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As promised, here's the 2-Step Garage Mini-Mix: [.mp3 removed]. By way of background, this music combines the trickier rhythms, vocal science, and hiphop atmospherics (e.g., sped-up scratching) of drum & bass with the party vibe and divas of UK garage (a house variant). You may recall
Ishkur (now in V.2!) called 2-Step "so fucking boring,"
complaining about its "idiotic" basslines and all the guest popstars. He's right about the guests: usually an electronic dance producer jumps the shark when vocals are added (
see Swayzak, Chemical Bros.). But the basslines kind of crack me up. They make me think of the original intent of the Roland TB303, which was to be a kind of automated "bass genie" for pubrockers. The three tracks in this mix are light on vocals, guest or otherwise, and heavier on the atmospherics. All are "classic" 2-Step, meaning about 4 years old: "Scrappy" by
Wookie, "True VIP" by
Youngstar, and "Romantic Call" by
DJ Deller. Any help with what the singer's saying in the last (after the lines "I'm on a romantic call/Talking to my baby down at the yard") would be greatly appreciated.