By Amanda Nowinski

A LOVE OF futurism fueled the mid-'80s beginnings of dance music culture. In Detroit, Juan Atkins readied himself for techno by obsessing over robotic Kraftwerk and outer-planetary P-Funk, video games, and the writings of futurist Alvin Toffler. Later, in Chicago, acts like Phuture were transforming disco into spaceship-bound acid house with the warped thump of the Roland 303. But Atkins's "No UFOs" landed 17 years ago, prompting the question, Is futurism in the dance scene now old-fashioned? It sure sounds like it. Popular house is about as tomorrow as yesterday's easy listening, and big-name drum 'n' bass producers keep pumping out tracks whose ruggedness rivals that of '80s big-hair metal. Apparently, the dance music industry at large has forgotten that futurism is by definition a constantly evolving ethos – not the hottest new computer program.

So while the house overground has become too soft and drum 'n' bass has settled for too hard, a number of devotees from both camps have become thoroughly disillusioned. "Drum 'n' bass lost the futuristic angle it was born out of," said Mikebee, cofounder of the True Intent Recordings atmospheric drum 'n' bass label and DJ crew, which shares members with Bottom Heavy, a genre-busting club night, and Future Breaks FM, an open-format breaks radio show on KUSF-FM that started in '98. "Drum 'n' bass [producers] were always looking to technology, trying to figure out what was possible next," Mikebee continued. "And now they make the same rollers over and over. There's no real desire to push it forward and do anything new with it."

When I met up with the True Intent Recordings crew several years ago to discuss the launch of their label, their optimism and faith in the future of drum 'n' bass was unshakable. But as we sat chatting on the stoop of their Lower Haight headquarters this past weekend, I discovered that the folks, who were wide-eyed a few years back, have dramatically wizened. Their exhaustion with grinding one style to death echoes the sentiments of a growing number of producers and DJs across genres today, and the only remedy, it seems, lies in mixing it up. For the True Intent posse – Mikebee, DJ Push, Arc Angel Gabe Real, Ms. E, DJ Sea, and Jason Greer – another U.K. genre inspired a change in direction two years ago: 2-step, a slower genre that encompasses a wider range of influences, like house, R&B, techno, hip-hop, reggae-dance hall, and of course, drum 'n' bass. "It took us to a whole different spectrum with a tempo that's free enough to allow nu skool breaks, electro, house, broken beat, and other forms of dance music," Gabe Real explained. "Not having yourself tied to a genre is liberating," Push concurred.

Given their nonlinear focus, it may seem inconsistent that the group are still behind a drum 'n' bass label. "We still have a vision for drum 'n' bass," Gabe Real said. "We're giving voice to a different vision of drum 'n' bass to begin with, and it's a relatively timeless style. It's not fad." Atmospheric drum 'n' bass – a more composition- and melody-driven aesthetic that producers like LTJ Bukem of Good Looking developed in the early '90s as a response to the increasingly ruffneck tone of U.K. break beat culture – has never remained within the narrower boundaries of straight-ahead drum 'n' bass. Sometimes referred to as "jazzy" or "intelligent" drum 'n' bass, the style culls influences from jazz fusion, ambient, techno, and to a lesser degree, house, all of which ultimately make the form a more malleable, accessible style of breaks. Although the genre appeals to a range of listeners beyond the drum 'n' bass hardcore, the number of labels supporting the sound is surprisingly limited, and club play is minimal.

As the stateside answer to a community of atmospheric labels like Canada's Gammaray, the Netherlands' Fokuz/Expressions, and the U.K.'s Covert Operations, Inperspective, and industry-dominating Good Looking, True Intent have released a string of superbly dreamy, soul-infused tracks from out-of-town and local producers like Kaos and Method One (as Atlantiq), Howard Hughes, and the U.K.-based Aural Imbalance and Forensics and plan to release Chris J in the next month. However, as is the case with most indie labels, money is the eternal bitch – $3,000 dollars of theirs is still sitting in a U.K. distribution office, a predicament that's put other True Intent releases on hold. Suffice it to say that this situation has added to the group's industry-demystification process. "We've learned lessons, but we're in it for the long haul," Mikebee said. "We're just a little less optimistic. Money's not flowing like water anymore." True Intent are planning to launch a sublabel this spring to reflect the open-ended direction of their DJing.

Bottom Heavy, which takes place Saturdays at the Top, is a stylistic preview of the sounds they'll pursue under their new label. Launched in December 2000, the night presents a mix of broken beat, 2-step, nu jazz, house, and breaks of all kinds. Despite the small size of the venue, the team have managed to host a solid number of U.K. guests, like broken beat artist Seiji, 2-step/left-field drum 'n' bass producer Landslide, and top atmospheric producer Blame. Still, although diversification is an enlightened way to present music, it's not necessarily a financial shoo-in – especially on weekend nights, which are dominated by aggressive single-genre promotion.

"It took eight months to get it around people's heads that they were going to hear different things in just one night," Mikebee said. "And it wasn't different like you're going to hear house and its influences, funk and soul, which are all part of the same continuum, anyway. But if you're going to hear drum 'n' bass, house, and 2-step, the people who listen to those genres aren't one unified group. So most of the time you are going to get people who want one thing all night. They'll say, 'What the fuck; I paid for this?' No one wants to be surprised."

In the wake of the dot-com crash, deviation from tunnel vision is what club owners fear most. It's hard enough to fill clubs today as it is, so big club owners are less likely to take creative risks, preferring instead to hire promotion teams that can guarantee a heavy-drinking body count – no matter the quality of the event. Why support a promoter with good taste and an educated palette when you can hire an uninformed socialite to pack a place with coke-sniffing frat boys in Dockers? Clearly, those with the freshest ideas in this town now make the least amount of money.

But the economic problems facing the more innovative sides of the dance music community haven't exactly stifled progress. In fact, one might argue that they've placed that old dance music cliché, it's all about the music, back into focus again. Like the True Intent posse, other free-thinking DJs and producers have reevaluated stagnant ways of presenting music and are opening up to more inclusive formats – an intelligent trend that will undoubtedly define the future of a more mature dance music culture.

"It's happening all over in the drum 'n' bass scene," Gabe Real said. "Compression is going to an open format. Star Eyes [of the Bass Kru] has started a new open-format party, and the front room at Eklektic, Hektic, goes across the board with different styles of breaks." DJ Push added, "All this microcosmic stuff is bullshit. How silly is it that a house guy, a drum 'n' bass guy, and a techno guy can't get along? At the end of the day, it's still machine-made music. And we're all more than cousins, aren't we?"