Hard House
House · 1994 · 140 to 155 BPM · also known as Booty House
Hard house is house music toughened up in English clubs of the mid 1990s, with Trade in London at its epicenter: faster, more percussive and more tense than classic house, without ever reaching the brutality of hardcore. It is built on pumping basslines, endless builds, and the hoover sound borrowed straight from rave. The style first spread through Britain's gay club circuit before feeding into the wider world of hard dance, where it eventually dissolved into a broader continuum of harder, faster genres that absorbed its energy and its tricks.
10 reference tracks
- DJ Trajic: Soul Patrol (1994)
- Jammin Gerald: Pump That Shit (1994)
- DJ Groove: Come Along My Brotha (Radio Club Version) (1994)
- Tony De Vit: Burning Up (1995)
- Tony De Vit: The Dawn (2000)
- Mori DJ: Back Now Y'all (2021)
- Mori DJ: Energize (2021)
- Anne Savage: Why (2022)
- Horsegiirl: My Barn My Rules (2023)
- Klubbheads: Hard House (2023)
At a glance
- Tempo: 140 to 155 BPM
- First appeared: around 1994
- Machines: Roland Alpha Juno, Roland Juno-106, Roland TR-909
- The sound: Hoover Alpha Juno, Basse offbeat pompée, Roland TR-909 durcie, Sirènes et montées filtrées
- Labels: Tidy, Nukleuz, Tripoli Trax, Toolbox, Underground Construction
- Key artists: Tony De Vit, The Tidy Boys, OD404, Ian M
Producing Hard House
Program at 140 to 150 BPM, the fastest corner of house alongside footwork, and keep the feel tense and dead straight with no swing. The signature is offbeat bass, a short note on every offbeat creating a galloping kick bass kick bass pulse locked to the grid. A hardened 909 kick, short and saturated, sits on every beat, with a 909 clap on two and four and loud closed hats in sixteenths opening on the offbeats; long tom rolls with rising pitch drive 32 or 64 bar builds. The bass is a filtered sawtooth pumped hard by sidechain against the kick, ratio around 8 to 1, so it ducks on the tonic, with a sidechained sub layer underneath. On top, an Alpha Juno hoover, rising sirens, filtered noise sweeps and pitched vocal samples deliver the rave signature.
The full production course, in French: tempo, drums, bass, sounds, arrangement, mix, plugins and machines, and a step by step start.
Frequently asked
What is Hard House?
Hard house is house music toughened up in English clubs of the mid 1990s, with Trade in London at its epicenter: faster, more percussive and more tense than classic house, without ever reaching the brutality of hardcore. It is built on pumping basslines, endless builds, and the hoover sound…
What tempo is Hard House played at?
Between 140 and 155 BPM.
Who are the key Hard House artists?
Tony De Vit, The Tidy Boys, OD404, Ian M.
