As a release show for the new The Bug vs Ghost Dubs album Implosion, Ninja Tune pioneer Kevin Richard Martin, aka The Bug, is coming to Berlin along with other representatives of the global bass avant-garde, and will be setting up his massive sound system at Gretchen in Kreuzberg.
The Bug’s DJ set will move between dub, ragga, dancehall, and grime, and this time he’ll be joined by none other than Warrior Queen. Their collaboration, “Poison Dart,” on Ninja Tune is a modern classic. With her politically charged, raw, and direct style, the versatile Jamaican singer, songwriter, and DJ has collaborated not only with The Bug but also with acts like Skream, Lee “Scratch” Perry, Mungo’s Hi-Fi, and OBF. After a long hiatus from the stage, Warrior Queen is back with new releases, making their performance at Pressure all the more special.
The French dub collective O.B.F. combines powerful reggae-dub with a modern sound system approach – analog, intense, and deeply rooted in tradition. Their sound, influenced by Jamaican reggae, 90s dub, and urban bass music, represents the search for a future-oriented dub sound and has made them an indispensable part of the bass scene for years.
Goth-Trad is, in a sense, Japan’s bass ambassador, delivering hypnotically psychedelic yet minimalist bass music that combines feedback, noise, and trance-like structures. His sets are perfect psychedelic bass journeys.
Gorgonn, building on roughly 20 years of sound engineering expertise, constructs a powerful neo-dub sound that he calls Sci-Fi Steppas. This means: A powerful combination of deep industrial dub, noise, techno, and no wave.
As expected from a tag team featuring British soundlab explorer and ‘London Zoo’ composer Kevin Martin, aka The Bug, and Michael Fiedler, aka Jah Schulz—a long-time graduate of Germany’s new school of sound system reggae culture—the duo approaches their target differently yet share the goal of keeping their sound “raw” (Fiedler) and “brutally minimal” (Martin). This proves that opposites can attract, even if their tools are different and their methods sometimes diverge.
