#blackdown

[grrlmusic]

Blackdown - Crackle Blues (Burial Remix)

[azaleassgc]

RETROSPECTIVE II KEYSOUND Dusk & Blackdown

Pour cette deuxième rétrospective, le label Keysound sera à l’honneur. Le label voit officiellement le jour en 2005 sous l’impulsion de Dusk (Dan Frampton) et de Blackdown (Martin Clark), deux immenses diggers et geeks férus de musique. (Nous ne pouvons d’ailleurs que vous conseiller de fouiller le blog de Blackdown, actif depuis 2004 et qui reste une mine d’or de ressources et d’informations sur le genre.) Les deux compères se rencontrent dans une boîte de nuit où Dan mixait un soir. Les deux sympathisent très rapidement autour d’un morceau de Stevie Wonder, « Superstition » joué par Dan.

Dan : « J’ai rencontré Martin dans une boite où on a commencé à discuter autour d’un morceau de Stevie Wonder. Je me suis dit : ‘ Si il connait cet album et qu’il le joue, ce doit être un mec bien !’ Martin […] de son côté : » Si il ne vient pas me demander de jouer quelque chose d’autre alors ce doit être un mec réglo. » Source: interview BigUpMag16

Dusk et Blackdown font partis du noyau dur de la dubstep originelle, notamment de l’époque FWD>>. (ndlr: nom des premières soirées « dubstep » en Angleterre au début des années 2000) Époque qu’ils ont connu et à laquelle ils ont participé. Au passage il est intéressant de rappeller que l’appellation « FWD » (Forward ou « Futur ») est apparue deux, trois ans après le début de ce type de soirée. À l’origine, ils n’étaient qu’une quarantaine dans une petite salle à partager la même passion pour le garage abrasif et le côté sombre de la jungle tous les deux mois. C’est avec le temps que ce type de soirées commença à évoluer, pour finalement devenir une véritable famille où les gens mixaient les morceaux des mêmes personnes présentes dans la salle. La seule clé pour rejoindre cette petite communauté était la contribution et l’entraide. Tu veux faire partie de la communauté ? Alors commence à produire et à mixer. C’est de cette manière que tous ont commencé, Skream, Hatcha, Youngsta, Kode9… Du moins, tous ceux de cette ère post-Garage début des années 2000. Car oui, le ‘step’ du terme dubstep ne vient pas de nulle part, mais bien du 2-Step, sous-genre tirant son nom de la rythmique d’une certaine friche du garage anglais.

Les deux compères ne manquent aucun rendez-vous du Plastic People (ndlr: célèbre club accueillant les premières soirées dubstep) et ce, depuis 2001. C’est finalement en 2007 qu’ils mixent pour la première fois dans une soirée FWD>>. Après avoir passé les deux dernières années à produire leur album (non sorti à l’époque), il est également intéressant de préciser que lors de ce set, Dusk & Blackdown furent les premiers à dropper le « Archangel » de Burial, le seul morceau de leur set qui ne fut pas produit par eux.

Cette famille partageait les mêmes valeurs musicales pour le garage et le côté sauvage de la jungle, qui sont les pierres de l’édifice des basses fréquences. Ce sont ces mêmes valeurs qui composent le son de Keysound. Valeurs que les deux compères n’ont cessé de triturer, d’améliorer, de personnaliser et de faire évoluer pour réellement devenir leur signature. Les débuts sont purement Do It Yourself et underground, les deux amis se lancent dans la création du label pour une raison simple : personne ne veut sortir leur musique. Ils profitent de l’entraide de la communauté rwd>> à leurs tout débuts. Loefah s’occupe du logo, Mala de la distribution et Pinch met également la main à la patte pendant que Kode9 passe des heures au téléphone avec Martin pour bien les aider à tout mettre en place. Rappelons que ce sont ces mêmes personnes présentes au début de FWD>>, autrement dit des amis.

« Le Brostep et la destruction du dubstep ont été des obstacles très embêtants pour nous. Ce style de musique est quelque chose de très importants à nos yeux, quelque chose dont nous nous soucions réellement, voir tout ça s’écrouler est toujours difficile. Nous avons décidé de réagir positivement à ce phénomène en construisant quelque chose de différent et en nous promettant de continuer sans jamais abandonner. Il suffit de s’éloigner de la forêt qui brûle, de la regarder se détruire jusqu’au bout pour la replanter. »

Les artistes signés sur Keysound opèrent tous dans la même direction : celle de se ré-approprier les sonorités du garage anglais, grime, jungle, hip-hop, dubstep ou reggae. S’il ne devait y avoir qu’un point commun entre toutes les sorties du label, ce serait l’univers propre à chaque artiste très mis en avant, donnant à chacun sa propre personnalité, très texturée et distincte mais toujours en gardant les mêmes influences et valeurs musicales. C’est ainsi cette connexion d’influences entre tous les artistes du label qui rend Keysound si unique. Wen aime la grime, Logos aime la grime, Grimino fait de la grime, Dusk et Blackdown adorent la grime… Les productions grime de Wen sont influencées par le 2-step, mais prenez Amen Ra qui ne fait pas de grime, ses beats sont aussi influencés par le 2step. Sully fait un blocage sur la jungle tout comme Double Helix, mais il garde une profonde influence du garage dans sa production. C’est réellement tout ce jeu d’interconnexions musciales au sein du label qui fait sa force. C’est également cette dévotion profonde pour l’époque FWD qui anime l’esprit Keysound depuis si longtemps : Croiser des ponts entre les styles, voir si ça marche et surtout ne pas savoir comment étiqueter le résultat.

[dream-world-universe]

Gudda Gumoo Gorge, Blackdown Tableland, Australia: Blackdown Tableland is a national park in the Central Highlands Region, Queensland, Australia. The park is in Central Queensland, 576 km northwest of Brisbane. The Blackdown Tableland is a 900 m sandstone plateau rising abruptly from the plains below. Many creeks on the Tableland have developed gorges and waterfalls along their courses, the most notable of which drains in to the spectacular Rainbow Falls (Gudda Gumoo) over a 40 m drop. Wikipedia

[dopescissorscashwagon]

Finally on 'Beauty of winter' week is a winter wonderland on the Blackdown Hills as the heavy snow cleared through, and the sun came out to light up the magical winter landscape...

Click on photo

📸 by @garyholpinphoto

[dinnickhowellslikes]

The VJ visuals for the Dusk + Blackdown song The Drumz of Nagano, by myself, Jonathan Howells. This was created as one of a series of stage visuals for Dusk + Blackdown's live tour called Margins Music (named after the album of the same name) way back in 2010, which I performed live as the songs progressed. The fun thing about these visual sequences, is that they weren't just 'hit play''. As I said above, I actually "performed" these visuals (well, some parts) along with the live band that was performing the songs. I had 2 VJ decks (Pioneer DVJ-1000), so I could cue every other track's visuals. And these decks actually had turn tables on top, allowing me to "scratch" the visuals! I had a lot of fun with this, because while most of the visuals were painstakingly prepared ahead of time (read: months of work), there were a few sections where I could improvise, and play around with these super cool decks. So I could mess with time, repetition, and controlling forward/reverse playback of my own visuals, very precisely, as much as I pleased. Was amazing. We had a n MC called Trim turn up (rather late) for one of the shows and I reprised one of the visual sequences that featured an enormous mouth. I scratched the mouth open and closed, back and forth, along with Trim rhyming on stage - sick.

Below are a couple of frames or that mouth. And further down, there's a shot of Trim performing during this very moment, but we can't see the screen (damn!)

The original videos were all made in SD (Standard Definitions) so pretty small and low-res. This Drumz of Nagano video has been up-rezed using the amazing Topaz Labs Video AI. It did an amazing job of interpreting the slightly fuzzy original, that was created with old film footage that was also probably SD. Topaz has enlarged it cleanly, making a few slightly weird AI guesses at what's what, but it's also given it an almost painterly quality, that I think I like. I added some film grain to soften it all a bit.

While this and the other videos from the time are almost 15 years old, I recently decided to take another look at them, and to my surprise, I still kinda dig them! Unfortunately, I can't find all of them - only a few. They must be on a hard drive somewhere, and I will try to uncover them, and Topaz them all up to HD or 4K.

Here's a pic of me performing on the VJ decks with one of the visuals (not this song) in the background on the screen.

Here's a review someone did of one of our shows and a few more photos from the shows, the first ones showing my monitoring of the video decks.

[thewaysoundtravels]

(Lonely Moon (Android Heartbreak) ft. Farrah | Dusk + Blackdown)

A lovely quiet emotional track unlike any of the others on the rest of the album.

[nottobeweird]

🥺

[thefollyflaneuse]

Garnsey's Tower, Blackborough, Devon

Near the hamlet of Blackborough in Devon’s Blackdown Hills, remnants of the local Whetstone mining industry can be found in the woodland. A battered pile of stones could be assumed to be another relic, but the more curious visitor will be intrigued to discover that it is marked on old maps as ‘Garnsey’s Tower’. Continue reading Untitled

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Reference: Topographical Elements

Ideas for Naming your Fictional Places

Buildings and stones brough, burton, caster, church, cross, kirk, mill, minster, stain, stone, wark ⚜ Examples: Crossthwaite, Felixkirk, Newminster, Staines, Whitchurch

Coastline features ey, holme, hulme, hythe, naze, ness, port, sea ⚜ Examples: Bardsey, Greenhithe, Sheerness, Southport, Southsea

Dwellings and farms barton, berwick, biggin, bold, by, cote, ham, hampstead, hamton, house, scale, sett, stall, thorpe, toft, ton, wick ⚜ Examples: Fishwick, Newham, Potterton, Westby, Woodthorpe

Fields and clearings combe, croft, den, ergh, field, ham, haugh, hay, ing, land, lease, lock, meadow, rick, ridding, rode, shot, side, thwaite, wardine, worth, worthy ⚜ Examples: Applethwaite, Cowden, Smallworthy, Southworth, Wethersfield

General locations and routes bridge, ford, gate, ing, mark, path, stead, stoke, stow, street, sty, way ⚜ Examples: Epping, Horsepath, Longford, Ridgeway, Stonebridge, Streetly

Hills and slopes bank, barrow, borough, breck, cam, cliff, crook, down, edge, head, hill, how, hurst, ley, ling, lith, mond, over, pen, ridge, side, tor ⚜ Examples: Barrow, Blackdown, Longridge, Redcliff, Thornborough, Windhill

Rivers and streams batch, beck, brook, burn, ey, fleet, font, ford, keld, lade, lake, latch, marsh, mere, mouth, ore, pool, rith, wade, water, well ⚜ Examples: Broadwater, Fishlake, Mersey, Rushbrooke, Saltburn

Woods and groves bear, carr, derry, fen, frith, greave, grove, heath, holt, lea, moor, oak, rise, scough, shaw, tree, well, with, wold, wood ⚜ Examples: Blackheath, Hazlewood, Oakley, Southwold, Staplegrove

Valleys and hollows bottom, clough, combe, dale, den, ditch, glen, grave, hole, hope, slade ⚜ Examples: Cowdale, Denton, Greenslade, Hoole, Longbottom, Thorncombe

NOTE

These elements are all found in many different spellings. Old English beorg ‘hill, mound’, for example, turns up as bar-, berg-, -ber, -berry, -borough, and -burgh. Only one form is given above (Thornborough).

Several items have the same form, but differ in meaning because they come from different words in Old English. For example, -ey has developed in different ways from the two words ea ‘river’ and eg ‘island’. It is not always easy deciding which is the relevant meaning in a given place name.

This resource does not distinguish between forms which appear in different parts of a place name. Old English leah ‘forest, glade’, for example, sometimes appears at the beginning of a name (Lee- or Leigh-), sometimes at the end (-leigh, -ley), and sometimes alone (Leigh) (K. Cameron, 1961).

Source ⚜ More: Notes ⚜ Worldbuilding ⚜ Writing Resources PDFs

[laclefdescoeurs]

Holmbury Hill (looking towards Blackdown), 1888, Henry Tanworth Wells

[corroded-void]

Wow.

Mary Tavy & Blackdown station on the rural and long gone South Devon and Tavistock Railway, circa early 1960s and no later than 1962, the year the line closed.

I can hear Duck's theme as I gaze upon this lovely picture.

[hometoursandotherstuff]

Here's an extremely unique home for sale in Devon, UK. Built in 2017, it has 5bd and is priced at €1.950M / $2.122M.

According to the listing, this house is under offer, so somebody must like it.

I'm not too crazy about the exterior design, but the interior doesn't look like anything out of the ordinary.

It has an open concept living space with a sitting area, dining area, and kitchen. The shape of the ceiling conforms to the exterior of the house. It's nice and bright inside.

Each area has its own doors to go outside.

The curved cabinetry gives the kitchen a retro feel, and the color and design of heavy 1950s metal office furniture. Also, the counters look like laminate.

Instead of halls, it has very open passages to the bedrooms with lots of natural light from windows.

This is nice, it looks kind of park-like.

I think that this is the main bd. It's a narrow space with the bed meant to face the window and there's space for a home office with a door to the terrace.

One of the other bedrooms is similarly narrow and also has a door to the terrace.

The terrace goes around the house and is just wide enough for lawn chairs.

Looking at the home from above, gives the shape of a modern sculpture.

The house comes with a lot of land- 7.6 acres.

[wolfpants]

thickets playlist

Here is a collection of songs I listened to death whilst creating my piece for @writcraft for this year's @hd-erised. Suffice to say, Patrick Wolf, who has been a constant in my life since a very young age, was a huge influence. The title comes from his song of the same name, the concept from my love of his album The Bachelor.

You can find the whole playlist on spotify

List of songs:

Patrick Wolf - Thickets Johnny Flynn - The Box Nick Drake - Cello Song Orange Juice - Blue Boy Johnny Flynn - Raising the Dead Owen Pallett - Lewis Takes Off His Shirt Fleet Foxes - White Winter Hymnal Smashing Pumpkins - Thirty-Three M. Ward - Poison Cup Patrick Wolf - Blackdown listen on spotify

read thickets on ao3

[dopescissorscashwagon]

Afternoon!

We're sticking with the snow theme this week, & celebrating the transformation that snow brings to the landscape in 'Beauty of snow' week. First is a drone shot of a snow covered landscape on the Blackdown Hills...

Click on photo

📸 by @garyholpinphoto

[dinnickhowellslikes]

[thewaysoundtravels]

(Kuri Pataka (The Firecracker Girl) (Feat. Teji, Farrah) by Dusk + Blackdown)

This is one to play loud and lose your cool to.

A remix: https://soundcloud.com/duskblackdown/kuri-pataka-her-mix

The full album: https://soundcloud.com/duskblackdown/sets/margins-music and on Bandcamp https://keysound.bandcamp.com/album/margins-music