Pressure Drop — The 90s English Duo Who Made It Big In Germany
Before trip hop took off, Pressure Drop found fame in Germany thanks to Marlboro Music, as they promoted the sound of the London Underground.
Dave Henley and Justin Langlands met when mutual friend DJ Paul Guntrip introduced them in 1986 and asked if they’d join him DJing at Wag Club, London.
The trio played their Heavy Duty nights each Wednesday for several years, and hosted sets from guests including the Stereo MC’s, Spoonie Gee, Jungle Brothers, and London Posse.
Going back a bit, Justin Langlands had played drums in a punk group called Stimulin with John Schofield and Tony McDermott, before John and Justin formed a new group A-Team in 1982 with Chrysta Jones, Tom Dixon, and Dave Killen. In September 1982 A-Team recorded Trouble at Mad Professor’s Ariwa studio, while Tony McDermott had started his label !Drum! Records.
Trouble, A-Team’s one and only song, was released as a 12" by !Drum! in 1983 with a dub b-side, and was later reissued in 2018 by Seance Centre with a new club mix.
Following A-Team, Justin pursued a career in graphic design while DJing and working as Art Editor for NME. He can be seen posing as a policeman for the 19 November 1988 Acid Crackdown cover.
When Justin and Dave met, Justin was working for the NME while Dave was cutting hair at Vision hairdressers in London’s Kensington Market alongside Paul Daley, later of Leftfield.
Starting in 1990 Pressure Drop released their first single Feeling Good. Produced by Justin Langlands, Mike Puxley and Gareth Tasker, it was released on Big World Records in March 1990 before Mike and Gareth left. Justin later explained, “[Feeling Good] was a real breakbeat garage tune. [Mike and Gareth] really wanted to pursue that avenue, but we wanted to branch out.”
Dave Henley joined, making Pressure Drop a duo, and they began working on some new songs, with Big World offering them an album deal.
September 1990 saw the release of their first collaboration Back 2 Back, and by October it was already making a mark, with The Guardian listing it as one of their top club tracks and writing on 6 October that it was “Slow but monstrous on the dancefloor, sporting a racial unity rap and a South American wind instrument that does an ingenious impression of a string section.”
Back 2 Back featured passages read from Soul On Ice, a book by Eldridge Cleaver, Minister of Information for the Black Panthers. The song reached #80 in the UK’s Singles Chart, and spent two weeks in the Top 100, but not everyone was a fan, as Justin explained to the Evening Standard in 1991:
“Our last single Back To Back talked about British racial problems very directly but the reaction it got was one that surprised us. We had Kiss FM DJs saying it made them feel ashamed to be white which wasn’t what it was about at all. Mainstream radio wouldn’t touch it because it was too controversial while other people disliked it because it wasn’t a house track”
Controversies aside, the duo released another 12" Transfusion in October 1990, this time under their Blood Brothers alias. It was later reimagined as Pressure Drop’s You’re Mine.
Between 1990–91 Pressure Drop were recording their debut album in a house owned by Big World Records in Ladbroke Grove, London. The album was licensed to IDE in Germany, to be released through their labels Marlboro Music and Boombastic Records.
Marlboro Music had been set up by Philip Morris Germany in 1986 to capitalise on the popularity of the Marlboro Cigarette’s iconography and brand. After initial releases focused on rock, by 1990 they were moving towards a more club friendly sound inspired by the London scene, and Pressure Drop were an important part of that shift.
Released in February 1992, Pressure Drop’s debut album Upset was initially only available in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland due to their UK label closing as the album was completed. Meaning Upset was only available in the UK as an import.
In Germany the album charted well and made record of the month in February’s Musik Express. The German magazine had also been fans of You’re Mine, which was released as a single and reviewed in their January issue.
To promote the album, Pressure Drop visited Germany for a DJ tour and were asked by Berlin radio station DT64 if they’d like to host a weekly radio show. Episode one of Blood Brothers Broadcasting Corporation (BBBC) went to air 26 August 1992, and could later be heard abroad on the Astra/Sky satellite network.
Marlboro Music also released their first London Underground compilation album near the end of 1992, compiled by Justin and Dave and featuring Pressure Drop’s Everything’ll Be Alright Tomorrow. The compilation was available on vinyl, CD, and cassette, and was accompanied by a documentary video billed as a “video guide to the London underground club, music, arts, and rave scene.” The documentary had also been shown during Pressure Drop’s 1992 London Underground tour of Germany.
Meanwhile, Upset finally received a UK release on Logic in August 1993 with some different mixes, but was reportedly limited to 2,000 copies.
Pressure Drop released their second album Front Row in October 1993, but again it only came out in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland and it’s been said James Lavelle from Mo’ Wax was personally responsible for importing the album to the UK. At the time he was working at Honest Jon’s record store in Ladbroke Grove, and had been meeting with the Marlboro Music team when they’d come to visit Pressure Drop in London.
1993 also saw the second volume of London Underground, with a third and final volume released in 1994. They were released by Marlboro Music, and were again compiled by Justin and Dave, featuring contributions from them under their Blood Brothers alias.
Front Row was later released in Japan on Meldac in June 1994, alongside Upset, but otherwise the album remained unavailable until it was released digitally in March 2021.
In May 1995 Pressure Drop released Tearing The Silence, a new EP on Hard Hands, the record label owned by Leftfield. This came about thanks to their friendship with members of Leftfield, who had previously remixed Pressure Drops’ You’re Mine in 1992.
Talking to Muzik magazine in 1995, Dave spoke about the experience of being English musicians with two albums mostly unavailable in England, telling them, “it’s been incredibly frustrating…Especially when people think we’re a German act.”
Meanwhile, their BBBC radio program had continued for five years until Paul Guntrip died in 1996 and Justin and Dave lost interest in hosting a weekly radio show, turning their focus to the next Pressure Drop album instead. The final episode, number 164, aired 17 December 1996.
By the end of 1996, Pressure Drop had secured a deal with Sony who put out their next few releases on their sub-label Higher Ground, including their third album Elusive released in October 1997.
Elusive had three singles, starting with My Friend in May 1997, and followed by Got To Be For Real in October, with remixes by Attica Blues and Grooverider, and Silently Bad Minded in March 1998 featuring remixes by Stereo MC’s and Roni Size. Both My Friend and Silently Bad Minded entered the UK Charts, reaching #91 and #53 respectively.
Elusive was released in Germany by Marlboro Music in 1998, and in Japan on Epic, also in 1998. This was their final release on Marlboro Music as the label shut down in the late 90s/early 2000s, and notably gave back the masters to all of their artists, giving them full control over how their music was released in the future.
Now that their music was more widely available, Pressure Drop began to receive more press outside of Germany too. In North America The New York Times included Pressure Drop in a discussion of trip hop, and they received further shout outs from Chicago Reader and SF Weekly as they toured the US in 1998.
Back in Europe, Elusive earned praise from The Irish Times, Spiegel in Germany, Les Inrockuptibles in France, and Muzik in England, among others.
Pressure Drop’s final album Tread was released on 19 March 2001 by Columbia, and had one single Warrior Sound which reached #72 in the UK Charts. Fans could even remix the single on the bands website using Flash.
Dave explained the album’s title to Austria’s FM4, telling them “The whole reason the album is called "Tread" is cause it's about putting your foot down and leaving an imprint and at the same time moving forward.”
As mentioned earlier, when Marlboro Music closed they returned all of the masters to their artists, and in 2003 Pressure Drop celebrated owning their back catalogue again by releasing Food Of Love, a compilation of their favourite tracks from their first two albums, alongside some remixes.
The compilation was released on their own One Eye Records, which also released two 12" singles from Cane Matto, Justin and Dave with Luca Roccatagliati.
After years of inactivity, in 2020 Pressure Drop returned to mark the 30th anniversary of Back 2 Back and put their archive online. This has seen their first two albums released on Bandcamp, their two Sony/Columbia albums released on Spotify and other services, and the massive BBBC Radio archive made available online.
What’s next for Pressure Drop? Keep an eye on their Instagram and Facebook. Here’s hoping there’s more to come.
