Wire
July 2002

Various
Dj Zinc Presents: Bingo Beats Vol 2 - Mixed By Zed Bias

Zed Bias - aka dave Jones, who records under the appropriate alias Maddslinky for Sirkus -plays selector for the second mix CD on DJ Zinc’s breakstep label, Bingo Beats. Especially for the vinyl-challenged, there may be no better introduction to the current state of darkside Garage: the mix is thick with sinister, bottom heavy tracks from Jammin (Zinc), Ras Kwame, and Darqwan, representing labels like Bingo, Soulja, Big Apple, and Sidestepper. Leaning heavily on upfront tracks on dubplate, this collection presents a percussive strain of Garage that veers ever closer to the singleminded skeletalism of drum’n'bass, albeit at that just-a-hair-past-House tempo. Maddslinky’s “Reasons” kicks things off with a wobbly low end, underwater keys and scattered chipmunk vocal bursts, and for the next hour the disc staggers between this kind of molasses funk and the Runnin label’s chunky breackstep. Paradoxically, the real action’s in the details hiding behind the breaks: just check Daluq’s shivery bass harmonics, ras Kwame’s airbone vocal divots, and the schizo laugh track that ricochets through Jammin’s closing “Tug O’War”.