Tag Archives: Fabric

inthemix.com.au, Music, Review, Writing

Fabric Present Elevator Music Vol 1

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Fabric bills this CD as “Bass music” or “dubstep” and wax lyrical about the sweet 140 beats per minute and act like this is all something new and exciting. However, if this CD was released 5 to 10 years ago, it would be labelled simply as “breaks”. And this is because breaks is such as wide genre, almost as indefinable as House, and certainly a lot more mutable than say DnB or Trance.

But, for whatever reason, breaks isn’t “cool” anymore, so dicks like the A&R people and promoters at Fabric along with journos who have to stamp their opinion on everything, have to come up with some other new terms to sell this music to the kids. Not like any of them buy it – I knew people who torrented this CD as soon as they heard about it. And it wasn’t because they’re into this music, but because it’s Fabric, and Fabric’s mixes are held in high regard.

So, yes, Fabric can sell as a brand, so why do they need to go further and break everything up into little sub-genres? I get that selling records is harder than ever in this day and age, but this tired splintering of music into smaller and smaller segments is not doing the industry any favours. It’s segmenting the audience, and moreover it’s making the audience dumb. People define music as dubstep, then suddenly people only like dubstep? That’s ridiculous!

Additionally, the music becomes boring and trite. Dubstep had been around for what, three years now and already the majority of it is full of RnB samples and remixes of popular commercial tunes. I mean there’s at least two Riverside remixes and probably more I simply haven’t had the misfortune of hearing! Motherfucker indeed!

Luckily, this CD has some decent tracks on it. Some of it is kind of housey. Some of it is kind of techy. And some of it is kind of dubby. And none of those terms are real words and I am putting my foot down and refusing to use them! Just get this album, listen to it and enjoy the music on it without putting any labels on it.

The producers who worked on these tracks probably started out with a formula, and for whatever reason their tunes didn’t stick to that. Hats off to Fabric for collecting all of this on one CD and getting it out there, but they shouldn’t pretend like they’ve discovered this wonderful new sound. It is breaks, no, it’s not even that – it’s electronic music – and in all its glory, so let’s stop pissing about with all these other genres and terms and get back to simply listening to and enjoying good music.

inthemix.com.au, Music, Review, Writing

Mark Farina – Fabric 40

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When you see large numbers in a series of titles, it’s quite hard to remove the stigma that it has to be bad. For example, the first Police Academy was awesome. Police Academy 7 was not so great. Likewise with Sonic the Hedgehog, the latest release being number 8, is a sad and sallow reflection of its former glory. So when you see that Fabric has hit 40 releases, it’s kind of hard to think that maybe this has gone on a little too long. Fortunately, music mixes don’t usually suffer the same fate as games and movies and with a DJ like Mark Farina at the wheels of steel, the quality is assured.

This mix sees Farina mixing some house, including names that even I know like DJ Sneak and Derek Carter, with what he says is much more obscure. I have to admit, I wouldn’t really know, but a google search for some of these names is very interesting. Ricardo Rae is from Queensland, although you wouldn’t pick it from his chunky beats. Giom is from France via the UK. Some of it is older stuff, like Mood II Swing, whilst some of it has an old school vibe, like Lawnchair Generals Broke Acid. It’s not just the usual “Chicago” sound that continues for 60 minutes non-stop, and I think it’s this wide expanse of music that make this CD so damn listenable.

The mixing is sublime as well. Farina plays snippets of other music and samples in throughout the mix. It’s his hiphop roots showing, and it helps to create something greater than the usual house type mix. My favourite mix has to be Last Word by Johny Fiasco, Mood II Swing Closer, and James Curd’s Pick Up What I’m Putting Down. It has a soulful croon throughout that says “Pick Up”, which is teasingly mixed with the chorus “Pick Up What I’m Putting Down” through the three tunes, until the chorus kicks in proper.

I was conflicted when putting my hand up to review this CD. Mark Farina is a damn good DJ. I loved his Mushroom Jazz releases from a few years ago, so knew I was in for something better than average, even if it was house. But as I’m not generally a great fan of house music, I was expecting to be able to totally exterminate this release, shooting off funny witticisms about the dull repetitiveness and general awfulness of house music. Fortunately I am happy to admit I was wrong and that Fabric 40 is rather good. Actually, more than that, it’s quite possibly one of the best house mixes I’ve ever heard.