FabSwingers.com forum: what happened to dubstep

By *oxes OP Man
23 weeks ago

Southend, Essex

For those that don't know Dubstep as the name suggest is a main genre of EDM that combines (the bass production techniques) from (regae) Dub Riddim and UK (dark) Garrage, played at 140bpm and uses a 2-step drum beat pattern instead of the normal 4 beat pattern.

It emerged in between 1997-2000 alongside is sister genre Grime (mainly in Croydon and Bristol).

It grew in prominence in the late 2019s whith the genre reaching international success with the rise of the LA scene (bassnector & skrillex) who helped spawn its most commercial genre brostep and a similar hard dark cold genre called tearout friend in the UK.

Note however some dubstep nerds do not include tearout and brostep as dubstep and seperate their dubstep as real-dubstep.

Later on we had post-dubstep genres (headed by James blake, [yes that James Blake] Mt Kimbe, and to certain extent Nero). We also had dubstep inspired tracks like SHM - Antidote and some works by London grammar.

When people first heard it they either thought it as unharmonic mess or as unharmonic perfection. I remember hearing magnetic man or chase and status and thinking to myself what is this. I couldn't not fathem what I was listening to it was unpredictable in a good way.

Dubstep other than being random. Has a distinction of being one the shortest lived music gevres in commercial charts history receaving the vast majority of beatport sucess 2010 -2014 with most of the tracks being bro-step, before crashing from mainstream to obscuruty.

My question really is why? And what was it's legacy?

I know certain parts of the world like USA and ex soviet nations. dubstep remained semi popular to 2018 with Bro-riddim and EDM-trap tunes like harlem shake and turn down for what, as well as inspiaring the mainly dub-techno DJs of the iklegal rave CXEMA in Ukraine.