FABRICLIVE.50
Autonomic
Despite the genre's future-forward and experimental beginnings in the early 90s, drum & bass' rigid uniformity over the last decade has made it a stifling environment for many producers. For dBridge, with his background as a former member of the drum & bass heavyweight champions Bad Company, the pressure of dancefloor expectations and DJs' desire for club smashers has been experienced and rejected once in his career already. Since going solo he has been busy developing a more cultured sound that has carved him a niche in a music scene from which he was feeling increasingly removed from. Instra:mental meanwhile, having had a successful stint in drum & bass some years earlier, returned to D&B production in the mid 00s with a uniquely fresh approach. Inspired by 80s synth music, the Detroit sound and the Warp back catalogue, and with a studio fully loaded with vintage hardware equipment, they set about writing drum & bass unlike anyone else; a method that struck a chord with a like-minded soul in dBridge.
fabric 50
Martyn
Martijn Deijkers' particular strand of bass defies genres or adjectives - to his fans and admirers, it's known simply as 'Martyn Music.' With a sound that became a cornerstone for dubstep in 2009, and a debut album ('Great Lengths') that became one of the most stylistically fierce long players the scene has produced to date, Martyn pushes a rebellious, out-of-the-box mentality into his every artistic venture. Commanding dancefloors with a strong sense of timing and attitude, his music revels in its relative simplicity - synth lines lounging atop swung drum patterns, all in turn massaged by warm low frequencies - a trait he's reinforced with fabric 50, his first mix CD to date.
I Beat My Robot / Marmite (Original Sin Remix)
Caspa
What a 12-months its been for Caspa. It was almost a year to the day when we first announced his debut album through fabric, the LP that took him from the underground hero he was to the household name he is today. Although we say that, but Caspa never left the underground, in fact he's managed to successfully stay true to his original fanbase by never changing his approach, style or sound, it's just everyone else in the world is a lot more interested than they used to be.
In the UK in 2010, you can safely say that anyone with an interest in popular music between the ages of 16-25 will know what dubstep is - it's everywhere. Sometimes things just fall into place and for Caspa, what started out as him going to UK Garage and Drum'n'Bass nights, dancing to new sounds and being inspired by the DJs has now evolved into him travelling the World as a global star.