best big beat song ever poll

"diesel power"

something else as if

something else though they're both classic material.

a lot else as if

would have agreed with the general sentiment if it had been a three-way: no "breathe"??? surely that has to be on the same level as the aforementioned; if not that, then firestarter (i prefer breathe but thats just me)

and that something is "Battleflag" by Lo-Fi All Stars

TS: "Rockefeller Skank" by Fatboy Slim VERSUS "Block Rockin' Beats" by the Chemical Brothers

man, i even posted in that thread.

where is my mind?

can never find an mp3 of this superior mix of 'Rocco' >:[

also why can i watch other DIV videos but not the best one ('Dirt') ffs

Rocco, Dirt, and Rematerialised have had some outings round my house of late.

Um, Battleflag gets another vote.

And another

Coldcut's More Beats & Pieces

I'm not sure if "Crash and Burn" by Eat Static counts as big beat (I think it does), but it's my favourite. And "Right Here Right Now" is indeed better than "Rockafeller Skank".

another nudge battleflag please.
thanks.

Preferred Vision Incision at the time but will happily give Battleflag another vote.

There was a Wiseguys song that wasn't Ooh La La that I really liked at the time but I don't really have any intention of tracking it down and re-assessing.

DJ Touche is now Fake Blood btw

I vote Shaolin Buddha Finger, but is that proto-Big Beat?

If not allowed then Santa Cruz. Or maybe What's That Sound?

Shaolin Buddha Finger came out in 94, right? No-one had called anything 'big beat' at that point afaik so I don't think it's legit rilly

which begs the question of what it was being called - The Aloof's 'Society' is from '94 too and fits Big Beat description almost to a tee

oh shit how the hell did I forget about "Battle Flag"

god the wikip page is so badly written (i know, what's new)

lol Youtube:

Underrated antique techno by Low Fidelity Allstars - Battleflag

http://www.discogs.com/viewimages?release=241611

I loved this tape!

which begs the question of what it was being called

There were some terrible names! amyl-house! brit-hop! (but they came later too, I think)

http://www.discogs.com/image/R-241611-1094570148.jpg

Hmmm. Some weird thing going on with that image.

I mean this tape: http://www.discogs.com/Various-Xmas-Dust-Up/release/241611

i think it's legit to call 94 dust brothers ish big beat.

everyone repping for Battle Flag completely OTM

Ha, the Wiseguys song I mentioned earlier appearing on Football Focus. Start the Commotion. Didn't realise it was on adverts and Zoolander and stuff as well. Clearly not as good as Battleflag.

More of the "this still sounds quite good after not listening to it for at least eight years":

Also I think that video is proof that something was seriously wrong with the music industry in the early '00s.

gpwm

second BRA album badly showed the signs of being delayed by record co and subsequently fiddled over for two years (that video's awesomeness aside), first is still impeccable

(second video was lol too)

NOTHING WILL EVER BEAT THIS!!

No, this is the shit!

Eat Static - Mondo a Go-Go!

(Couldn't find it on Youtube.)

Hardfloor also did some nice 303-flavoured big beat under the alias Da Damn Phreak Noize Phunk:

The album this is from (Electric Crate Digger) is totally dope.

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Rasmus - 'Mass Hysteria' and Aleem 'Why Hawaii' are ace.

These two have mostly been better when they have been a bit less big beat and more generally electronica.

The best big beat song ever would be "Bentley's Gonna Sort You Out" by Bentley Rhythm Ace. Also love "Poison", which IMO, is Prodigy's best moment.

The Prodigy were never Big Beat. Althoguh I do like that Bentley's track a lot.

And props to Mighty Dub Katz. "Magic Carpet Ride" is IMO perhaps better than any of Fatboy Slim's singles. Great cartoon video too.

Does that PF Project thing with samples of Ewan McGregor count as big beat? In which case that is what I'd vote for.

"Choose Life" ? The Trainspotting thing?

dunno.

The Prodigy were never Big Beat.

Really? I thought they pretty much went big beat with Fat of the Land.

And I would say they already did with some of the "Jilted Generation" tracks, such as "Poison" and "Voodoo People". "One Love" and "No Good (Start The Dance)" are obviously more rave than big beat, but that album was kind of transitional, and some of the more famous songs were moving away from rave and closer to big beat.

Big beat didn't really exist in 1994 though. But I do agree that Poison was kind of a proto big beat tune.

prodigy not exactly big beat but pretty big similarities in 'poison', the method man remix, and a few things on 'fat of the land' (by which time big beat was just about played out).

it's partly about where the acts positioned themselves. prodigy were already huge when they did 'poison' and had nothing to do with the heavenly social or any of the big beat labels.

'official' big beat starts, i guess, in '94 with the dust/chemical brothers remixes + 'chemical beats' and the start of the heavenly social. not sure when the name 'big beat' happened, probably in '95 or '96.

Interestingly, Chemicals have probably moved away further from their big beat roots than most of those other names. Already by their third album, they ditched the breakbeats, replaced them with straight 4/4, and also started using softer synth sounds to an increasing extent.

The thing with big beat is that all the stuff that defined it before it had a name (or it had a rubbish name like "amyl house") - early Chems singles, Poison, Depth Charge's Shaolin Buddha Finger, Leftfield's Inspection Check One - is great and almost everything made once it was codified as "big beat" (apart from the key Fatboy singles) was terrible. You could say the same about trip hop - never as good as when nobody knew what to call it.

Sure. It's important to remember that not all British electronic music 94-96 was Big Beat, same as "electronica" doesn't refer to British electronic music 94-96. Big Beat was, as far as I remember, just a term to describe stuff on Skint records - flimsy indie-dance with an emphasis on comedy noises and loop-breaks - kind of like baggy but less drugs and less vocals going on. I remember the Chems early stuff being placed under Trip Hop (but then the term Big Beat hadn't really taken off yet).

skint, wall of sound, concrete (iirc), some JBO + some heavenly

"as if" aka battleflag

no band is ever one genre btw guys

early Chems tracks like the original 'One Too Many Mornings', 'I'll Kling To You...' and 'Chico's Groove' would've fit the vague trip-hop label reasonably well at the time. still working on that 'pre-95 proto big beat' primer tho...

strongly disagree that there was no good Big Beat once the term was coined. how can you say that but then cite a couple of Fatboy tracks as the exception?

No one else here is freaked out by Geir talking sensibly about evil dance music?

he's not though.

I'm convinced that Trip Hop (as shorthand for Trance Hip Hop) was *coined* to describe the Chemical Bros, (then Dust Bros) in, maybe, the Melody Maker, and that it gradually then got used with a different meaning for first Mo Wax then Portishead et al.

But my timelines and memory may be wrong.

The Dust Brothers also got called Balearic (lol), although for eclectic DJing, not records.

I'm convinced that Trip Hop (as shorthand for Trance Hip Hop) was *coined* to describe the Chemical Bros, (then Dust Bros) in, maybe, the Melody Maker, and that it gradually then got used with a different meaning for first Mo Wax then Portishead et al.

this rings a bell. what was probably the first record with 'trip hop' in the title questioned the usefulness of the term:

http://www.discogs.com/Various-This-Aint-Trip-Hop-Part-One/release/50386

wiki say not though:

The term "Trip hop" was coined by music journalist Andy Pemberton in the UK magazine Mixmag [in 1994] to describe the hip hop instrumental "In/Flux", a 1993 single by DJ Shadow, and other similar tracks released on the Mo' Wax label and being played in London clubs at the time. "In/Flux", with its mixed up bpms, spoken word samples, strings, melodies, bizarre noises, prominent bass, and slow beats, gave the listener the impression they were on a musical trip, according to Pemberton.[5] James Brendall termed the experience of trip-hop with the combination of "computers and dope".

OK - so the article I'm misremembering was probably an abuse of the term, with confusion about its derivation. Anyway, it was used to describe a pretty loose set of acts/tracks.

What did people call Massive Attack around the first album, as it's the blueprint for coffee-table Trip Hop? I can't remember.

Stereo MCs invented trip-hop with 'Chicken Shake' lol

Chems have always done 4/4 and breaks stuff side by side really, for all the talk of them going Gatecrasher-trance for the third LP (they still came back with things like 'Galvanise' so whatever)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2008/apr/09/bigbeat

^^ missed this from the midfield general

"strongly disagree that there was no good Big Beat once the term was coined. how can you say that but then cite a couple of Fatboy tracks as the exception?"

Precisely because they're the exception. Fatboy established a template which became boorish and cliched when people copied it. Big beat only took off as a label in 97 (although BB Boutique existed before then) and nothing good came of it after 98 so it's a fair comment. The Lo-Fi's are the other big exception. Good stuff far outweighed by crud on Freskanova, Bolshi, FC Kahuna, etc

Pre-95, proto-big beat primer - Poison, Shaolin Buddha Finger, MBM's Radio Babylon/Mars Needs Women, Selectah's Wede Man, Sabres of Paradise's Tow Truck, various early Chems remixes (incl Packet of Peace, Jailbird, Voodoo People), Mekon's Phatty's Lunchbox, Coldcut's Beats & Pieces.

yeah i'd include The Aloof 'Society', Monkey Mafia 'Blow The Whole Joint Up' (discogs says '94 so), maybe even Air Liquide's 'Stratus Static' and that Leftfield mix of 'Renegade Sounwave'

plus Fila Brazillia 'Pots And Pans'

Definitely - didn't realise the Monkey Mafia single was pre-95. Also Weatherall's MBV remix and, by extension, Westbam's Alarm Clock. And Artery's fantastic The Dollar.

wiki's wrong about trip hop - it was used before that in the independent to describe stuff like de la soul. jonathan taylor, july 11 1989:

"The redeeming features of last year's summer of Acid-House were that it generated energy and ideas for both the fashion and the music industry: from the omnipresent fluorescent clothing to the 'trip-hop' sound, ethos and indeed morals of bands such as De La Soul, Redhead and The Jungle Brothers."

'blow the whole joint up' was only properly out in 95, presumably on white label earlier. 'the dollar' was 94 i think.

in my recollection, DJ magazine did a big feature early in 96 circa 'brit hop and amyl house' and by then 'big beat' was the name people used. there were blatantly some primo tracks issued after that! and not just by fatboy slim.

probably something good by freddy fresh before '95 also

post '96 big beat faves:
propellerheads - big dog
howie b - angels go bald: too
b.r.a. - bentley's gonna sort you out
sir drew - let's get some girls
death in vegas - opium shuffle (monkey mafia mix)
atletico borough upstters - take it back
coldcut - more beats and pieces
deejay punk roc - dead husband
prodigy - mindfields (headrock dub)
depth charge - blue lipps (sounds more like something from 'super discount' tho)
lo-fis - battle flag
freddy fresh - c'mon
freddy fresh - chupacabbra (bassbin twins mix)
death in vegas - rocco (sing for a drink mix)
super_collider - darn cold way o' lovin (harvey collision course mix)
amon tobin - sordid
sparky lighbourne - where are you goin chicken
superdense-child - project arthur
deadly avenger - charlie don't surf

Ah well, that's my memory deceiving me then. I remember doing a sidebar on the "Social Sound" for a Chems feature in spring 97 and I thought that "big beat" wasn't established then. If we're talking early 96 instead then yes, some brilliant stuff was still to come, not least Block Rockin' Beats. My point is just that the joy of big beat - the catholicity, the anti-purist stance, the sense of surprise - dissipated once a formula became established.

that happens with pretty much everything. i wonder if one reason big beat is easy target for some is because it doesn't have a credible black roots angle for people unlike pretty much every previous dance trend in the UK with the exception of trance (also much-derided, psy or otherwise) the bullshit IDM tag (obv loads of good stuff labelled as such tho), even if the influences are often (but not always) clearly there in the funk break samples and whatnot (maybe it seemed more 'exploitative' on this basis but i don't remember that ever being a conscious objection). not a provable theory so easy to disregard but makes me think anyway.

I'll buy that. It was dubbed "student music", which is the kiss of death. It wasn't sexy, it wasn't "pure", rock fans liked it, and it had no subversive qualities whatsoever. Also, the bad stuff was actively annoying whereas bad house, techno, garage, etc, is usually just dull. But the Social and Boutique still provided me with most of my favourite clubbing memories so what the hell - I'll just remember the good stuff.

i wonder if one reason big beat is easy target for some is because it doesn't have a credible black roots angle

that's how people perceived it anyway. i always thought of monkey mafia as one of the major big beat acts and it's hardly true of their shit, or of jon carter as a dj.

Buddy Holly, Ben Hur, Space Monkey, Mafia

i like to imagine 'space monkey mafia' is one thing

― and what, Wednesday, October 31, 2007 3:26 PM Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

i always thought of monkey mafia as one of the major big beat acts and it's hardly true of their shit, or of jon carter as a dj.

yeah true lol how could i forget 'work mi body'

iirc carter was a studio engineer on loads of jungle? anyway 'work mi body' is a freaking classic.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

justice