Kniteforce Revolution

The History of Kniteforce - Chapter 9

Nov 22, 05:58 PM

Chapter 9

Since the original website went up in 2001, it has been revamped and changed a number of times. In its last incarnation, I was selling the vinyl through my own store, as Kingsize no longer wanted to run his shop. For a brief time, I joined up with other labels under the All-4-1 banner, in an attempt to pool resources and sell more records in a dwindling vinyl environment.
KFA had bought in new artists, such as Panacea and Belladonna, both of whom remain pioneers in the scene. The production on the label became more professional, and of course, I started to do the Supaset thing.

The Supasets came about because, by the time I got to KFA20, I was already getting bored of my own music when I played out to crowds. My Dj work had piled up and I was getting busier and busier, touring the world and playing regularly in the UK. I had received massive support in the form of an online petition to get me at more events, and that remains one of the high points in my career. It was flattering and touching. And the work it generated for me was very welcome.
Nevertheless, I felt constricted when playing out. I wanted to play all the styles I was into, in one set. I was playing old skool in Germany, harder music in the USA, and a mixture of the two in the UK. And wherever I played, I usually dropped a few D’n‘B tracks, just for the hell of it. I began to see that if I wasn’t going to burn out or get tired of the Dj work, I would need to make it more exciting for myself. My career has always been, at heart, a selfish pleasure. I am pleased other people like what I do, but, in truth, I am motivated by my own whims and curiosities.
So I started work on a set that combined all the styles of music I was into. This was tricky, because I would need to shift tempos and styles very quickly. However, I had a studio to help me work this out…and CD mixers meant the cost of testing an idea was negligible. To cut a dub was ¬£30.00, and if it didn’t work as planned? You were screwed. Burning a CD on the other hand…
So I set to work. A month or so later, I had a chaotic mish-mash of tracks that I could play in one set. I was using both vinyl and CD, other peoples tracks and my own, as well as purpose built transitional dubs and samples to bridge from one style to another.
I was terrified the first night I played it. I knew what I was doing was a bit odd, to say the least. How would the crowd respond to Gabba, D’n‘B, Old Skool, Banging modern hardcore and Jungle in one set? With silly samples and jokes thrown in?
The answer was, pretty fantastically actually, lol.
Its funny to think so now – My DJ work is synonymous with diversity, in much the same way that KFA is as a label. And in 2008 I am certainly not the only one doing this. But at the time of the first Supaset, my inspiration was the CD series “Journeys By Dj”, the one made by Coldcut. Offhand, I cant think of anyone else that I heard who was mixing that way, although I am sure there were people doing so. Anyway, the Coldcut CD is a mixup of styles, mostly quirky downbeat, but jungle, dub, techno etc, and even the Doctor Who theme makes an appearance. I recommend it to everyone, by the way. If you can find it, that is. I was also working from the idea I had in 1998 while touring Japan. Having no music I liked, I made a set of dubplates that I could mix combining all sorts of music along with TV theme tunes and general silliness – those of you who know the label will know I am speaking of the Japanera mix, which I now think of as Supaset 0.
Nowadays, plenty of people like Shitmatt and Skywalker (to name the first 2 that spring to mind) are mixing in a chaotic style, and playing with music from other genres with no regard to traditional barriers. And the scene is more interesting and vibrant for it. And I am certainly not claiming to be the first to do what I did. I think many people were feeling the same thing – that the music in each scene was mostly boring with occasional flashes of brilliance, and to mash up the brilliant bits from each genre made music and djing lively and fun again. I also think the scenes were ready for this change. And parties were, and are, changing. After going to a party like Bangface, you cant help but think that the new way to rave has arrived, and the old way is going to have to catch up or fade away, eventually!
So Supaset 1 was a success, and it made most people happy, and a few confused, which was fine by me.





Another thing that happened about this time was, while djing in the USA, I met my wife, DJ Bexxie. I am not going to get all wishy washy about her, but I mention it because she had a big impact on me, and more importantly (to those reading this), on the label and the running of the business. I was in the process of making Supaset 2 when she came to live with me in the UK, and, as she had studied music production at school, she was and remains a very useful person to have around. Most of you will know I am self taught in the studio. This has advantages – I don’t follow the rules, so I go about things in an unusual way, with unusual results. However, it has a disadvantage, and its best summed up like this. I know how to do things, but I don’t know why they do what they do. Bexxie knows why, so when I have a problem I cant fix, its a pretty safe bet that she can!

Of course, I could learn this stuff, but 1. I am always too busy to start looking through manuals or going to school and 2. I don’t want to. I hate getting bogged down in the details. Some people love that side of studio engineering – Dj Ham springs to mind as a person who seems to absorb knowledge like a sponge. The first tracks on Kniteforce I made with him, and I engineered. By KF038, he had far surpassed me! Me? I have to ram that sort of knowledge into my head with a hammer, and then there’s still a good chance it will fall out the other side with me none the wiser lol…I have trouble learning things that aren’t immediately useful.
Also, Bexxie quickly took on the responsibility for the KFA store, which freed my time up to get more music done. While at the same time, it meant that orders and things got done properly. To this day, she is a key element in the process for me – she masters my tracks, and is a great sounding board for both music and ideas. Lastly, she designed and built the website you are reading this on. Which is also a pretty major bit of usefulness right there! And this is all on top of being a dj and musician in her own right, who was producing music and playing out at clubs in the US before we even met.


So where was I? The Supasets gained me a lot more work, but produced a curious paradox. It soon came to be that I was largely booked to DJ because of the Supasets. I couldn’t sell them – the samples and other peoples music made that a logistical nightmare. So I gave them away free online. And the nature of the sets was such that they very often only contained 1 or 2 tracks from KFA – and those would be in a bastardized form. I made other tracks for the sets, but these were either jokes, contained very illegal samples, or were not in a proper release format. They might be only 2 minutes long, or start at 145bpm and finish at 200bpm. So I have ended up with sets that promote my djing, and djing which promotes my sets, ha ha.
And KFA became a label that was almost a side thought. Or rather, it was complimentary to the Djing, rather than central to it. Not that I dont enjoy making records and putting them out. I love that part of it! It was why I got into the industry, and nothing compares to holding a finished release in your hand! Only, I was making a living from djing and only covering costs on the record label, which wasn’t really doing anything for me business wise. It promotes me, of course, but only in a limited sort of way.
Usually record labels in the hardcore scene are like adverts for the Dj, or for compilation albums. KFA is a freak, and so isn’t invited to the compilation party very often, and when it is, it feels uncomfortable being there ;o)
And, record sales were stagnant – which was actually a success in a weird way. We were getting more popular, but record sales were dropping. This translated to static sales, pretty much. And thats where we were by the end of 2006…

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