It’s a sobering thought that the sounds of Massive Beat are actually practically as bygone as Merseybeat was when Fatboy Slim, Propellerheads and Groove Armada burst onto the dance scene within the mid- to late 90s.
If Britpop was guitar music’s contribution to Cool Britannia, Massive Beat was its blissed out, drugged up (and it undoubtedly was up) sibling. But within the final years of the century, there was extra crossover between the Britpop and dance crowds than there had ever been between rave and indie, that musical hole being bridged by collaborations equivalent to Noel Gallagher, Paul Weller, Tim Burgess and James Dean Bradfield with The Chemical Brothers, Richard Ashcroft and Thom Yorke with U.N.Ok.L.E., Liam Gallagher with Loss of life In Vegas.
If there’s a style that managed to bottle the heady optimism of the period, then it’s extra the party-ready sounds of Battleflag, The Rockafeller Skank or Bentleys Gonna Kind You Out! than Nation Home, Widespread Folks or Sonnet. Hell, Massive Beat was so ubiquitous on the fag finish of the 90s and the toddler days of the Noughties that Channel 4 used it because the theme for his or her new actuality present Massive Brother (courtesy of Elementfour, aka Paul Oakenfold and Andy Grey), whereas a lot of its signature bangers have been cribbed for the blockbuster motion pictures of their day (Ya Mama turns up in Charlie’s Angels, Busy Little one’s in Gone In 60 Seconds and Spybreak! soundtracks one among The Matrix’s cash shot moments).
Massive Beat summarises the spirit of the late Nineteen Nineties each bit as a lot the art-school stylings of Blur and the lad rock of Oasis, a lot in order that Fatboy Slim was one among a small variety of artists to carry out on the closing ceremony of the 2012 Summer time Olympics (enjoying Proper Right here Proper Now and The Rockafeller Skank, naturally).
Twenty-three years on from Massive Beat’s defining second – Brighton’s 250,000-throng Massive Seaside Boutique II live performance – its authentic followers have swapped ecstasy capsules for multivitamins and traded the Massive Beat shuffle for Pilates. For that technology, although, ought to they ever really feel like reliving essentially the most hedonistic moments from their youth, it’s not City Hymns or I Ought to Coco they attain for, however Decksandrumsandrockandroll and You’ve Come A Lengthy Method, Child.
And whereas we’re right here, although there are strands of the scene within the works of The Chemical Brothers and The Prodigy, they minimize throughout a number of dance music genres. So right here, we’re zeroing in on the artists which are 100% undiluted, indisputably Massive Beat. Buckle up…
