Emotion, imagination, and rich, thought-provoking atmospheres: that's what you hear in the music of Fanu .
But there's the fourth, almost the most important component missing from that list: THE BREAKBEAT. The wild, syncopated beats of the drum that make drum and bass and breakbeat music what they are are the central element in the music of Fanu.
This music comes from the cold North, which, with its winter climate, has shaped its creator's twisted fancy for eerie soundscapes and "the otherness", which he's expressing in his music: Fanu represents drum and bass, downtempo and also something in between.
Fanu's drum and bass is the child of the mid-nineties, which brought to the world the dark breakbeat-o-ramas of Metalheadz, Source Direct, Photek, Paradox, Danny Breaks, and Good Looking Records, all of which fanu claims to be his main influences. Many have said that Fanu's music definitely sounds like that of his influences, and that comment is - like his fans know it - very very spot-on.
It was in the mid-nineties that Fanu fell in love with the aforementioned artists and labels and started finding out more about the music they called jungle and drum and bass. Soon after that, he started making his first electronic music experiments with his home computer, and he's been on an ever-continuing mission ever since. His first vinyl release worth mentioning, a track called Defunct Drums' Depression Decade, came out in 2003 on the NYC-based Offshore Recordings.
"I still consider that release somewhat seminal to me as it's definitely a track that won't age with time," Fanu admits. To make music that will stand the test of time is one of Fanu's goals. "In today's drum and bass, there's still quite a lot of short-life material that's just boring and it has no content. Quantity is outweighing quality to quite an extent, and hype often overpowers substance," he dares to claim. "But hey, there's still a lot of good stuff out there as well, and there's definitely something for everybody," he says with a smirk.
Fanu's music with its breaks and soundscapes has definitely found fans from around the world. So far, Fanu has released music on Subtitles, Commercial Suicide, Offshore, Breakin', Warm Communications, Subtle Audio, Thermal, Forestry, LoCuts, Soothsayer, 13 Music, Darkestral, OHM Resistance, Cyberset and today, he is mainly writing music for his own record label, Lightless Recordings .
"I like to do varying stuff: it can be light, it can be heavy, but I wanna keep it musical - and actually, I'm not even meaning melodic here. I'm keeping it varied. Whether it be drum and bass or downtempo, I'm trying to put equal amounts of breaks action and musical soundscapes into my tunes: that's what I grew up listening to. I never repeat myself too much in my music, so every tune I finish offers something new. Sometimes I love to do a little break science, but sometimes I love to highlight some other elements instead." Sounds like a successful recipe, doesn't it?
Fanu also DJs, representing the breaky dnb and fat dnb in general. Fanu's been called to play the breaks in so far, he’s been called – to do some breakbeat reformation work – to England (Bristol, Exeter), USA (Chicago, Washington DC, Saint Louis, Seattle, Portland, San Fransisco, Jacksonville, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, Raleigh, New Orleans), Canada (Toronto), Hungary (Budapest), Germany (Berlin, Leipzig), Holland (Amsterdam, Groningen, Utrecht, Antwerp), Poland (Warsaw, Rybnik), Belgium (Antwerp), Lithuania (Klaipeda), Latvia (Riga), Estonia (Tallinn), Sweden (Stockholm), Austria (Wien, Graz), Russia (Moscow, Wetluck Festival), Ukraine (Kiev), Bulgaria (Sofia), Italy (Codroipo), Slovakia (Bratislava), as well as his homeland, Finland (Helsinki, Tampere, Rovaniemi, Joensuu).
"DJing is the best thing ever. Everytime I rock the decks, I do it with a burning passion. I like to keep my sets varied - you need to keep it interesting to keep the crowd interested, of course. I've never wanted to put myself into any mould as a DJ: I play new dubs and old dusty grooves. But most importantly: you gotta make it fat, hot and groovy, baby! No beard-stroking sets from me, trust!"
As if keeping busy on every possible front wasn't enough, Fanu's running a record label of his own to represent his visions to the fullest and to contribute to the world of music as much as he can. Lightless Recordings kicked off in late July 2006 and has so far released four 12"s as well as the Fanu album, "DAYLIGHTLESS", a 2CD/3*12". The label concentrates on representing the dark, eerie, deep, breaky side of things, whether it be drum and bass or downtempo. Some of the music is deeper, some more for the dancefloor - but the quality control is high as usual so there will be no fillers! Check info on the label, the past and future releases as well as some soundclips at Lightless Recordings' Myspace page as well as the Lightless page on the official Fanu site .
Check the official Fanu website at www.fanumusic.com for a comprehensive audio section, free downloads, mixes, a news'n'blog section, discography, discussion forum, etc!
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Contact: [email protected]
Booking: [email protected]
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Download a press sheet here (.pdf).