On rare occasions barriers of time, space and musical cultures seem to melt down, condense and solidify into something new and outrageous at the hands of a gifted individual. Take the example of Drew Lustman, whose recordings as FaltyDL have been among the most hyped of the year 2009.

Growing up in New Haven, Connecticut, didn't exactly predestine Lustman to a career of chopping up all dance music genres ever conceived on the British Isles, adding a large dose of sample-based hip-hop and coming up with a unique musical recipe of his own.

Yet this is precisely what he ended up doing, and while his prior experience as a sushi cook and jazz bassist might have helped a bit in the process, the general public had been left largely unprepared for the firework of fresh ideas that was 'Love Is Liability' - his debut album that used UK garage breaks, dubstep bass and dreamy Ceephax synths to conjure up mid-90s rave moods with modern means.

London's importance in the development of modern urban music cannot be overstated. The bass-heavy genres of drum & bass, grime, 2-step, broken beat and dubstep have all evolved out of the unique villages within the UK's capital, each with their own idiosyncratic culture.

Nearing its tenth year in existence, dubstep, like many DJ- and club-centric genres, had its genesis with 12" b-side instrumentals, specifically the melodic, uptempo dubs of speed garage and 2-step.

As dubstep began to untie itself from the loose 4/4 frameworks of speed garage and 2-step around 2000, it shifted towards a darker, deeper, and less accessible sound, with an emphasis on sparse kick drums and teeth-rattling bass.

Early releases from artists like Horsepower Productions, a crew whose atmospheric productions placed a new importance on dub inflections and delays, and El-B and Oris Jay, who focused on dark atmospheres and ominous, wobbling basslines, created a dubby 'breakstep' midpoint between 2-step, breakbeat and drum & bass. These early releases, and the white label 12" culture that surrounded them, established an ecosystem of producers, DJs, MCs and labels around record shops like Blackmarket Records in London, and Big Apple in Croydon. Fans of IDM and forward-thinking electronica began to take notice, and the underground tastemaker press, led by the likes of XLR8R and Pitchfork soon followed suit.