Jungle/Drum 'n' Bass

Watch your head, what with all these beats ringing and ravaging the neon-tinged air like gunshots, testing the stamina of every ear canal in the club. Which is an appropriate analogy, really, given that jungle standards like "Snapshot (Instrumental)," "The Calling (VIP)," and "Up All Night" are as relentless and unforgiving in their delivery of rim shot polyrhythms and bellowing bass lines as is a semi-automatic post-trigger pull.

Now that your heart's racing — trying to keep up with the pretzel-y twists and turns of tempo-upping tracks like "Tarantula," "Age of Empires," and that aptly titled stinger "The Hornet" — your resident DJs for the evening have a few slower selections cued for mass consumption. "Dreadlock" buzzes and bumps hard enough to break a speaker cone in half but maintains a delightful dub reggae bounce; "Trefusis Point" occasionally follows a trail of ambient techno; and "Move On" has its moments of cucumber-cool R&B.

Judging by the lulling, sparkling-pond tones of "Still Grey" and "Before Today," it sounds like the night just hit another valley — another series of sides meant to soothe rather than slam and slice. Which means one final peak can't be far away, building on the abrupt cuts of "Broken Sword," the steam-pressed shuffle of "16 Stories," and the tumultuous toasting of "Who Wan Seek War (Rewind Mix)."

At the heart of this entire playlist's quickened pulse is an "Amen break" — a skittering, scampering drum loop lifted from the vintage kit of Gregory Cylvester Coleman for block-rocking rap and the hectic haze of jungle/drum 'n' bass. Listen past those strangely familiar four bars, however, and each song reveals a dystopia as dynamic and daring as the future-shocked film sets of Spielberg and Lucas. Only one that's more human and C.G.I.-free, a product of drum machines and producers determined to inject their dub plates with intensity and a mixed record bag of hardcore techno, effervescent film scores, R&B, and dub reggae.