In a public square in Dalston, east London, out the back of the kind of bog-standard white van more used to transporting fitted kitchens or cleaning supplies, a crowd of ravers are in a jubilant mood, all sweat-sheen and wide smiles. Inside the van DJs spin tunes characteristic of this itinerant party, dubbed HomeBass: garage, jungle, drum’n’bass. It begins to rain but they remain in place, arms upraised, waiting for the first drop from rising jungle star Nia Archives.
What began with the van pulling up to forest raves during Covid – with all the legal and ethical quandaries that entailed – is now a UK dance music phenomenon. Artists of the calibre of Fatboy Slim, the Ragga Twins and Eats Everything have played out of the HomeBass van. There have been festival takeovers, thousands-strong pop-up raves and subsequent police shutdowns; Sony, MTV and Universal have enlisted HomeBass to add spice to album releases, a record label is in the works and US promoters have been in touch. This weekend they head to a secret Manchester location.
In March 2022, hundreds turned up near Shoreditch station in London just 10 minutes after the location was announced for a guerilla party launched by driving the van across Tower Bridge, later named as a viral moment of the year by BBC Radio 1. “That was when we first felt there’s something amazing here,” says George Fleming, HomeBass’s creative director. “The energy is unmatched. Normally you go to raves and everyone’s got their phones up. This: none of that. People jumping all over each other, arms around strangers, gunfingers everywhere.”
“It felt like we were in the 90s,” adds Jackson Long, who co-founded HomeBass in 2020 alongside his father Si. “It was ridiculous. Even [veteran drum’n’bass DJ] Bryan Gee was like ‘woah, you guys are bringing it back to the old days. This is how it really happened.’”
The plans of the father and son duo initially didn’t stretch much further than putting on parties for fellow Warwickshire locals, giving young people a chance to let loose amid stifling Covid-19 lockdowns. “We set up in the first lockdown,” explains Jackson, 21. “The main focus was mental health. Everyone was depressed and no one had anything to do.” Si continues: “Kids were absolutely suffering. I’m not going to go into detail but people were dying … really, really bad stuff.”
Si turned the garage into a little “party room” for Jackson and his mates. “Even though we might get fined £10,000, I still went for it,” he says. “I just thought these kids deserve more than this.” They acknowledge the moral stickiness of putting on parties during a pandemic, but argue they had to prioritise youth mental health. Next, Jackson asked his dad if he could “nick his work van”.
Both father and son have dance music form: Si started putting on events in the backrooms of pubs when he was 17 and ran Birmingham’s fondly remembered house night Wobble. He continues to produce acid house under the moniker Silong, and Jackson, who says his dad is his greatest musical inspiration, produces and DJs drum’n’bass and jungle as Jhunna.
It took three weeks to rig up the van: ripping out the interior and installing decks, a soundsystem, neon lighting, and HomeBass branding that imitates the logo of the DIY superstore. Some 300 revellers turned up to the first forest rave – at 5am came the dog walkers and the van was duly packed up, rubbish cleared. Things carried on in the same way for a while. “It was spur of the moment stuff,” says Si. “We’d go, ‘shall we just pop out in the van and see what happens?’
Their spontaneity aims to take raving back to a time when – major label tie-ins notwithstanding – it was both gritty and clandestine. “It gives music lovers an insight into what the [dance music] industry was built on,” says Fleming. “We want to create a community where anyone can come to the rave,” adds Jackson. “The whole vibe is freedom and acceptance.”
“There’s always someone a bit odd at our events,” chuckles Si. “Could be a 70-year-old guy just walking to the shop and then he’ll jump in and get involved. We’ve had dogs at our raves. Kids.” They remember an eight-year-old in a chicken outfit; a baker busting moves with apron and chef’s hat still on.
A big step up was the Freedom to Dance protest in June 2021 against Covid lockdowns, which its organiser Fleming saw as draconian and harmful to UK nightlife. He invited the van along and 50,000 people, by some estimates, turned up. “The vibe was insane,” Jackson recalls. “Everyone was itching for a rave. One of the craziest days of my life.”
Fleming joined the HomeBass team, Instagram followers soared and videos racked up millions of views. Jackson dropped one of his own tunes at the protest and a few days later, record label DnB Allstars asked to release it. A string of outdoor parties and brand-sponsored pop-ups followed (Nike funded the Dalston party with Nia Archives).
Do they feel grubby working with brands that leverage their underground vibe to sell stuff, and could it dilute their own? Fleming is pragmatic. “If we’re making it accessible for brands to get behind culture, that’s only a good thing,” he says. “Our culture needs investment. Venues and artists are on their knees … It costs money to put on events and we want to keep them free – how else are we going to pay for them? If it means having a Monster [energy drink] logo on the side of our van, so be it.”
The UK’s music scene was on an unsteady footing even before Covid, and inflation and energy price hikes have only made it worse. Further exacerbated by property developers buying up or pushing out club spaces, the UK has lost about a third of its nightclubs since the start of the pandemic; by some counts, a venue shutters every other day. Hemmed in by a 10% VAT rate and £499m yearly sector expenditure against £500m in revenue – a measly 0.2% profit margin, according to the charity Music Venue Trust – many venues operate in the red, making HomeBass’s itinerant van look rather appealing.
“Governments and local authorities are proactively ripping the heart out of our country,” fumes Fleming. “Everything that makes life worth living seems to be getting trampled on and disregarded … Human connection is what’s on the line. Theatres, clubs, music, that’s an integral part of our country’s cultural identity.”
In October 2022 Ministry of Sound asked HomeBass to do a pop-up for Eats Everything and Fatboy Slim’s track Bristol to Brighton. Si had already messaged Fatboy Slim on Instagram asking if he fancied doing a HomeBass set. His reply: “I’ve been watching you guys. Deffo.”
But on the day, the event spun out of control. Police shut down the first location before the van had even arrived. A second was found and thousands rocked up, with 2,000 more lingering outside after capacity was reached. People started scaling the walls. “We found ourselves in a sort of Titanic situation, where we needed a bigger boat,” says Fleming, mixing his film metaphors. They decided to shut it down.
“I was depressed beyond belief,” admits Fleming. “We realised we’d gone past the point of just giving things a bit of a whirl … If you’re going to do events of that scale, for a brand or record label, you’ve got to do it by the book. It’s a lot more professional now.” At least five stewards, two security guards, and a first aider are present at every event. There are risk assessments, unlicensed events are limited to three to four hours, and usually finish at 10pm to minimise nuisance.
“These days, it’s such a hard industry to get into, everyone’s doing the same thing – if you want to stand out and make a name for yourself you have to take risks,” says Fleming. “And it doesn’t always work out, like it didn’t with Fatboy Slim. But if you take the risk and try to be unique and keep going, you do break through the noise and people gravitate towards it.”
Despite its growth, commercial ambitions and potential for chaos, the HomeBass pair are determined to create a home for underground music, a community for all ravers, and a space to elevate up-and-coming artists. “In the very early days, we’d be in a lay-by or something with five people dancing,” recalls Jackson. “There would be abuse from people on TikTok saying there’s no one there, this van’s a joke … fast forward two years and it’s one of the fastest growing movements in dance music. I never thought a little idea would turn into such a massive part of my life.”
• Homebass’s next event is on 4 June, secret location, Manchester
