Bonkers Part 18

 

The Best of Bonkers album didn't get a number therefore the 18th Bonkers album to be released was Bonkers 17. More accurately it was called "Bonkers 17 Rebooted" which could be to do with the fact it had been over a year since a Bonkers album with new material had been released.

By late 2007 when this album was released the new hardcore I was listening to was hardcore breaks i.e. new music being made early 90s style before the kick drum came in. One of the main DJs doing this was Luna C who had been asked to mix on this but would have had to change his style so he refused.

When it comes to 21st century Bonkers albums the highlight more often than not is the Next Generation tunes. Now for the first time we have Brisk & Ham who make the bulk of these Next Generation tunes doing a mix.

In theory this should be a welcome change, but I'm also aware that there came a point where Next Generation tunes started to become more like the other modern hardcore tunes. I also was told by someone who knew Brisk personally that he no longer liked the tunes he was making but had to make them in order to make a living. This became evident when he started a sauce business and stopped making hardcore.

I think we've reached the point here where Brisk no longer liked his tunes. It is an improvement on the likes of Raverbaby but nowhere near the standard of the tunes they were doing a few years prior. But maybe it was making tunes like these that enabled them to mix a Bonkers album.

Sharkey was joined this time by Kevin Energy, the owner of Nu Energy which accounts for a big chunk of the freeform records of the 21st century.

If freeform was the type of hardcore music you were supposed to take seriously then they're not doing a very good job of it on this mix. It includes a remix of "Techno Wonderland" which is one of the cheesiest hardcore records ever to be made.

Scott Brown is joined by Marc Smith who had previously mix a Bonkers with Sharkey. The result is less Scott Brown records than there would likely of been had he mixed on his own. Judging by the actual Scott Brown records on here though that can only be a good thing.

Scott Brown had been a breath of fresh air compared to Raverbaby and co but these records now wouldn't have sounded out of place on Raverbaby. A stand out example of this is the irritating vocals on "Hold You In My Arms".

In theory because of this line up this should have been the best Bonkers of the 21st century. The reality was that happy hardcore has always been seen as kids music. As I was a kid when I first got into it I can't really argue with that. By the time this Bonkers came out I was nearer to 30 than 20. Around the same period I was at a wedding reception where I saw a kid who was probably 12 listening to happy hardcore on their iPod. I was no longer the target audience.

It would be another 2 years until the next Bonkers was released. During that time the ownership of Bonkers changed to All Around the World records. This was the label responsible for much of the commercial dance music and the Clubland albums. More on that next week.