Garage, from New York to the UK
The Paradise Garage, Larry Levan and New York garage, and how the name traveled to London to become UK garage and 2-step.
The Paradise Garage
The Paradise Garage was a nightclub in a former parking garage in New York's SoHo area. It operated from 1977 to 1987, and its resident DJ, Larry Levan, became one of the most influential DJs in history.
The Garage was known for:
- An exceptional sound system, tuned with great care, which influenced club sound design for decades.
- Eclectic programming. Levan played disco, soul, funk, early electronic music, rock and dub-influenced mixes, connecting them through mood rather than genre.
- A devoted crowd, many from New York's Black and Latino LGBTQ communities, who treated the dancefloor as a community.
- Long, dramatic sets that rose and fell over many hours.
Levan's approach, focused on emotion and the room, remains a model for reading a crowd.
Garage as a sound
The records played at the Garage, and new ones made in its spirit, became known as garage or garage house. Compared with Chicago house, New York garage often features:
- Soulful, gospel-influenced vocals.
- Live-sounding piano and organ chords.
- Warm basslines and a swung, human groove.
- Tempos around 115 to 125 BPM.
The overlap with Chicago house is large, and in many places the terms were used loosely.
The name crosses the Atlantic
In the 1990s, US garage and house records were popular in London clubs. DJs began speeding them up and emphasizing heavier bass, borrowing energy from the city's jungle scene. This produced:
- Speed garage in the mid 1990s, with chunky basslines and a four-to-the-floor kick around 130 BPM.
- 2-step garage in the late 1990s, with a skippy, syncopated beat that drops some kick drums, chopped and pitched vocals, and heavy sub bass, typically around 130 to 135 BPM.
Together these styles became known as UK garage. Pirate radio stations and club nights helped it grow, and by the turn of the millennium UK garage tracks were reaching the national charts.
Garage's family tree
| Style | Approx years | Notable traits |
|---|---|---|
| New York garage | Late 1970s to 1990s | Soulful vocals, organ and piano, swing |
| Speed garage | Mid 1990s | Faster, heavy basslines |
| 2-step | Late 1990s to early 2000s | Syncopated drums, chopped vocals |
| Grime | Early 2000s onward | Darker, sparser, MC-led, around 140 BPM |
| Dubstep | Early 2000s onward | Half-time, sub bass, around 140 BPM |
| UK funky and bassline | 2000s | Regional and percussive offshoots |
Mixing garage
UK garage's skippy rhythms make beatmatching by ear harder at first, because the kick does not always land on every beat. Focus on the snare or clap and the hi-hats. Garage tracks often have MC-friendly intros, so DJs and MCs can work together. See beatmatching by ear.
The word "garage" in UK garage comes from the New York club, not from garage rock. Two very different genres share the word.
For more on tempos, see the BPM chart.
