While Beyoncé has centred herself amidst a renaissance relocating house and dance music back to its Black roots, this shift in focus toward the Black origins of club music has been quietly raging in the underground for some time now. One case in particular: Black Rave Culture. The DC trio of Amal, James Bangura, and DJ Nativesun have made it their joint mission to champion forms like house, techno, Jersey club, jungle, and baile funk as Black music, by embracing and updating these forms in accordance to their vision. Starting with last year’s Black Rave Culture Vol.1, the trio have presented both a history and revival of Black dance music, weaving threads from across its diverse and complex landscape into pieces of potent dancefloor machinery. The mission continues on their latest, BRC Vol 2, an album that sees much of their theory consolidated and the synergy between the three more electric than ever.
While BRC Vol 2 sweeps through a gamut of influences, often combining motifs from multiple in a single track, the music here is immediately less academic than its predecessor. Which is not to say that Black Rave Culture Vol.1 was didactic in any way, but rather Vol 2 expresses itself with a greater sense of freedom and play. Something Else, for instance, exists between jungle, grime, and Jersey bounce with distinctly dancehall vocal samples. While Black Rave Culture Vol.1 did the same, it often did so neatly within the boundaries of its own futurism. BRC Vol 2 is a more fluid beast, there’s less restraint and more instinct, which makes for some truly thrilling dance music. There’s touches of afrobeats and baile funk in the bass bounce of Activate, while over six minutes, Issa Bop fuses techno, hyperpop, and house to the point where you stop caring about pinpointing the styles and allow yourself to get lost in the energy.
Download and stream BRC Vol 2 here
Central to the music on BRC Vol 2, as with Vol.1, is its use and sampling of Black cultural artefacts. Long Distance Dilemma weaves Allen Iverson’s infamous utterances of “practice” into a skittish acid techno by way of house beat. On Sub Poppin, the whining stab of the Ha Dance is chopped into Jersey bounce and blended with jagged footwork two-step. Sampling becomes an essential act of archiving here; reclaiming, immortalising, and subsequently revving pieces of cultural history that resonate with Black identity. There’s a reverence given to these touchstones, and also to the multitude of genres the trio expertly manage to juggle. Interestingly, while Black Rave Culture Vol.1 made a point of noting in its credits which of the trio were responsible for each track, on Vol 2 this is left unspoken. It speaks toward how they’ve amalgamated. Just like the vast history and diversity of styles they draw from, they’re connected by virtue of identity. Together, they’re testament to the enduring power of Black born sub-cultures, often whitewashed and overlooked, but always at the core of pushing culture itself forward.
Listen to Issa Bop from BRC Vol 2 below.
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