January 17–24, 2002

music

Scratching the Surface

Dev79’s Slipstate night is a year old and just getting started.

by Sean O’Neal

’Statesman: Dev79 puts the needle to the record.

In this city, there’s only one way to experience the psychoactive merger of downtempo flavors like illbient and abstract hip-hop. The noise-laden, broken-beat-driven Slipstate gatherings (every third Thursday of the month at Aqualounge) uniquely bridge the gap between a live show and a club night by interweaving cuttin’ and scratchin’ on the turntables with laptop frolic, earsplitting synthesizer manipulations, MCs ranting and rhyming, and some occasional live instrumentation, like tribal drumming or an accordion. It’s an experimental combination that’ll make your head spin wondrously and bob graciously within such a laid-back, intimate atmosphere.

Spawned by artists like DJ Spooky, We, Sub Dub and Ben Neil, illbient music can be defined as a psychedelic, sample-heavy, all-encompassing amalgamation of trip-hop, hip-hop, dub, funk, jungle, noise, spoken word, atmospherics and ambient soundscapes (typically reflecting the profound subconscious struggle and exertion of urban living). But it should be viewed more as a DJ’s mixing style than a genre, one that yields an opaque collage of sound through innovative recombination. Of course, as times change, so does the illbient "scene." It remains open-ended as a sort of free-for-all for the artist and listener.

"There are a lot of misconceptions about the scene," says DJ/producer Dev79, organizer of the Slipstate parties. "But unlike a lot of other genres, illbient can be different things to different people at different times."

Dev79 (a.k.a. Gair Marking, of Atco, N.J.; a black-wearing baby-faced cutie pie with sideburns and floppy bangs) can be credited with bringing illbient behavior to Philadelphia. Coming from a post-industrial and experimental background, Dev79 embraced artists like Mick Harris (a.k.a. Scorn), Kool Keith, Anti Pop Consortium and Company Flow. His own serene, yet schizophrenic and frenzied, music is a dense and sinister fusion of splattering rhythms, slowly swirling textures and tasteful cacophony — lightly doused with dub, ragga, dark-hop and punk rock abrasiveness.

"Broken beats are an integral element of my sound," he contends. "Utilizing off beats and skewing the sense of rhythm is my thing — sort of taking a nod from free-jazz time signatures along with skittery IDM [Intelligent Dance Music] and breakcore.… Right now, abstract hip-hop with noise is my current fetish."

Through Slipstate and his own illbient creations, Dev79 aims to trigger strong emotions — beyond the boundaries of "good" or "bad" — in his listeners. "I think more people need to know that there are options out there. A lot of people just don’t know what’s available under the surface, but I’d like to shed some light on obscure and beautiful things.… I’m, like, forcing shit on people."

With such a nonrepresentational and extraordinary plateau, for some, it may take a little getting used to."I want people to open their minds," he says, "to look beyond 4/4 beats and embrace abstract concepts. Too often, he says, music is regarded as disposable entertainment. "But true art is about aesthetics," he asserts.

Since it began one year ago, Slipstate has become a place where static-loving experimentalists and hip-hop kids meet to see a diverse mix of guest performers like Lloop (of We), 5 Points of Logic, Timeblind, Kenneth Masters and others from New York, D.C., Philly and beyond. "The acts I book tend to be on lots of different tips, yet they all maintain a certain feel that gives the night an eclectic yet cohesive vibe."

For its first anniversary celebration, Slipstate brings North Jersey’s Dälek, a progressive hip-hop trio that fuses components of psychedelia, jazz, South Asian and African music. They instantly recall a wacky mishmash of artists like Public Enemy, Eric B and Rakim, Gang Starr, My Bloody Valentine and the Pet Sounds-era Beach Boys. Dälek has released their nonfigurative beats on labels like Gern Blandsten, Matador and Philadelphia’s Manvspape and made studio guest appearances and done remixes for 2nd Gen, Techno Animal, Oddatee, My Bloody Valentine’s Kevin Shields and others. At Slipstate, you’ll see these forward-thinking cats dropping beats through effects from a laptop, MCing and running two turntables and a mixer through a distortion pedal, a delay pedal, and a wah-wah pedal.

Before Dälek, Philly’s own Maxx Luvv will warm up the room with U.K. dub and roots reggae rhythms. And opening up will be, of course, Dev79 and the No. 2 Slipstate resident, Charlie Brownski — a slick-fingered turntablist mastermind who will mesmerize you with his wicked cuttin’ and scratchin’ of abstract underground hip-hop.

"People tell me all the time that I’ve opened their eyes," says Dev79, who is awed and appreciative of the positive feedback. "I try to keep Slipstate fresh and varied.… I definitely have gained a following, [and] there’s a core of people that come every month.… And heads show up at my other gigs and buy CDs, and people recognize me on the street. It’s cool."

Slipstate’s one-year anniversary, Thu., Jan. 17, 9 p.m.-2 a.m., with Dälek, Maxx Luvv, Dev79 and Charlie Brownski, Aqualounge, 323 W. Girard St., 215-769-5114.