Instead of getting to bed like a good girl, I'm here wandering through old blogs of mine and reading up on the various posts. I figure I'll post a few of my oldies-but-goodies here, for no other reason than entertainment and to compare then and now. Here's a post from January 5, 2009, dedicated to my love for the bassline:
I was driving to work this morning, listening to some tunes, and I realized something. I love bass. Not bass the fish, but bass in music, as in that thump that rattles in your chest when the beat drops. Don’t ask me what it is, but something about a serious bassline makes a song sexy to me.
I think I’ve been this way since I was a child. My dad worked in a factory, but held a side gig as a “selecta” and would regularly host weekend dances in our basement. The laundry room held 2 huge club sized speakers that were conveniently located right under our kitchen, so when the bass hit, pots on the stove jumped to the beat and plates shook out the cupboards to join the party. My mom would rush in the kitchen screaming, and my dad and I would laugh, and in true Jamaican form would take a swig of his Heineken and say “Jus’ cool man, di music sweet, eee?” Mom would laugh too, and I couldn’t help but link bass to warm fuzzy feelings.
There’s nothing I love more than to be in my car, or in the club, listening to a real bass-heavy song and feeling the vibrations move through my body. In the car can be a bit dangerous, because I find myself banging out the bassline on the dashboard with one hand while driving with the other. Not a good look in the wintertime. At the red lightbulb basement jams back in the day though, you best believe I’d be knocking out a bassline on somebody’s mama’s furnace with no hesitation!
Go listen to Timbaland (circa Aaliyah “One In A Million” days) and you’ll see what I mean. I have to give T-Pain props for his production (and dutty bassline) on “Chopped N’ Skrewed”. Drum and Bass says it all (don’t even dare call it techno). Find some early 90s gun-man reggae tunes (Bounty Killa anyone?) and tell me if the bass in those songs doesn't add something serious to the track. Nothing like this tinny, jiggy-jiggy crap that’s been out for a while…sounding like a song that hasn’t gone through puberty yet. I’m a grown-ass woman, I like grown-ass men, and a song with a heavy bassline sounds like grown-people music to me. Get familiar.