ALWAYS EVERYTHING

A HESSLE HISTORY

Tonight Bristol’s most on point, club-destroying collective is playing host to one of UK bass music’s most beguiling labels: a ship-sinking Hessle Audio hook up on the Thekla courtesy of Crazylegs. The combination of Untold, James Blake, Ramadanman, Ben UFO and Pangaea probably make this the party of the summer, if not the year thus far (well, until Crazylegs unveil details of their next party.. all I’m saying is DJ EZ..). For those not yet down with the label, an Always Everything trip through Hessle history and beyond..

Formed on the inconspicuous Hessle Avenue- the Hyde Park base of operations for their time at Leeds University- David “Ramadanman” Kennedy, “Ben UFO” Thomson and Kev “Pangaea” McAuley set the wheels in motion for one of dubstep’s most world conquering labels with a scant £300 investment a piece. Fast forward to today and some of the most prominent dancefloor narratives of the last two years come via their now well established penchant for percussive muscle and tunnel vision selections from bass music’s outer limits. Always Everything co-editor Rory continues to push the idea that in the future their idiosyncratic sound will simply be known as “Hessle music” which, far from being a catchy slogan, describes their unique position in the UK dance music scene pretty concisely. Pulled for by figures as far flung as techno don Ricardo Villalobos and pushing the boundaries of what can burn up a ‘floor with every release, Hessle steady rise throughout the last three years has been one of the most satisfying in bass music.

TRG // Put You Down [2007 Hessle Audio]

But taking it back to the beginning, it was the debut release from TRG that launched the label in 2007. Arranged in part by the exchange of messages on former scene hub (now wobble dystopia) Dubstep Forum, TRG sent across Put You Down and Broken Heart to be played on the trio’s Sub.FM show, Ruffage Sessions. Now defunct (but happily replaced by a Hessle slot on Rinse), the ten best sets are archived >here<. I recommend the second birthday show featuring Night Slugs boss Bok Bok, badman DJ extrordinaire Oneman, Blunted Robots CEO Brackles and newest signing Elgato. The slick double header resurrected UK Garage on a devastingly weighty, sombre tip, hijacking a Detroit-esque middle distance stare to augment the vintage grooves. Vitally, this was at a time when very few could escape the pull of cavernous half step. This wasn’t just a minor flirtation for the label either. With Pangaea’s opening salvo of Coiled/Nest/Deviant following, Hessle set out a firm statement of intent to salvage the rhythm patterns of UKG from a Craig David grave. This time round things were different though. The beats still pulsed and swung, but in quasi-robotic way; armour plated and metallic. Six Million Dollar Man style, Garage had been rebuilt: stronger this time, bolstered by new technology and futuristic circuitry that could defy a So Soild-soundtracked shanking. Culminating in Pangaea’s gargantuan Memories white label, the Hessle crew were instrumental in the resurgence of UK Garage. Ben UFO’s incomparable DJ chops have set him up as something as a UKG foot soldier: in the same style as Oneman, Ben bolsters his impossibly tight sets with a hefty proportion long slept on rolling 2 Step.

Pangaea // Memories [2009 White]

Comparing and contrasting these 12”s with some present day “future” garage suggests that perhaps the bold marketing that propels strains of the 2010 movement masks the fact that a couple of steps have been taken backwards in certain corners. That TRG record would find itself having a second wind the next year with an exquisite remix 12”.  HES 004 contains what should certainly go down as one of the finest moments of dubstep’s lifespan: Martyn’s incredible Broken Heart Remix. Quite rightly an anthem on arrival, Martyn stretched the sorrow implicit in the original to breaking point, creating one of the most well realised of 2008’s techno x dubstep hybrids.

TRG // Broken Heart (Martyn’s DCM Remix) [2008 Hessle Audio]

And TRG and Pangaea weren’t the only ones to have their first outing on Hessle. Untold, the man who cut an eski shaped path through 2009, was unearthed by the Hessle boys for a triple header of mongrel bass abstractions long before he started playing with old Musical Mob and Wiley instrumentals. Unlike later work, the Test Signal 12” was far from functional, full of dizzyingly long bass drops and Peverelist-style rhythmic tics. Purify married squelchy acid bass to insane tribal shapes, featuring galloping Karizma rhythms that have to double back on themselves lest they fall of the rhythm grid. Although he’s honed his inimitable dance floor destroying style to a fine point now, listening to the prototypes is pretty fascinating. None so much than follow up Hessle plate Anaconda, a 12” I’ve written about so many times over the last year and a half its hard to produce new permutations of my love for it: particularly given how minimal yet morish the track is. Ruling 2009 bass music and turning up as far as the crate of Italian nonsense-mongers Crookers, the track’s ridiculous bass drops, dying elephants and disjointed, ritualistic riddim conjured up WTFs that quickly subsided into intense dancefloor destruction. Like pulling Wiley’s Ice Rink into the jungle (lower and upper case ”j”), the track was (and still is) unlike anything else anyone was doing: the Hessle magic pulling another anthem from the unlikeliest of places.

Untold // Anaconda [2009 Hessle Audio]

At this point the label was pretty firmly established as an outlet for some of the most innovative and compelling dubstep mutations, and its only natural that one character would rise to embody that personality in his productions: Ramadanman. If 2010 has belonged to any one artist, its undoubtably David Kennedy; and considering the fecundity of the musical landscape right now, that’s no small praise. Utilising a rhythmic prowess utterly unmatched anywhere else in dance music, Ramadanman’s productions exist at an amazing nexus point between everything good in house, techno, dubstep, juke, grime, hardcore and more. And these aren’t obvious headnods to particular signifiers either, the power and structures of each are abstracted away and absorbed into a totally unique new whole. 2010 club anthem Work Them changes at every angle you look at it: is it a love letter to Chicago juke? A blistering techno blitzkrieg? An overdue Bmore banger? And what about those emotive synths that enter at the half way point? The skittering drum patterns are obscenely complex, but not as a sexless, chin stroking IDM workout: this is music to get down to, music to sweat to. Throughout the year Ramadanman records have weaved in and out of different dance music narratives with staggering ease. Whether its the breaksy junglist energy peaking out of the Ramadanman EP, the heady, Swamp 81-allying 808 work on Glut or the sheer indefinability-through-reference Fall Short rides on, the productions sound 100% floor ready and 100% David Kennedy. 

Ramadanman // Work Them [Swamp 81]

Whilst earlier work wasn’t quite as effective, it did heavily lay out the template for Hessle A&R: unusually rhythmic and sub heavy dance music that lies just out of scenes. It was Ramadanman’s Blimey that the aforementioned Villalobos pulled for to open his 2008 sets, and further work under the Pearson Sound alias further blurred the boundaries and made more pronounced the awe-inspiring percussive might Hessle is now renown for.

Joe // Rut [2009 Hessle Audio]

This has been solidified by releases from two unknowns - Hessle seems to effortlessly pluck these guys from thin air - Joe and Blawan. The first Joe 12” was a revelation when it dropped, one that has seen imitation from all corners of the Funky & Grime liberated, ultra-rhythmic mini scenes splintering out of dubstep. Showcasing exactly how much character you can coerce out of minimal parts, both sides were drum pattern masterclasses and deceptively sub heavy. Established rhythmic tropes had holes punched out of them until they became so abstract as to erase all lineage; Todd Edwards vocals, a natural swing and weighty low end the only hints to what came before.

Blawan // Fram [2010 Hessle Audio]

The Blawan 12” goes one better, taking the label full circle back to release No. 1 whilst embodying the awe-inspiring power Ramadanman unlocked. Centred around the most gnarled 2-step beat imaginable, Fram’s acrid synths and paranoid whispers combine to create an unholily claustrophobic inversion of all of UKG’s core values, whilst, amazingly, embodying its best swing unlike anything else on the label to date. 

If we’re going to talk about newcomers though, there’s one name that’s been conspicuously absent thus far: peerless man of the moment James Blake. If there’s anybody related to the Hessle camp that’s going to go overground in a dramatic way, Blake’s the man. Its barely been 12 months and the fevered anticipation for Blake’s every new movement is palpable. A string of bizarrely compelling releases have solidified a bizarre and abstract take on 90s RnB that is refracted through the prism of present day UK bass music into totally alien and unique new shapes. Far from falling out as some experimental art school experiment gone wrong, the results have been so convincing as to unite nearly every section of the music world in praise.

James Blake // The Bells Sketch [2010 Hessle Audio]

One such 12” was the brilliant Bells Sketch EP put out through- you guessed it- Hessle Audio. With a title track centred on the most mournful reimagining of G-Funk you’re ever likely to hear- and if Dre were to suffer an untimely death any time soon, his funeral would more than adequately be soundtracked by this’un - its hard to imagine it having much dancefloor success. But like the best of classic pre-wobble dubstep, it sits above a bottomless chasm of sub-bass. Whilst the synth heavy approach might seem out of step with the Hessle catalogue, the ethos behind it is well in keeping. His latest release, CMYK, has gone overground in a way even his most ardent admirers wouldn’t have guessed, receiving the kinds of plaudits- Pitchfork Best New Musics and BBC Radio Hottest Records- its completely unheard of for anybody in the scene to even be considered for. All’s set for Blake to go supernova, but anyone expecting some easy jams on his next EP should prepare themselves for another leftfield turn, as its probably his most obtuse outing to date. Characteristically brilliant, of course, but further still down the rabbit hole.

James Blake // CMYK [2010 R&S]

With all this said and done, don’t let this long, arduous prose and insistence for innovation make you think the Crazylegs party won’t be a wild one. Far from being a bunch of obtuse chinstrokers, the Hessle crew are dynamite DJs and have more than enough experience of duppying dancefloors to demolish any hopes of using your Bank Holiday Monday productively. To whet your appetite, the majority of the Hessle catalogue can be streamed from their youtube account >here<.

Simon