Billy Borez and Carl Loben met through mutual friend Barry Ashworth, and soon discovered that theyd both been to Barrys Monkey Drum night back in the day. Hence the Drum Monkeys, once theyd started making tunes together.
Uber-producer Billy is a bit of an unsung dance music legend. Back in the old hardcore days at the turn of the Nineties, he recorded as Zero B. His biggest track from back then was LockUp, a tuuuuuune licensed to countless compilations and that stills brings goosebumps to older raves who remember it from way back when. At one point the Zero B name was up there with The Prodigy, until he made the decision to sign to a major label - London Records.
The A&R wanted him to become The Beloved. Billys career stalled.
Disappearing back underground, he ran the near cult status Effective records recording studio, clocking credits with virtually every top name DJ in London before moving ship to Freskanova Recordings in the mid nineties. His multi alias remixing credit's span 15yrs of dance music and include everyone from Carl Cox to Jeremy Heally and from The Freestylers to Snowpatrol, covering every major label and a stack of Indies.
DJ/journo Carl is a bit of an unsung dance music legend, too. Well, he likes to think so, anyway. Hes interviewed countless electronic music playas, often giving innovative acts like Squarepusher, DJ Marky and, err, Skunk Anansie their first UK press. In parallel hes DJd all over the show from Gatecrasher to Glastonbury, from the Ministry Of Sound to the Miniscue Of Sound. And beyond
Drum Monkeys first release was Electro Ladyland, the second release on the fledgling Westway imprint. A shared EP with the Velours Brothers, it received a corkin tech-nasty breaks mix from Klaus Heavyweight Hill and got some quite good reviews.
It sounds like Jimi Hendrix was resurrected by some kind of electro-voodoo and ended up in the studio with the Clash, The Specials popped in for a cup of tea and Miss Kittin left a message on the answerphone halfway through. - SOTO, M8 magazine
Would sit perfectly in a rocky Freeland or Evil Nine set. - Danny McMillan
The DMs then got on a remix tip. They reworked Ilss Loving You (Distinctive) into an end-of-night breaks anthem described as Outstanding by Streetwise Music.
They rejigged Madoxs disco-funk breakbeat thing Movin into: The best tune the Plump DJs never made. - Mike Hogan, Breakspoll
Their cheeky booty of a certain Specials track was rinsed out by DJs like FreQ Nasty, Krafty Kuts, Eddy TM and Ali B off CDR, and in May 2006 they bashed out a quick revamp for Dreadzones world cup song Lion Shirt just in time for the tournament.
Next up is their Summer Anthem "Acid Drop" featuring Kstar on vocals
