music journalist Simon Reynolds which chronicles the development of dance and rave music from the mid 1980s to the early 2000s. The book was published in the United States under the title Generation Ecstasy: Into the World of Techno and Rave Culture.
Ben Settle, known by the stage name Ed Rush, is a drum and bass producer and DJ. Rush has been releasing records since 1992 primarily with Optical, his musical partner since 1997. Along with Optical, he is also the co-founder of the record label Virus Recordings, which releases his records along with other drum and bass acts. He is most associated with the aggressive styles of drum and bass music known as techstep, darkcore and neurofunk.
Happy 2b Hardcore is a DJ mix album by Canadian DJ Anabolic Frolic. It was released in 1997 on American breakbeat label Moonshine Music and is the first series in Frolic's Happy 2b Hardcore series of DJ mix albums, documenting the emergence of happy hardcore music in the United Kingdom and Europe. The series itself is a spin-off of Moonshine's Speed Limit 140 BPM+ series of fast-tempo dance music compilations. The album was conceived to introduce American audiences to happy hardcore, and contains sixteen of the genre's anthems which carry many of happy hardcore's defining characteristics, such as fast tempo, frantic breakbeats, major key tonality, off-kilter, quirky keyboard effects and "semi-melodies."
Matt Quinn, known by his stage name Optical, is a British musician, producer and DJ. He is co-founder and owner of Virus Recordings, a widely regarded drum and bass record label. He is best known as one half of drum and bass duo Ed Rush and Optical, whose debut album Wormhole has been described as one of the most significant LPs of the drum and bass genre. He is also the brother of Jamie Quinn also known as Matrix.
Noise Factory were an English breakbeat hardcore and jungle group active in the early 1990s. The group is credited as being pivotal in the transition between hardcore and jungle music.
Belgian hardcore techno is an early style of hardcore techno that emerged from new beat as EBM and techno influences became more prevalent in this genre. This particular style has been described as an "apocalyptic, almost Wagnerian, bombastic techno", due to its use of dramatic orchestral stabs and menacing synth tones that set it apart from earlier forms of electronic dance music. It flourished in Belgium and influenced the sound of early hardcore from Netherlands, Germany, Italy, UK and North America during the early-1990s, as a part of the rave movement during that period.
