FYI.

This story is over 5 years old.

Music

Bassline Legend T2's Back with A Banger from the Vaults

The "Heartbroken" producer's new EP 'Return of the Grandmaster' is a big and bassy bit of brilliance.
Josh Baines

It's genuinely hard to believe that nearly a decade's gone by since Tafazwa Tawonezv's luminous, legendary, era-defining bassline anthem "Heartbroken" was pipped to the number one spot in the UK charts by Leona Lewis. Despite its relatively lowkey status these days, bassline—that juddering, snaking, hulking northern powerhouse—never died, never went away, never really vanished. And T2's back to prove it.

Advertisement

With a new EP arriving on the 1st of July—the bolshily named Return of the Grandmaster—it seemed like the perfect time to check in on the Leeds based producer. With UK Funky having another turn in the sun, we wondered if he thought that it'd be bassline that you'd see Drake sampling next. "I think it's time that bassline got its dues because the first time round people who weren't in the core audience weren't ready for the sound," he says. "I mean, OK, I had a hit record but even then certain major radio stations wouldn't playlist it. It wasn't personal, but they just did not get it it. It wasn't the Arctic Monkeys or Fedde Le Grand. It's raw, edgy, underground British music."

Which is what makes his return so exciting. The EP touches on classic bassline as well as veering into warehouse-ready, bass-heavy house territory, and the kind of shuffling deep tech you might hear Mark Radford play.

"Let's Go to Another Place" is a previously unreleased screamer from the vaults and it turns out that bassline from 2007 still sounds ludicrously enjoyable today. "It was a track only I had, and I never sent it to another DJ," T2 told us. "I only played it in the club a couple times and it has always been one of those tracks that I thought only I liked and nobody else would. I reckon I'm wrong now." We reckon he is too. Check out the tune below:

It's genuinely hard to believe that nearly a decade's gone by since Tafazwa Tawonezv's luminous, legendary, era-defining bassline anthem "Heartbroken" was pipped to the number one spot in the UK charts by Leona Lewis. Despite its relatively lowkey status these days, bassline—that juddering, snaking, hulking northern powerhouse—never died, never went away, never really vanished. And T2's back to prove it.

With a new EP arriving on the 1st of July—the bolshily named Return of the Grandmaster—it seemed like the perfect time to check in on the Leeds based producer. With UK Funky having another turn in the sun, we wondered if he thought that it'd be bassline that you'd see Drake sampling next. "I think it's time that bassline got its dues because the first time round people who weren't in the core audience weren't ready for the sound," he says. "I mean, OK, I had a hit record but even then certain major radio stations wouldn't playlist it. It wasn't personal, but they just did not get it it. It wasn't the Arctic Monkeys or Fedde Le Grand. It's raw, edgy, underground British music."

Which is what makes his return so exciting. The EP touches on classic bassline as well as veering into warehouse-ready, bass-heavy house territory, and the kind of shuffling deep tech you might hear Mark Radford play.

"Let's Go to Another Place" is a previously unreleased screamer from the vaults and it turns out that bassline from 2007 still sounds ludicrously enjoyable today. "It was a track only I had, and I never sent it to another DJ," T2 told us. "I only played it in the club a couple times and it has always been one of those tracks that I thought only I liked and nobody else would. I reckon I'm wrong now." We reckon he is too. Check out the tune below:

Return of the Grandmaster arrives on July 1st.

T2 is on Facebook // SoundCloud // Twitter

Return of the Grandmaster arrives on July 1st.

T2 is on Facebook // SoundCloud // Twitter

Tagged:basslinet2thump exclusive streamlets go to another placereturn of the grandmasterThump
0
Advertisement