Neal Pereira tells us about that sound sometimes known as Porn Groove...

As soon as the lift doors open to the ground level, I'm already plugged in and on my way to the train station. Stepping into the packed train, there is much going around, sometimes unpleasant, like the-newspaper-in-your-face-or-back-I-don't-see-you-there-in-front-of-my-newspaper or the I'm-stubborn-and-couldn't-care-less-about-anyone-esle-thus-I-will-not-move-into-the-empty-spaces-available, morning's are quite alright compared to afternoon's, where primary school kids and crying babies could drive a man to literally combusting with all that ruckus, and trust me when I say ruckus because sometimes, there is a bunch of Malay primary school kids on the north line towards Woodlands, who think the train is their own personal moving playground.

At one time, a 30 something year old Malay man got so mad at them, he stood up and shouted at them, twice, at different times on that particular ride home. But that didn't stop them on other days.

Nights are not as bad, but the packed-like-a-can-of-sardines (where there are a few, from a hectic day, smelling like sardines) can still get to you when you're tired and had a long day. With cars, there's traffic! And bad drivers (I sit in the passenger sit most of the time, and I encounter 4.5 bad drivers a trip, and they get my blood boiling, even though I ain't the driver! which makes me wonder if I could get double boiled when I get my license pretty soon).

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The last two modes of main transports (unless you're like some freak I know who likes to walk long, long distances and then boast about it like it was a night march during BMT) would be cabs and buses. In the cab (no, not in the club, in the cab), there's the I-love-jerking-you-around-in-the-back-seat-and-I'm-sorry-but-I-suffer-from-brakealotis, the can't-stop-talking-cabbie, the singing cabbie, I swear this cabbie was singing Chinese opera and he had his free hand moving with the grooove, I seriously thought he was trying to get a compliment or he just lost a lot of money and was singing his sorrows away or maybe he just didn't get any recently (I had forgotten my Zen as I was in a rush, what a time to not have it!).

Lastly the bus, where if you don't have a seat, then you have fun holding on and strengthening your gripping power and watching the wonderful TV Mobile and its liking to once in a while, FREEZE.

This alone, is transport, getting from one place to another. The next few issues would be, stress, sleep, love, sex (yes 2 different things and I found that out the hard way!), and all the negative energy in the world that forms unpleasant moods.

How do we deal with all these factors? From turning off to turning on, reducing to seducing, there is one path to trip onto; the music genre known as Trip Hop aka the Bristol Sound. The genre has many sub-genres, Downtempo, Lounge, Big Beat, Ambient, New Age, and to a certain extent Porn Groove.

West of London, if you take the M4 motorway, you will reach the Southwest coast of England, a city called Bristol, a multi-ethnic place that is one of the European Centres for Culture. Famous for Bananarama, Jeremy Irons and well pretty much nothing else but Trip Hop. The evolution of this genre was just like a virgin, tentative at first then gradually getting into the groove and then orgasmic euphoria. Unknowing to most, it was commercial artistes like Sade and Neneh Cherry and obscure Soul 2 Soul, a then duo project formed by Jazzie B and Nellee Hooper that paved the way with singles in the 80's. But the core of Trip Hop derived from a guerilla collective of deejays, rappers and arrangers called The Wild Bunch.

The group became defunct in '87 but from its ashes rose future bands, artistes and producers like Massive Attack (compromising Daddy G, Mushroom and 3D), Tricky (originally from MA, he went solo in '95), Smith and Mighty, Nellee Hooper, DJ Milo and Willy Wee.

Four years later, Massive Attack and producer Nellee Hooper started the ball rolling with Blue Lines, a reggae infused, ambient, abstract of hip hop, funk and soul in '91. The song that brought Trip Hop to the world was 'Unfinished Sympathy', which was accompanied by Shara Nelson on vocals. A line from that song really describes the beginning of Trip Hop, " You're the book that I have opened And now I've got to know much more" and Shara dragging the word 'more' really emphasises the point.

Enginner Geoff Barrow, who was a tape operator on Massive's Blue Lines album, soon formed his own band with soulful melancholy-inducing vocalist Beth Gibbons and released Dummy in October '94. Dummy was a mono soundtrack of haunting basses, dreamy orchestral instruments, emotionally driven piano sounds, timely scratches of the turntable and the oh so sweet and erotic voice of Beth Gibbons, whom I think has the sweetest soothing voice ever since legendary Jazz singer, Billie Holiday.

The first single and most popular song from this Dummy was 'Sour Times', with the catchy line, "Nobody loves me, It's true, not like you do" but personally 'Strangers', with it's high pitched start and heavy bass flow through the song was my favourite and 'Glory Box', a song I introduced at a small house party where the lights were dim and the atmosphere 'trippy', and had my friends raving about it and asking if I had more of this music for them.

A few months later, the pioneers were back with their second album, Protection. Massive had collaborations with legendary reggae vocalist Horace Andy (also involved in Blue Lines), Everything But the Girl's Tracey Thorn, Nicolette, pianist Craig Armstrong (who later released albums under MA's solo label Melankolic). 'Singles Protection' and 'Karmacoma' followed 'Unfinished Sympathy' into legendary status. 'Protection' with its soft approach lulled listeners while 'Karmacoma' portrayed the dark eerie seductive side that was to be the trademark of Massive's future productions.

A live remix of The Door's 'Light My Fire' was also featured on the album. This was also the last album Tricky would be with Massive, as he took on his successful solo route with Maxinquaye released a few months later after 'Protection'. His album featured crooner Alison Goldfrapp, who with Will Gregory formed chill out/electronica duo Goldfrapp in the late '90's.

The single Hell Is Around The Corner had borrowed the composed beat of Portishead's 'Glory Box' and slowed and softened it down. Soon bands like Sneaker Pimps, Morcheeba, Duo, Lamb all got in on the act too, all 3 compromising lead female vocalists. In '97, Portishead released their 2nd album, self titled, but personally it was not as good as their first album.

The growing popularity of the genre reached out across the Atlantic and across the Pacific too. In the States, Josh Davis aka DJ Shadow released Endtroducing in '97, a trip hop album leaning more towards hip hop and turntablism, Thievery Corporation, a duo compromising Rob Garza and Eric Hilton, who played the more downtempo, bossa nova dub music, released Sounds From The Thievery Hi-Fi.

In Japan, Hideaki Ishi aka DJ Krush released in '95 his self-titled album; Krush and the first single 'Big City Lover' became a hit. But the song that started me out on Trip Hop back in 98 was 'Dig This Vibe' by Krush, played in a surprising laid back party scene in the gore fest movie Blade. '98 was also the year the most seductive and probably greatest album Trip Hop will ever produce was released. Mezzanine, with its black beetle on a white background cover by Massive Attack took the music world by storm with its blend of jazz, middle eastern beats, dark brooding bass, eerie haunting sounds, sweet soothing female vocals, Daddy G's deep voice, 3D's raspy whispery rapping and a whole lot of other elements that made it mind blowing.

The music on this starts out with a loud rumbling bass that explodes with guitar riffs and drums in 'Angel' to howling wolves introducing the most haunting song on the album, 'Rising son' (a personal favourite of mine), leading on to the most successful song on this album, with its recognizable beat, 'Teardrop'. The video was an eerie yet beautiful view of an unborn child, inspired by Liz Fraser who was pregnant at that time. 'Inertia Creeps' (heard in a Levi's ad few years back) shows the diversity of the genre with its Middle-Eastern sound influx. The next track, 'Exchange' is a voiceless dream.

'Dissolved Girl', would be familiar to Matrix fans at the beginning of the show, where Neo is asleep on his computer desk and he has his headphones on. 'Dissolved Girl' follows suit with 'Angel', starting off slow and then coming right at you, and then down a notch. Sara Jay's soothing vocals on the track really makes you want to dissolve. 'Man Next Door' features Horace Andy, and of course the reggae feel you would get from him. 'Black Milk' and 'Mezzanine' don't disappoint either with Liz Fraser (Cocteau Twins) crooning in 'Black Milk' while 3D and Daddy G exchanges lines back and forth in 'Mezzanine'. The last track is a remake of 'Exchange', this time with vocals.

The genre continued to grow around the world, with Amon Tobin from Brazil, with his abstract trip hop jazzy sound, DJ Cam from France, influenced by the Hip Hop turntablism style of Trip Hop like DJ Shadow, Kid Loco, another Frenchman, is a brilliant downtempo artiste (A Grand Love Story and DJ Kicks compilation are his highlight albums, check them out) DJ Vadim from Russia, another with the heavy Hip Hop turntablism style, Kruder & Dorfmeister from Austria, with their more Thievery Corporation bossa nova downtempo approach. More bands came out along with the different sub-genres, Cinematic Orchestra ('Flite' is a brilliant song), Groove Armada and their big beat style, though their more remembered for their dance hit 'I See You Baby'.

Even bands like the Deftones, Stabbing Westward, Bush have produced Trip Hop songs. Chino Moreno (one of his vocal idols is Sade), lead vocalist of the Deftones, even has a side project called Team Sleep, which recently released an album. (Released a singled called 'The Passportal' on the Matrix Reloaded OST).

The genre has been growing ever since then, many more bands and duos have come out Alpha, Daughter Darling (very much similar to Portishead), Boards of Canada, Lemon Jelly, Mandalay, the Ninjatune artistes, Amon Tobin, Hexstatic, Cinematic Orchestra, DJ Vadim, Wagon Christ, Mr. Scruff and many more from the label, British Indian DJs, Talvin Singh and Nitin Swahney and many more.

The genre has firmly rooted itself around the world, and the sound, with so much diversity and flexibility is a joy to listen to anytime of the day. I will leave you with words to describe this genre. Sweet. Antistar. Lullaby. Numb. Heaven. What Sound. What Your Soul Sings. Teardrop. Angel. Dream Sequence. (Ironically, all are song titles from artistes mentioned).