Skream and Benga at The White Room.

Greetings From Miami,

This past Wednesday night I was treated to some of the best dubstep in the world, when local club The White Room hosted a night with pioneers of the genre, Skream & Benga.  I was lucky get to see the show up close and personal.

For anyone unfamiliar with dubstep it’s a genre of electronic music which was developed in London at the beginning of the decade. It can be distinguished from other types of electronic music by it’s use of snare and bass to develop the music’s rhythm  in this way dubstep is not dissimilar to the electronic genre grime. Skream and Benga hail from Croydon South London and represent two of the most important figures in dubstep, they have been performing together and developing the sound for the last ten years.

The White Room is one of five or six venues in Miami that will venture out of the tourist scene and play new edgy music (Along with the Vagabond, PS-14, Churchill’s, The Electric Pickle and maybe one or two others). The venue has two indoor rooms, a large outdoor space and three bars. On this particular Wednesday, the night started with two local DJs, Damaged Goods and Juan Basshead spinning as support. I would like to note that Damaged Goods is quickly becoming one of Miami’s best known DJ’s thanks to his weekly party Misfits Fridays at Louis. Normally he is confined to top 40 bangers so it was great to see him get to experiment a bit for the dubstep crowd.

I should admit that before the night began I knew little about the dubstep scene, so it’s a little tough for me to judge the show, however I do know that by the time Skream and Benga started spinning (about 2 AM) there were probably 500 people in the room. The crowd was full of well dressed hipsters who were having a great time. I actually spoke to a bunch of people who had driven from Tampa for over 4 hours to see the show. The duo spun until about 5 AM at which point most people stumbled home to get a couple hours sleep before work. Ultimately I’m really happy that I got to see the show it expanded my musical horizons a little bit and it was a fun night out, too bad it couldn’t have been on a Friday though because those couple hours of fun certainly didn’t increase my productivity for the rest of the week.

Both Skream and Benga will be touring North America until the end of the month.

Benga
Sep 17 Harpers Ferry Allston, MA
Sep 18 The Mod Club Toronto
Sep 19 NY LPR New York
Sep 20 Parc Jean-Drapeau Montreal
Sep 23 BarFly Loft Minneapolis
Sep 24 Neumos Seattle, WA
Sep 25 103 Harriet St San Francisco CA
Sep 26 Nocturnal Wonderland LA

Skream
Sep 17 The Highdive Champaign, IL
Sep 18 Smart Bar Chicago IL
Sep 20 Parc Jean-Drapeau Montreal
Sep 22 Element Nightclub Victoria
Sep 23 Lotus sound lounge Vancouver
Sep 24 Rotture Portland
Sep 25 Cervantes Masterpiece Ballroom Denver
Sep 26 Nocturnal Wonderland LA
Sep 27 Wrongbar Toronto