When house started building a home in the UK underground around 2007, there was a lot of excitement about the new lease of life it might bring to grime production, which had become rhythmically weary, reduced to a less expressive, less experimental formula by its own failure to hold sway on London dancefloors. No grime raves meant no reason to make dancefloor-shocks; producers either gave up altogether or resorted to unimaginative retreads and 'bait hip-hop' (those words were inseparable on RWD/Grimeforum for about two years). 2007/8 presented great opportunities for grime's first generation to bring their avant-garde motifs and dynamism to house and funky - and back to the clubs ('building a funky igloo at FWD' in 2009). But the UK funky scene - Marcus Nasty in particular - have been vehement that they don't want grime kids scuffing their shiny shoes, pulling a hood down over its clean new haircut. They've won, sadly. Grimey house production and MCs jumping on funky riddims has been a glaring, unfulfilled promise of the last few years.
From the 2002/3 era Geeneus stands alone in having taken the simple, all-powerful synth stabs of early grime and moved them into a house template. At least one of Oddz or Eastwood (featured on the mix below) is now a devout Muslim with no interest in music; I forget which one. The Eski Kid himself is still groping for that number 1 slot any way he can - and the greatly-anticipated Wiley Eskimo Instrumentals CD was deleted before it was even released.
But there are newer names fusing the two styles. Grievous Angel has moved in this area with his fantastic 'Ice Rink' funky refix, Spooky continues to mix up grime and funky to great effect, and of course our Bok Bok and Jam City wear their grime influences high up their sleeves. Tommo's shows on Live FM are well worth listening to: check this fairground madness - a tune of Tommo's own called 'Gutter Walk' apparently (warning: may contain traces of Discarda).
All this is a long-winded way of saying that the man you want on this is Slackk: semi-professional scouser, www.grimetapes.com supremo, south-east London's biggest Mr Wong fan, Junior Spesh blogger and increasingly hyped producer (watch out for the brilliant 'Fire Flies' getting a release soon). The rhythms are loose and compulsively danceable, and the sound palette is grimey enough to demand a revival of the shower face. Whatever happened to the shower face? It's about fucking time it came back, anyway.
