It is the long-held opnion of this fine olf Mag that the real lifeblood drum and bass, or any electronic genre, for that matter, is the smaller labels who look for potential in artists whose work is a bit off the beaten path. Maybe they don’t fit neatly into a subgenre, or the big labels are too busy to pick them up, or the artists themselves want to keep their A&R integrity; whatever the reason, the underground is and always has been the leading edge for music. D&B is lucky enough to largely adhere more strongly to its subversive mores than some other electronic genres, so even the ‘bigs’ aren’t too big. In the age of WORSHIP, AI and other such soulless shenanigans, however, it seems a good idea to look at and highlight labels and artists who are staying on that cutting edge.
Given the ethos of this new monthly series, it seems only reasonable that the first Label Profile go to Lucked up Music. This South UK-based imprint has been deliberately operating on the fringes since 2017, when artist and DJ Section initially started it as a self-release vehicle. After only a few drops, however, Locked Up grew into a proper label with compilation/collab series like Section Presents the Alliance and Inmates which featured artists like Mentah, Agro, Jaybee, Future Shock and a baby Kumarachi, as well as solo offerings by the likes of Opius and Xeropoint. Locked Up was off and running early, demonstrating a gao in label representation for these maverick artists that Locked Up have been filling for the past nine years.
Section’s philosophy around the music he releases on Locked Up is rooted in the roots of jungle and drum and bass, and both his own sound and his A&R reflect that, as every release has some callback to the golden age of D&B, where snares featured heavily and syncopation wasn’t just in the main beat. That said, this is not a one note song, as it were. There is an incredible amount of diversity on the label’s discography, covering deep and minimal sounds, jungle vibes, darkstep, groove, even early neurofunk. it seems if it’s deep, a bit atmospheric and sonically interesting, Section’s having it.
Locked Up’s latest offering by label mainstay DE CET is a good example of this label’s sound and values. Beakbeats for the Streets is both classic and modern, diverse and grounded in groove. It runs the gamut of deep, sub-rumbling bass in tracks like ‘Lucid’ and ‘Scarab’ to melodic yet dubby tracks yet melodic tracks like ‘Love Injector’ and ‘Sku Burial’. There’s also a healthy dose of darkstep/early neuro crossover in ‘The Link’, a collab with Section himself, and album closer ‘Cool Down’. It should be noted there are also some surpises along the way in this album: it’s called Breakbeats for the Streets, not D&B for the Streets (wink wink, nudge, nudge).
As an underground mainstay that’s stuck to its core values for nearly a decade, Locked Up has given a home to deep dubs and D&B and it will likely continue to do so into the future. Punters who love deep vibes with a healthy edge and haven’t checked out Locked Up yet would be wise to do so with this epic DE CET album burning up Bandcamp (vinyl version currently sold out) and other popular platforms. Fans who want to check out the label’s full discography, their Bandcamp hopepage is here and Beatport here.