Towards the end of the 90´s it was quite apparent that trance had finally become boring. With the approaching new millenium, we were begining to see what was more like a chart run-down of all the 20th centurys pop-music genres, all crammed into a year. Generally, the musical landscape looked very boring.
By 1999, tedious tv-trance had reached it´s peak with paul van dyk at gatecrasher. he reportedly received a whacking £100k for 3 hours djing in dec 1999, and really everyone agreed, it (and he) should have stopped there. trance was set to be the last pop/dance genre of the 20th century. The positive/optimism felt on the dancefloors in the mid 90´s had all but disappeared at the dusk of the decade and the dangerous changes in world power politics announced a tougher age (all adding to the general fear lurking in the subconcious).
Meanwhile, on an ever downward spiral, the repetative, over-commercialised, unimaginative, highstreet trance tag has become an embarrassing word. the top-trance dj´s desperate to clear some distance now claim to be making so-called "progressive" music, but sadly there is no progression to be heard, just a new muddy derivative to hide behind. they have become boring old farts playing sad slack tunes which they blandly term "electronic dance music" (i suppose it comes with age?)
Go to a UK club these days and the kids look like they´ve walked out of H&M or M&S, ready for a church service. uninspired and uncreative. It is these younger clubbers, shivvering in their shiny shirts, those who missed out on the revolutionary euphoria of the early techno days and those who have grown up with the evolution of trance. In reality, they are really dancing to the tune of another generation and deep down, they know it - most of them are just going through the motions (as seen on tv), secretly hoping for something to come along and enlighten them and give them a sound and style that they can at last identify with. Rescue was close at hand...
Deep in the european underground there were also a small number of young and frustrated producers and dj´s. some had been dj-ing for years without a hint of recognition as they were playing with a slightly harder sound, experimenting with a mixture of tribal, techno, disco fused with a few of the better elements of trance and oozing with loads of sex. but it really had no name, to describe it and they were grasping at anything that would seperate it from trance (tech-house, tribal-techno, groovy techno, this and that, hmmm and ahhh....)
It is this style of music which has become known worldwide as wet & hard, the sound of the pornoground, the sound born from hot relentless nights in clubs like XS or KitKat with young and fresh artists like kama arts, corvin dalek and black emanuelle.
Wet & hard is the term that describes the kind of music it is, perfectly. It is the pile driving sound that will eventually tip trance from the top.
Wet & Hard really began in 1999 with alex flatner´s remix of corvin dalek´s Pounds & Pénz, this is the track that gave this style form (and me the idea for a name, sitting in a street-café in pardubice in the czech republic with well hungarian, corvin dalek. we were thinking of a term that would define and describe his records and style of music he was playing in a way that distanced it from the 20th century. Some die-hards will probably still call this sound tech-house or groovy techno, obviously fearing change. however, these are terms that both incorporate 20th century terminology - which is very boring and unimaginative).
Certainly, pounds&pénz has all the hard elements of techno and tribal as well as softer elements of Pounds & Pénz, all mixed together. but it is also very different. We decided that the name should be provocative and entertaining and at the same time be open to all kinds of interpretation. so we called it appropriately, Wet & Hard. Almost immediately, Wet & Hard was embraced by the emmensly popular timo maas and pete tong to describe their sound too, and always on the pulse, pete tong was the first radio dj to mention it on his show after debuting pounds&pénz (which also went on to be one of the most played records on his show!) In the meantime, such gizz guzzling wet&hard tracks as riding on a storm by timo maas or groove tubes remix of substance by tarantella or recentlly oliver klein´s rheinkraft have not only been drenching the dancefloors with their full bodied hot and throbbing basslines, but also inspiring others too to take the step out of the circle and try something new. And that´s basically it, with wet&hard, it´s the bassline that has taken over from the kitchy hookline.
Wet&hard gives the younger dj the chance to say and play something new and the opportunity to rise above the rest. (after all, how many trance, techno & house dj´s are there?) Wet&hard also has an immediate global appeal, new dj´s like the maltese joseph armani or mr sam from france, as well as the pretty sunshine from croatia, have all embraced this fresh new sound, as corvin, oliver and timo play it all over the world, to evermore acclaimed success.
Wet&hard is music for a generation that have no problems with internet porn, this is for the generation who swap xxx website addresses at school, this is for a generation who don´t give a fuck if sex sells, it´s more a matter of sex is geil! (if we´re honest, it is what we all really want). pornography is destined to be the art form of the 21st century (hotkunst?). porn is no longer a taboo subject to be sniggered at. finally, the skin of two thousand years of puritan churchianity have been stripped off, to reveal fresh flesh in the form of fucking cool music. We know some will find that sordid too and that is not the only thing that is thought provoking...
Wet & Hard is only the foreplay for things to cum.
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