Aphrodite is well known in the Drum 'n' Bass fraternity and has released tracks since the early days. He famously paired up with Micky Finn and created 'Bad Ass' a track well known by many. In 1999 he released the album of this review - 'Aphrodite' - containing some of his best know tracks such as 'King Of The Beats', 'Music's Hypnotising' and 'B.M. Funkster'. It had been a while since some of these tracks had first surfaced, and I wondered how they would compare against more contemporary styles of D 'n' B. Also many albums like this can sound inconsistent in places and lacking continuity, where as others are so similar it is hard to differentiate between tracks.
Anyway....
There are three sections of mixed tracks, each preceded by an interlude so the album keeps its continuity. Though the album is continuously mixed, this has been done within its production, rather than manually with two turntables and a mixer. The overall sound is clean and punchy and suits this style of Jump-Up Drum and Bass.
After the first interlude, the album starts with a track called 'Cross Channel', a deep-basslined song with echoes of seagulls in the background. Although this is not the most exciting track to start an album with it has a certain indefinable quality to it that introduces us into Aphrodite rather well, though slightly in the background. It is not a track that particularly stands out on its own, though
sits well within the framework of the album. Similarly, 'Stalker' (featured on Human Traffic) is consistent in terms of the sound and how it has been mixed, yet lacks the excitement that the much better tracks on the album have.
With 'King Of The Beats', it is a different matter entirely, and shares its name with his 1996 classic of the same name - though the similarities end literally in the name. Whilst we may be disappointed by this were we looking for the original track, this reworking is of highest quality, and the mixture of cleverly used samples and sounds, mixed with a catchy and pleasant bassline make this a highlight of the album.
Another track that has undergone the remix treatment is 'Music's Hypnotising', which has worked in its favour too, although this time the track remains much closer to the original. Other remixed tracks include 'Style From The Dark Side', 'Rincing Quince', and 'Spice', which all benefit from being tweaked here and there. The latter two tend to be my favourites of the three, with well structured and melodic breaks in-between basslines that make the tracks distinct from each other. 'Style From The Dark Side', although a fairly decent track, tends to sound a little too like 'King Of The Beats'.
Another excellent track is 'B.M. Funkster', as is 'Listen To The Rhythm', which mixes in from 'King Of The Beats'. Unfortunately the melody to the bassline of this song sounds almost identical to the latter, and because 'King Of The Beats' comes first, it is eclipsed somewhat - a shame because on its own it rocks!
This is perhaps a weakness of Aphrodite; whilst the intermittent parts of tracks that interrupt the bassline are quite distinctive from each other (especially in comparison to the same parts in other Dark/Jump-Up Drum and Bass music), the actual bassline melodies and beats are all a bit too similar. This tends to make each track blend into the next and we forget which parts of the album we enjoyed listening to.
Comparing Aphrodite to other D 'n' B music, however, then his style sounds quite original. The main difference in Aphrodite's take on Drum 'n' Bass is how he arranges his tracks. Whilst most dark D 'n' B tends to exist only for the drop (when the track cuts out to just a throbbing baseline before the beat kicks in) there are excellent interruptions to the basslines with effective vocals, and/or catchy melodies. His basslines are very particular too as they tend to by composed of quite catchy, dark, mellow sounds that comprise most of the background, but are in contrast to the brighter parts of the bassline that cut into the mix in occasional rhythmic bursts. And whilst the basslines are deep and bass-heavy, the overall sound is mixed brighter then his contempories with much more midrange sounds and melodies. The tracks can sometimes sound a bit sparse though, but the tracks are fast moving and the continual use of sounds/vocals tends to stop us from becoming bored.
It is a reasonably difficult task when comparing this album to other Drum and Bass albums, because there hasn't been albums to choose from from. The most obvious one would be Roni Size's Mercury Music Prize Winner 'Newforms', because it is the biggest selling Drum and Bass album of all time. What made this album popular was the fact that Roni Size abandoned the harder and darker side of the genre in favour of a less synthesised 'live act' (named 'Reprazent'), and this more conventional arrangement allowed judges of the Mercury Prize for Music to accept Drum and Bass as a style of music. Whilst this innovation spawned many other great acts such as Red Snapper, it did not 'Reprazent' the D 'n' B scene by in large. Unsurprisingly, Aphrodite's synthesised sounds, sampled beats and deep basslines seem wildly electronic, heavy and sinister in contrast to the more percussive and natural sound of 'Newforms'.
Released in the same year as Aphrodite, 'Molten Beats' by Ram Trilogy represents more faithfully the kind of Drum and Bass likely to have been played in clubs, and seems to me a better mark to compare Aphrodite by. Whilst Reprazent points towards Jazz, Ram Trilogy's style is incredibly dark and twisted, creating hypnotic riffs with throbbing basslines and high-energy beats.
Although much closer in sound to 'Molten Beats', Aphrodite sits a little left of Ram Trilogy, still having the fat basslines but tending to be a little more melodic and diverse in sounds and vocals. There is a lot of energy on the Aphrodite album, and the tunes are certainly more distinct from each other (IMHO) than 'Newforms' and more catchy then 'Molten Beats'. However as dance floor action goes, Aphrodite falls a little short of Ram Trilogy's offering, though many will find it a better listen to at home than the latter. I do not think that 'Aphrodite' is an album that defines Drum and Bass of its era quite like 'Molten Beats' did. Instead its beauty is comprised from the fusion of punchy electronic sounds and samples, interlaced with rolling melodic baselines that create a highly listenable album with energy and magic, and which represent several long years of Drum and Bass music rather than simply a single era.
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As part of the Urban Takeover collective, Aphrodite has produced some brilliant funky drum ... more
and bass remixes of the Jungle Brothers, Luniz, Moloko and Audioweb, and on his own he's been belting out top-notch jungle since the genre's inception in the ear...
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