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‘It’s a northern sound, it gives you hope that it can happen to you’: how bassline bounced back

Once maligned as a scene marred by violence, bassline is booming once again thanks to pioneers such as Big Ang, Jamie Duggan and a T2 track that changed everything

It’s booming again, so much so that it’s getting its own celebratory event this week as part of 2025’s Bradford City of Culture: Bassline Symphony, in which pioneers of the genre Jamie Duggan, DJ Q and TS7 are collaborating with Katie Chatburn and the Orchestra of Opera North, held in one of the UK’s oldest concert halls. While unglamorous, in the 2000s it became so identified with a buzzy new sound – one fusing overlooked and pitch-shifted B-sides, track reworks, and original productions from the likes of Big Ang, Jon Buccieri and DJ Booda – that a genre was even named after the club before “bassline” properly took hold. Given that DJs and producers have spent years trying to undo an unfair reputation placed on the music they love so much, you can understand a bit of retroactive PR work on Niche – with everyone I speak to saying it was safe, welcoming and inclusive – but it was unquestionably littered with instances of violence, and even the murder of the club owner’s brother, Mick Baxendale, back in 1998.

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