South London producer Benton has hardcore and jungle running right through him like a place name on a stick of rock. Growing up near Croydon, his first introduction to rave culture came from older siblings passing tape packs on to him, picked up from the raves he wasn’t quite old enough to go to yet. By his teens in the early 2000’s, he’d graduated to digging for records at the likes of Big Apple and Swag Records in Croydon, where he’d rifle through 12” records from jungle and hardcore’s golden era in the mid-90s. “I remember the guys behind the counter dusting them off and being like, ‘why do you want all this stuff!?” he laughs. 
Obsessed with learning to mix on a passed down pair of Numark decks, his late teens coincided with the emergence of dubstep in South London and his debut release Shook That Sax came in 2007, a track that won fans in the nascent dubstep scene but had decidedly out-of-step hardcore influences at its centre. 
Things stepped up a gear in 2013 when, following the release of his debut album Reflections his track The Callin’ became an unexpected hit at that year’s Outlook Festival, leading to Swamp 81 head honcho Loefah offering to sign the track and suggesting Benton start his own Swamp 81 sub-label. 
BBS was born and, over the next few years, gave Benton the opportunity to bring his hardcore and jungle influences to the fore at a time when a whole new generation of DJs and producers were beginning to embrace those sounds. 
His latest release comes on HERAS Records, the record-label arm of Johnny Banger’s Sports Banger brand. Recorded during the pandemic, Primal Pads sees Benton lean into a slightly more expansive and experimental sound, with the producer being inspired to ‘write some music to listen to, rather than rave to,’ during the enforced break from the dancefloor. 
With plenty of shared influences and experience, the team-up with HERAS and Johnny Banger seems a perfect pairing and along with a brand new monthly Friday night show on Rinse, signals a tantalising start to 2023. 
“The show on Rinse just gives me something to focus on and forces me to write and find new music to play,” he explains. “I’m over 15 years into my career but it feels like I’m just at the start of something really exciting.”

Benton February 2023

Hardcore

Jungle

Techno

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Benton - 11/03/2023 - 03:00

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