Mr Clutch...
I first stepped to mic from the age of about 10 years old. Armed with my Dad's mono Philips tape recorder and the family Decca record player I began recording my vocals over instrumentals of Electro and early hip hop tunes in the front room of our North West London semi. Hours and hours were spent day after day scribbling down rhymes about being the best thing since sliced bread in my school exercise book when I probably should have been doing my homework.
I grew up listening to the greats'. From Marley Marl and Rapping Duke days I was there from the beginning. I remember when UK Hip-Hop had events held at Wembley (the old one not the one with the arch that can't finish yet!) and everyone thought it was going places. I was there writing lyrics and crudely recording my efforts on TDK D90's.
I suppose due to the undersurgence of UK Hip-Hop in those days my influences were limited to the US and to a certain degree are still. I was always amazed by the slickness of the deliveries from the US and wondered why (at the time) no one in the UK appeared able to emulate that. So I got serious with some friends of mine and formed a group known then as 'Outer Limits'.
Alongside such eminent artistes as Dropswell, Miss V (as she was known then) and DJ Quartz we played venues around London most notably being the Marquee at the Survival of the Fittest Jam which aired on Cable TV. We released a track together and underwent a name change to 'Afroblu' which better reflected the diversity of the group. Unfortunately, we could not escape the twist of fate that split the group and ultimately prompted me to get deeper into the Production side of things.
I've been producing my own tunes now from about '96 and decided to showcase my talents on the now defunct website: www.getoutthere.bt.com. It was set up by the UK communications firm British Telecom for the purpose of giving undiscovered talent a forum in which to expose their art to the online community. As a regular uploader I tasted on-line success when one of my tunes hit the number 1 spot which claimed me a 'tune of the month' competition win. It was during these good old days that I first linked up with Lawds (http://www.myspace.com/lawds) and eventually began recording with him due to what we shall class as a 'chance meeting' at a bar where Lawds happened to be peddling his wares and I happened to be purchasing some alcohol.
Got to say we hit it off from the very start. I think musically we had reached the same point and crossed paths at the right time. As people we adopted similar beliefs about how to approach this business/life in general and the rest is about 4 years of collaboration history and a lot of good times along the way.
Now, along with Lawds I am a founding member of the Partnership of Sound (P.O.S.) (http://www.myspace.com/partnershipofsound) under which we have produced the album FOUR YEARS LATER...