DJ CRYSTYL

DJ Crystl: Dee Jay Recordings 1993: REWIND of post from 26/3/22 with reinstated audio courtesy of odysee.

To me Dj Crystl is one of the great sound designers of the jungle era. Perhaps Pete Parsons aka Voyager, his engineer and right hand man deserves some credit here too. The tunes below display a producer at the peak of his powers going from strength to strength like Omni Trio, Foul Play, 4Hero and Goldie all were at roughly the same time. While Dj Crystl's 1993 was brilliant choon-wize and his 1994 was also pretty good, it was the following year that things just did not blow up for him how they were supposed to as jungle ballooned into Drum & Bass. Crystl somehow missed the momentum and it felt like his potential was never fully realised. Like is there several albums worth of material that never got released? What happened? While that's probably an interesting story (that I don't actually know) I just want to point out here what a stellar set of releases DJ Crystl issued in 1993 on Dee Jay Recordings. 

Dj Crystl's three 12"s on Dee Jay Recordings and one 12" on Force Ten Records in 1993 make up one of Jungle's most sublime winning runs. If Crystlize, Deep Space, Meditation, Warp Drive, Sweet Dreamz, Your Destiny, The Dark Crystl and Inna Year 3000 were all put on one cd it would have been one of the top jungle albums of all time along with The Deepest Cut, Parallel Universe & Black Secret Technology. Actually I can't believe somebody didn't have the foresight or hindsight to compile that (?). 

I suppose Dj Crystl was one of the original ambient jungle producers. I always think he's got a vague shoegaze vibe too with his walls of synth sound, drones and ethereal vocal science scattered amongst the jungle elements. I wonder if Kevin Shields or Seefeel were fans? or vice versa? Anyway his sides are a lot crisper than you might imagine or remember. They are immaculately put together with all sorts of microscopic detail. I imagine Dj Crystl spent a lot of time meticulously crafting each second of his tuneage while never losing sight of the big picture. The sound while fastidious however never appears to be too fussy, often quite the opposite and that balancing act is where his potency lies. Like Omni Trio there is an aura of splendid excitement, elegance, generosity and transcendence in Dj Crystl's jungle.

DJ Crystl - Crystlize

Swirls of synths, shapeshifting walls of sound, time-stretched drum opulence, alluring dark tunnels, ethereal vocal science and an uncanny rattling clang accompany the endlessly chopped snares into the Crystlized echo chamber.

DJ Crystl - Deep Space

Frantic intricate choppage that is somehow mellifluous. Those melodic snares are cushioned perfectly amongst the atmospheres of enchanting darkness. 

DJ Crystl - Meditation

Oceanic pools of sound, bleeps and waves of delicate vocal science eventually make room for exquisite rhythm-ology. At  5.10 a dramatic halt to proceedings occurs to allow the sonic waves back in before the beat momentum effortlessly picks up again. In the remaining couple of minutes it moves into mesmerising choppage of sparkling ambient snares. 

DJ Crystl - Warpdrive

Dj Crystl's most in yer face moment in 1993. This is a deluge of chopped and stretched breaks that go euphorically haywire amongst ominous drones. Don't forget that gloriously dark synth lull at 3.12. then the breaks continue go more and more insane. Holy shit this is the Best!

DJ Crystl - Sweet Dreamz

Idyllic sounds of the seaside with heaven bound synths, a woman's soothing meditative voice and a beat much less frantic than most jungle. Sweet Dreamz is all space age tropical vibes of calm tinged with disorientation and twilight. Pretty psychedelic.

DJ Crystl - Your Destiny

Waves of miniature ambient delirium and disorienting backwards abstractions where the spirit of MBV circa Glider lurks. The rhythm stop starts until 2.53 when it gets fully rolling as the darkness encroaches with a spectral presence coming in and out of focus. Choice dubby bleeps add to the subtle elusive charms of Your Destiny.

DJ Crystl - The Dark Crystl/Inna Year 3000 (1993)

Getting back to where I was up to in my March jungle posts. This was Crystl's most famous tune as I recall (Hey I might be wrong as my brain is diminishing daily. Feel free to correct me). The Dark Crystl is undeniable darkside jungle choonage of historical significance to the hardcore continuum.

This was the flip.

*This is a test. Testing Testing 123....Let's hope these two audio clips work.

**POLITICSES ALERT

***I'm using Odysee which like Rumble is a Youtube alternative. Like Twitter pre-Musk Youtube has a retarded biased establishment left agenda (the mainstream democrat media line that actually blindly cheerleads big pharma, big tech, war etc.) so does not believe in free speech. In the last few days they have taken down videos of honest  commentators, who only want the truth backed by evidence and facts, because they didn't agree with their political viewpoints.

I'd love to never use the youtubes ever again as we don't need our information and thoughts policed, particularly by those Neil Young-crying into their man nappy Soviet types with authoritarian cheerleading tendencies, but unfortunately youtube have a cultural stronghold on music video content. 

The dude who runs the channel that these two DJ Crystl clips are from had his youtube account suspended a few months ago. Fortunately he had uploaded a mirror channel onto Odysee which I've only just rediscovered.  Anyway at this stage Rumble and Odysee seem to be the video content platforms that aren't the censorship arm of the establishment. For now it appears you are allowed free thought & speech so I'll be trying to use them as much as possible. 

Enjoy the music while you can as DJ Crystl's clips usually don't seem to stick around on these platforms for long. I'm guessing whoever runs hardcore Junglism is the copyright zealot who keeps reporting rogue Crystl clips. At this stage of the game you would think that keeping this music in the conversation is what is going to give it longevity. Every other hardcore/jungle/dnb artist is available to be discovered and listened to so this strategy is just going to write your music out of the game...anyway...

Keep on rockin' in the free world...

Parabellum - Sacrilegio

ULTRA METAL Pt II

More unhinged noise from Colombia in the 80s. This is uncategorisable. It's got elements of Hardcore, Thrash, Black Metal, Noise Rock & Death Metal but really it's not particularly any of these is it? It's so chaotic and amorphous it unwittingly becomes pretty psychedelic. Sacriligio is noise-y metal but I kinda hesitate to call it that because some micro-genre nerd has probably already claimed that as a pigeon hole for some other type of music. 

Some bright spark called this wave of metal coming out of Medellín, Antioquio, Colombia in the 80s Ultra Metal - and they were correct! 

Apparently Parabellum were one of the first extreme metal bands to come out of South America, possibly the original. I love that this glorious racket came out on my favourite Latin label Discos Fuentes who were responsible for bringing the tropical sounds of Cumbia to the world in the 20th century. There ain't no latin rhythms on Sacrilegio though.

ULTRA METAL

Ten years ago I discovered a lil' treasure trove of insane 80s South American metal on, I think, what was an Aussie extreme metal blog. Anyway you know how the best music is before a genre gets solidified, the stuff that's proto, that doesn't stick to the rules or genre boundaries because they are not set in stone yet. That's what this is. 

Most extreme metal fans would know Brazilian pioneers of the original 80s wave of black metal Sepultura, the terrific Sarcrófego and the great Cogumelo record label but who knows the groups of Colombia from the same era? Blasfemia were a side project for members of the Colombian black/death metal group Parabellum (more on them in the next post). Blasfemia released just one 12" and this is it. Guerra Total from 1988 contains an insanely hardcore black metal thrash hybrid that really could have been an entire new sub-genre. I guess it kinda was, almost was. A handful of disparate 80s Columbian metal groups were included in the umbrella term ULTRA METAL. There couldn't be a better word for it. The ultra metal groups came from Medellín, Antioquia, Colombia hence the alternate ultra metal title of Metal-Medallo. 

These four tracks from Blasfemia have got everything that is good about dark mental metal and there is no holding back or conformity to orthodoxy. They just wreak metallic havoc for 13 minutes. This should have been the future instead we got fucking nu-metal, groove-metal, metalcore, several thrash revivals etc.. I'll take this lo-fi unhinged cacophony any day of the week.

SCOTTIE - SUBNATION

Jamma - Candyman (1993)

Jamma is an alias for Subnation's W. Wilson. I never heard this back in the day but discovered it 10 or 15 years ago, probably on the Back To The Old School blog. Doomed belles of doom, Amen breaks, samples from the titular horror movie, a pitch black pummelling synth drone and noice rumbling dubby bass make this a lil' piece of terrific darkside jungle.    

Subnation - Scottie (1993)

Plenty has been written about this panic attack anthem. Peak jungle.

Warrior Bass - Ride The Rhythm (1994)

Step into the cold dark world of this darkside jungle weirdness on the verge of techstep from Subnation alias Warrior Bass. Some choice psychedelic backwards chopped drummage here!

Sacred - Do It Together (1992)

I just listened to this for the first time in 12 months and 30 years later I am fucking astonished, still. Do It Together is just so inspired and so inspirational. It's got the lot! All the hardcore elements of the past, present & future are here. Why even bother with words? They just fail to capture the essence of the dizzying heights (emotionally, artistically, culturally) of this tune. This is quite simply possibly the best breakbeat-hardcore-rave tune of the entire 90s.

Remarc and Lewi Cifer - Ricky

CAPE FEAR

All three of these tunes are from the 1994 Ricky 12" released on Dollar Records. I'm not really sure who Lewi Cifer is or what his contribution is here, who cares... I spose. A bangin Amen tune with samples from the 1991 Scorsese remake of Cape Fear. 

SCEPTIC

Okay here's a weird sample for ya...it's from Home Alone.

RICKY

I don't know which was first? Ricky, Subnation's Scottie or Johnny Jungle's Johnny? I always assumed the order was Johnny, Scottie and then Ricky was last. I could be wrong... at this point nobody cares. All three are bona fide classics. Anyway this was Remarc's contribution to the Panic Attack micro-genre. Sample a panic stricken character from a movie yelling somebody's name then add manic chopped beats and a tense atmosphere to match. Great fun. 

Remarc 1994

RIP - REMARC (1994)

Now for some undeniable classics that I've probably posted before but...

RIP is top 5 all time ragga jungle gem. 

THUNDERCLAP - REMARC (1995)

If you don't know anything about jungle just press play. 

1:33 is the moment you will know if you are a born junglist or not as the chipmunk samples clear and a reggae toast heralds the incoming Amen breaks followed by a pile-driving sub bass drop. The chopped up breaks are a supreme ruff rush of the manic variety. Hardcore. Peak jungle. 

DRUM N' BASS WIZE - REMARC (1994)

The "pizza de resistance" of Amen smashers Drum N' Bass Wize just gets better with age. This delirious choppage will have you hanging on every snare hit and gap in-between. There's just a smidge of a Mentasm in the background throughout and that hallucinatory time-stretched "drum n' bass wize" hook is irresistible. The best. 

*to be continued...

4HERO (Cold Mission & Project A-KO)

Cold Mission - For Da Ladies (1994)

A ruff rush where the hardcore rave spirit lives on a few years later. A rare bit of ragga jungle from 4HERO circa 1994. 

Project A-KO - Passion & Fire (1994)

Project A-KO is another 4HERO alias. Maybe later there was too much of this style which became the commercial public face of hardcore but this slice of mellow jungle into dnb from '94 is just sweet here. The unmistakeable sound of the mid 90s. 

Project A-KO - In Time (1994)

Staying true to '92 (in 94).

Internal Affairs (Goldie & 4 Hero) - Shinin' Down On Me 1993

On the surface this is a blueprint for radio/cafe friendly dnb that was to come in a year or two but give it another listen. Beneath the future gloss is a pretty deranged hardcore jungle tune. This is truly a sonic moment where the avant and the pop intersected. A real tension exists within this track where the pioneering hardcore underground elements meet the crowd pleasing commercial pop needs of the masses.  And yet it wouldn't be until the following year that Goldie would break into the charts with Inner City Life.