PA Rhythm Section Profile

Seated in an inflatable chair in his record company office in the beating heart of Soho it was seven years ago that Rennie Pilgrem first toiled in the studio to produce the sonic fruits which would help provide the soundscape for the early hardcore days.

After meeting up with the DJ Ellis Dee it was he who dragged the rave virgin Rennie in to the maelstrom of hardcore chaos erupting in the Dungeon club in East London . A bit of persuasion from Mr Dee and Rennie soon dragged his studio set up in to the club and was playing live in classic rave style as the sun rose to the rapturous E’d up hordes. There were all races, all classes, people from fourteen to forty everyone just going completely mad. 

Gaining inspiration from these sweat drenched nights Rennie, Ellis Dee and two other producers (Richard Thake and Nick 'Newton' Scott) formed Rhythm Section who would go on to play at all the big out door events which worried Trevor McDonalds and Co. were soon reporting on.

Fantazia, Universe, World Dance, Perception and Raindance all had the knob twiddling addition of Rhythm Section gracing the stage and moving the crowd.   After the success of their first single 'Check Out The Bass' Rhythm Section recorded the classic 'Coming On Strong EP' which would have made the charts were it not for the fact it didn’t have a barcode.  Rennie doesn’t seem at all miffed about this as he explains 'It still sold about 15,000 and was so big it stayed in the dance charts for about a year and a half.'

As the rave scene started to go down in a different direction,  Rennie and Co. decided to call it a day with Rhythm Section.   'We had majors interested but they didn’t understand it at all so we ended it.'

Rhythm Section played at many of the early Fantazia parties including New Year 1991, as well as a others like Raindance, Perception & World Dance.

Rhythm Section Interview 1993/94

The Rhythm Section have made their mark on the Rave Scene in recent years. Then they went quiet for some time as one of the group split away. Now they are back to full effect and are ready to kick our scene alive with some good ideas…

What are your real names and where did you get the name Rhythm Section from?
Ronnie Pilgrim, Richie Thomas and Roy Collins (Ellis Dee). Roy invented Rhythm Section, the name. We don’t know where from, he just dreamt it up from somewhere.

How long have you been together?
About 3 years.

How did you get together?
I, Richie, used to live above Ronnie and we were doing some music together, and then the person I was selling my flat to knew a DJ on Sunrise and the DJ came round and introduced us to Roy.

Where are you based?
We have got 3 separate studios, one in Woodford, one in Bethnal Green and one in West London. In other words we’ve all got studios based where we live. But we probably mostly congregate here in Bethnal Green.

Do you spend much time home working alone?
Sometimes we do. We get an idea for a track first of all and then when it is nearing as far as you can take it you take it to the others and say what do you think! And then they change bits and pieces. We all do that to each other really. We also do quite a lot of our own solo projects under difference, names such as Tribal Underground, MK 13, Ellis Dee Project and Bass to Base.

So what would you say is the best work you have done together so far?
The best so far in terms of sales success would have to be the Comin’ on Strong EP. That was when the scene was the most exciting, about 18 months ago.

What’s your fondest memory of playing out together?
Perception at Long Marsden Airport in 1990. There was about 11,000 people and this was our 2nd ever gig together. We were playing stuff off of the Atomic EP. It was also when there weren’t too many decibel restrictions like there are now, so because it was louder all the crowd were getting into it more and there was no trouble.

What is your plan of action for the coming year?
We are going to try and do more varied stuff. We are not just going to stick to 150 bpm stuff because of the speed. We’ll be doing more of a mixture really, anything from House to Rave to Techno and even Trance. We also hope to get the label more set up, get more organised and do more interesting stuff.

As you get bigger, along what sort of lines do you hope to go and what sort of image would you like to create, commercial or non-commercial?
We would like to get some sort of financial success out of it so we’d like to do something a little commercial based but we would still be doing our sort of underground stuff under a myriad of names, much like most people are doing now. We would like to do something commercially successful without lowering any standards and as far as the image goes none of us are 16 so we are not going to be dressing up and jumping up and down. I think the image will come more through the strength of the music.

How do you see things going in general this summer?
The thing that has spoilt it a bit is the down the media has on it, also the volumes have gone down and people can’t enjoy it as much. The police harassment and roadblocks to stop people going doesn’t help things either. It doesn’t seem as happy as it was a while ago. The music has got more moody and a lot of people are reverting back to house music where it all came from. It would be better to hear more of a mixture of stuff. With regards to the beats per minute, there is a limit where it isn’t danceable anymore.

Do you plan to make any trips overseas?
We’ve done some gigs in Europe already. In particular a couple of trips to Switzerland but the main problem is getting a decent venue for it. There aren’t many ‘rave’ places in Europe as it is more Techno orientated. We have also had offers to go to America and Canada.

Can you tell me about your new work and the latest E.P.?
It is a double release. One is house music, slower, going from commercial to more underground, but it is just really an exercise to see how well received it is.

For the hardcore stuff we have got one that is slower and one that is more hard. From now on we will probably be doing more of a mixture, not sticking to any one style. Having said it is slower, it’s at 129 bpm, the same speed we were doing the rave stuff 18 months ago. It was considered fast then which gives you an idea of how fast it has got now!

Is there any others you particularly rate at the moment?
Some of the people whose stuff has always been quite good has been Manix, Prodigy, Shades of Rhythm, Bizarre Inc. and Urban Shakedown.

This is turning into a shout list! Most people who have done well have done it because they are consistent and not on the strength of their label.

Any final comments?
Yes, if Sony is listening we are interested!

Seriously, people have got to stop putting out mediocre records because it will the scene as people don’t want to listen to hours of stuff that is similar and not very good. It’s better to spend longer doing a track then rushing something out which is the same as the stuff before. We would definitely like to see more variety in the music at Raves with DJ’s of different styles playing i.e. a section of house, rave, techno, just to see if it would work.

Reproduced with the permission of Blaze

Rhythm Section Releases

Atomic EP (12") Rhythm Section Recordings 1991
Check Out The Bass Bass (12") Rhythm Section Recordings, 1991
Circuit Breaker (12") Rhythm Section Recordings 1991
Comin' On Strong EP (12") Rhythm Section Recordings 1991
Midsummer Madness EP (12") Rhythm Section Recordings 1992
Remixes Volume 1 (12") Rhythm Section Recordings 1992
Rhythm Takes Control (House Mixes) (12") Rhythm Section Recordings 1993
The Chainsaw (Hard Mixes) (12") Rhythm Section Recordings 1993
Rhythm Section II The Sequel (2x12") Not On Label 1995
Check Out The Bass 96 (12") Rhythm Section Recordings 1996
 

Links to Fantazia

Rhythm Section played at a number of Fantazia events including:

Fantazia New Year 1991
Fantazia Second Sight