Zomby-Rumours and Revolutions

Where was I in '92? Good question. Certainly not listening to anything like Zomby. Good thing too, because I might have ruined my later life enjoyment of his future via past production style. Much like the material on his recent Werk Discs release, Where Were U In '92?, Rumours and Revolutions (2008, Brainmath) modestly asserts what I've long suspected to be an unfuckable aesthetic precept, i.e., that you only need a few elements to make a piece of music work, as long as you pick the right elements. To argue my case, I casually cite the Wu Tang Clan's Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers) or Photek's Risc Vs. Reward as venerable tomes on the subject. Now let's consider Zomby's addition to the literature. The meat and potatoes of the work in question are a pulsing, somewhat rushed kick pattern, kabuki cum Morricone keys and rude ghost salutations. Pepper this with a tight snare pattern and a sputtering rhythmic flourish here and there for the win. What is revolutionary in art is often a more tasteful reworking of the not too distant past. It is by this informed tweaking that simplification ordains itself as refinement. In the case of Zomby, we hear jungle minus the aerial maneuvers and bravado (that made jungle exhaust itself and it's audience) and we hear dubstep minus the going-though-the-motionisms which are already bringing the style to an impasse. Not with a bang... but a whisper.