METALHEADZ

Who they are

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  Goldie

  London, United Kingdom · 7 bookings since Jun 2024

  “<u>Goldie - Autobiography</u> Some people might call what I do drum 'n' bass.”

  their own biography

  the whole biography

  <u>Goldie - Autobiography</u> Some people might call what I do drum 'n' bass. But I'm not going to narrow it down to what the music industry thinks is commercially viable. I'm not really into narrow thinking. Making this music is like poker. You begin with five cards. You don't play poker with two cards. That's just the rule of the game. Once you learn how to play you can bend the rules. I've been in this game for as long as I can remember, seeking out bits of punk rock, pop and reggae when I was still a kid in Walsall. When slap bass days arrived in the mid eighties I started to get into Loose Ends, Change and Maze travelling for funk all-dayers. I even gave Rastafarianism a shot earning myself the nickname Goldielocks, but then the hip-hop scene blew up and you can't spin on your head if you've got locks. So I said see you later to that! Hip hop allowed me to express myself artistically for the first time. Doing graffiti art made me learn how to make something out of nothing, and it got me involved in the music scene. I spent time in New York exhibiting my work and appeared in Africa Bambatta's feature film 'Bombing' as one of Britain's top graffers. That rocked. In '86 I moved out to Miami and started a business selling engraved gold teeth. By 1990 I was on the move again, to London, where something very special was about to kick off... The club was Rage at Heaven. Everyone was just going for it. The adrenaline was pumping around the place. I heard DJs playing a weird hybrid sound, there was still the late rave stuff but here was a new sound, a mad fusion of the old and new. I'd always been the sort of kid who wanted to belong and felt like I'd found a home. In '92 I produced my first track as Ajax Project while I was doing some design and A&R work for 4Heros's Reinforced label. My next tunes Killermuffin and Menance were put out under my early moniker Rufige Kru1 on the Metalheadz label. But at first I was just this deranged kid at Rage with gold teeth shining, this nutter talking a million miles an hour. I remember clutching the cage, watching Fabio or Grooverider take the record I'd made out of the box and put it on the deck and thinking "Fuck, fuck"! By late '92 a darker sound was taking over. By '93, recording as Metalheadz, I had released my darkcore anthem Terminator, lifting the buzz saw synth riff from Joey Beltram's Mentasm alongside the mutating breakbeats that began to characterise darkcore. It was just like rebelling with the music. The darkness was Britain's new urban blues. Dark to me was just a representation of the way people were feeling at the time, there was a recession and the country was in decline. But forward ever backward never, I was in the studio again creating something fresh. My '93 release Angel was one of the first tracks to push what the industry referred to as drum 'n' bass in a more musical direction, with Urban Cookie Collective's Diane Charlemagne providing jazzy vocals. Rage shut down this year with AWOL quickly stepping in to fill the void that it left behind. Meanwhile I was working on my debut album Timeless. For me Timeless was the ultimate statement of drum 'n' bass's technical sophistication and manipulation. Back then I was the first of the drum 'n' bass crew to sign to a major label; London records. To me this made no odds, I didn't care if music was underground or overground; I knew where it came from! Timeless shot straight into the album charts at number seven, which was a first for a drum 'n' bass record. But I don't even know if I'd call it a drum 'n' bass record. I'd prefer to call it inner city ghetto music, because I'm not going to come up with stuff just to match people's perceptions of drum 'n' bass. Inner City Life, one of the albums vocal tracks, became a signature tune at LTJ Bukem's club Speed in 1994. But my style was now far removed from the bark of the Jungle music that I was putting out in my Rage days. By '95 the Metalheadz label was well up and running. Then came the Metalheadz Sunday Sessions at the Blue Note. The atmosphere was just unreal and drum 'n' bass was the music of the moment. In '96 and '97 I collected awards for Timeless, my DJing, the Metalheadz label and my compilation album Platinum Breakz. It was fair to say I'd arrived, but I was by no means burnt out and I was looking for new ways to challenge myself as an artist. In my second album Saturnz Returns the tones and tempos were more varied, the experiments bolder and the tracks definitely more personal. No one could sing about my own misfortunes more than myself. I just wanted to be sincere in my work. Sometimes I think back to when I was a kid staring out of the window going "fucking hell I'm really depressed, I really want to make it". To go from that to now is to go from real extremes and it's quite unbelievable to me. In '99 I played a bad guy in James Bond film 'The World is Not Enough' and also in Guy Ritchie's 'Snatch'. In 2001 I had a part in Eastenders as a Gangster called Angel. It's surreal. But now my focus is getting back on the music while keeping the acting thing going strong. After a two year break the Metalheadz Sunday Sessions has a new home at The Limelight, Shaftsbury Avenue. I'm currently in the studio with Jamie Matrix and J Majik recording my third album Sonic Terrorism. Meanwhile I've got a release out under my old moniker Rufige Kru called Stormtrooper VIP / The Beach on Metalheadz. The stuff I'm putting out as Rufige Kru is more dancefloor than my new album which is more like my older experimental stuff. The new Metalheadz album Platinum Breakz 3 has also just been released. So, Metalheadz has been away for a while, but it isn't dead. We don't need to put out releases every five seconds to prove ourselves. The label is still one of the most respected on the scene. After a decade of doing music it's still all good for me.
  Their RA profile lists TrustTheDJ, Moonshine, INCredible, Metalheadz and 3 more.

  Recently at Camp Kennybrook, Nowadays, Elsewhere · often with mando.mucho, Growers and Showers, cxntapillar69, none of them here that night

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  Adred

  New York City · 5 bookings since Jul 2024

  “Deeply rooted in a lifelong passion for sound, Adred (Adam Baker) has carved out a highly respected space within the global drum and bass and jungle communities.”

  their own biography

  the whole biography

  Deeply rooted in a lifelong passion for sound, Adred (Adam Baker) has carved out a highly respected space within the global drum and bass and jungle communities. His musical journey is profoundly inspired by his late father, a musician known affectionately as Kimba, whose enduring legacy instilled an early and permanent reverence for the craft of music-making. Eschewing standard, cookie-cutter templates, Adred’s production style is characterized by a meticulous, highly textured approach. Favoring a dynamic workflow that leans into the rich analog warmth of tools like the ASM Hydrasynth, Arturia, and Eventide processing, he builds sonic environments that are as cinematic as they are heavy. This dedication to deep, rolling atmospherics, complex breakbeat manipulation, and heavyweight sub-bass naturally caught the attention of drum and bass royalty, leading to a permanent home on Goldie's seminal Metalheadz label. With a substantial and growing catalog on the imprint, Adred's output represents the true vanguard of modern jungle. Whether in the studio or behind the decks, his work is a testament to an unwavering commitment to the genre's underground ethos—delivering music built for massive sound systems, yet intricate enough for deep headphone listening.
  SoundCloud ↗
  Their RA profile lists Metalheadz, Soul:r, Dispatch Recordings, 31 Records and 3 more.

  Recently at Paragon, KEYBAR · often with Paradøx, Mhmgrams, Xtralimb, none of them here that night

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  Diverge

  Leeds, United Kingdom · 4 bookings since Oct 2024

  SoundCloud ↗

  Recently at Paragon · often with Photek, Box2, Cursedin (Potsdam/ DE), none of them here that night

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  Anónima

  Georgia · 6 bookings since Nov 2023

  “DJ and event organizer, Anónima, pulls beauty from lunacy across all iterations of electronic music.”

  their own biography

  the whole biography

  DJ and event organizer, Anónima, pulls beauty from lunacy across all iterations of electronic music. Born and raised by a teen-mother in Central Florida, Anónima had adolescent exposure to the likes of rave and club culture which developed their affinity for Detroit techno, electro, and breaks. In winter of 2021, they founded a bi-monthly techno party, Unruly, which prioritizes booking other BIPOC and queer artists.Their bass-heavy selections will make you bounce against sweeping grooves and a side of sweet melodies. With deep driving cuts peppered in before the colliding gunpowder of industrial to finish. Anónima is dominating more than just our dream dance floors with their multidimensional quality.
  SoundCloud ↗
  Harsh Noise Wall on 10, House on 10, Noise on 10 and Minimal on 9. styles on their catalogued releases

  Released on Anti-label (1), AudioNautes Recordings (1) and Da Vinci Classics (1). labels on their catalogued releases

  Recently at Le Bain, Paragon, Bossa Nova Civic Club · often with Guarionex Jr, Kelman Duran, Tromac, none of them here that night

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  LOKA

  Miami · 65 bookings since Sep 2023

  SoundCloud ↗Bandcamp ↗

  Recently at Nowadays, Bossa Nova Civic Club, Paragon · often with MORENXXX, SIRENS, Via App, none of them here that night