Hmm...
We need to establish something here. Gabba / Gabber, while two different things are both equally shite. Hardcore 909 beats I enjoy, but ear-grating hoover sounds and mindless vocal loops stop being fun once you reach puberty. And it isn’t dark, not even in the least. Whenever I hear gabba people try to be dark and gothy I just laugh because it’s so incredibly absurd. Real [read: good] hardcore can be better indulged in elsewhere. Here are some suggestions:
Early Hardcore / Rave >> [Just got into it recently, so not quite an expert yet...]
Planet Core Productions - Dark, atmospheric, and brooding. None of that galling ravey posturing here. This music is the soundtrack of the dammed.
US Midwest Era Hardcore / Acid >> [The greatest music in American history that absolutely no one listens to...]
Drop Bass Network - Woody McBride, before he went on to make boring clubby techno (like everyone else), did some of his best work on this, America’s first great hardcore label. Fast, distorted, low-fi noise daggers that plunged into the unsuspecting hearts of baby ravers the world over. Find his stuff and cherish it, for like all great things it is no more.
Analog Records USA - Freddy Fresh’s signature label that began with some incredible hardcore gems and sadly regressed into trendy tek-elekto. While Freddy Fresh was never dark per se, his hardcore stuff is easily the craziest music ever committed to wax. Imagine filtering fax machine noise into a guitar pedal and then recording it from an answering machine onto a DAT. That’s somewhere close to what Freddy would do, and against all logic it was frequently brilliant.
EXperimental - Damon Wild’s New York label. Never a huge fan of Damon Wild, but if you like trancy acid, he’s your guy. EXperimental is yet another host to Woody McBride’s and Freddy Fresh’s unyielding talents. Fresh’s
Advanced Waveform Synthetix is probably the closest he’s ever done to a dark acid record, with the haunting soundscapes of Suffering Souls and the frenetic intensity of Alex's Rhyme. McBride did a masterpiece of his own with
Natural Glow, with an acid line that eats men alive in Hardest Work. Both of them are very sought after and deservedly so.
German Hardcore / Acid >> [Is there anything better? I’m going with no...]
Labworks Germany - Without a doubt, the most diverse and influential German hardcore label ever. Consistently good and host to a vast spectrum of talented artists from all over the world. Cellblock X and Thomas P. Heckmann did some of their best work here, and Desperation’s
Our Reservation is nothing short of a timeless classic.
ESP Records - Two artists single-handedly made this label: Mindscape and Nico. Both are legends, and both of their best works were released on ESP. While people will try to tell you that Nico’s
Field of Vision is his standout track, I’m convinced that Raw is his finest hour. Abrasive, enraged, and far ahead of its time, Raw could fit perfectly into any modern hardcore set and absolutely decimate people where they stand. Every Mindscape record on ESP is classic, from majestic dark trance tunes to acid-laced hardcore epics. Do not overlook this stuff.
DJ.Ungle Fever - While Martin Damm has released more records than most people will ever listen to, the best and brightest were put out by DJ.Ungle Fever. Not dark in the least, but mind-numbingly psychedelic acidcore madness reigned on this label until its demise and curious resurrection a few years ago. Unfortunately, its current incarnation has fallen prey to the suffocating blight of minimal nonsense that has infected all electronic music as of late. However, the original releases, if you can track them down, are well worth the effort, and the crazy colored vinyls are purdy to boot.
UK Hardcore / Acid >> [What happens when you give crazy punk rockers a bunch of TB-303s? Let’s find out...]
Kill Out Recordings - Without a doubt, the most notorious, fascinating, and obscure of all hardcore labels. Don’t expect to pay less than $50 to own any of these records. Why? Well, for one, most of the early [read: good] releases were pressed on picture discs in limited runs and were, for their time, the most devastating acidcore records ever released on the public at large. Most of the artists were never heard from again, save for the irrepressible genius of Brandon Spivey. DJ Freak later took over the label, and the subsequent releases mostly regressed into his particular flavor of crass noise-vomit.
Eurk - And you thought Killout records were expensive! Seriously, it would make you sick to know how much these records sell for. And you know the worst part? They’re worth every penny. Tony Clements, along with his associates, really created a completely unique brand of hardcore techno with these records. Something along the lines of the band Cake, hopelessly catchy but remarkably substantive.
Magnetic North - Dave Clark’s label back when Dave Clark pretended to make good music. There’s good stuff here, but really the only thing you need to know is Cristian Vogel’s
Infra EP. Seriously, find someone who owns this record and then murder them. The resulting life imprisonment will seem a trifle sum when compared to owning the most mind-shattering record ever commended to the world of man.
Modern Hardcore >> [Yes, a small minority of it does not, in fact, utterly suck...]
Black Monolith Recordings - Somehow, the smoldering waste heap of creation known as New Jersey managed to give birth to a rather respectable hardcore label. While good stuff is abundant, despite the infrequent releases, the real superstar of the label is Low Entropy. I’m convinced this man is really some psychotic cosmonaut who managed to record the ominous, sub-frequency sounds of deep space and just enjoys playing them on occasion.
Anticore Records - At this point in time, believe it or not, the only people doing anything interesting with hardcore are the French. Maniak is particularly unique in his penchant for marrying industrial hardcore with classical music. This probably sounds like the worse idea ever, and while not all such tracks work as well as others, some are surprisingly brilliant. His hardcore rendition of Clint Mansell’s theme from Requiem For A Dream is nothing short of inspired.
Lasse Steen - If I actually sat down and pondered the idea of Lasse Steen doing that mediocre dark trance stuff he does now, I’d probably cry. For prior to his tragic submission to the world of mainstream club music, he was, without exception, the greatest hardcore musician of all time. By the sheer output and unwavering quality of his releases, no one even comes close. He really carried the torch between the fall of classic hardcore circa. 1995 to about the beginning of the modern era circa. 2000. Scattered on a host of obscure labels and written under a number of secretive guises, Steen’s music represents a singular, unrelenting artistic vision that set him apart from his contemporaries. I could write for pages about this man’s music, but, suffice to say, if you listen to anything from this list, make it something of his.
I realize this seems like a lot of information, but it’s really just scratching the surface of things. Guys like
Brandon Spivey and
Somatic Responses aren’t so easily definable, not to mention all the super-obscure records that one might happen to come upon in the course of one’s search. But, hopefully this establishes a sufficient starting point for listening to good hardcore music. Remember, just because something’s loud and angry doesn’t make it good...
qube said:
“You have learned much, young one...”
