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trippnface
Advanced Member
United States
1,661 posts
Joined: Jan, 2010
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 Posted - 2014/11/04 : 23:21:50
quote:
Originally posted by DJAppyD1:
I personally think hardcore these days is really good, i mean i started listening 2 years ago but i think hardcore is awesome these days UK Hardcore all the way! :)
agreed. honestly some of my favorite vocal bangers are still quite recent in the past or even current; stuff that brings tears to my eyes :') welcome to the site :D
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Elliott
Advanced Member
United Kingdom
1,147 posts
Joined: May, 2012
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Posted - 2014/11/06 : 15:38:16
quote:
Originally posted by jordesuvi:
This post peaked my interest enough for me to chime in. There'll be some errors in the way I word this, I might start rambling and I'll probably delete this post soon but here we go:
How non listeners view hardcore:
From what I've gathered in my experience, the main demographic of hardcore listeners are the "happy chavs" and the "likely-has-an-anime-pic-as-an-avatar" guy. For starts, I can imagine it can be frightening to a typical mainstream listener to be even remotely associated with any of those types of people. I know most hardcore fans like their MC's but when I see them perform in a vest and a baseball cap it only strengthens the happy chav stereotype.
Almost any time I've exposed someone to hardcore the first reaction has always been "it's too fast", although that reaction is always weird to me because they'll go and listen to the latest Sigma tune at the same BPM.
Even when hardcore had funding for music videos the track has been played at 150-160bpm (Anybody Else But You, Outta My Head, You're Shining etc).
Typically in a popular mainstream EDM track the song will either focus on the following.
1. The drop
2. Sex/booty/turning up
3. Addressing a crowd with "we"
I know there's cases where other tracks trickle into the spotlight but there's the current trend. College kids looking to party want music about turning up and ass.
While that's happening, hardcore is releasing tracks with lyrics about rainbows and fairies and dancing all night.
Klubbed Up and HU sometimes release music with more relatable lyrics about love or whatever but those two labels seem to market their music towards their pre-existing fan base and it never gets further than that.
Hardcore and PLUR sorta went hand-in-hand for a while but due to trading kandi beads often being correlated to drug use PLUR has become a bit of a mockery. Diplo even banned kandi at an event because he thought all those were people on MDMA.
Krewella have been supporting Futureworld through their sets by playing more bassline oriented hardcore from the likes of those such as Tyl3r and Breeze. I attended their set at Global Gathering this year and when they dropped those tracks a lot of the crowd didn't know what to do, you had the hardcore fans bouncing along - of course. However vast majority of the crowd stood nodding their head a little.
Also, some of the older hardcore listeners are so reminiscent on the 90's happy raves or that little spike in popularity hardcore had around 07-08 that they refuse to accept the evolution of the genre. Resulting in forum members here leaving posts such as "hardcore just isn't good anymore".
A lot of you are thanking HU for their diverse releases and while it's true that they are a quality label it needs to be understood that outside of the UK it's a lot more rare to find happy chavs, so instead you have all your anime fanatics from around the world support the more "colourful" side of hardcore, hence why that's so popular.
I'm not sure if this is anything to do with anything but a lot of the big hardcore producers aren't exactly in their 20's anymore. Your average DJ that you'll see on the mainstage at festivals is probably some skinny dude varying from 17-27 years old.
nanobii made an bit of a mark on hardcore when he brought out Rainbow Road. Besides S3RL I'd say he's one of the only other producers that gets significant views on YouTube, especially since that track earned him a release on Monstercat.
To increase hardcore's popularity I'd probably go around slowly re-introducing it again such as having tracks feature at the back of dance compilation albums.
I think this is all broadly true, accurate and right.
To be fair, Nobody To Love had rather sparse drum work that's much easier to listen to for most people than a 4-to-the-floor kick. But I do take your point. Hardcore didn't seem aggressively fast, even when I first got into it.
The one thing I don't accept is that I should put up with the devolution of hardcore. I don't have to like or approve of every album a band releases just because I like that band. I intend to whine my nuts off about hardcore until it dies or goes back to an empirically better state.
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rafferty
Advanced Member
United Kingdom
667 posts
Joined: Feb, 2012
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Posted - 2014/11/08 : 04:11:35
quote:
Originally posted by The drunken scotsman:
To be fair it only seems to be the Americans who bother with the candy thing. Aye it's cringey as fcuk but so are Americans in general ;-)
Haha yeah true, they seemed to obsessed with the candy shite there.
Anime and Candy in hardcore should be left as far away from Hardcore as possible. The Hardstyle scene seems to be more like what the Hardcore scene was back in the day these days.
Good heavy oldskool Hardcore Basslines and Euphoric meldies with a street wear crowd that never embraces candy. Maybe that is why defqon is doing so well. Nothing shameful in their scene.
I just wish all the uplifting vocal Hardstyle guys like Headhunterz are doing was Hardcore speed.
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Let's ditch the candy & go back to the gym & streetwear at raves :)
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Elipton
Advanced Member
United Kingdom
1,268 posts
Joined: Apr, 2013
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Posted - 2014/11/08 : 08:18:37
quote:
Originally posted by rafferty:
quote:
Originally posted by The drunken scotsman:
To be fair it only seems to be the Americans who bother with the candy thing. Aye it's cringey as fcuk but so are Americans in general ;-)
Anime and Candy in hardcore should be left as far away from Hardcore as possible
Take away those elements and Hardcore halves in size and popularity.
The anime side of things is heavy in Japan's Hardcore - of course. With it you have great looking albums that always seem to be far more vibrant and detailed than anything the West has produced.
The anime side of things also opens up Hardcore to demographics around the world. Anime fans globally seem to enjoy Hardcore, partially thanks to J-core, but also thanks to promoters on YouTube.
Believe it or not, people listen to the music for the anime artwork. It's a great combination, and it's something that has made jordesuvi, xy4Trance and other similar channels more popular than the non-anime equivalent; Mozz020.
Candy is also prevalent pretty much everywhere. There are still people who enjoy that aspect, and you'll be hard stretched to go to a rave in the UK and not see florescent skirts or socks. Scar rocked the candy attire all the time, and of course Kikwear has grown into quite a successful little business.
Take these aspects away and you look most American fans, you lose most of the reach to non-hardcore fans on YouTube, you lose J-core, and what you're left with is a bunch of raving 40-year-olds with cocaine on their breath. That's pretty much the UK scene anyway, but the anime side of things is a lifeline, and the candy thing is simply tradition.
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jordesuvi
Junior Member
United Kingdom
143 posts
Joined: Feb, 2014
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Posted - 2014/11/08 : 14:23:40
I am in full support of Elipton's post. If it was possible to like or favourite forum posts I would have been all over that.
You will also notice that anime has actually made its way to more mainstream/music variety based channels such as xKito, Diversity Promotions, HDdubRAVE and many more.. Despite this, I don't think I've ever seen a complaint about it in their comments sections.
I have had requests by artists before to not use anime for their song and whilst I respect their wish by using a more scenic image, it's still baffling why it would be such a big deal.
I recently did a survey (I deleted it after I had got the information I'd needed) and I found that a fairly large amount of the subscribers I receive found me through being enticed by a (quote:) "beautiful" thumbnail of mine in the related videos.
I realize to the older generations all of this could come off as childish since cartoons and music have become a thing. But it works, it's both stimulating for the eyes and ears and it honestly wouldn't surprise me if in years down the line anime became part of an EDM artists visuals or became festival mascots. It's totally farfetched and unlikely, yes.
But:
If Skrillex can make Nyat Cat part of his show visuals
Porter Robinson's music and show be heavily influenced by Japanese culture
Pasquale Rotella can name his daughter Rainbow
Ravers dress up in magenta tutu skirts, lime green fluffy boots
And even the manliest of bros wear t-shirts/vests with fluorescent words on it whilst wearing colourful beads around their wrists in front of everyone at a huge festival then it's certainly possible.
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Edited by - jordesuvi on 2014/11/08 14:28:56 |
brenergy
Junior Member
Canada
105 posts
Joined: Oct, 2011
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Posted - 2014/11/08 : 15:13:43
I'd also support Elipton's statement on anime and candy in Hardcore.
Might not be a large part of the UK scene, but it's among the bread-and-butter of the international scene (thanks to J-Core and promoters, but I would think Konami's rhythm games might have played an influence as well, especially the tunes our man Silver was behind :V). And believe me, with the drama queens hogging the spotlight on the UK side, I'd much rather the anime and candy were a bigger part of the genre's image than the crap perpetuated by the likes of MC Storm and Scenekiller.
And yeah, I'd certainly believe the statistic jor brought up about "beautiful" thumbnails helping promote Hardcore.
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Elipton
Advanced Member
United Kingdom
1,268 posts
Joined: Apr, 2013
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Posted - 2014/11/08 : 16:04:49
Would I get a Reddit Gold thingy for that post if I put that on Reddit? :3
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rafferty
Advanced Member
United Kingdom
667 posts
Joined: Feb, 2012
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Posted - 2014/11/09 : 10:46:03
quote:
Originally posted by Elipton:
quote:
Originally posted by rafferty:
quote:
Originally posted by The drunken scotsman:
To be fair it only seems to be the Americans who bother with the candy thing. Aye it's cringey as fcuk but so are Americans in general ;-)
Anime and Candy in hardcore should be left as far away from Hardcore as possible
Take away those elements and Hardcore halves in size and popularity.
The anime side of things is heavy in Japan's Hardcore - of course. With it you have great looking albums that always seem to be far more vibrant and detailed than anything the West has produced.
The anime side of things also opens up Hardcore to demographics around the world. Anime fans globally seem to enjoy Hardcore, partially thanks to J-core, but also thanks to promoters on YouTube.
Believe it or not, people listen to the music for the anime artwork. It's a great combination, and it's something that has made jordesuvi, xy4Trance and other similar channels more popular than the non-anime equivalent; Mozz020.
Candy is also prevalent pretty much everywhere. There are still people who enjoy that aspect, and you'll be hard stretched to go to a rave in the UK and not see florescent skirts or socks. Scar rocked the candy attire all the time, and of course Kikwear has grown into quite a successful little business.
Take these aspects away and you look most American fans, you lose most of the reach to non-hardcore fans on YouTube, you lose J-core, and what you're left with is a bunch of raving 40-year-olds with cocaine on their breath. That's pretty much the UK scene anyway, but the anime side of things is a lifeline, and the candy thing is simply tradition.
Jcore is probably the worst form of hardcore there is. Hardcore might have gained new fans with its anime and candy but it probably lost twice that number at the same time in Europe.
Hardstyle has pretty much incorporated all the original aspects of Hardcore apart from the speed. And look what has happened, Hardstyle is now head and shoulders the biggest Hard dance genre and has djs in the top 100. People won't ever take Hardcore seriously in the wider dance scene with cringeworthy shite like anime being part of it. Look how well Future World is doing without anime or candy as part of the music.
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Let's ditch the candy & go back to the gym & streetwear at raves :)
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Edited by - rafferty on 2014/11/09 10:56:45 |
Elipton
Advanced Member
United Kingdom
1,268 posts
Joined: Apr, 2013
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Posted - 2014/11/09 : 12:23:55
quote:
Originally posted by rafferty:
quote:
Originally posted by Elipton:
quote:
Originally posted by rafferty:
quote:
Originally posted by The drunken scotsman:
To be fair it only seems to be the Americans who bother with the candy thing. Aye it's cringey as fcuk but so are Americans in general ;-)
Anime and Candy in hardcore should be left as far away from Hardcore as possible
Take away those elements and Hardcore halves in size and popularity.
The anime side of things is heavy in Japan's Hardcore - of course. With it you have great looking albums that always seem to be far more vibrant and detailed than anything the West has produced.
The anime side of things also opens up Hardcore to demographics around the world. Anime fans globally seem to enjoy Hardcore, partially thanks to J-core, but also thanks to promoters on YouTube.
Believe it or not, people listen to the music for the anime artwork. It's a great combination, and it's something that has made jordesuvi, xy4Trance and other similar channels more popular than the non-anime equivalent; Mozz020.
Candy is also prevalent pretty much everywhere. There are still people who enjoy that aspect, and you'll be hard stretched to go to a rave in the UK and not see florescent skirts or socks. Scar rocked the candy attire all the time, and of course Kikwear has grown into quite a successful little business.
Take these aspects away and you look most American fans, you lose most of the reach to non-hardcore fans on YouTube, you lose J-core, and what you're left with is a bunch of raving 40-year-olds with cocaine on their breath. That's pretty much the UK scene anyway, but the anime side of things is a lifeline, and the candy thing is simply tradition.
Jcore is probably the worst form of hardcore there is. Hardcore might have gained new fans with its anime and candy but it probably lost twice that number at the same time in Europe.
Hardstyle has pretty much incorporated all the original aspects of Hardcore apart from the speed. And look what has happened, Hardstyle is now head and shoulders the biggest Hard dance genre and has djs in the top 100. People won't ever take Hardcore seriously in the wider dance scene with cringeworthy shite like anime being part of it. Look how well Future World is doing without anime or candy as part of the music.
Okay, that post will need some dissecting.
J-core has become very popular in Japan, meaning there's a scene in Japan and therefore business for UK DJ's. Just recently Gammer's and Scott Brown went out there for an event. In your opinion, it may be the worst for whatever reason, but Shimamura and M-Project are on a number of UK labels such as Lethal Theory, so there's good signs of UK and US fans embracing and enjoying it.
There's no evidence of fans leaving Hardcore or stopping listening to it as result of anime's presence. It bears little influence on conventional releases or events, and is simply an extension of what there already is. People have left Hardcore because they've outgrown it. Hardcore in the UK, for the last 5 or 6 years hasn't appealed to young people and they haven't gotten involved. I'd love to see a statistic on the average age of event goers, because I'd say it's rising relentlessly on my experience.
Hardstyle has done well, but it's another type of music altogether. FutureWorld's success is very debatable. Releasing digitally is an easy thing to do, and volume of releases doesn't indicate the volume of sales. Futureworld in my eyes has been slow off the mark. Meanwhile anime themed releases in Japan are abundant. Every year new releases are put to press for seasonal conventions such as M3. Tano*c has a larger array of albums than most UK labels put together. M-Project run a huge amount of albums out of his studio too. There's simply albums everywhere and they are all-round great releases.
Hardcore in the UK is lacking not because of anime, but because it's run out of the easy ideas and won't risk something out of the ordinary. New people need to be reached. If someone with the label and meane doesn't do it, Hardcore as it has been for the last twenty years will wither and stop. Eventually it will be a genre that exists entirely on the Internet with only occasional small raves for the enthusiasts. It's a grim prediction, but where do we really see Hardcore in 10 years? It's natural that people move on and focus on family or careers, so who exactly will take up the reigns as a big promoter or label owner? I'm struggling to see the candidates, and more and more I can only image Hardcore as a genre celebrated through online radio festivals, YouTube and digital releases.
I went off on one there..
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Samination
Advanced Member
Sweden
13,239 posts
Joined: Jul, 2004
195 hardcore releases
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Posted - 2014/11/09 : 15:41:24
quote:
Originally posted by Elipton:
Hardcore in the UK is lacking not because of anime, but because it's run out of the easy ideas and won't risk something out of the ordinary.
They have tried taking risks though.
CLSM crew tried the Hardscape stuff and that didnt work. Breeze tried changing in completely and we all know what happened there.
But looking at the history, there's always been some kind of resistance towards change. When Hardcore became the Happy Hardcore most people here love and enjoy around 1996. When Hixxy started Raver Baby and started making more trancier stuff popular in 2002. The electro phaze Dougal & Gammer enjoyed (and I hated :P) during the mid-late 2000, and ofcourse Breeze here recently. Only difference is that Breeze's try has gotten a more vocal resistance
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Happy, UK Hardcore, Freeform, Makina and Gabber
http://samination.se/
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trippnface
Advanced Member
United States
1,661 posts
Joined: Jan, 2010
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Posted - 2014/11/09 : 20:08:13
quote:
Originally posted by rafferty:
quote:
Originally posted by Elipton:
quote:
Originally posted by rafferty:
quote:
Originally posted by The drunken scotsman:
To be fair it only seems to be the Americans who bother with the candy thing. Aye it's cringey as fcuk but so are Americans in general ;-)
Anime and Candy in hardcore should be left as far away from Hardcore as possible
Take away those elements and Hardcore halves in size and popularity.
The anime side of things is heavy in Japan's Hardcore - of course. With it you have great looking albums that always seem to be far more vibrant and detailed than anything the West has produced.
The anime side of things also opens up Hardcore to demographics around the world. Anime fans globally seem to enjoy Hardcore, partially thanks to J-core, but also thanks to promoters on YouTube.
Believe it or not, people listen to the music for the anime artwork. It's a great combination, and it's something that has made jordesuvi, xy4Trance and other similar channels more popular than the non-anime equivalent; Mozz020.
Candy is also prevalent pretty much everywhere. There are still people who enjoy that aspect, and you'll be hard stretched to go to a rave in the UK and not see florescent skirts or socks. Scar rocked the candy attire all the time, and of course Kikwear has grown into quite a successful little business.
Take these aspects away and you look most American fans, you lose most of the reach to non-hardcore fans on YouTube, you lose J-core, and what you're left with is a bunch of raving 40-year-olds with cocaine on their breath. That's pretty much the UK scene anyway, but the anime side of things is a lifeline, and the candy thing is simply tradition.
Jcore is probably the worst form of hardcore there is. Hardcore might have gained new fans with its anime and candy but it probably lost twice that number at the same time in Europe.
Hardstyle has pretty much incorporated all the original aspects of Hardcore apart from the speed. And look what has happened, Hardstyle is now head and shoulders the biggest Hard dance genre and has djs in the top 100. People won't ever take Hardcore seriously in the wider dance scene with cringeworthy shite like anime being part of it. Look how well Future World is doing without anime or candy as part of the music.
hard style sucks though. :p. the US is complete opposite of what you are talking about in the UK i guess. the future of what you say is not doing great is going to take over. "cringeworthy shit"? lol... and i am assuming the last part is a joke. future world is trash; and despised as a hardcore label...if you can even call it that. i dont know one person into hardcore that likes what futureworld are doing. everyone i know loves hardcore & anime fusion..... i for one look even more forward to extra cringe worthy anime induced kandi kid hardcore ; that IS the scene here. need moar Japan. besides HU; j core is one of the ONLY other outlets producing really good hardcore
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MC Deecee
Average Member
United Kingdom
194 posts
Joined: Jul, 2009
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Posted - 2014/11/09 : 21:54:49
As mentioned numerous times already, i don't really think its ever been a case of being cool or not, hardcore has always been more of an acquired taste as far as i can work out, certainly in the circle of people i grew up with in any case.
As much as i don't like to bring up the age old commercial/underground debate i think it is a factor, back when i was growing up the only way you'd ever come into contact with hardcore as a genre was if someone you knew listened to it, it is a lot more accessible now, as is all music i suppose, all my mates were into it when i was a lad, nowadays on the occasion i see any of my old lot they always say stuff like "oh yeah hardcore, are you STILL listening to that" yes, yes i am, im aware some people do outgrow it but not me :)
The essence of what i'm saying is that 12 - 15 years ago you couldn't simply walk into a supermarket and buy a hardcore CD off the shelf, maybe not so much right now but in recent years with CXH and HTID's albums on sale it brought it into the view of many more 'normal' people than ever, but then again is that in itself a bit of a double edged sword, in a more niche scene everyone's in it for the music, once you introduce it into the public eye so it becomes more available does it not dilute the fan base a little so your up town of a weekend youngsters are all into it simply because it sounds alright and they saw an advert for it on clubland TV, is that really a good thing, doesn't the fact that its still relatively underground kinda add to the magic?
Buying it off the high street was something that you most certainly couldn't have done a few years ago in any case, in those days you had to know the right decent little independent record shops who could order it in for you, (i remember being about 15 and buzzing for the whole week while i waited for my copy of slammin vinyls absolute hardcore volume 2 that id ordered to come in) but nowadays, it goes even further than that, anyone can access any given genre at any given time with nothing more than a smart phone, so can anything really be regarded as underground anymore?
The other thing i do find is that while hardcore is almost constantly evolving, any memory of it that a member of the general public may have is stuck at the arse end of the 90's still, if someone asks me when out in our local pub or wherever what we listen to and i say hardcore, they usually think rock/metal first, then when i correct them and say "no hardcore as in hardcore raves", chances are they'll say something like "oh yeah happy hardcore, i remember that, shooting star, heart of gold, dj hixxy" it makes me laugh that the general perception of it is over a decade out of date.
Don't get me wrong, i love happy hardcore, its what i grew up listening to, and without it we would not have the upfront hardcore that we have now, but UK hardcore is quite a bit different to the happy era, it all grew from the same point but the sound is markedly different now.
And while im here, thats another thing i don't like, people who say they love the uk upfront stuff but openly say that they cant stand the "old cheesy happy hardcore shit" and iv'e heard semi established artists say things like that as well, to say its shit means you are basically taking the piss out of the very roots that the music that you now say you love originally grew from.
Apologies if i have gone off on a few tangents here, i didn't mean it to come across as a rant or anything, i just had a few different subjects to broach so got it all in with one post lol.
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Thankful to everyone who had a set and put me on it, mind blown, twisted tempo, white noise and hyperbolic :)
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Edited by - MC Deecee on 2014/11/09 21:57:25 |
Triquatra
Moderator
United Kingdom
12,637 posts
Joined: Nov, 2003
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Posted - 2014/11/10 : 08:36:10
It's always been quite clique'y...but you could buy Hardcore in superstores....I mean there is a reason Bonkers 3 went silver in 1997 and a bunch of others followed eventually going gold! :)
You could buy Hardcore in most big retailers in the 90s. I bought Bonkers/hardcore heavens etc in MVC/HMV/Virgin and eventually ASDA/(walmart) when they got their entertainment section etc
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Sulphurik
Advanced Member
United Kingdom
1,002 posts
Joined: Jan, 2009
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Posted - 2014/11/11 : 11:30:43
quote:
Originally posted by MC Deecee:
And while im here, thats another thing i don't like, people who say they love the uk upfront stuff but openly say that they cant stand the "old cheesy happy hardcore shit" and iv'e heard semi established artists say things like that as well, to say its shit means you are basically taking the piss out of the very roots that the music that you now say you love originally grew from.
Yeah that's true.
I was into hardcore up to around 2010/2011 and it would have been the main music genre I listened to. The sound has evolved so much since then and imo the sound as a whole especially the very commercial tracks are making it the uncoolest it has ever been.
In saying that it's great that some of the bigger names have returned eg. Scott Brown and it's good to see a large number of albums/compilations being released on HU. The large majority of well known and popular producers have now released their own albums which is good to see...although there's still one big name who hasn't yet! Hixxy. Is he still releasing tracks through HTID aswell as Futureworld?
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The drunken scotsman
Advanced Member
United Kingdom
1,488 posts
Joined: Dec, 2011
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Posted - 2014/11/11 : 12:36:43
quote:
Originally posted by Sulphurik:
quote:
Originally posted by MC Deecee:
And while im here, thats another thing i don't like, people who say they love the uk upfront stuff but openly say that they cant stand the "old cheesy happy hardcore shit" and iv'e heard semi established artists say things like that as well, to say its shit means you are basically taking the piss out of the very roots that the music that you now say you love originally grew from.
Yeah that's true.
I was into hardcore up to around 2010/2011 and it would have been the main music genre I listened to. The sound has evolved so much since then and imo the sound as a whole especially the very commercial tracks are making it the uncoolest it has ever been.
In saying that it's great that some of the bigger names have returned eg. Scott Brown and it's good to see a large number of albums/compilations being released on HU. The large majority of well known and popular producers have now released their own albums which is good to see...although there's still one big name who hasn't yet! Hixxy. Is he still releasing tracks through HTID aswell as Futureworld?
Lol he isn't releasing anything. He joined Futureworld about a year ago and in that time 2 collabs of his have been released and not a peep of any upcoming releases. He's very quiet these days although he still DJ's regularly as far as I know.
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