Hardcore Will Never Die.

As I was reading through Simon Reynolds' blog, I stumbled upon an interesting blog post that Reynolds himself linked to, in which the blogger Pearsall shares his own mix of old school breakbeat Hardcore made by new players in these last couple of years. As I've said in my previous post about today's unabashed retroism, recent years have been fruitful for all different styles of music made by artists whose eyes are fixated on the rear view mirror, some of whom are happy with not going much further than imitation. Pearsall acknowledges this:

"If we're honest, most of the tracks betray precisely no influence from musical developments of the last 20+ years, something that, to me, brings up many interesting questions

This is because the original hardcore rave sound arose in a musical, social, and political context that is very different from the one we experience today, a whole confluence of events  that cannot be recreated. It also can't be ignored that the scene was like a huge hive mind focused on relentless change and innovation - the speed of change was breathtaking, and probably without much parallel in recent musical history.

So it's an interesting paradox with tracks like the ones I've selected for this mix, in that they are very consciously imitating a moment in time when musicians were desperately trying not to imitate, but to innovate and keep progressing. It's a bit like modern guitar bands still reaching for that classic garage punk sound, in a sense."

That last paragraph is very telling. As I've previously said, I attribute this "Hardcore revivalism/retroism" to the fact that we have virtually all of the music at our disposal with the help of the Internet. For anyone, music from the past is, or can be, just as relevant as the music from today. Unearthing older music brings the same rewards of "newness" as digging into new releases. Consider, for example, the recent and ongoing fascination that young people (Millennials and teenage Gen-Zers) have for City Pop, Japan's funk-glamour-neon-cheesy pop from the 80s, a previously unknown and forgotten genre.

As to the question, "Why Hardcore?, well, it seems as if those early rave days have been romanticized and mythologized by everyone that was a part of it. The "being there". The "being part of something new and special". The "feeling of freedom and reverie". For someone that is, say, 20 years old today, there might be some form of longing for those days, reading testimonies and looking through the pictures of a past youth celebrating music, life, drugs, and love. And as Pearsall notes, between 1990 and 1995, things were moving and evolving so fast, that the old school Hardcore sound only lasted a little less than three years before it split into the Jungle and Happy Hardcore scenes. Out of sheer luck, others were born just in time and were at the right place to live through that era, experience it firsthand. And it came and went. Sure, the sound lived on in the two mentioned genres, but it's not exactly the same, is it? Old school Hardcore has a specificity to it, its own vibe. So why not bring it back? Why not give it one more life? Maybe that specific sound has more left into it, maybe not everything has been exhausted from it? Maybe by recreating those sounds there's a way to bring back the energy of that era - to find whatever it is some are looking for.

But, in my opinion, imitation (and nothing but imitation) can only take us so far. It seems to me that if we want to recreate the energy of the old school Hardcore era, we have to dig deeper than its plasticity, to unveil what its spirit and approach were, rather than its specific sonic palette. Hardcore was a bastard genre, a sort of Frankenstein's Monster taking bits and pieces from other genres of that era. Techno of that era. House of that era. RnB of that era. Hip hop of that era. Dancehall of that era. If we want to bring back the sense of release that the older generation experienced, we have to start by creating our own bastard genre of today. Taking bits and pieces from the music of today. Techno of today. House of today. Dancehall of today. Etc. And also look at new genres that have sprung have in the last two decades: Dubstep, Grime, Funky House, Alternative RnB, Drum n Bass, Afrobeats, Afroswing, Gqom, etc, etc. Only then, I think, can we get our own "being there", our own "being part of something new and special", and our own "feeling of freedom and reverie".

At the same time, who cares? Good music is good music. As Pearsall writes: "...sometimes music is just there to be enjoyed, so maybe I should shut up, stop overthinking things, and have some fun, right?"

And with that, I leave you with his mix of  "new school" old school Hardcore.