Dubstep

A genre of electronic dance music that emerged in South London in the early 2000s, growing out of UK garage, 2-step, drum and bass and Jamaican dub. It typically runs at around 140 BPM but feels like half-time, because the snare lands on the third beat of each bar. It is built on heavy sub-bass, sparse drums and wobbling, filtered “wob” bass lines. Early pioneers such as Skream, Benga, Digital Mystikz and Burial developed the sound around the club night FWD>> and the Big Apple record shop in Croydon, with key support from pirate radio and BBC Radio 1’s Mary Anne Hobbs. Around 2010 a louder, more aggressive American offshoot, often called brostep and led by Skrillex, brought dubstep into mainstream pop and festival culture.