DIY videos are the launchpad for your new favourite underground house tracks

Men on Wall Street scream at each other on the trading floor. Nuclear families ride a 1950s rollercoaster. A sequence of grainy footage and 90s PC graphics flash onscreen. Everything is underpinned by the crunchy 4/4 thud of the latest underground house music. No, it isn’t some hellish/magnificent DMT trip. It's the world of DIY dance music videos.

Uploaded to YouTube by anonymous users who have a penchant for Adventure Time characters, tracks like Palms Trax’s ‘Equation’, Mall Grab’s ‘I’ve Always Liked Grime’ and Route 8’s ‘I Can’t’ have all soundtracked archive visuals to brilliant effect. All that’s needed to get into this game is some cheap video editing software and an extensive Internet search.

“I just figured if tracks are going to be put up online, on YouTube or anywhere, then they should be presented well.”

Otherwise known as Cheal, OOUKFunkyOO has established himself as one of the scene’s leading video creators. With a background studying film at university, he’s made over 1800 videos on his YouTube account, amassing 40,000 followers in the six years he’s been running the channel. Some might see it as easy clicks for what is essentially some weird footage whacked over a pumping track. But, while the editing process is fairly straight forward, Cheal’s videos can take anywhere from a couple of hours to three months to create depending on how quickly he gets an idea of which source footage to use. And anyone accusing these content creators of piggybacking on the hard graft of producers should know the music is always the priority.

“I have thousands of video things that could work amazingly for something in the future. But if the right track doesn’t come along then it’s not going to happen, you know?” Cheal says. “If the artist puts so much time into making the tracks then if people want to make amateur videos they should try to reflect how the artist would like that to be presented.”