At the start of 1996 Oasis had become just about the biggest band out there. In the summer I went to what I believe was my last village hall disco for teenagers before deciding I was too old for them. At that disco people were chanting for Oasis after every song. I didn't get it, they were too slow and boring for a disco in my opinion. Had you told me at that disco that Noel Gallagher would feature on one of the best number ones of the year I wouldn't of believed you.
That's exactly what did happen when he provided vocals for "Setting Sun" by the Chemical Brothers. It couldn't sound any more different than Oasis. That said it did have it's similarities in that both this record and many Oasis records were heavily inspired by The Beatles. In the case of this record it came from "Tomorrow Never Knows".
I felt I had bragging rights in a way because I'd been singing the praises of the Chemical Brothers for a year or so at this point and now they'd hit the big time with a chart topper. I was a fan before they reached these heights.
However I couldn't claim the same thing for the commercial dance record that had the biggest impact on me in Oct 96. On an episode of Top of the Pops I was introduced to "Insomnia" by Faithless. I'd never heard anything quite like it and bought the single the following week. However it had previously reached number 27 in the Top 40 the previous year and this was a rerelease.
Now for some future bragging rights. Scooter were well known within the rave scene for being German cheesers. The had 4 Top 40 hits that made the lower reaches in the mid-90s and the final one of these was "I'm Raving", their take on the Shut Up & Dance record. They wouldn't return until 2002 with "The Logical Song" where the mainstream public assumed them to be a new act but I'd refer to "I'm Raving" as and example of them being around for several years.
One of the big rave anthems of the early 90s was "Don't Go" by Awesome 3. It never made the Top 40 though until 1996 when a remixed version featuring Julie McDermott on vocals made the charts. It didn't end there though because another version by Third Dimension which also featured Julie McDermott on vocals charted. My advice though is stick to the original.
I would occasionally listen to Trevor Nelson on a Sunday afternoon on Radio 1, a show that had started earlier on in the year. It made me start to appreciate R&B and the music he played was more of an urban variety.
One such record was "No Diggity" by Blackstreet. My previous reservation about R&B was that it seemed a bit sappy, but this was anything but. It was hip hop with singing as opposed to rapping, though it did have rapping on it courtesy of the opening rap by Dr Dre and a later rap by Queen Pen. One might assuming the presence of Dr Dre meant it was produced by him but it wasn't. It was produced by Blackstreet member Teddy Riley who'd produced for Michael Jackson amongst others.
In the last weekend of October when we had the Helter Skelter Odyssey event at The Sanctuary in Milton Keynes. This was the last event where they release a drum & bass 4 pack, hardcore 6 pack and and 8 pack that was a mixture of hardcore & drum & bass. Following this it was either a hardcore 12 pack or drum & bass 8 pack. The music had now split to the point they could no longer be mixed.
We were however seeing early signs of a split in hardcore. Although the Billy Bunter set was still a happy hardcore set it had a more mature sound than the other sets and the signs were there on what would evolve into trancecore.
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