Bristol's Musical Mind
The Bristol Sound
This is a brief introduction to the Bristol underground scene and the Bristol Sound. As much I have been told from the several years of being a student to not cite from Wikipedia, Wikipedia has been a lot of help, along with their resources! (4)
The underground scene in Bristol was a big cultural movement starting from the 1980s. With Bristol filled with people of different backgrounds, especially from the Caribbeans, different types of music were passed around, which later created the Bristol Sound, like trip-hop and drum and bass were invented/discovered.
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The underground scene was also a movement to protest the large venues not catering for music like hip hop, punk and reggae at that time
The Bristol underground scene
Trip Hop
According to Jeff Wragg (1) " The term 'trip hop' was first used by Mixmag in June 1994 to describe the track In/Flux by DJ Shadow and other similar artists on the Mo' Wax record label (2)"
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Trip-hop is a glowing example of what can be the result of a mixture of different cultures and experimental music styles. By the 1980s, Bristol was overflowing with a variety of different genres, that DJ had the opportunity to experiment with. Such genres included acid, jazz, dub reggae, techno and so much more. That is simply how trip-hop was born, through experimenting DJs, who had close interaction with several different music styles. This is exactly how Massive Attack, one of the pioneers of trip-hop was created. Due to the growing popularity of trip-hop, music groups that were solely created as a trip-hop group, such as the Portishead, another influence trip-hop group from Bristol.
Drum and Bass
Drum and bass are most prominently known in both London and Bristol, with Bristol having the most impact. (1)
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The huge influence on the popularity of Drum and Bass is from the Windrush generation and the introduction to the different sound systems and genres such as reggae and dub.
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Due to Bristol being a city in the middle of the countryside and, attracted most people from the west of England and Bristol high concentration of Caribbean people living in Bristol, especially in the St Paul area, Bristol became the best-known place to listen to Drum and Bass till this day.
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Apart from the number of artists from Bristol producing drum and bass, we can't forget about the record stores that keep the drum and bass scene alive even now. "Record stores in Bristol suddenly started selling huge volumes of Bristol drum and bass on vinyl." (3)
With around 20 record stores operational the demand to produce drum and bass and other music on vinyl is still there.
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Even though recently venues have been struggling to stay afloat Bristol still have a large density of rave venue in the UK, with places like Lakota, the O2 Academy, Motion and more.
Bryan Gee is a drum and bass artist from Bristol who has mentioned that he is inspired by the sound systems like Jah Lokko Sound
Intrigue is a music and record label company that has been one of the leaders in drum and bass music scene in Bristol
A Bristol Drum and Bass producer, who was noted one of drum & bass and jungle's founders and pioneers
Inspired by the Bristol sound and with the help of the Sefton Park Basement Project, teaching h music production. Ron Size became a great drum and bass artist
One of the most known trip-hop groups in Bristol and worldwide
The Wild Bunch is one of the most iconic sound systems, which inspired the start of the genre trip-hop, with members of that same sound system, starting Massive Attave and Tricky
If you have time check out the origins and story of the iconic trip-hop group Massive Attack and check out this article, explaining the inspiration behind the book
Hover over the box to see the pictures and click on the picture to see the links
Reference List
(1) Wragg, J. (2016) Just Don't Call it Trip Hop: Reconciling the Bristol sound style with the trip hop genre. Organised Sound, 21(1), pp. 40-50.
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(2) Phillips D. (2009) Superstar DJs Here We Go . London : Ebury Press .
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(3) Amen Breaks. (2020). Bristol Drum And Bass: A DNB Powerhouse - Amen Breaks. [online] Available at: https://amenbreaks.co.uk/blog/bristol-drum-and-bass-a-dnb-powerhouse/ .
(4) Wikipedia Contributors (2021). Bristol underground scene. [online] Wikipedia. Available from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_underground_scene