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Yorkshire Bleeps and Bass or Yorkshire Techno is a rather clumsy term for an early 1990s musical genre that up until recently didn't really have a name. At the time just called plain old techno, it was a short-lived and very localised musical movement centred on the northern English cities of Bradford & Leeds in West Yorkshire and Sheffield in South Yorkshire in 1989-1991.
The sound was characterised by harsh, funky minimalism, speaker-breaking sub-bass and electronic bleeps or other futuristic sounds. Unlike the present-day English techno scene, this early Yorkshire movement was inner-city, multi-racial and aggressive, and went on to influence groundbreaking London breakbeat acts such as Shut Up and Dance and The Scientist and later jungle, which upon listening today it shares many similarities.
The first record of the genre was probably "The Theme" by Bradford's Unique 3 in 1989, although Leeds outfit LFO's "LFO" was being played on white label at the Warehouse in Leeds for several months before being released on Sheffield's Warp Records in 1990. Leeds's Nightmares on Wax next realeased "Dextrous" on Warp Records in 1990. The label went on to release the club anthem "Testone" by Sweet Exorcist (DJ Parrot, and Richard Kirk of Sheffield avant-garde experimentalists Cabaret Voltaire), a track that went on to define the Yorkshire sound, and also the rather silly "Tricky Disco" by Tricky Disco. These were followed by a string of releases on the short-lived Leeds label Bassic Records, including the awesome "Ital's Anthem" by Ital Rockers, a Chapeltown dub reggae band diversifying into techno, and Juno's "Soul Thunder", an understated track now recognised as a techno classic.
Techno Sub-Genres:
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