Roni Size Attempted World Record for Deepest Underground Rave

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THE DEEPEST RAVE ON EARTH? RONI SIZE TOOK DRUM & BASS 1,375 FEET UNDERGROUND IN HISTORIC WELSH MINE

Forget warehouses, abandoned factories and secret woodland raves. Drum & bass pioneer Roni Size has taken underground music to an entirely new level. 1,375 feet beneath a Welsh mountain.

Dj Roni Size reveals what it was like performing 1,375ft underground for a record breaking gig.

In what could become one of the most extraordinary events in rave history, Mercury Prize-winning DJ and producer Roni Size descended into the depths of the historic Cwmorthin slate mine in Eryri, North Wales, on Thursday 15 October 2026, for an ambitious attempt to stage the world's deepest underground rave.

And this wasn't simply a DJ set in an unusual location. It was an extreme underground adventure, a celebration of rave culture and a fascinating scientific experiment exploring how music interacts with the natural environment.

FROM BRISTOL SOUND SYSTEMS TO THE DEPTHS OF THE EARTH

Roni Size is no stranger to pushing musical boundaries.

Emerging from Bristol's influential sound-system culture in the early 1990s, Size became one of the defining figures in the evolution of jungle and drum & bass.

As a founding member of Reprazent, his groundbreaking album New Forms won the prestigious Mercury Music Prize in 1997, helping bring drum & bass to a wider international audience without abandoning its underground foundations.

Nearly three decades later, Size has returned to the adventurous spirit of those early rave days quite literally going underground and there's something rather poetic about that.

Jungle and drum & bass grew from a culture of musical experimentation, unconventional venues, independent promoters and sound systems pushing the boundaries of what electronic music could be. From illegal warehouse parties and makeshift dancefloors to one of the deepest publicly accessible underground locations in Britain, that spirit of adventure remains very much alive.

GETTING TO THE DANCEFLOOR WAS AN ADVENTURE IN ITSELF

Cwmorthin slate mine, which dates back to 1810, operated in various forms until its closure in 1997. Today, sections of the extensive underground complex are used for guided adventure experiences operated by Go Below.

But reaching this particular rave was certainly not as simple as walking through the doors of your favourite nightclub.

A small group of attendees, selected through a public ballot, faceD an extraordinary two-hour descent through the mine.

Equipped with helmets, harnesses and specialist safety equipment, they navigated historic miners' stairways, dark passages, flooded tunnels and underground ravines.

The journey involved scrambling across difficult terrain, traversing zip lines and abseiling down rock faces before finally reaching a vast underground chamber known as Deep Sleep.

Their reward?

An exclusive Roni Size performance approximately 419 metres beneath the surface.

No ordinary queue at the door. No VIP entrance. Just a descent into the depths of a Welsh mountain to experience drum & bass in one of the most remarkable settings imaginable.

WHEN THE MOUNTAIN BECOMES PART OF THE MUSIC

Perhaps the most fascinating element of this event wasn't simply its extraordinary depth, but the technology used to explore the relationship between music, vibration and the surrounding geology.

Rather than relying solely on a conventional sound system, specialist audio engineers used equipment designed to transmit and capture vibrations through the mine itself. Vibration transducers transferred elements of the performance into the slate, while sensitive instruments known as geophones and hydrophones detected vibrations travelling through the surrounding rock and water.

These captured signals could then be processed and incorporated into the musical experience.

In effect, the mine became part of the sound experiment.

The engineering team also explored the mine's unique acoustic properties using techniques such as convolution reverb, which can recreate the characteristics of an environment by measuring how it responds to sound.

The result was an ambitious meeting of electronic music, geology and acoustic science and there's something particularly appropriate about using drum & bass for this experiment.

Bass-heavy music has always been as much a physical experience as an auditory one. Low frequencies can be felt as vibrations as well as heard, particularly through powerful sound systems and resonant surfaces.

However, precisely how those vibrations travel through rock depends on factors such as the material, frequency and coupling between the equipment and the surrounding surface.

The experiment therefore offered a fascinating opportunity to explore something that has always been central to rave culture: the relationship between sound, physical space and the people experiencing it.

RONI SIZE: THE SPIRIT OF THE ORIGINAL RAVE SCENE

Speaking about the project, Roni Size reflected on the early days of Bristol's rave culture, when parties could spring up in the most unexpected locations and musical innovation often came through experimentation.

He recalled the importance of what he described as "happy accidents", when playing records at unexpected speeds could reveal entirely new musical possibilities.

For Roni Size, a DJ set is not simply a fixed collection of tracks. It is something that evolves through the relationship between the performer, the crowd and the surrounding environment.

That philosophy feels particularly relevant to an event where the environment itself becomes part of the sound.

Reflecting on the extraordinary location, Roni Size described the experience as:

"The most underground of underground raves ever."

And it is difficult to disagree.

A WORLD RECORD ATTEMPT WITH A COMMERCIAL TWIST

The event was organised by Casio's G-SHOCK brand to coincide with the launch of its GDG-B100 MUDMAN watch.

Ballot winners were offered an exclusive underground experience connected to the product launch, bringing together extreme adventure, electronic music and watch technology. While the event was undeniably a promotional campaign, the ambition behind the production went considerably further than an ordinary product launch.

The organisers sought recognition for the world's deepest underground rave, with evidence from the event being submitted for independent verification.

At the time of writing, the record has not yet been officially confirmed.

The performance was also broadcast through G-SHOCK Radio using Starlink connectivity, allowing the music to reach listeners far beyond the underground chamber.

A recording of the set has since appeared on G-SHOCK Radio's Mixcloud channel. Listen to the recording: Roni Size — The Deepest Underground Rave, G-SHOCK Radio on Mixcloud

MORE THAN JUST A RAVE

Beyond the spectacle, there is a wider cultural significance to this event.

Rave culture has always been rooted in finding new spaces, challenging conventions and bringing people together through music. Whether it was the illegal raves of the late 1980s, the underground jungle movement of the early 1990s or the development of increasingly sophisticated modern sound systems, innovation has remained a defining characteristic of electronic dance music.

What makes this particular event interesting is the way it connects those original principles of exploration and experimentation with modern technology. It also raises fascinating questions about the future of live electronic performance.

Could future DJs use the acoustic properties of natural environments as creative instruments? Could the physical characteristics of a location influence the way a performance is mixed, produced and experienced?

Projects such as this demonstrate how musical creativity and sound engineering can intersect in unexpected ways and while the commercial sponsorship is very much part of the story, so too is the continuing influence of an artist who helped shape one of Britain's most important underground music movements.

From the streets and sound systems of Bristol to the depths of a 19th-century Welsh slate mine, Roni Size has once again demonstrated that drum & bass doesn't necessarily need a conventional nightclub to make an impact.

After all, underground music doesn't get much more underground than this.