Person
1: “Boofy's really been on a roll recently”
Person
2: “Since when?”
Person
1: “Yeah”
Nottingham
label Tumble Audio have had an excellent year. Receiving heavy
support across all platforms from a host of DJs (not least Marcus
Nasty, Brackles, Slackk and Madam X) they've been steadily making a
name as a reliable source of quality club orientated bass music. For
006 they've enlisted Boofy who himself has been having a great few
months; Since When was released on Kahn and Neek's Bandulu Records
and he's started his own label with collaborator Lemzly Dale. Their 12” was released to virtually universal acclaim. Thus there were
high hopes when we first got wind that he had turned his mind to his
first solo grime EP...
The
title track, Nank, has all the hard-hitting brilliance we've come to
expect from Boofy. Hi-hats skitter, claps punch on and off beat
indiscriminately and a cut up bass provides the lead. Plenty of
sub-bass movement reminds us of his dubstep background while roaming
square waves float in and out of the general soundscape. Underneath
it all, though, lies a terrifying sense of menace contributed to by
the sparse arrangement, the violent samples and the relentlessness of
the drum programming.
The
other Boofy production on the EP is the aptly titled Warzone, perhaps best
described as Nank's hyperactive younger cousin. The riddim switches
up not every 8 bars but every 4. Once again faint rumblings from the
sub-woofer testify that this music built for and best enjoyed in dark
club rooms with big rigs. Intricate rhythms are strung together with
ease as Boofy manages once more to make a complex arrangement sound
spacious.
Remixes
are provided by fellow Bristolian grime artist Hi5ghost and funky
producer Nativ. Hi5ghost's remix of Nank makes explicit all of the
violent undertones present in the original with an 8 bar remix. Tough
square bass stabs are punctuated forcefully by a kick-snare combo
that would wreak all sorts of havoc in the club. Nativ's Nank is a UK
Funky belter that is as rude as it is infectiously danceable. Dark
and sinister, the track builds and builds to a second drop will have
punters clambering over each other to reload it.
TUM006 is out now