The newest genre to attract attention in the dance scene has been labelled ‘Drumstep’.  As the name implies, the genre’s beats consist of a mix of dubstep and drum and bass, incorporating the tempo and emphasis of dubstep’s basslines with the energising, fast-paced breakbeat of drum and bass.  Die hard house and electro fans are unlikely to appreciate what has been called the evolution of drum and bass, and drumstep doesn’t offer any mainstream appeal; you would most likely hear it in the early hours of the morning radio, offering your ears not much enjoyment at all.  This is not to say drumstep has no potential, as with all relatively new genres it needs someone to step up and guide it in the right direction; it took years before drum and bass achieved mainstream recognition with artists such as Pendulum, Sub Focus and High Contrast, but perhaps part of the appeal is the relative secretiveness of drumstep right now.  At present drumstep appears to be caught between two genres, it doesn’t know whether to lean towards the potential for an entrancing, melodic tune that dubstep offers or the energising kick drum and bass evokes.  Tracks from Heist, Original Sin, and Hazard naturally show the same aggressiveness of their earlier drum and bass tracks; releases such as ‘We Need Killers’ and ‘Step On’ bear remarkable similarities to the already established tunes of the genre ‘Jump Up’ and would be sure to go off in a principally drum and bass club.  But would you want to listen to it all night?  Probably not.  The vicious breakbeats of these tracks urges you to get up and move like you would to your favourite drum and bass anthems, but the bass inevitably leaves you wanting.  Alternatively, south London based DJ ‘Distance’ offers something far less overtly aggressive.  Having spawned from the dubstep scene, Distance seems to better understand how to intertwine the bass of dubstep with the breakbeat of drum and bass so as to provide the listener with a situation where one would want to play it.  His tracks such as ‘Free Me’ allow for easy listening that one could play for an extended period of time without wanting to immediately press the stop button.  However, without a firm hand to steer drumstep towards a definite purpose, the genre is set to remain caught between the already immensely popular tracks associated with drum and bass and dubstep, and until drumstep provides a widely enjoyable track, it will certainly not be at the top of the playlist.