Bonkers Part 10

 

Bonkers 10 had been out for around a year or so when I purchased it. The scene seemed to be in a healthy place and I had started going to upfront events again. That said, it seemed nowhere near as big as it's 90s heyday and if an event had an old skool room I'd probably spend more time in there.

The opening track on the Hixxy mix is a spoken word piece called "Thou Shalt Not Forget" which was basically a dig at those who had previously written hardcore off but have changed their tune now it's popular again. In some ways I was one of those people, though I did stick with it up to it starting to get popular again.

The first actual tune is a Hixxy remix of "Bullet In The Gun" by Planet Perfecto. Then comes "Punk" by UFO which I'm surprised wasn't labelled Ferry Corsten - Punk (UFO Remix) because that's basically what it is. Then it's "The Beat Kicks" by Breeze & Styles which sounds like it should be a hardcore version of a Ferry Corsten tune but it isn't. You can see what angle the Hixxy mix is taking though with these tunes.

A slight change in direction for the next track, it's UFO and MC Marley with another tune that makes me cringe, "Underground". It doesn't really sound too different to "Connection" from Bonkers 9, just different lyrics with a bit of autotune. Then it's the Hixxy, Styles and Breeze remix of "Pretty Green Eyes" by Ultrabeat which seems a bit strange given Styles was one of the original composers.

For the 3rd time in a row "You're Shining" by Breeze & Styles makes an appearance as part of a mash up with "Future Set" called "Future Shining". We also have a remix of "Tekno Harmony" which itself is a rip off of "Sweet Harmony" by Liquid. 

For the first time since Bonkers came back there is a tune in the Hixxy mix which isn't on one of the big 6 hardcore labels or one of the bigger non-hardcore labels which is "Ultimate High" by Stargazer. The fact it's the Breeze & Styles remix probably helped get it on there. But after what I find quite an uninspiring mix up to this point, it suddenly comes to life with this tune. 

The next track is "Starlight" by Dowster which is the best tune in the mix. The last 2 tracks are also a big improvement over the earlier tracks in the mix. For the 3rd time in a row the Hixxy mix gets better at the end, the challenge is getting that far.

The Sharkey mix is the opposite. It begins with 3 breakbeat tunes from Ham which are all decent. The trouble is once the kickdrum comes in on track 4 I'm just wanting more breakbeat tunes. It would have probably alienated the freeform fans though if Sharkey did an entire mix of breakbeat tunes.

Once again though the best mix is the Scott Brown one. Like with Bonkers 9, it's 15 tracks with the first 10 being hardcore and last 5 gabber. Track 1 is what I think of as being the warm up for track 2 which is "Commence" by Plus System aka Scott Brown which has one of those great riffs.

I'm also a big fan of track 3 "Sunrise" by Deejay Bee & Overflow ft Vision, one of just two non-Evolution tracks in the first 10 with both being on Essential Platinum. The fourth track "I'm In Heaven" by Scott Brown sounds like I've heard a similar tune without the vocals. It's cheesy but I find myself singing along to it so it must be doing something right.

The rest of the hardcore part has a lot of what I would call evil voice type samples which can be a bit "what the fuck?" but at the same time the great thing about hardcore is you're not supposed to take it seriously. 

Maybe this was done on purpose to warm us up for the gabber section. Again no stand out tracks as such but good to have a bit of gabber in the mix.

Along with other newer Bonkers albums at the time, I found myself listening to the Scott Brown mix more than the Hixxy & Sharkey ones. But in the case of Bonkers 10 I would say I prefer the end of Hixxys mix and the start of Sharkeys mix to the middle of Scott Browns mix. 

I honestly can't remember if I bought Bonkers 11 before or after Bonkers 10, I did buy them close together. More on Bonkers 11 next week.