Taking it out of its original afrobeat context, Mopse places Femi Kuti’s “You Better Ask Yourself” into a dubwise hip hop setting. His remix is structured around a prominent boom bap base, hypnotic horn stabs, and rhythmic bass. Kuti’s lyrics were clearly the star of the original, and the instrumentation there was pretty much a frame for his singing to be presented within. But the vocals in the French producer’s mix are part of a more egalitarian arrangement: they’re edited to be more clearly tied to the beat, and the compositional progression doesn’t wither in their presence. These lyrics refer to the “resource curse,” in which countries with abundant natural resources so often fail to prevail economically. (For a recent and extreme example of this curse, take the bloodshed caused by the discovery of diamonds in Zimbabwe.) The further expansion of resource exploration into the developing world makes the question increasingly urgent.

Kuti held a remix contest for “Ask Yourself” last year, but this Mopse mix didn’t get any recognition. (The winning remix was very good, though.) He was, however, recently one of the six winners of the Tremor remix contest we mentioned a while back. That remix - a smokey headnodder with some healthy melodic goodness - is due to be released in the next couple months. (Photo of Mopse by Sebastien Pons.)

Triumphant, ravey synths soar with melodic intricacies over a half step beat and warm basslines on “Olive,” produced by a 17-year-old Staten Islander named Deadstock Mind. Dude may be a youngblood, but he knows his club music history and he’s definitely built up some production skills since he started five years ago, as evidenced by this here joint. “Olive” was apparently inspired by a track from the ’90s by a group with the same name, and the synths are a recreation from that tune (fixed). The first and second half of this song are pretty similar, and we’re more partial to the second part. There’s no waiting for the build up, the melody is longer, the quick high-hats stay present throughout (keeping the pace up), and the modulating synth from the intro is integrated with the rest of the elements. This was supposed to be included on our NYght Out mix, but he wanted to clean it up first. Well worth the wait. Peep Deadstock’s Tumblr blog to see what he’s diggin’ right now. (Art installation by Duvier Del Dago via i am.)

A moody hip hop cut like this sounds like it could have come straight out the late ’90s underground. But 20-year-old producer Bagir wouldn’t even have been ten by that point. His smokey beat on “Babylonian Nights” is comprised of a jazzy instrumentation flipped on the mysterious tip, all surreal and dangerous. Meanwhile, Toronto’s Sense I matches that with a picturesque, streetlamp-lit tale full of dense rhymes, a smooth voice and a chill delivery. If dudes like this were in the spotlight more often, maybe backpacking would never have become a dirty word.

The song is part of an unfinished album from 2007. We have no idea why it remains unreleased, but now it’s free for y’all! Bagir, who resides in Virginia and has played the djembe since he was a kid, was featured on our last mixtape and you can be sure to hear more diverse styles from him around here in the future. (Photo by Patrick Boury.)

A broad diversity of percussive instrumentation threads through a catalog of shuffles, slides and cadences in DJ Slouch’s “Black Coffee.” The drums have kick like a strong fresh brew, but veer away from aggressiveness. One bar rarely progresses without a new element being introduced to the mix. But order is kept among the throng of sounds. Drums are allowed their shine, but they play the background when the melody or vocals deserve the limelight. The track consists of an almost entirely organic sound palette, save an amelodic crunchy bass. It is a work divorced from a dependence on novel noises. Instead, it is sustained by the height of its bounce. The sounds pay homage to Sarah Vaughan’s era, but introduce her lyrics to a new century of expectations.

Also, listen to Slouch’s “Mirage,” exclusively on The Downbeat Treaty.

Someone can write all they want about music, but the true test of it comes down to the listen. So sure, Sa Bat Machines say they make a conscious effort to create dubstep departing from the expected elements. But listening to their music makes such a comment superfluous.

In one song, gypsy folk styles blend with dub tendencies and melodic wobbles. Here, the wobbles take on a percussive aura, trickling along like rapid fire drums. There, jazzy instrumentation creates the foundation. Overall, a powerful sense of songwriting prevails.

One of the benefits of being involved in a genre during its youth is that everyone who comes to it arrives from somewhere else, bringing along their varied experiences. The backgrounds of these four Parisians are certainly evident in their music. One is a bassist, another a trumpeter. There’s also a turntablist and a jazz singer. Two teach computer assisted music. The common interests among them are breakbeat, jazz, jungle and African influences.

Although dubstep’s tribal primitiveness first attracted them five years ago, they weren’t content to leave it at that. And now, at the turn of the century, they’re contributing their own unique perspective to the global dialogue.

Listen to Sa Bat’s “Sylvia” on the Melodic Wonkster mix, or buy it at Juno. “No Money” (in the player above) is expected to be released in September. “Time Dub” is a CS dotplate for now. Peep the new MPFree category!

We’ll let homeboy do the explaining on this one. (On a side note; after I heard this and did some digging through his stuff, I wasn’t surprised to find out that Watson is also a dubstep producer. Check him on MySpace.)

“Basically the title says it all: the tar (North African frame drum) solo announces the ‘Tabla’ or doumbek/darbuka solo, and then re appears for the outro. The percussion tracks are all improvisations. The riq (Arabic tambourine) which accompanies the other instruments plays the rhythmic foundation throughout the entire song. The rhythm, which is the same from start to finish, is called ‘Khaliji’ [a style native to Arabic culture]. I recorded all the percussion parts myself using a laptop running Ableton Live.”

Also, as much as we love SoundCloud, we realize it doesn’t show up on all RSS readers. So we got the stream (and freeload) right here:

"Remaking the Night Sky," Graphite on paper. By Michael Schall. Show up now at Pierogi Brooklyn.

Long melodies written with sub-bass are generally the province of the bassline circuit. In a genre like this, where less attention is paid to sound design, that makes sense. It deals with a smaller sound palette and makes up for it with melody, similar to electro. But even in bassline, creating comprehensible melodies is an achievement, because wobbly sub-bass is such an unintuitive sound.

With a piano, for example, the notes are laid out in order; one related, subtlety different note after another. But wonky bass has such a wide variety of textures, pitches and speeds that putting them all together seems like it would be a daunting task. Even when successful on this front, however, bassline can leave more to be desired, since it has a tendency to lack depth of mood and tempo.

But now, such melodies in dubstep have begun showing up on on Culture System’s radar.

The most prominent label to push the sound is the young Sludge Records, situated in Brighton. Sludge was (presumably) birthed from Ed Solo’s "Sludge" dub from last year. Solo, who unsurprisingly is very comfortable with bassline, released this song which marked a distinct departure from the rest of his eclectic sound. Then recently, he released the "Age of Dub" on the new Sludge imprint and killed it. Next, Crissy Criss dropped "Don’t Mess About," arguably burning Solo.

Although it is hardly recognized at the moment, New York dubstep will not to be left out of this shift, thanks to DJ Dore. A couple weeks ago, Dore dropped "Dark Ecology (dubstep remix)," and it deserves a place alongside Sludge at all dance music distributors. Also notable among Dore’s portfolio are "Hidden Dub" and "Snowcone." Although loopier and simpler in composition, "Hidden" is a good listen. "Snow" also has a tendency to get loopy, but builds into an expansiveness of melody (albeit less rhythmic) that surpasses the aforementioned dubs, Sludge included. All these songs are on his MySpace page.

You can catch Dore, and the rest of the Code of Arms recruits at Synctank at Bar on A this Saturday, January 10th. The event, which we covered last time around, will again be hosted by Slouch. He released a new EP with The Great Mundane, which is available for free download at Mundane’s Web site. (It’s well worth your time.)

But they’ve got their competition cut out for them. London’s murderous Zomby will be performing has cancelled his appearance at Trouble & Bass’s show at Studio B the same night.

Bossasaurus, "The Wait is Over"

Bossasaurus keeps it movin’ and flips a classic sound to pop your lock to (that’s an innocent phrase, for those Ebonics-challenged among us). The standout joint on homeboys’ demo is "The Wait is Over."

On this song, they introduce new melodies or sounds every few bars that revolve around a loop which grounds the theme of the song. And over the course of this five minute song, they switch it up entirely three times, but keep it all within the family - still promoting the theme, but dipping into valleys and soaring into triumph, like the ups and downs of an epic story. They even drop the percussion at certain points and allow other instruments to carry the rhythm, or toss out the rhythm altogether for a hard piano solo interlude.

It’s great when you’re listening to a song, and after a kind of rolling, staggered progression, you realize that none of what it began with remains and the song is wholly different. Unfortunately, the shifts within "The Wait" can be abrupt since they’ll drop the main sample loop and shift the rhythm simultaneously. In fact, those primary sample loops drag out a bit too long.

With "The Wait" - and most of their sound so far - they have a tendency to rely on rather generic instrumentation. They’ll rock some guitars or pianos or plain vanilla drums and keyboards rather than seek out less thoroughly explored instruments and sounds. Guitars and such are great because they have such a broad range of notes, and you can bring your melody wherever you’d like to take it. But Boss relies on them predominately, and often uses them for a short loop that will play for a couple minutes.

Although I take issue with the selection for drums, they’re well versed in how to use them. This results in a complex composition that avoids the tiring repetition of some programmed or simpler percussion choices.

"Moonlit Trees" - another choice cut - breaks their J5-like, happy-go-lucky hip hop feel, and flips it on the moody tip. Although less intricate than "The Wait", its atmosphere and mood are undeniably powerful. It’s like walking through a winter forest in dense fog or lounging in a smoke filled room lit with deep red light.

Boss’s demo cover reminds me of a pillowcase I had when I was like six. Sorta like those hoodies some people still rock.

Overall? Big up! Can’t wait for more.

Steady taking advantage of the new world music has entered, Radiohead is throwing a remix competition for the release of their new single, "Naked." These are Culture System’s top choices.

These two selections were chosen from a review of nearly 200 entries out of the 650 entries currently submitted. (That number grew to 670 by the time CS was finished reviewing them.) Both deserve to make it to an actual "Naked" RMX release. After the jump, listen to some more notable mentions.

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