twenty years of abuse and still broke - first flickerings

it recently occured to me that this year of our lord 2012 actually marks my twentieth anniversary of making beats and writing rhymes and how, to that end, i thought that it might be wise to mark the occasion with a series of field reports outlining some of the more distant facts in the case of my ongoing creative enterprise. i shall thusly attempt to spend some time reminiscing on the early years, perhaps shedding a little light on my humble musical beginnings as well as unearthing some rather embarassing and/or surprisingly still good photographs, videos and songs for our general amusement.

so, might i start at the almost very beginning. 1992 was a glorious year indeed, not least of all for my own young self as i somehow, after much long persuasion managed to convince my dearest mother that we really needed a soundcard for our home computer, which was without a doubt my first real step into the world of music production. naturally, being that this was still the stone ages in terms of digital audio manipulation, the technology was not quite up to what my imagination could conceive, but working with sounds at 8bit, 11k in mono really wasn't so much of an hindrance.

my closest musical companion at this time was my high school friend by the name of matt. he and i were already becoming pretty well known at school as the kids who listened to the weirdest music. we had known each other from the age of three, but our friendship really got into full stride when we realised we could trade albums and share all this amazing new music together. we were pretty much into hip hop, death metal and anything you could pre-fix with 'industrial' at this stage, and how that was very much the direction of our first band, 'meat turbine'.

my first official 'promo shot', circa spring 1993. bless

'meat turbine' existed for a wonderfully short period and produced one cassette tape of almost unlistenable experimental sound collage/montage material, chiefly built from a blend of hip hop beats, death metal riffs, field recordings and 'controvesial' vocal samples. a succession of 'solo' projects followed under a myriad of names i can now scarcely recall; 'car crash', 'infanticide', 'half dead', 'unexplained', 'traumatic'; one lurid title after another. still, it all began to wind down for a while as my computer began to show signs of ageing and my interest in collecting vinyl and 'turntabalism' increased.

1995 into 1997 was spent strictly riding bmx, buying vinyl and freestyling around campfires in the woods, if my rose-tinted memory serves me correctly. matt and i were still buying up as much vinyl as we could, although i have moved much further into underground hip hop whilst he steadily explored the newly emerging drum & bass sounds coming from our part of south london. we talked endlessly of music and of making more music. all we needed was access to some better technology and all would be in hand.

finally, in the summer of 1997 i found myself very fortunately having access to a brand new top-of-the-range pc, largely due to my uncle's intervention who, in returning briefly from his residence in africa, insisted to my mother that we needed a 'proper' computer to work with, and how i somehow again managed to insist that we would also need a 'proper' soundcard to go with it. suddenly, as if by magic, in the space of a few short weeks i was back in business.

this time-frame also happened to coincide with the establishing of my ongoing musical relationship with two of my closest friends, andy skopes and michael rea. we met at sixth form college in the autumn of 1994 and ever so slowly came to become closer and closer friends which eventually lead to extensive musical collaborations from 1997 onwards. the first two years spent working on a seemingly endless series of hip hop tracks under a series of amusing monickers, some too cringe-worthy to mention. but the music was promising and wonderful relationships were cemented.

finally, in 1998 fate would have it that my path would cross ever-so-briefly with fbcfabric in a dingy college in wandsworth, sound london. we were both studying 'music technology' of some sort and only walked passed each other in the corridors a few times, but how a mutual friend and he happened to have a conversation which happened to lead to another meeting again in 1999 which lead to fbcfabric placing a phone call to me to talk about maybe working on some music at some point, and how the seeds were soon sown for what would become the basis of all that i have been trying to achieve with my artistic work ever since. strange twists of fate indeed.

it seems so strange in looking back, how the path leads from there to here, from then til now. how we slowly tread the boards, sometimes with keen intention, sometimes stumbling a little out of step, always the same age in our minds, while our bodies slowly begin to describe to us the long seasons. i often reflect on these formative years and how they would have lead to where i am today. it is a truly strange life indeed, a truly remarkable existence. but let us never forget that we are all experiencing these fascinating moments together, that we can extend a glad hand and utter a hopeful word and commune even in the darkest of times. here's to the ongoing experience indeed.

keep safe, take care

jamesreindeer