Rollers on a diet: the Autonomic moment
Autonomic was a short-lived but much-talked-about strand of drum & bass that cut the rush and left room for the tune to breathe. It took shape in the late 2000s around dBridge and Instra:mental, and the name did several jobs at once: a club night, a podcast series, an umbrella for the participants' labels and a sound. dBridge's fashioning of the movement dates to around 2009. By 2013 the word was no longer a buzzword, with the first Mosaic compilation in 2011 a climax of sorts for the Autonomic sound.
Half-time, hardware and a lot of empty space
The whole vibe hung on space. The music leant on half-time rhythms around 85 bpm and steered clear of obvious breaks and drum patterns, working on a primarily 170/85 bpm axis. Think 170 bpm music with more emphasis on space and melody, pushing away from the usual drops and amen rinse-outs that come with that tempo. A different kind of drop from the usual tear-out.
Hardware was central. Instra:mental's inspirations were the Detroit sound and the Warp back catalogue, and the space and soul in the music likely came from working with hardware. The drums on the 2010 FabricLive.50 mix ran skeletal and sparsely deployed, under a self-imposed 170 bpm speed limit. When ASC launched his label Auxiliary in 2010, his own summary of the aesthetic was drum & bass music that does not sound like drum & bass music.
The stated aim was priority of music over genre: music first, drum & bass second.
How the crew linked up
Before the name
dBridge (Darren White) is a former member of Bad Company. He recalls that in April 1998 the group left Renegade Hardware and set up BC Recordings. His 2004 12-inch "Bellini" / "True Romance", made with Vegas for Metalheadz Platinum, is a record he named as helping establish him as someone able to make different styles. He has also referred to that release as a new beginning, and said that listening to both tracks today shows how they would ultimately lead him to Autonomic. He founded Exit Records in 2003, and he called Steve Spacek's Black Pocket (2007) the first album on the label.
2009: the switch-up gets a name
Instra:mental (Alex Green and Damon Kirkham) collaborated with dBridge on "Blush Response", and as a result a club night, a podcast, an umbrella for their labels and a style were born. From 2009 ASC's music came out mainly on Instra:mental's Nonplus label.
The dubstep crowd came knocking too. Two of dubstep's biggest names of the time, Scuba and Skream, did eventually appear on Autonomic-related releases, and dBridge's own account is that dubstep producers such as Pearson Sound, Scuba and James Blake were sending 85/170 material. The FabricLive.50 mix by dBridge and Instra:mental, reviewed in June 2010, drew substantially on the hosts' Exit and Nonplus+ labels. Its track listing puts ASC, Alix Perez, Genotype and Riya alongside Skream, Scuba, Pearson Sound and Actress.
Exit, Mosaic and the long goodbye to the buzzword
Early 2011 brought Mosaic Vol.1, a snapshot of the post-Autonomic days: spacious, meditative and at times subtly energetic music from names including Manchester's Synkro and Indigo. In late 2011 Exit issued "Marka" by Dub Phizix and Skeptical (Ashley Tindall), a tune that sits at around 174 bpm. Mosaic Vol.2 landed in August 2013, with Autonomic by then a style pioneered by dBridge and Instra:mental.
Pulling apart
Instra:mental moved toward techno and electro after "Watching You". In July 2012 Green said the duo was finished, with one more release still to come that he described as "very much Autonomic", and that he was running Nonplus+ alone. ASC said he had reached a point where what he was recording could no longer be called Autonomic, though he still found plenty to explore at 170 bpm.
Who was rinsing it
- dBridge - the Exit Records head, who launched Autonomic with Instra:mental and pioneered the style alongside them.
- Instra:mental - Alex Green and Damon Kirkham, who ran the Nonplus+ label; in 2012 Green said the project was finished.
- ASC - James Clements, California-based and originally from the north of England, with more than 50 records since 1999 as of 2010. His 2012 album Out of Sync for Samurai Red Seal built on a piece called "Autonomic".
- Synkro and Skeptical - Synkro is among the names on Mosaic Vol.1 (2011); Skeptical co-created "Marka" with Dub Phizix.
The labels behind the pressure
Exit Records, run by dBridge, released Mosaic Vol.2 and "Marka". Nonplus+ was Instra:mental's own label, and it reached its fiftieth release in 2019 with Timelines Part 1. ASC's Auxiliary was launched in 2010 with "The Touch", featuring vocals by Riya, as its first release, and the label would focus mainly on the 170 tempo, though not exclusively.
What stuck after the dust settled
Several producers credit Autonomic with widening the music's possibilities. Fracture said it "paved a way and gave drum'n'bass more possibilities to blend with other genres", and Sam Binga praised it for opening up links and influences between genres. The footwork-influenced movement that followed took a different tack, leaning on 160/80 rather than 170/85. In 2019 Nonplus released Instra:mental's Timelines Part 1, which uncovers unreleased gems of the Autonomic Podcast series and is mainly rooted in 170bpm. In January 2020 Exit held its debut party at London club E1, with sets at 140, 150 and 160 bpm. Proper session, different tempos, same label.
