Three years ago to the very day: Knife Party – LRAD landed on our flagship channel.
Some throwback uploads feel like yesterday but when you look at how the mainstream electronic music sound has mutated and developed and dated so quickly, this one feels like it dropped longer than three years ago….
Back in May 2013 Martin Garrix had yet to release Animals, few of us knew (or cared) who Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike were and EDM wasn’t even a thing. Back then it was good old fashioned big room.
Released on their Haunted House EP, LRAD is one of the most divisive songs Knife Party have created to date (they’ve even publicly hated on it themselves) And while its impact in a live environment is unquestionable, it was scarily close to seemingly endless slew of identikit minimal drops from the likes of Chuckie, Krewella, Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike then, a little later, Garrix, David Guetta with his dangerously similar Shot You Down a year later.
At one point it genuinely felt like hundreds were copying the riff which Daleri famously satired with their epic mashleg (b decided to omit LRAD for reasons of a political and respectful nature because Knife Party were one of the earlier acts on the minimal drop bandwagon and, well, its production level)
At one point Deadmau5 joined the Twitter rabble with his trollish pointy finger (to which Rob replied with a micropenis gag a year or so before they released a song with the same title) and even Zedd, the little scamp, got in on the action….
Hi @knifepartyinc I made an EDM Version of LRAD so u can play the mainstage at festivals https://t.co/hm8URzIaMO @rob_swire @Garethmcgrillen
— Zedd (@Zedd) November 19, 2013
For a track that Rob Swire has described as a DJ tool, it’s actually one of that particular era’s biggest and most influential hits. It could easily be recognised as the bigroom/EDM watershed moment, if there ever was one.
@jkream1 the difference: LRAD was released last year, and was mainly a DJ tool / experiment – i.e. not intended for commercial radio.
— Rob Swire (@rob_swire) February 25, 2014
Three years later and while the shameless copies are a dim and distant memory, LRAD continues to have a life of its own. The Prototypes’ bootleg remains a heavy duty weapon for those D&B DJs lucky to have it (especially in a double drop scenario) and Knife Party themselves dropped a new VIP during their Ultra set earlier this year. Regardless of your opinion on LRAD, its influence and impact over the last three years are impossible to ignore.
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