Stateside story

With Footcrab comfortably blitzing dancefloors everywhere it's clear that Juke has been cannibalised for parts in the way that 'UK bass music' producers have a habit of doing. It's also the latest stage in the resurgence of an American influence over emergent British scenes. Witness all the US house that was played when Funky was getting hot (like Men At Work, Karizma and that Aaron Carl track). Now it's Juke's turn. Like a banana tossed into a cage of hungry monkeys, its discovery among the British blog/forum massive has caused a bit of stir. Well, by 'stir' I mean there's a long thread about it at Dissensus.

Let's hope the buzz percolates away and we continue to get great Juke inspired tracks from disaffected Dubstep producers. The minimal 808 style pushed by Loefah is a good start, bring on those toms! (Check his mix halfway through this Rinse Podcast).

Now, as this is happening another idiosyncratic American genre has very quietly crept into the UK scene via its side entrance. In recent sets for Lower End Spasm, both Kingdom and GIRL UNIT played tracks from the VOGUE SCENE! Being a long time Vogue House fan I momentarily dropped my butch affectations and screamed like a Femme Queen when I heard Mike Q's 'I am Legend' and Jay R Revlon's 'Godzilla Ha' on Kingdom's and GIRL UNIT's mixes respectively (found here and here).

Does this signal Vogue House's entry into the UK bass scene a la Juke? Let's hope so, I wanna bust some dips and strike some poses at Plastic People. But I do have my doubts because 1) it's very gay and the UK bass scene is traditionally a bit macho and 2) as much as I love Vogue House, it's quite simple music and nowhere near as innovative as Juke can be (so some say Juke's the new jungle?!) so I doubt producers will adopt it out of blinding inspiration. But what Vogue House can offer is its attitude, its ultra bitchy gender-bending "let's werk that motherfucka" fierceness, which is what sets it apart as a genre. After all the screwface/bassface stuff, it would be a breath of fresh tongue-in-cheek air.

*Plus! Here's a mix of Vogue House/Cunt beats tracks I did back in 2008 where I strung together a series of bad Imeem rips into 34 mins of camp terror.

Pic courtesy of cross promotional blog whoring via emptyswimmingpool