Roni Size, Kid Hops, Pressha
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I'll admit, I didn't think UK drum & bass producer Roni Size was still in the music game. Like many, I assumed he faded out after 2000’s In the Mode, the slightly disappointing, rap-heavy follow-up to 1997’s D&B paradigm-shifter New Forms. Don’t get me wrong: In the Mode is a solid record with a grip of club-friendly burners. But compared to its world-beating predecessor, it couldn’t help seeming underwhelming. On New Forms, Size and his beat-savvy cohorts in Reprazent (Krust, Die, Suv, drummer Clive Deemer) brought a jazzy, virtuosic feel to the typically utilitarian condition of much jungle; check “Brown Paper Bag” for one sterling example. Reprazent’s large-band live shows supporting New Forms exemplified D&B’s status as electronic music’s vanguard genre in the late 1990s. It’ll be interesting to see if Size can rekindle that mercurial rhythmic brilliance two decades later.
by Dave Segal