Solaris Studios - Label Boss Interview

Real name and where you're from?
Richard Elliott, from Peterborough originally, but moved to Edinburgh about 5 years ago

How did you get into the scene?
I was always into underground music from around 1983, listening to electro & oldskool hip-hop.

When did you get your 1st set of decks and what were they?
When I was about 12, they were really nasty hi-fi decks, only one had a pitch control; I built my first mixer from a couple of variable resistors and a few wires. I used to sell mixtapes to my mates at school.

What was the very 1st record you bought?
Kraftwerk - The Model

What was the last record you bought?
Desmond Dekker - Isralites, from some charity shop, I'm waiting for a couple of '92 tunes from ebay as we speak

How many records in your collection? And how many genres?
About a thousand, mostly funk breaks and a bit of jazz, a lot of oldskool hip-hop & electro, early house from '86-'88, acid, quite a few '89 tunes, a good bunch from the rave era, and a load of breakbeat. I've also got a quite a lot of obscure '70s synth music that I picked up for sampling.

You also DJ, can you tell us what you've been up to recently, what do you play?
Allsorts, I play funk & jazz every Sunday in a cafe bar, although that can vary, I've done a few oldskool ¡¯89-'92 sets there too. I finally got asked to play an oldskool set at one of the 'back to the oldskool' style events in Edinburgh.

When did you find you had a knack for making tunes?
I used to play around with my brother's gear, he had a 303, a 606, and a Korg MS10, I was about 12 then, I was into electronics at the time and started building my own synth modules, I still have the filters somewhere. I first started going out in '89 to a night called 'Tekno Dream,' I heard some really special tunes, like Strings of Life when they were brand new, this inspired me to put my Commodore Amiga to use and I started making tunes on a tracker program, some of which got played in the clubs in '89, I was only 17 then.

Is there a tune you've done that really stands out for you when you thought, wow, that really rocked?
A tune I done in 1993 called 'Unfuckingbelievable' it was never released because it was far too fast for the time, had I written it a year or so later, it would have had a better chance of a release.

how long does it take you to put a tune together ?
Some take a few days, some drag on for weeks, the best ones are the ones that come together in moments, the creative energies are really flowing then

How does it feel to listen to dj's playing your tune?
I've mentioned this in my biog on my website. Easygroove played 'Reach Up', (a piano tune on F-Project #013) in the middle of the night at Fantazia new year '92/'93, then gave it the rewind. Had I been there I think I would have passed out!

Favourite promoter?
Hard to say, I've never had direct dealings with them, I like the way Fantazia are keeping the scene alive, I'm also pleased with anyone that is promoting the hardcore breaks scene (new tunes with an oldskool sound)

Top 10 Favourite oldskool tunes?
In no particular order, because these are all top tunes in my opinion;

'89-'91 (the early days)
1) Derrick May ¨C Strings of Life
2) Jago - I'm Going To Go
3) Shades of Rhythm - Sweet Sensation
4) Reel to Reel - BTA Vol.1 (white label)
5) Congress - 40 Miles
6) Echo 1000 - Disco Biscuits (white label)
7) Liquid Crystal - Inner Sense
8) Exocet - Safety Zone
9) Shades of Rhythm - Frequency (from their first LP)
10) Nexus 21 - Can you feel the Beat

'91-'92 (the golden era)
1) Egyptian Empire - The Horn Track
2) Mickey Finn - Some Justice
3) X-Ray Xperiments - XRAY003 Track A3 (white label)
4) Demon Boyz - Jungle Dett
5) Jonny L - Hurt You So
6) Oaysis - Incredible Bass
7) Liquid Crystal - Radiate
8) Sonz of the Loop da Loop era - Far Out
9) 2 Bad Mice - Bombscare
10) LTJ Bukem ¨- Demon's Theme

Worst tune?
There's plenty that make me cringe!!!

Other Dj's & MC's you rate?
In the '90s, I listened to a lot of Bukem & Conrad, but I also liked Top Buzz , Mad P, Dougal, Slipmatt the list is endless. I also like turntablism, which is a different ballgame, and much more technical, Q-Bert, for example.

Other producers?
Kraftwerk, Derrick May, this is another endless list!

Funniest/ most embarrassing thing that ever happened at an event?
I think this was more a case of shock¡­ I was playing live at Total Kaos, we had just set up, the room was empty, so we sat behind the keyboards, which had a 'Brainstorm Crew' backdrop in front, albeit, we couldn't see past the front of the stage. A few of hours after playing Sonic on the Megadrive, I stood up and looked over the keyboards, I'd never seen it so rammed, going from an empty room to a place that was packed was a bit of a shock, so I decided to go outside for some air, the queue was right up the road, they weren't letting any more in and I was due to go on in the next 30 mins. It was quite a buzz though!

Cosy Club or Warehouse?
'Cosy' I think that had to be 'Tekno Dream' Peterborough, '89 we were like one family there!  I like the Warehouse thing too, I went to loads of illegals back in the day, 'Proper Stuff' was a favourite.

Describe yourself in 5 words?
Love my tunes too much!

If you could be any other person, (past present, fictional or real) who would you be?
Nobody, I've spent all my life carving and shaping myself, I wouldn't want to change now. I'd like Bill Gates' wealth though!!!

If you had a time machine what year would you go back to and why?
About teatime last Saturday and buy myself a lottery ticket!

What do you do to chill out away from the music?
There are always tunes playing in my house! To chill out, I sit in bed with my laptop, chatting to friends, lurking eBay etc. For recreation I do a lot of graffiti art, I also love mountain biking in the summer.

How do you think the scene compares now to back in the day?
I hope the hardcore breaks thing takes off and the scene becomes as big as it was in '92, the music is still there, the awareness needs to grow more.

How would you like to be remembered?
For my music and art, more the music though.

Anything else you want to say? Any shouts?
DJ Nee for his hardcore breaks show on nuskoolbreaks.co.uk radio, if it wasn't for that show, I wouldn't be here now, Let's get back what we had in '92 and what we lost thereafter, when a whole genre of music went missing and split into two completely separate branches, leaving the root behind. Hardcore Breaks is the way forward!
Shouts to each and everybody reading this!

Events you've played :

Shock, 1991
Total Kaos, 1992
Southey Woods, 1992
Purple Haze, 1994

Equipment software/hardware you use?

Synths:

Casio CZ1000
Casio VZ10M
Jen SX1000
Kawai K1r
Korg DW8000
Roland ¦ÁJuno1
Yamaha TX81Z

PC Hardware:

AMD Athlon XP 3200 CPU
1.5Gb DDR3200 RAM
Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe MOBO
80Gb system drive
120Gb audio drive
Terratec DMX 6Fire 24/96

Outboard:

Seck 24/2 analogue console
Boss RDD-10 digital delay
Zoom Studio 1201 effects
Kenton Spindoctor MIDI controller
Beyerdynamic DT150 headphones
Sennheiser HD25 headphones
Rode NT-1 studio mic
Rotel RA820 amplifier

Drum Modules:

Akai XE8
Boss DR550
Yamaha RY30

Laptop :

HP Pavilion laptop
Echo Indigo i/o PCMCIA soundcard
3.4 GHz Pentuim 4
1 GB DDR2 Ram
100 GB hard disk
2x 160GB External drives
Dual Layer DVD writer

Pc Software:

Steinberg Cubase SX
Steinberg Wavelab
Steinberg Halion
NI Absynth
NI Battery
NI Pro5x
Many freeware synths & plugins

Discography:

Southey Woods EP (whitehouse records - white label) 1991
Plastic EP (Formation) 1992
Red EP, aka The Storm EP (F Project) 1992
Wise Ones (F Project) 1993

Remixes:

Eurythmics - Here comes the rain, a project Paul Oakenfold was involved in (Sola remix) 1999
M3 (Matt Darey) - Baliamos (Sola remix) 1999
Save the Whales - Gatecrasher compilation - Sola remix 1999
Shane - Feeling High - Sola Remix 1999