It's Monday, and so time for a new BBB! 🗞️✨
ENJOY 💙💙
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NEWS
Skrillex gives first interview in over 10 years
The goat has spoken. Modern Dubstep pioneer Skrillex gave his first formal interview in over 10 years for Berlin-based magazine 032c in conversation with British-Swedish artist Ecco2K. The producer / DJ - real name Sonny Moore - gave some insight into his breakout project Scary Monsters And Nice Sprits, sharing that only $2k was put towards marketing for the EP. He also talked about initial pushback he got when pitching working with Justin Bieber to Atlantic Records - "They were on their Blackberrys like, "Justin Bieber, hmm interesting"" - and gave an insight into the secret behind his longevity as an performer, citing his continuous want for "people to come see me live, jump around in a room, and create a real, shared space". Though he did also mention that he'd rather "hang up the boots" than do shows that don't feel completely "authentic". He also talked about the importance of the process in music-making, saying "Starting from something imperfect forces you to end up somewhere you'd never expect".
But most significant were the thoughts he shared on the rising use of AI in music-making. He spoke of a sudden realisation he had, that "the value of art can almost be measured by its ability to make someone feel seen" as a listener. Moore went on to say that good, human-made music "makes you think: 'They get me. They're on my wavelength. They're speaking to me'. Maybe there are some AI songs that can go viral, but you can't have that feeling of being seen if there isn't a human on the other side". This is an important perspective given that music is, in a big way, about connection and the sharing of energy between people, so Moore's thoughts are ones that would be hard to rebuff for even the most staunch of AI stans. Accompanying the interview was a video / photo shoot which can be viewed through the link below.
Buy the 032c Skrillex interview magazine here: https://www.032c.com/products/issue-49-summer-26-skrillex
Skrillex photoshoot video: https://www.instagram.com/p/DanUtajCDez/?igsh=c2dlYXU5YnVpYTN3
I for one am very happy that he's publicly questioned AI-generated music. He definitely could've gone further with it, but I think his appeal to humanity - within the context of art and creativity - was extremely important, especially from an artist of his calibre. I'll definitely be purchasing the magazine, let me know if you do too!
Nasko exposes aina for AI use
More of this please! Last week, underground Dubstep supremo Nasko took to X to expose aina, an AI 'artist' who's become quite popular on Soundcloud in the last few months. One upload in particular, titled 'Destiny' (pictured below) has nearly 5.5k likes and 90k plays. In his post, Nasko wrote: 'It's very obvious too but unfortunately many are not familiar with sunos sound palette', referencing the AI music app many are using to generate 'music'. Nasko rounded off the post by saying, 'They're deleting comments and blocking anyone from calling them out', only adding to the suspect vibe of the aina project.
What followed was a flurry of discussion on the X platform, with a mix of people lauding Nasko's call-out, whilst others unsurprisingly objected to it. Most funny was probably fellow producer / DJ euphee's reply - '84k in 2 months with 1k followers yea SURE pal'. Another artist Phrva wrote 'a.i. generated "soul" dubstep... jokes write themselves'. Another user cleverly spotted that the artist name 'literally has AI in [it]' which I hadn't even noticed myself! Many pointed out how blatant the use of AI was in the songs too. In a follow-up tweet, Nasko asked Soundcloud: 'could you consider adding a label for AI generated content?'
Though as aforementioned, there were detractors to Nasko's original post, and the discussion that followed. Particularly fascinating was an exchange between Nasko and a user by the name of @DaWorldRevolvin (0 followers), who was essentially arguing that all art is a copy of some sort, with AI-generated music being no different. Nasko bit back effectively, with my favourite part of his quote tweets being his description of apps like Suno as a 'hallucination process', explaining that it's impossible to own AI music since you didn't make it, and therefore it can't be copyrighted. It was an important conversation to have publicly through the quote retweets, simply to show how nonsensical the AI music argument is.
All of this to say - do not listen to aina's music, or further this alias in any way. I know it'll be tempting to listen to how awful it is, but every play, share, like and comment just normalises the use of AI in music even more. Instead, call it out, please and thank you!
More Lost Lands B2Bs
The back-to-back announcements are coming in thick and fast for the biggest annual Bass music bonanza. The latest B2B additions to the 9th edition of Excision's Lost Lands festival are Subtronics and his wife Level Up, INFEKT and Samplifire as the 'TRENCH TIME' duo and Craze and Dieselboy. Of those, I would really recommend catching the TRENCH TIME set if you can, I saw their performance at Rampage last weekend and it was very good. Was there a lot of stompy Dubstep on offer? For sure. But was it also captivating and engaging from start to finish, thanks to the fantastic mixing and remixing on show? Absolutely.
Per their post on Instagram (pictured above), the festival apparently has one more B2B to offer, following other announcements such as Eptic B2B LYNY, Sullivan King B2B Ray Volpe, Calcium B2B Mad Dubz and more. Who could the final pair-up for LL'26 be?
If you're going to Lost Lands this year, let me know in the comments!
MUSIC
New Dr. Ozi EP?
Do not quote me on this! Modern Dubstep fan favourite Dr. Ozi will be dropping his latest single, titled 'Titan', this Friday on his very own Hard Tooth Records label. This is his first release since 'Anthem Sound' with vocalist Nat James for Never Say Die's Vol. 7 compilation, and interestingly the artwork has been made by the sister of one of his production students.
And might it be leading towards a bigger project, to come out later in the year? I said what I said at the beginning of this segment as I saw somewhere that an Ozi EP was incoming, but I can't remember for the life of me where I saw it, and now can't find that information to verify it. Any new Dr. Ozi is always great, but of course an entire multi-track project is gonna be better than just one single. I'm looking forward to seeing how 'Titan' turns out, and we can proceed with our hope for more Ozi material from there.
New Nitepunk single
Last Friday, Nitepunk put out his first single since dropping 'Soma' with Skrillex, titled 'Umbra'. The track comes in at just over the 3min mark, and is a self-release. With rumours intensifying in recent months about the release of a second / sophomore Nitepunk album at some point in the near future, single releases from him can now be viewed not only as solo, individual cuts, but as leading tunes for a potentially huge future project. I personally think that's what we're getting here, which is exciting! Though because we don't know for sure at the moment, I will be checking the track at some point soon. Maybe on tonight's stream after I've listened through the new MUST DIE! album. 9:30pm GMT tonight, see you there!
Moore Kismet announces new project
Well this is a turn-up for the books! Moore Kismet took to Instagram last week to announce that their project will be taking a distinctly different turn in the immediate future, veering more towards music that isn't strictly dance or EDM, which is what they've become renowned for over the last 6/7 years. They'll be releasing a mix soon consisting of 90% non-EDM music (their words), and announced today they'll be releasing their first single in this new venture this Friday, titled 'I'M YOUR FAVOURITE!'. Genre-wise, Kismet will be delving into RnB, Neo Soul, Hip Hop, Pop and more, which is a definite step away from what we've known Moore Kismet as up until now. As much as I like Moore Kismet's Bass material, I'm definitely excited to hear how their sound translates to lighter forms of music-making and production.
It's crazy to think Moore Kismet is still only 21! Are you looking forward to hearing a new side to Moore Kismet's project and material?
Big Bass releases of the week
What did we get beyond the Nitepunk single last week? Well, most notable was a fifth album in five years from none other than MUST DIE!. As I mentioned above, I'll be streaming my reaction to that tonight around 9:30PM GMT, so do make sure you tune in to that if you can! There were several eyebrow-raising collabs in the Bass scene too, including Kaskade & Crankdat (how??), Flux Pavilion x Liquid Stranger x Ahee, SampliFire & Mad Dubz and Clockvice & Vorso. On the singles front, it's worth noting on the latest cut to drop from Viperactive, 'Mantra'. In terms of remixes, there's a new one from UKG fan favourite MPH of Travy, Elzzz and Fred again..'s 'DID IT AGAIN', as well as a redo of Skrillex & ISOxo's 'Smoke' by SPAG. Happy listening! 💙
DISCUSSION
Why aren't human artists copying AI-generated music?
You know when you think about something intensely for a short period of time, forget about it, and then see someone spell out that exact thought in a detailed way online? I had that when viewing the latest Instagram story update from producer / DJ HerShe, who was basically saying: why aren't human artists ripping AI-generated music ideas and using them as their own? It would be sticking it back in the faces of AI music obsessives - the foundation of which is stealing human-made ideas without consent - but would also be fine to do given that that 'music' can't be copyrighted.
Initially in my head it made sense, but the more I think about it I feel like this just adds to the problem of laziness in artistic creativity. It would be funny to own the AI people for a bit, but say that process becomes normalised, you then have an issue of human artists looking to AI to generate musical ideas for them, and potentially becoming dependent on that. Would there be a distinct difference in using AI in the music-construction process - like altering the sonics of a particular sound, for example - and using it to create your own human-made versions of what is ultimately AI-generated music? You'd be producing the idea yourself from scratch, but the concept would still be derived from an artificial source, and exist against the motive of artistic creativity at its source. I hope I'm making sense with that?
The idea that AI 'artists' would get copyright strikes after a human copied their entire track and released it is beyond hilarious, but I also can't help but think that just adds to the slippery slope that we're sliding down faster and faster as the week go by. What do you guys make of this topic, and is there a way in which it could work on all fronts?
FUNNIES // COOL STUFF
Madeon's 'Pop Culture' turns 15
Wow, 15 years old! I can hardly believe or fathom this milestone, I remember watching it for the first time and just marvelling at the fact that so many Pop tracks I loved could be meshed together like that. I didn't fully understand what DJing / mixing was at that time, so seeing something like this really blew my mind. What a special piece of art, and I'm glad Madeon was able to commemorate it like this, especially after dropping a first album in almost 7 years - it all lined up! If you haven't watched this before, you absolutely have to - link below!
'Pop Culture' link: https://youtu.be/lTx3G6h2xyA?is=Cdnxr1aqBjJFqWjl
Another Effin funny
Not an instant classic of his, but I still chuckled.
MUERTE's cool new tool
I have to be honest, I'm still not entirely sure what MUERTE has created here, but going off the reaction of everyone in the comments, it seems to be a pretty amazing piano-related tool that he's put together. I'm pro anything that improves musicality within a Bass music context, so I'm glad this is a thing, and that it's been received as well as it has.
Reel link: https://www.instagram.com/reel/Daqbk-phqyK/?igsh=ZHh0cGJjbDg3czZl
Dillon Francis on finishing tunes
Some good and relatable words from EDM legend Dillon Francis on the process of finishing tunes, which I imagine will be a good watch for all you producers out there. Get viewing!
Reel link: https://www.instagram.com/reel/Dac2LQbOnwO/?igsh=MWVhczFvbWptbmJlaQ==
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Did I miss anything from the last week in Bass music? Let me know below! 😌