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7.11 Batty Bass w. DJ Hannah Holland |
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Written by plui
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Tuesday, 08 July 2008 |
“Batty Bass” founder Hannah Holland plays this Friday, July 11, followed by Dave "Switch" Taylor of “Switch & Sinden” “Bassline” fame at the end of the month. It’s all a great follow up to Shimon’s thundering set at Siesta’s Drum ‘n’ Bass birthday bash last week.
This Friday, July 11, Club Bonbon dishes up some of the latest sounds at the core of the East London electro-fashion scene. DJ Hannah Holland's trademark "Trailer Trash" nights have run successfully for almost 4 years bringing together anyone with a itch to dance, creating a free-for-all atmosphere centered around bottom-heavy beats and an East-Ender attitude.
"It’s a total mish-mash of music, people, drag queens, gays, straight Shoreditch party guys and girls… And the crowd's always up for whatever I play. It’s wicked!" Holland said recently to Time Out London.
As clubnights continue to evolve, reinvention becomes de rigeur and it’s often the mashup up of classic styles which emerges as something new. But reinvention itself is not enough to drive a new style’s popularity, and Holland points out that a key element to the success of Trailer Trash has been the constant striving to find new and unique places for one-off parties and events which complement the weekly events in Hoxton.
"Last year we threw a Trailer Trash party in a 500-year-old prison that still had the torture chambers in it. It was mad; there were strobe lights everywhere and trannies dancing in the cells. It felt like you were on some sort of ghost ride." She recalls.
The ongoing success of the Trailer Trash parties has spawned a new event “Bastard Batty Bass” by Hannah Holland and Mama Shamone whom also fronts the party's rock-electro band. The music, as the name implies, is all about bass. "I play jackin’, feel-it-in-your-pants music – music that you can get sweaty to." Says Holland.
Getting there was no ball of wax, however, and Holland cites DJs like “Switch” (coming to Bonbon 7/25) who have helped London's bassline house scene shed its bad rep and in doing so, open the way for a new breed of DJs like Holland who, with her signature Bastard Batty Bass sound, are prepared to take the core elements into new directions.
What is Batty Bass? Think of a mashup of Chicago Booty house and Baile/favela funk, with the rolling bass of late 90s Speed Garage, yet having roots in Jungle! It’s a sound which DJs such as Zombie Disco Squad and Tron and Johan of Radioclit are also pushing forward. Holland’s drum’n’bass angle is a throwback to her South London roots where she grew up listening to DJ Hype and Goldie. She’s sure to give Bonbon's Funktion-One soundsystem a heavy duty workout.
Curious for more? Check out her 8 or 9 mix sets available freely from apple.com, just search for “Hannah Holland Batty Bass” in the iTunes Music Store podcasts.
Her appearance at Shanghai marks the 3rd LGBT-friendly monthly event at Club Bonbon with previous visits by Larry Tee (Ru Paul's producer), and Parisian fashion set founders of Kitsune's Gildas and Masaya this past May.
Hannah Holland is capitalizing on the emergence off the new sound and has established her own independent record label Batty Bass Records. She is currently working on a number of releases including a track with infamous drag queen promoter Johnny Woo.
“I love dirty minimal music but it sounds so camp and serious, I’ve always wanted to make a minimal track and stick a drag queen drawl over the top, so that’s what we’ve done. You can do such good vogue-ing to minimal music but no one has caught on yet.” says Holland.
Hannah Holland, Batty Bass at Shanghai Club Bonbon, Home of Godskitchen, China. Friday July 11 2008
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