Manchester's Affray (Joseph Wood) has been involved in the drum and bass scene for the past seven years. After developing a love for the genre in his late teens he became a regular at local events and began buying records, he has been DJ-ing since 1999 and producing since 2002.
Affray has established himself as a promising new producer, celebrating his first drum and bass release in Summer 2005 alongside fellow Mancunian Zyon Base (Daniel Blishen). Ceasefire, their debut studio collaboration was picked up alongside Visions, both tracks were signed by Digital and released on the L Plates label. The inclusion of their work in the L Plates release schedule placed Affray & Zyon Base in the company of previous L Plates signings such as Sonic & Silver, Baron and Amit. The pairs tracks have received play from Digital, L Double, Martyn, DJ Kid, TC1, Ray Keith and the Tactile collective.
Raw, brittle beats for those left cold by the synthetic operatics of Pendulum et al.the dubbed-out and rolling old skool vibes supplied by both tracks are undeniably convincing. Knowledge Magazine August 2005.
Since his first club performance in 2001 Affray has clocked up a huge amount of gigs including appearances alongside scene legends such as Marcus Intalex, Calibre, Ed Rush, Optical, Hype, Krust, Die, Shy FX and Nicky Blackmarket. Affray has performed all over the UK including sets in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Affray has also performed on the continent.
Alongside his production and DJ-ing work Affray has also been heavily involved in promotion. Affray was one of the founders of long-running Manchester drum and bass event, Gutterfunk, where he was resident alongside DJ Poi (Gareth Morris) of www.nwdnb.co.uk. The event, which began in Summer 2001 and closed its doors in Feb 2006, was part of a small handful of boundary-pushing events in Northern England and featured appearances from the likes of Digital, Artificial Intelligence, Q Project and John B. Gutterfunk was the first event to bring artists such as Cyantific, Stress Level & TC1, Logistics, Commix and Chris SU to Manchester.
Affray & Zyon Base continue to DJ and produce with lots of new work in the pipeline including forthcoming releases, watch this space...
* Affray's latest studio mix, complete with cue file, is available for download here: http://forum.nwdnb.co.uk/showthread.php?t=20773 (paste link into internet explorer) *
