The first release on Optimo Music founder JD Twitch’s new compilation-focused label Cease & Desist will be a collection of pioneering turn-of-the-90s British “Bleep & Bass” techno tracks curated by author and music journalist Matt Anniss.
Join The Future: UK Bleep & Bass 1988-91 is a partner product to Anniss’s critically acclaimed book on the foundations of British dance music’s ongoing love affair with sub- bass, Join The Future: Bleep Techno and the Birth of British Bass Music. The book, which was published by Velocity Press in December and features a foreword by JD Twitch, documents in vivid detail the previously untold story of the Yorkshire-pioneered style and the impact it had on the development of UK dance music.
The compilation is the first to focus on Bleep & Bass since the sound’s heyday in the late 1980s and early ’90s. It features a mix of historic cuts, period classics, overlooked gems and unreleased material. It was mastered for release by Warp Records co-founder and Forgemasters member Rob Gordon, a producer, remixer and studio engineer who arguably did more than anyone else to define the sub-heavy sound of the style.
Gordon also contributed a previously unheard version of Alfanso’s “Dub Feels Nice”, a near mythical track he produced in 1991 that has never received a proper commercial release. The cut has been a secret weapon for a handful of Sheffield DJs for almost 30 years, most notably Gordon’s fellow Forgemasters member Winston Hazel. Fittingly, the compilation also includes the original unreleased instrumental version of Tuff Little Unit’s Steel City classic “Join The Future”.
Track listing
1. Unique 3 & The Mad Musician – Only The Beginning 2. Demonik – Labyrinthe
3. Original Clique – Come To Papa
4. Nexus 21 – Self-Hypnosis (Mr Whippy Mix)
5. Cyclone – A Place Called Bliss (Dub Mix) **
6. 100 Hz – Low Frequency Overload (Subsonic Mix) **
7. Cabaret Voltaire – Easy Life (Jive Turkey Mix)
8. Alfanso – Dub Feels Nice (Version 4)*
9. Ital Rockers – Dreams
10. Man Machine – Animal (DJ Martin & DJ Homes’ Primordial Jungle Mix) 11. Nightmares On Wax – 21st Kong
12. Tuff Little Unit – Join The Future (Original Instrumental Mix)*

Media Support - Resident Advisor
Tweets/Instagram posts on the book from:

• Mella Dee,Paul Woolford/Special Request, Toddla T, Martyn, Interstellar Funk, Luca Lozano, Tita, Normski, Chris Farrell/Idle Hands, DJ Guy
Excerpts from the book published on Resident Advisor and the Quietus. Further coverage online from Mixmag, FACT, Test Pressing, Attack Mag. Forthcoming interview with me on Trackhunter (includes reference to the compilation) and a special NTS show (Circuits) to be broadcast in early March featuring an interview with me plus tracks from the compilation.