No matter what sounds you profess to be your music of choice, chances are, that at some point over the last five years, you will have got your rocks off to Matt Edwards.
As Matthew E he fashions club-based, dancefloor slayers. Under that aegis he’s updated the classic Chi-town, jackin’ sound beloved of house aficionados and layered it with fractured funk, belligerent, oddball beats and mechanical soul.
If Matthew E is all about the Saturday Night Fever, then, by contrast, Rekid is the slower, more deliberate, rhythmical funk of the mid-week mayhem. Its well-intentioned muscular intensity making it perfect soulful sustenance.
Quiet Village is something else all together. A collaboration with long-time musical sparring partner Joel Martin (a vinyl freak, like Mr Edwards, who works in esteemed auction house Christie’s pop department), it’s sample-based music which veers from drawn out disco-not-disco delirium to evocative, under-stated soundscapes.
Sea Devils - you keeping up at the back? – is undeniable electronic pop brilliance. Working with Tom from Cagedbaby, it’s the least niche of Matt’s projects and thanks to Sea Devils alluring pop dance grooves they’ll no doubt be shagging the upper reaches of the hit parade sometime soon.
Last, but by no means least etc, etc, etc, is Radio Slave. Perhaps Matt’s most instantly recognisable nom de guerre, thanks in part to his inspirational melding of Kylie’s Can’t Get You Out Of My Head to New Order’s Blue Monday, this is Matt’s DJ moniker and the guise under which he completes his incendiary remixes and re-edits.
However, before such sonic schizophrenia gets you calling for the men in white coats, just feel the quality and consider Matt’s legacy. Fired by the first wave of acid house, Matt gained his musical spurs by partying to dance music that was just that: music you danced to, irrespective of tribal factions.
This was the raison d’être he acknowledged when he took to the decks, first at London’s legendary Milk Bar in 1992, then onto the, then, recently opened Ministry Of Sound and then to parties across the country, most notably in Wales – where he was a regular at free parties – and in Brighton, his home since 1998.
His love of re-edits, dance music’s oft-forgotten backbone, led Matt into the studio himself. His own re-edits and remixes, such as the aforementioned epoch-defining re-imagining for Ms Minogue, soon gave way to his own productions and since the floodgates opened there’s been no stopping the man known as, erm, Matthew E, Quiet Village, Sea Devils, Rekid and Radio Slave.
He’s released records for Skint, Soul Jazz, Classic, Whatever We Want, and he’s worked with fellow travellers, Belgium’s The Glimmers. If Matt comes up with another two projects he’ll have enough alter egos for every day of the week.
Psychologists would probably have a field day with him; mercifully, we don’t have to worry about any crisis of identity, we just get to keep on dancing.
Luke began his professional DJ career in 1990 having practiced hard at his Friday night residency at Middlesex University student Union, where he met cohort Justin Harris. During this period he started working at a local Barnet record shop selling house music and soul music whilst holding down a part time job as a fishmonger.
Following this his career within the industry was secured whence he got a job at Freetown, then home to Robert Owens, Felix the housecat,Jamie Principle and Masters at Work. This opened doors and led him to a long lasting relationship with Rob Mello and Kenny Hawkes, with hom he started his recording career and passion for live radio (Girls FM) respectively. Rob took Luke under his studio wing and taught him the ropes.
Together they worked on productions for both Freetown and Prescription Underground. It was through the prescription owner Chez Damier,that he met a certain Mr Derrick L Carter. They immediately jelled due to their fascination with late nights and wild parties. From this Classic was born. The DJ's record label, home to artists such as DJ Sneak,Isolee,Tiefshwarz and Greenskeepers. During this time Luke and Justin had also begun to devlop their own production team,"Freaks." Recording for their own label Music for Freaks, they went to complete 3 studio albums, including within this, "the Man who lived underground".
This brings us to present day. Luke decided to take a step back from the the record label business and began focus on production. Freaks have just signed their latest album,"Psych", to German label Ladomat. This is in the last few weeks of mixing and will be released in 2007. They are currently touring showcases with a 5 piece bands,finding new fans in Switzerland and Holland to name a few. Luke has also been busy working on his own re-edits and productions. Working with people like Radioslave and Henrik Shwarz. He has currently signed singles to Crosstown Rebels, Gallery, Icon, Rekids and most recently, he has been welcomed into the world of Cajual and Relief having finished his first single for Cajual, entitled monsters.
You can also catch Luke back at the radio dials with Freak partner,Jonny Rock. The 2 record a monthly show of eclectic nonsense on WWW.Samurai.FM/washhouse....
http://www.myspace.com/lukesolomon
http://www.musicforfreaks.com
for bookings james@elitemm.co.uk
http://www.garageband.com/lukesolomon/podcast/main
Mr G really is Colin McBean. He initially was part of the KCC DJ trio playing at the now legendary Confusion parties and subsequently started recording as one half of The Advent, producing many ground-breaking releases/remixes and albums, and touring the world with their intense, relentless style of techno. In 1999 Colin decided to go his own way and founded the Phoenix G label in order to create his unique brand of analogue bass-heavy electronic tech-funk, which immediately attracted props from his peers and the music press alike.
Having achieved great acclaim for releases on other labels such as Defected, Duty Free, The End and Skint/Loaded, and remixing a wide range of artists - overground from chart-topping Roger Sanchez to Ms Kittin, and underground from Xpress II to Josh Wink and Ben Sims -, he also received much attention for his releases/remixes out of Detroit on Moods ‘n’ Grooves.
In the works are several EP’s on Phoenix G, a new EP on Moods ‘n’ Grooves and a project out of Japan under one of Colin’s many aliases. Furthermore his live show: After tearing down Fabric last year and again this year think it’s time the show hit the road soon !
Toby's first forays into production began around the heady rave days of the late eighties early nineties. Everything before this had been digested in his Gullliver and taken on some kind of influence or another, from hearing his first ever remix at 13... of Bros believe it or not, to listening to New Order's Substance on constant rotation on his Sony Walkman, to his dad's constant insistence on playing Sky or Stevie Wonder in the family car, buying his first electric guitar when he was 13, his mum buying him Crucial Electro one for christmas of 83 and the subsequent breakdancing tirade that followed.
The first productions were scored on a simple Roland sampler, and spawned tracks that were on a techno/house kind of vibe, but warranted a play from Colin Favor on his revolutoinary Kiss show. Toby's first DJing experiences were at Art College where he had the chance to play his records through a bumping JBL system, he also learned the art of throwing his own parties, using the Graphics skills he'd acquired to to do the promotional gear. An early love of deep sounds gained Toby the reputation of having something different to offer and began to spread his djing wings, as far as Scotland and Glastonbury ...
It wasn't till 2000 when he met part time music partner Craig 'Alexis Forge ' Macculough that the productions started to take shape.. they had an oppurtunity to play around with lots of music software together for a year, from these sessions Toby created a whole lot of music. It got farmed out to labels, and some of it made an appearance on Deep house label Low Pressings, one tune got picked up by Steve Kotey of Bearfunk.
From here a steady flow of productions emerged on labels such as Odori, Hi-phen and most recently Rekids and Tiny Sticks. The Rekids release 'A Close Shave' recieving great reviews and consequntly remix offers started coming in. Remixes have been done for Beat Freeze Records, Bent, Bloop recordings (Portugal) and Dialect Recordings. Side projects including edits for Urban Myth, collaborations with Danny Clark for Latenightaudio productions and a live studio group called Mythical Beast with Foolish Felix and Marcus Lee (a track called Magical Creature is waiting for closure at this very moment!!)
DJing wise , Toby DJs monthly at his own night with Danny Clark called www.latenightaudio.com, this has been going great guns and has pulled in some top guests as well as a healthy following, recently Toby was signed up to Warm DJ agency - 2007 promises more overseas dates, as well as the first Rekids release of the year ...with a remix from the mighty Quiet Village, more work with Bearfunk and Germany's Members of the Trick /Sonar kollectiv, a tidy package from Tiny Sticks with a remix from Mark E and more releases on Urban myth. Culminating in his first artist album on Rekids dropping in the autumn.
Spencer Parker is one of Europe's leading dj's, his unique style of house music is in demand the world over and with his productions, remixes and re-edits being supported by such names as Radio Slave, Tiefschwarz, Laurent Garnier, X Press 2, Nic Fanciulli and Pete Tong, the future looks bright.
Spencer's style is simply best described as underground electronic house music. Preferred record labels range from the electro/techno stylings of Get Physical, Planet E, Bpitch Control, and Rekids through to the uber-cool house of Buzzin Fly, SAW, Saved and Dubsided. A set from Spencer would include minimal, electronic and acid house alongside some cool jackin' tracks and the odd trippy vocal, all played while utilising an array of effects. Spencer has held a highly successful 3 year residency at The Cross in London and continues to regularly guest at the capitals best clubs, including Fabric, Ministry Of Sound, The End and Turnmills as well as being in demand worldwide, with recent visits alone including Russia, Belgium, China, America, Australia, France, Italy and Slovenia.
In 2005 Spencer began his production career with the release of his debut single "Open Your Eyes", the track was snapped up by UK based label Cr2 Records and became one of their biggest selling singles to date. "Open Your Eyes" was heavily supported in the clubs by such names as Deep Dish, Erick Morillo, Felix Da Housekat, Sander Kleinenberg and Erol Alkan. Pete Tong also supported by playing "Open Your Eyes" several times on Radio 1, adding it to his Pure Pacha compilation cd and describing it as "hot hot hot!". In the autumn of 2006, Spencer unleashed his second single, the electronic acid house track “Beautiful Noise”, on Radio Slave's new Rekids label. Early copies garnered support from names such as Nic Fanciulli, Tom Middleton, X Press 2 and, once again, Pete Tong, who described the track by saying "the new sound of minimal starts here". In addition to "Beautiful Noise" Spencer will also release the much hyped single "Neon" in early 2007, on the London based Tsuba label. Already becoming an anthem for Nic Fanciulli after constant play at his Space (Ibiza) residency, "Neon" is currently being supported by such names as James Zabelia, Laurent Garnier, Boris Dlugosh, John Digweed and Hernan Cattaneo - who has already requested it for his new Renaissance cd.
In addition to producing original material, Spencer often remixes or re-edits some of the hottest tracks around to give himself an exclusive secret weapon to play and make his dj sets completely original. On the re-edit front, both DJ T's "Rimini" track on Get Physical Records and the awesome "Eurodans"" by Norwegian producer Todd Terje have both been remixed, re-edited and rearranged in Spencer's studio. The A list dj's again showed their support with Tom Middleton and Nic Fanciulli proclaiming the “Rimini” edit as "a whopper" and “wicked" and Diesel from X Press 2 shouting that the “Eurodans” edit was “doing it for us”. As for the remixes, in 2006 Spencer set to work on hot new punk/funk band New Young Pony Club's future single "Get Lucky" and turned the original into a 9 minute long rolling house extravaganza. All three remixes/re-edits have been given the seal of approval by Pete Tong and played on his Essential Selection show on Radio 1. As well as preparing his own remixes and re-edits, Spencer works alongside Radio Slave under the name Slave and Parker, their most famous collaboration being their remix of "We Are Your Friends" by Justice vs. Simian which was supported by Pete Tong on Radio 1, reached no.1 in the UK DMC Buzz Chart and was described by Rocky from X Press 2 as "fantastic, one of our biggest records". Virgin Records heard about the hype surrounding the Slave and Parker re-edit and subsequently requested it to appear on the official release, released July 2006.
In 2007, Spencer's production skills look set to gain him even more fans and he has already started the year by being personally asked by X Press 2 to remix their new single "Wichi Tai To". Forthcoming on Skint Records, an early copy sent to Nic Fanculli had him proclaiming that the mix was "the fucking bomb!!!" while Ewan Pearson said it was "sounding great" and Diesel of X Press 2 stated that he "loved the remix".
Spencer is an experienced and adaptable dj that knows how to warm up for big names intelligently as well as rock a main room in his own right, anywhere in the world. Now with his production and remixing skills developing at a rapid rate, the package is complete.
To put it simply, THE MAN ROCKS!