Skullstep
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| Skullstep | |
| Stylistic origins | |
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| Cultural origins | |
| Typical instruments | |
| Mainstream popularity | Small |
| Other topics | |
| List of jungle and drum n bass artists List of jungle and drum n bass record labels | |
Skullstep is a pejorative term used to describe a certain type of sound found in the electronic music genre drum and bass. The sound is typified as having several drum hits, horror movie samples, industrial sounds and, at a certain extent, blood and gore imagery. This was also classified in the past as Grindstep by the band Evol Intent. The meaning of the term is less a musical description than an insult within the world of internet drum and bass culture.
The name originated from and popularised by posters on the world renowned drum & bass webforum Dogs On Acid, as an act of mockery against drum and bass producer Zardonic, while he was promoting his drum & bass free net label, Zardonic Recordings, which according to him was supposed to make a stand against major drum & bass labels in an effort to release underrated and fairly unknown producers. The phrase was embraced by the site's moderators, appearing in posts frequently, due to its derogatory usage. A thread promoting a false parody label named Internet Recordings was spawned and caused certain commotion between producers of this tendency, more specifically, smaller producers who released their productions through this net label, aswell as Black Hoe Recordings, Evil Beats, Future Sickness, Killing Sheep and MindSaw Recordings, this last one being the major exposer of the tendency.
Despite the nebulous nature of the term, many drum and bass fans have found certain producers to be strong purveyors of the skullstep "sound". While the term doesn't have total acceptance between heavy drum & bass producers, Zardonic recently recorded a drum & bass set for the Drum Therapy radio show in Dark Wax Radio entitled The Skullstep Chronicles which, once again, caused posters in Dogs On Acid to mock against it. Curiously enough, the track listing of this set barely contains songs that could be classified under the term.
Ultimately, despite the muddiness of the term in many circles, and its persistent pejorative connotation, the sub-genre of skullstep seems to have a sound at least as distinctive and identifiable as that of Drumfunk, Neurofunk, or Hardstep. Despite this, artists still chafe at the label. While Killing Sheep Records seems to have cheekily and rather ironically embraced the tag, others remain offended. Producers that can also be named under the term are Forbidden Society, Current Value, DJ Hidden, Numek, Cytech, GasMask 71, B Soul, Xpander, The Teknoist, Paul Blackout, Throttler, and many many others.
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