Beyond London: Jungle and Hardcore Up North

Jungle and hardcore music is constantly relayed back to the country’s capital.

Breakbeat anthems from the early to mid 90s glorify its London-centric roots, from Bodysnatch’s exclusive offering to the city, ‘Euphony [just for you London]’ to FOI [Family of Intelligence] and Fusion’s track, ‘Treat all girls right’ — which proudly explains, ‘Big tings a gwaan a London, ya know’.

More overtly, many of the biggest labels from the golden era were based in London or Essex, including those who successfully reached mainstream listeners such as ‘Suburban Base’, ‘Shut up and Dance’ and ‘XL recordings’ [an offshoot of the Beggars Banquet label]. Yet, throughout the 90s, jungle and hardcore raves were happening all the way up the country from the Midlands across Birmingham, Nottingham and Leicester, to further afield Northern cities of Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool. So how important were other cities in its development? Where does the North fit in?

As someone who wasn’t born until 1990 and missed out on raving in this period, I have always wanted to dig deep into how things were during these seminal years.

THE MIDLANDS

A good starting point might be the unlikely town of Leicester, where DJ ‘SS’ founded seminal hardcore/jungle tekno imprint, ‘Formation’, a label which still has a firm footprint in jungle’s more obvious history with the instantly recognisable loved/hated anthem, ‘The Lighter’. Part of the Formation roster was local DJ ‘Mastersafe’ who released on the label and was a host on local pirate station, ‘Fresh FM’.

It was also from Leicester where legendary underground DJ ‘XTC’ hailed before his eventual move to Nottingham — known for his high impact club sets, turntablism and infamously rare Barrington Levy remix release on Greensleeves*. Alongside him in Notts there was Joe Shotter [1 half of ‘Nebula 2’] who’s seminal track, ‘Atheama’ humbly released on the Eastwood based ‘J4M records’ was snapped up by ‘Reinforced’ [allegedly, not completely fairly-but I’ll save that story for now!].

Major influences on the nationwide scene were predominantly coming from record shops, pirate radio and raves -of which the Midlands had many.

‘Que club’ [which still operates today] in Birmingham was home to big raves such as ‘Obsession’ and ‘Quest’, Coventry had the legendary ‘Eclipse’ [and formative artists Neil Trix/FBD project] and Nottingham had the ‘Marcus Garvey Ballroom’ running nights from the infamous ‘Bush Doctor Promotions’. There was also Kemet FM in Nottingham-who’s owner, Andrew Campbell was a major part of distribution for the early 90s sound on vinyl across the country.

According to many the Midlands ‘“bubble” was predominantly the hardcore sound, however, since the Midlands is neither North or South, it requires further travels North to continue the investigation.

[*sub story about this release and the legend of DJ XTC coming soon!]

THE NORTH

Where in 91–95 the Midlands was popping off with all styles of rave music; up North, many people have mentioned a notable desire for the more “ravey and happy” take on hardcore/jungle in contrast to the dark and fast breakbeats typical of the London ‘Jungle’ sound.

Of course, Manchester in the years prior was known for the emergence of Acid House and Balaeric through the Hacienda and later Sankeys [Soap] — both of which dipped their toes into hardcore and jungle but abruptly cut things short due to the alleged threat of violence.

One fundamental early producer who managed bridge this gap was, ‘A Guy called Gerald’. Whilst his most familiar tracks might be closer associated with early Acid house and Techno, his ‘Juicebox’ label showcased more breakbeat-focused tracks — most notably ’28 Gun Badboy’ and the killer ‘Ses makes you wise’. Incidentally, A Guy called Gerald also co-ran a label in 1994/95 called ‘Celestial records’ alongside Nebula II which, when jungle was thriving, chose to divert into the realms of Hard trance, Acid Trance and Goa.

Shelley’s Laserdome in Stoke-on-Trent also stuck out a solid 2 years in the earlys 90s rave scene and linked up the overflow from Birmingham promoters and Manchester post-Hacienda ravers in a series of legendary parties [including Altern8 filming a music video in the car park causing absolute carnage]. Without a doubt the “Madchester” era of clubbing created an appetite in the North for more loved-up rave music and melodic forms of jungle and hardcore rather than the stripped back darker beats.

But, on the other side of the coin, in Leeds, Huddersfield and beyond there were labels such as ‘Back to Basics’, ‘Flex records’ and renowned artists like ‘Darkman’, ‘Mark XTC’ and ‘Marcus Intallex’ who were largely pushing more stylistically “jungle” music in regards to what was coming out of London.

Perhaps worth noting, is Scotland’s lack of interest in jungle and hardcore as something distinctively ‘English’. Instead the Scots developed more of an appetite for “Bouncey” techno/hardcore with influence from early hardcore and gabba but with a much lesser focus on rolling breaks. Perhaps the taste for this particular sound is something that filtered down to some of the Northernmost regions of England.

— — — — — —

After 1995 everything became [mostly] dispersed again in terms of rave music. Jungle became a gimmicky add-on to the more commercial and refined new-school ‘Drum and Bass’ sound [to which it still remains in many respects] and hardcore became ‘happy’, ‘bouncy’ or another mutated form distinctly different to the early breakbeat era. Before anyone could reflect on things in detail, it had passed.

Yet, in the last 3–5 years things have started to flourish again and the North/South influence remains an interesting question.

In Sheffield you have one of the most influential jungle labels of recent times, ‘Green Bay Wax’-sprouting off-shoot producers who have become prolific in their own right; Tim Reaper, Percussive P and Phineus II but to name a few.

Huddersfield is also upholding a very important part in the scene, with labels ‘Supercharger’ and ‘Hypercharger’ — pushing everything from modern tearin’ ragga jungle to early breakbeat hardcore. Leeds has a thriving jungle/hardcore rep too, with regular events including ‘West Yorkshire Jungle Collective’, ‘License to Jungle’ and ‘Jungle Jam’ at established venues across the city.

Ultimately, there’s definite truth in London being the heart of jungle and hardcore— purely for the high concentration of the artists, labels and music coming from the city. It’s likely large-scale events like Notting Hill Carnival in the early 90s helped generate this cultural significance too [especially when you consider Lennie De Ice’s track, ‘Carnival 93’ being used exclusively as a backing track on the official radio and TV adverts].

Regardless, the North and Midlands undeniably formed important pockets of activity outside the capital city and arguably were just as influential on the ultimate sound. But — try as we might in our investigation, a defined answer to this longing question, is like navigating our way through… jungle.

Special thanks to Joe Shotter [Nebula 2] and ‘Long live beautifully crafted jungle’ members for additional information/references.