This is kind of a tangent from the System thread, so Ill just quote myself
This may seem alittle odd, but who the fuck is buying all these records? Like we are on the “biggest” dubstep forum in the world you could count like I duno 20 or 30 of them across this site.
Theres no real nights outside of the BIG ones like system and dmz (in London atleast) , nobody really talks about it much anymore yet there is still thousands of records being sold out in 1hour windows.
Loads of EU or USA buyers? Im just horribly out of touch?! Ive no idea.
Its bizarre to feel like im in a bubble of some kind but I guess that comes from being in London.
I imagine Brighton, Leeds and Bristol you can run into the same guys over and over, but here you can completely miss huge chunks just cos you haven’t linked via a mutual friend on FB or something.
Like I could book ( and will) the guys putting out these records and be half scared nobody would show as “dubsteps dead” Unless bizarrely you are DMZ and can bring out anyone with a passing interest haha
The same way I dont know whos buying all the stuff like Arkital and Tempas new stuff? Nobody ever talks about it on here and youd think of all places it would be on here haha
I only know my mate has the Thelem artikal bit, the rest kind of blur into dungeon plodstep sounds every preview I whack on.
A few comments saying most people dont use forums anymore, but @hirszu said
So, Are there really people out there super excited about Artikal stuff?
Is there this huge untapped “crowd” of people, that buy these records but dont seem to be linked in some way?
I mean I guess thats why DMZ and System are so big as its kind of the focal point for people from all over.
Is this forum actually the minority and that things like FKOF, Headmuk and Trusik are actually where all the “fans” lurk?
Do I just have tunnel vision? I mean I know they have Wheel and Deal nights but I couldnt even name one person that goes to those nights.
So many questions, so many tangents.
i know plenty of people into it that don’t think about using forums at all, you can see how many people are on the dmz 10 event and how desperate they are for tickets, in london i don’t really see the same people from night to night either like i might do in bristol at 140 type events
also bar these labels that sell out bare quick there’s not that much to splash your vinyl budget on in dubstep unless you’re reaaaally into it (although obviously it’s not cheap keeping up with these ones either)
90%+ of the dubstep fans I know arent on this forum. Most of the people here are more heavily interested/involved.
I prob know more on here than an accurate representation of the scene cus of connections made here. dsf is the tip of the ice berg when it comes to music that was getting some real radio 1 support at one point.
I only really thought about/realised the number of people into it cus out of the the 35 interns the company i used to work had whilst i was there at least 5 mentioned they had been to DMZ/system/fwd. (The office was on the same road as plastic people tho tbf)
100% this. it’s mad how many people i see on fb that care quite a bit about this kinda stuff, truer heads than I! US heads too i’m talking. there are quite a few of em. i’m not even personally friends with most of them, i just see them in the groups and commenting on other friends’ statuses or artist pages, event pages etc. always recognize lots of the same names though. maybe a good portion of them were on dsf at some point and left, i don’t really know.
It’d be interesting to see a graph showing the number of listeners to different Rinse shows. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to find Yunx still in the top 5 especially if you disregard the heavily talk based ones like Drive Time or Artwork/Pokes. Yunx still kind of represents a stage that a lot of dubstep fans go through, a desperation for ‘truhead’ status. I don’t know anyone who listens to him on the regs anymore but I’m sure there are new fans who will beeline for his show.
Otherwise I guess you’ve still got Hatcha on Kiss who may have quite a sizeable user base. He’s probably the most unpredictable of the big DJs for exactly what he’ll play in a set and it often seems to depend on who he’s got guesting. So you get him sometimes playing deeper stuff that encourages people to dig further.
Must admit since Oneman went off the boil and turned to monthly there’s no single radio show I check on a regular basis, certainly not dubstep. Hessle probably come the closest of all radio shows and Jay 5ive/Anti-social stuff from dubstep. Guess the anti-social lot may have a reasonable fanbase too?
To be honest in my opinion the forums like this would always interest the people making the stuff or putting it out, it’s more for the people that make it than take it, bit like expecting civs on an army forum
In terms of the buy outs I think it’s the labels with the do or die fans the absolute loyalists that buy out the entire release, where as I could expect blacklist presses to sell out within hours where a label like wheel and deal probably wouldn’t shift their all of their 500 units for example, I don’t think it’s down to any massive PR or stunts they do it’s more than original fan base they built up that follow everything they do like IM with Gantz and all that lark, those two could alone sold out 1000 blacklist pressings…
A lot of the labels that are able to do this seem to have a culture about them, something more than just releasing tracks on wax/digi
But then again what happened to all the vinyl dj’s? 99% of people I see play out regardless of status mostly play CD, and I go to a lot of nights etc but never really see vinyl dj’s… mysteries.
I guess I could say I’m one of these people you’re all talking about, I’ve been lurking (& occasionally posting on DSF) for about 4 years now.
I live in a a pretty small town in New Zealand, There is basically no scene where I am unless I drive about 3 hours north to our countries biggest city, and even then, strictly dubstep nights are few and far between, but I still try to keep up with the latest news and such, mainly through this forum and other websites, I don’t use facebook though.
I buy as much dubstep vinyl as I can afford, mix them whenever I can find the time etc amongst myself and/or a handful of my like-minded mates. I’ve never played out, never really intend to, it’s just one of my hobbies, I just love the sound/vibe dubstep has.
Maybe one day I’ll make it over to the UK and get to go to a DMZ/System show, I don’t really know, right now I’m just enjoying listening to the music.
dubstep went the way of dnb and became enclosed in itself. i think dbridge said this about dnb, that it’s not appealing to anyone outside of the dnb world. that’s exactly how dubstep is nowadays. it’s strictly for people who are into dubstep. there’s hardly any crossover anymore (except with some clinical minimal dnb and very bad attempts at techno). so when you start detaching it isn’t going to be as obvious anymore.
forums are kind of obsolete, especially for younger generations. i mean i look at the people i went to uni with; we had our own platform with a forum n everything, but people still made & preferred facebook groups.
then there’s also the fact that there’s only a handful of dubstep labels that manage to still capture the attention of people. i mean, there’s probably loads of digi labels on beatport or w/e putting out dungeon but who cares
dsf just isn’t where the music breaks for most people who still follow or get into proppa ds
I pick up more info about new stuff from radio/Wire/record store than here now days
this place is more like a fireside chat between heads with dubstep in common
no need to impress or flog anything but many valued opinions
habitual & comforting…a true forum.
See I guess I see it a little differently as I go on one of the largest gaming forum in the world side by side to DSF, they have to have 3 months staged sign ups, then even then you cant post
a thread until youve made 200+ posts and you can be life banned if you cock up once. During the big gaming conventions its has hundreds of thousands on users at any time.
So I see this huge burgeoning forum with people interacting across the globe and then feel like, if you like dubstep, this is kind of the focal point of it the same way Neogaf is for gaming.
DMZ I can understand it has a following, but SYSTEM only started a couple years back, though I guess the popularity of system rises with the decline of regular dmzs.
Def agree with the handful of labels, Im sure there are loads of digi ones but if you go on redeye you are goning to see the same 5 or 6 labels, of that only 3 are doing stuff on the regular.
Also part of this could be me and that alot of the DSF people ive met and become good friends with, are kind of shifting interests into thnks like techno, noise, drone and stuff. @riddles might agree.
Also, If its really the case that this is the minority way to interact with people, how do you go about engaging with these people?
Is there some kind of massive dubstep facebook group? certain people to follow and be followed by on twitter? radio shows Im totally un aware of?
I say this mostly as a promoter, as we have like 200 likes at most on our page. If I book I duno Las and Headhunter. How am I supposed to tell all these hordes of people?
As I know I have missed looooaaads of big nights, purely because ive not been connected to the right person on facebook whos hit “attend” for it to pop up in my feed.
usually, we go about this by distributing flyers at other nights leading up to our event, and I’m pretty certain most other promoters do the same. plus there’s certainly a dubstep group on facebook for all londoners etc., even we have that shit.
@Johnlenham i’d say that gaming is an entirely different world from music. comparable maybe to production forums. but that’s a bit more geeky, for the lack of a better word, than just being into the music and harder to get good info froom social media.
with music it’s not the case. cause producers even when they interacted on here, they didn’t do anything they don’t do on fb/twitter - post links/tunes and answer some questions. big guys in the scene don’t need forums, they get more readership out of social media, and small producers probably just spam various facebook groups or w/e
that’s probably because of the point i made earlier about dubstep being closed off, and as a consequence, not as interesting anymore
I never really meet people in my daily life that like dubstep to the point where they know the names of producers and labels, buy the records etc. Only at the raves.
I think the guys who buy the records are bedroom DJs and collectors mostly. It’s so rare going out and seeing someone spin vinyl, the overwhelming majority of the guys who play at clubs use CDJs, whether at a low level or high level, and tbh I don’t blame them, playing vinyl out is a pain in the arse a lot of the time. So I think most of the records sold just sit in crates in guys’ bedrooms.
i guess i know a fair amount of people into the scene. In bristol, i probably know 4 guys from doing a radio show online originating from reddit of all places, and then recognize a few heads when im out at nights. Also living with a few other guys who mix dubstep vinyl too so im surrounded by a good number of heads. With these new big releases i know probably 10 people who regularly buy all the big new tunes and only like 1/2 of them play out. Also in terms of dubstep of facebook, i havn’t really found one, instead go for the vinyl groups, like vinyl vigilance (https://www.facebook.com/groups/414905631919119/?fref=nf) run by compa but all the new dubstep tunes gewt talked about on there, same with some of the other dubstep vinyl groups