Hardcore Vibes: UK Hardcore News & Reviews (December 2016)

From the finest up-to-the minute nu-skool beats to some classic echoes of the old-skool, here’s Alive At Night’s run-down of everything that’s going on in the UK Hardcore scene!

Everyone, and I mean literally everyone, down here in Sydney, Australia is going UK Hardcore crazy right about now because this week we have a legend of the UK Hardcore scene right here in our city and he is making headline news!

Last Saturday, Gammer played for 18,000 delighted Hard Dance fans at Knockout Circuz, the biggest indoor harder styles event in the southern hemisphere. That’s a heck of a crowd by any standards and every single raver in the place was going mad to Gammer’s set.

If you got in early enough to Knockout Circuz you might now be the proud owner of one or both of the exclusive Hardcore ‘Til I Die (HTID) CD’s being given away at the event – one mixed by Gammer and one mixed by Hixxy. But you may be wondering, what’s the connection between Knockout Circuz and the iconic HTID brand?

The answer is that the creators of Knockout Circuz, Harder Styles United (HSU), have just been announced as the new owners of HTID! When Gammer broke the news on his social media, the internet went insane! The name HTID is instantly recognised the world over as the leading name in UK Hardcore, while HSU is one of the world’s largest hard dance event organisations – the future of UK Hardcore is looking very, very exciting indeed!

If that Post Knockout Circuz Depression is setting in already, help is at hand because Gammer is still in town and will be appearing at OneSeventy vs Hardcore Masif – The Summer Showdown this Friday night! I’ll see you there!

Moving on to some new music releases now and one of the hottest names in UK Hardcore right now is Callum Higby, whose biggest tune to date “Bass Face”, is out now on Lethal Theory. Looking beyond the boundaries of the hard dance arena and taking influences from the wider electronic music scene, “Bass Face” is exactly the kind of track that gets UK Hardcore noticed far and wide outside of its usual fan-base and could well be the track that propels Callum Higby to international stardom!

Pushing boundaries is just an everyday occurrence in the studios of Stamina Records boss A.B, a man responsible for some of the most innovative Freeform sounds coming out of the UK. Freeform tracks get included in this column because Freeform is kind of like UK Hardcore’s rebellious cousin who doesn’t play by the rules but still very much deserves our attention!

Stamina Records releases are nearly always in pairs, with a ‘yin’ and a ‘yang’ to each release. The current release comprises two tracks by A.B. and Finnbarr. The ‘yin’ side of the current release, “Stick Together” is Freeform Hardcore with very strong UK Hardcore influences and even features Finbarr himself on vocals duty. By contrast, the ‘yang’ side track, “Guggle”, is something very different with a combination of sounds that truly cannot be pigeonholed and shows just how varied, interesting and totally wicked Freeform can be.

Coming straight outta Japan to conquer the UK Hardcore scene, the masked crusader M-Project seriously has been a music making machine this year! As the last of his many releases of the year he’s ready to deliver an artist album titled “Detonated” on Lethal Theory, which drops on 31^st December. So be sure to get straight on to that to get your new year off to a banging start!

At the moment I’m absolutely loving the KFA Recordings “M-Project Take Over EP”, because only M-Project could enter a remix competition and end up with his own dedicated four-track EP release because his entries were so damn good!

KFA Recordings (aka Kniteforce Again) is a sister label to Luna-C’s legendary Kniteforce Records. M-Project and Musik Servant take four instantly recognisable classic Kniteforce Records tracks including Blunted “Freedom” and Future Primitive “Ban This” and give them a thoroughly modern twist.

Talking of remix competitions, Justice Hardcore have got one on the go! The track in question is a Breakbeat Hardcore number named “Hourglass” by IYF & Nobody ft. Blue Eyes. The lucky winner will get their remix featured on the “Hourglass EP” along with the original mix and remixes by Macks Wolf and Daniel Seven, plus the winner will also score a studio date with IYF, Nobody and Blue Eyes. Check out all the details on facebook.com/JusticeHardcore and the original mix of “Hourglass” at the link below.

Ravers in Australia will get the full Justice Hardcore experience in just a few weeks as IYF and Nobody touch down in Sydney for the inaugural Justice Hardcore Australia event. Taking place at the Factory Theatre on Saturday 14^th January, this multi-arena event also features S3RL, Technikore, Sc@r, JTS and Team Rocket to name but a few!

The latest track release from the OneSeventy “Gridlock” album project is the JTS remix of Technikal & Steve Hill’s “Right Here Right Now”.  JTS has transformed this punchy reverse bass track into an upbeat UK Hardcore stomper, while keeping the original anticipation filled breakdown and build up in play.

Legitimate Recordings is the label started about a year ago by DJ D-Lyte, creating brand new music with a nod to all of the things we all loved about old-skool rave music. The latest Legitimate Records release, due out this month, is by D-Lyte himself and is named “Poundland” – definitely a UK in-joke there but this track has actually got nothing to do with popping down to your local discount store for some bargain basement Christmas decorations and everything to do with top quality hardcore that will get ravers of every generation up and dancing!

It wouldn’t be Christmas without some catchy, sing-along festive tunes doing the rounds and this year once of the first artists to get in the holiday spirit is the undisputed king of the kandi raver scene S3RL, teaming up with vocalist Sara.  Taking note however of the very sensitive world in which we now live, S3RL has thoughtfully censored their cover version of a famous seasonal pop song, resulting in a “Generic Holiday Song”.  If you like the track and want to hear the full offensive/uncensored version (seriously, it’s so offensive it’ll make you blush), just look out for the link and the code word at the end of the video.

Thanks for reading! Wherever you are in the world, have a wonderful “Generic Holiday” season! Party hard!