FANTAZIA TAKES YOU INTO 1992

I never went to this event as I was at some dodgy rave at Wonderland Arena in Hackney, but I’m eternally grateful for the tape packs that captured some of that era’s most amazing sets! One of which has consistently been in my all-time top 5 – Top Buzz! The pioneering collective consisted of Mad P on the mic and Jason Kaye on the decks, together they were the foundation force behind the Jungle Techno sound. Never afraid to do things differently and play tracks no other DJs would, the Top Buzz collective always delivered a Top Top Top Top Top Buuuuzz!

The Top Buzz set from Fantazia Takes You Into 1992 was the last set of the night and for me was the defining set that saw the birth of Jungle Techno.  The Buzz fused sounds of Hardcore, early Jungle and 4/4 style Techno belters, with just a sprinkling of classics thrown in for good measure. Add to this, the unmatched lyrical genius from Mad P and the deafening sounds of thousands of ravers giving it everything they had, you have yourself one of the defining sets of that era.

Whether you like or whether you hate we,
You have to respect Top Buzz ability.

A TRIBUTE

I’ve done many tribute sets in my time, mostly for events & promotions that no longer are, but when we lose one of our underground soldiers then the tribute sets take on a whole new level. In March 2023, Jason Kaye left this world to grace the next and left behind a legacy that will burn bright forever. With his set from Fantazia alongside Mad P & Mikee B being one of my all-time fav’s, I wanted to create a vibe based around that set that I can only hope did some form of justice to pay respects to one of the pioneering founders of our scene. RIEP Jason Kaye.

TOP BUZZ – FANTAZIA TRACK LIST

There are a variety of sites that have the track list from that night, but I found a few inconsistencies in them so I set out to not only create an accurate one, but also to link Discogs listings and links to buy the digital versions officially (not all are available, but the ones are found are listed below).  To sense check I got these right I even mixed the record into the tape playing on my laptop to ensure I had the right version! I may have got some wrong, but I’m pretty sure these are all right.

In addition to this, I’ve also created a walk-through video of all the records that were played that night that gives a little background and history to each track that was played that night.

The post Fantazia Takes You Into 1992 | Top Buzz track list appeared first on Hardcore Junglist.

…they often say, and it’s no different when trying to find the music you love from back in the day in either digital or vinyl form. The fact is, there’s a very healthy re-press and second-hand market out there, it’s just spread all over the place instead of in one tidy record shop!

I still buy a lot of records and as a result, I often get asked where I buy them, so I decided to put all the stores and links together in one place for an easy one-stop place to get your beloved Old Skool Hardcore, Rave & Jungle.

NOTE: This is by no means a final list, I’m positive there are plenty more links to be added and I’m more than happy to do so to spread the word. Please feel free to drop a comment below with recommended links or get in touch via the contact page.

CLASSIC HARDCORE & JUNGLE

LABELS

21st Century Impact (DJ Seduction) – Direct
ADR & Universe (Dave Charlesworth) – Bandcamp
Creative Wax – Bandcamp
Deep Jungle – Bandcamp
Face Records – Beatport
Ibiza Records – Bandcamp
Jedi Recordings – Bandcamp
Just Another Label – Direct
Kemet Records – Direct
KLP Records / DJ Monk – Bandcamp
Kniteforce Records – Direct – Bandcamp – iTunes – JunoDownload – Beatport
Liftin Spirits – Direct
Lucky Spin – Beatport
Metalheadz – Direct
Moving Shadow – iTunes – Beatport
RAM Records – Direct
Reinforced Records – iTunes – JunoDownload – Beatport – Bandcamp
Ruff Guidance / Bay B Kane – Bandcamp
Skeleton Recordings – Bandcamp
Sound Entity – Facebook
Suburban Base – iTunes – JunoDownload – Beatport
Trouble On Vinyl – Bandcamp
V Recordings – Direct

ARTISTS

Acen – iTunes
Altern-8 – Bandcamp
DJ Pooch- Bandcamp
DJ Red Alert & Mike Slammer – Beatport
DJ Zinc –Bandcamp
Fat Controller – Direct – Beatport
FBD Project – Bandcamp
Force Mass Motion – Bandcamp
Jack Smooth aka Ron Wells – Facebook (he posts all his releases here)
Justice & Mercury- Bandcamp – Couple of represses from back in the day and a few new bits as well
Krome & Time – Bandcamp
Manix – Bandcamp – iTunes
Nookie aka Cloud 9 – Beatport
Orca – Beatport
Pascal – Beatport – iTunes
Seduction – Bandcamp
Shades Of Rhythm – Bandcamp
SL2 – iTunes – JunoDownload – Beatport
Slipmatt – Direct – The full SMD collection and more!
Synchronome – Bandcamp
Tango (RIP) – Bandcamp

ONLINE RECORD SHOPS, RE-PRESSES & RE-MASTERS

Discogs – A really obvious one but my go-to for 90% of the records I buy!
Juno Records – Can be a little tricky discovering tracks on here but worth keeping an eye out as they do stock re-presses.
Vinyl Junkie UK – All the new releases for Hardcore & Jungle in one place!

8205 Recordings – Bandcamp
Blueskin Badger Records – Direct – Instagram – Discogs
Deep Jungle – Bandcamp
Disc World – Direct
Flashback Records – Direct
Flex and many more!
HardcoreJunglism.com – Direct – Massive selection of artist/label approved digital (and now vinyl) from the likes of Dillinja, Foul Play, Cool Hand
Keeping Vinyl Alive – Direct
MPS (Music Preservation Society) – Bandcamp – These guys have done a great job re-mastering and re-releasing some classics, also check their Facebook Group for requests.
Music Mondays – Run by the cheeky chappy of Hardcore, Billy ‘Daniel’ Bunter, A great selection of old and new records as well and Rave autobiographies!
Ninety-Two Retro – Run by the Elusive Dave Birch, the releases are fairly spread out but when they come, they come BIG!
Redeye Records – Direct – Like with Juno, you’ll need to hunt through to find the gems, but worth it.
Take It From The Top – www.takeitfromthetop.co.uk
Two Twelve Tens – Direct
Underground Music – Bandcamp – Selection of represses from the likes of Ellis Dee, Cheeba City, Bogwoppa, Criminal Minds, Skanna, and more!
Vinyl Fanatiks – Direct – Bandcamp – A project run by Brent from Aquasky to bring back some major classics and underground bangers!

NEW HARDCORE & JUNGLE VINYL & DIGITAL

Here’s a selection of sites making new and authentic Hardcore & Jungle

4 The Core Recordings – Bandcamp
Ako Beatz – Direct
Flash Cats – Bandcamp
Good2Go DMR – Bandcamp
Hardcore Vinylist Records – Bandcamp
Pete Cannon / N4 Records – Bandcamp
Seventh Storey Projects – Direct
Sneaker Social – Bandcamp
Spandangle Selection – Direct
Sub Code – Bandcamp
Parallax – Bandcamp
Peace On Wax – Bandcamp
Trigger Happy – Bandcamp
Tru Unity – Bandcamp
Violet Nights Recordings – Bandcamp

The post Where to find Old Skool Hardcore & Jungle Vinyl & Digital appeared first on Hardcore Junglist.

There’s a HUGE amount of historical digital music out there that was encoded in low-quality bitrate but there are some gems out there as well.  But are they what they say they are?  How can I trust them? Can they be improved?  You bet ya last white dove they can….

THE SOURCE – NOT KETCHUP!

First up: Nothing will ever beat purchasing a file that’s followed the official and correct path: Original track from the label/artist, from the original DAT that’s been professionally mastered to today’s standard and uploaded to a legitimate site.  But we live in the real world and if I was to hazard a guess as to how many tunes were released in 1992 and how many are available to buy now that have followed said path, we’d be lucky to get near 3-5% – which leaves a fuck lot of tunes out there you want in your collection!

Of course the quality of the file matters, but what trumps this is WHERE IT CAME FROM.

To check out where you can buy these files check the Where to find Old Skool Hardcore Vinyl & Digital article

So reality check over, let’s tackle a few key questions that you should be asking yourself in order to get the best files and get the most out of them as well…

MY COLLECTIONS ALL WAV BRUV, I’M GOOD

No, you’re not, well not 100% anyway.  The reality is a lot of these low encoded MP3’s have been opened up by some bright spark who thinks ‘saving as a WAV’ will bring all the magic back.  It will not.  Once encoded at a low level your stuck with it.  “But I open it in Ableton, did this, that and the other to it” – well done you, all you’ve done here is polish a turd and shove some diamonds in it – at the very core, it’s still shit.  Sorry bruv!

So how can you tell if your files are any good or not?  Well, there are 2 free programs out there that I’d recommend be an integral part of your music review process: Spek.cc and Fakin The Funk, I mainly use Spek simply because it’s crazy easy to use as you just drag and song into and open your eye balls! Fakin The Funk isn’t complicated by any means, I’ve just not got into it but it does look good.  I should mention Spek is in beta but it works great for me.

What Spek (and FTF) are great for is highlighting those tracks that started their life as a low quality MP3 and then been saved as something higher.  Once you’ve downloaded the app and it’s open you simply drag the file into the app and shit loads of pretty colours show up – but what to they mean?

Here’s a break down of the same song that’s been encoded at different levels to explain what you’ll get from each one.  I should mention that I’m no audio engineer, but I don’t have to be – it’s clear what you see below when you encounter a problem file:

ENCODE 1: Original file, from original DAT, re mastered to todays standards – the ultimate digital file!

As you can see below the pretty colours (professional engineer talk) are hitting above 20kHz, we’re looking very good!

ENCODE 2: Same file as ENCODE 1 but re-encoded at 320kbps

The pretty colours are capped at 20kHz, certainly not the end of the world, but there’s some degradation for sure. I’m not getting into the MP3 vs WAV debate – I’ve played 320’s in my sets for the last 15 years and no one’s ever come up to be and said: “bruv, I just heard you play a 320 mp3, me and the misses are out of here!”

ENCODE 3: Same file as ENCODE 1 but re-encoded at 128kbps

Here’s where the damage is caused, our beautiful pretty colours have had their heads chopped off! This is going to sound fine on your crappy, out of the box, iPhone headphones, but sound systems will shit them out for brunch. Delete and replace immediately.

ENCODE 4: The 128kbps re-encoded as a WAV file.

If you’ve understood what I’ve shown you in the above 3 images then there’s really nothing more to say!  This is where you find out that the lovely WAV you thought you had,  turns out to be nothing but a piece of shit that’s taking up precious space on your hard drive.  Delete and replace immediately.

ANY THING ELSE I CAN DO?

There sure is, there’s a great program called Platinum Notes that’s going to help us with the final step.  Now I’ll be upfront with you – I avoided this program like the plague for years as it basically claims to set all your music library to one audio level, in essence, you may think this is great, but as a label owner for nearly 15 years I know how much time, money and skill goes into professionally mixing and mastering a track and I don’t want a program to just whip through a cut what ever DB off its loudness, just so I don’t have to mess with the gain while DJing – that’s a humans job to balance your mixes and your over all set.  Rant over!

With that said, a lot of the files are encoded in decent quality, but just at a low level.  This is where Platinum Notes comes in to ramp up the volume, retune (great for those early 90’s tunes) as well as expand the dynamics if needed.  Like Spek, it’s a simple as to use as you just drag the file into it and away it goes.  There are options to mess with the settings but I’ve personally not found anything better than the preset.

When I put a decent quality vinyl rip of Orca’s ‘My Brother’ into Platinum Notes it boosted the overall level by 3.7dB – nice swan!

NB: I’d strongly recommend A/B testing the original and PN’d file to see if it has done what you want it to do (make it louder!).  

Finally, if you’ve got some basic production skills then you can use a program like Ableton to boost gain, EQ etc as well as warp the beats to cater for all those time signature inconsistencies.

COMMENTS?

Got any comments or thoughts?  How do you prep your digital files?  Let me know below!

The post Hardcore Digital – Getting the most from your digital music files appeared first on Hardcore Junglist.

As well as my own show, there’s a wealth of regular podcasts out there that are keeping the ‘Hardcore Will Never Die’ statement alive with their regular shows.  Here’s who they are, and where to find them:

Basement Phil – Mixcloud
Billy ‘Daniel’ Bunter – Mixcloud
Kniteforce Radio – iTunes
Slipmatt’s ‘World Of Rave Show’ & ‘Slip’s House’ – iTunes – Mixcloud
Stu Allen – Mixcloud
Uncle Dugs (Weekly on Rinse FM 11-2pm Every Friday) – Mixcloud

HARDCORE, ON MY RADIO

As well as the regular podcasts, there are still many shows globally that are preaching the good word of Old Skool, Hardcore, Rave, House & Jungle.  Check them out here:

Dream FM
KoolLondon.com (Rat Pack, Billy Bunter, Slipmatt, Tamsin, Mark XTC, Congo Natty & more)
Hardcore FM
OnlyOldSkool.com
OSN.com
OldSkoolSundays (Glenn Aston & more)
Origin FM

ANY MORE

Yes I’m sure there are many more out there that I’d be glad to add to this list, please leave a comment below with DJs name and link to show and I’ll get it added – nice one!

The post More Old Skool Hardcore Rave & Jungle Podcasts appeared first on Hardcore Junglist.

Taking care of your records is paramount! Making sure they are clean and well stored means you’ll getting years of play out of your precious collection, but how do you do this on a budget?  I’ve done some research and for less than £100 you can get yourself a decent set up that will get your record collection sounding great. 

WHAT DO I NEED?

Personally I use the Knosti record cleaning kit, it’s currently on Amazon for around £70 and has been hailed as “The best manual record cleaner out there” by thevinylfactory.com. Unfortunately, the immediate downfall of the Disco Antistat (known as the ‘Knosti’ elsewhere) is that, straight out of the box, it doesn’t perform that well. The fluid isn’t great for your stylus (I’ll show you how to make your own fluid for a fraction of the cost), the funnel and filter pads are not well designed, and the instructions aren’t thorough enough. On the other hand, the cleaning bath/trough is great, the clamp protects the labels, and the rack is well designed in that the support pads don’t touch the record’s grooves.

In addition to the Knosti, you’ll need the following:

• 2 large lint free microfibre cloths. The more the better, make sure they’re at least 12″ square. Test them on a CD case to make sure they don’t scratch.
• 5L of distilled (de-ionised) water.
• 1 empty bottle with a spray-gun attachment.
• 1 measuring jug.
• 1 Y-shaped funnel.
• 1 pack of unbleached coffee filters.
• 1 carbon fibre brush.

You’ll also need poly-lined inner sleeves and, most importantly, a home-made record cleaning solution.  There are various types of mixtures people recommend but we’ve found this one works well:

MAKING YOUR OWN SOLUTION

• 700ml lukewarm water
• 2 drops of washing-up liquid
• 1 cap of distilled malt vinegar.

Pour the fluid away and make up a new jug for every batch of 10-15 records, If you don’t want to make it yourself, get Plane Groovy’s ‘Vinyl Clear‘.

METHOD

Use a clean area with lots of light and wash your hands!

1. Clean the record on the spinning turntable with the carbon fibre brush to remove excess surface dust. Check YouTube for instructions on how to correctly use these brushes.

2. Following the Knosti instructions, fill the trough with your own solution or Vinyl Clear (you’ll need at least 500 ml to fill the trough so use the measuring jug), put the clamps on the record (not too tight, but tight enough so that liquid doesn’t run down the label), wash the record. I turn the record 20 times in one direction, then 20 times the other way (give it another 10 each way if it’s really dirty!).

3. Lift the record from the trough and allow the excess liquid to drip into the trough.

4. Hold the record over the sink by the still attached clamp and spray the record with distilled water at eight points per side. The idea here is to remove the solution as you don’t want any residue left over on the cleaned record. The spraying method does a surprisingly good job of jetting the solution off the record, I give it a spin over the sink to let the water go round the record. It’s important that you don’t rinse the record with tap water as it could leave mineral deposits on the record (especially if you have hard water). Some users buy a second trough from the other place and fill that with distilled water. I find the spray-gun method works fine and it’s cheaper than buying an extra trough.

5. Remove the clamps and place the record on a clean microfibre cloth on a clean flat surface. Place a second microfibre cloth over the record to create a sandwich. Press down lightly on the cloth so that the water is absorbed. Turn the record over and repeat this drying process for the other side.
Note: You should not rub the record in order to dry it, just press down with the cloth on the record and it will absorb the water.

6. Place the record in the Knosti rack for the final air dry. Be careful when putting the record on and taking it off the rack so as not to scratch it. Feel the white tips, they’re well positioned but a little sharp! You can either place balloons over the stands or tape over the white tips with electrical tape which is soft and won’t scratch your record if it makes contact.

Repeat steps 1-6 until you have filled the rack. It will hold seven records. Once you’ve placed the seventh record on the rack, the first record should be completely dry.

NOW YOUR VINYL IS CLEAN AND DRY

1. Carefully remove the dry record from the rack. Feel the label and outer edge of the record to check that it is completely dry. If you’ve followed the above method correctly the record should be pristine and free from dirt, fingerprints, and dust. Obviously, nothing fixes a scratch. Even brand new records will come out looking (and sounding) better.

2. Place the dry record in a new polylined inner sleeve. Keep any printed inner sleeves as they have collectible value. Bin (or sell) the old paper sleeves. There’s no point in putting your freshly cleaned record back into a dirty sleeve!

When you play your cleaned records they should only require a dry sweep with the carbon fibre brush before and after each play. You only need to perform the above wet cleaning method once per record as long as you keep your records clean.

Make sure you wash the trough out in warm water after use and let it air dry completely. Filter the Vinyl Clear back into it’s bottle via a funnel and coffee filter. Keep the Vinyl Clear in the fridge. You’ll notice the Vinyl Clear depleting gradually over time. You should always ensure that the trough’s brushes are completely submerged in Vinyl Clear (500 ml). I top up with distilled water when supplies are low. You could also consider filtering the used solution into a separate bottle, so as to keep your un-used solution free of residue. If you are using your own solution then you can simply pour this down the sink, a single batch should be enough to do up to 15 records. 

CONCLUSION

This method is cheap and a bit messy, but it works so well. It’s a rather therapeutic experience and far more personal than using a record cleaning machine. Seeing second hand records, previously covered in a layer of grime, come up sparkling is very pleasing. The best thing is the sonic benefit, you can really hear the difference that a good clean makes. There is a regained sense of clarity and subtle detail, the noise floor is greatly reduced also. I wouldn’t say it’s “night and day”, but the change is quite audible.

GOT ANY TIPS FOR US THEN PLEASE LEAVE THEM IN THE COMMENTS BELOW

[Additional credits: R. Cowlin & Mich O’ Phull] 

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