Audio Farm presents Steevio and Suzybee this Easter Weekend
Steevio has been involved in electronic music since he managed the UK’s first electro / breakdance club The Sidewalk in 1982 in Newcastle. It was the beginning of a love affair with machines that has only grown stronger with the passing years. His early electro experiments were surpassed throughout the 90’s when he became a live techno artist at clubs and free parties in the UK releasing dozens of records under various aliases such as 3000003, Free Radicals and Mindtours, and managed several techno labels, culminating in the formation of the Mindtours label with Suzybee in 2000.
Always remaining stoutly underground, with the focused intention of producing original live electronic music on hardware, in 2005 he returned to his former interest in organising events and created the first Freerotation Festival with Suzybee in Wales. Freerotation has grown from a small party for friends and like-minded musicians into the highly-regarded and much-loved international event it is today.
Freerotation has furnished Steevio with the perfect platform to showcase his live hardware performances, but everything moved up a gear in 2009 when he built a dedicated modular synthesizer as an improvisational instrument on which to make techno, and from 2010 he began performing live on his new set-up at Freerotation.
Steevio’s modular is 100% analogue, so there are no memories to save sounds or sequencing patterns, and everything happens in real time. Steevio’s performances are pure improvisation, and all the music is totally unique to each gig. All the sequences and sounds are created from scratch on the fly.
Recently Steevio has embarked on several projects with other live artists, The High-on-Wye Quintet with Move D, Soulphiction and Juju & Jordash, and Circle of Live with Sebastian Mullaert, Mathew Jonson, Johanna Knutsson and Dorisburg, and more recently the Circle of Live has expanded to include such diverse artists as Amp Fiddler, Peter Van Hoesen, Frank Wiedermann, Steffi, Vril and more.
AUDIO FARM FESTIVAL LIVE - BLEEPFUNK
Graham Fletcher is an electronic music trooper of the most diligent.
Meeting him some years back on the campsite of Freerotation some years back, it was clear from a cursory conversation that I was just treading water in shallows of a Mariana trench depth level of electronic music knowledge.
That musical knowledge is spread over two sets featuring his performances on both our main 'Sundance' stage and also his early morning ambient set at our 'Nest' stage.
Graham is no stranger to the latter, having spent over 16 hours behind the turntables on the Nest stage in 2017's One Tribe festival alongside his turntable tag team partner and another one of our family favourite, Luke Farey.
Audio Farm Festival 2018 - Aloona
Many people are saying Audio Farm 2018 was our best yet with unforgettable performances from DJ Sneak, Carl Craig, Lone, Jerome Hill, Special Request, Surgeon and so, so many more
Amongst the highlights and headliners, however, was a wealth of fresh new talent to discover, amongst them was the first of our live sets recorded at Hopton Court this year on the Sundance stage early Saturday afternoon. Aloona.
Brought up with the sounds of reggae, soca and soul, Aloona was inspired by the revolution in dance music in the early 90s and the likes of Unique 3, Rebirth of Cool, Portishead, Omar and the world sounds of Giles Peterson and Nitin Sawnhey.
On the dancefloor, Aloona displays the fevered passion for quirky unique tracks, blending jazz, jungle, trip-hop, house and world sounds and most recently has played Elrow’s festival after-party at Ministry of Sound.
As you’ll hear for yourself, Aloona’s sound is a perfect accompaniment for a hazy summer head, even under these changeable autumnal skies.
Just a little note here, all of our mixes recorded from the event (save for a few) will be put on our forthcoming Patreon page in order to help raise money for the festival and charity.
And if you want to get a warm feeling warm without urinating yourself, you can donate to our Crowdfunder
Enjoy x
AUDIO FARM RESIDENTS 004: ASHER
Fellow Sauce resident (alongside previous resident selector, Bradford Dave), Asher has been a staple underground wall-crawler and DJ for over a decade in the city of Manchester’s sprawling music community, regularly taking to the turntables in venues like The White Hotel and beyond.
Asher has been a huge component in mapping out the sounds of our festival since 2013 as well as our Dug Out stage at the acclaimed Festival Number 6.
This mix has Asher taking you through rugged, bumping rhythms and melodic house sounds all the way to high-end electro-tinged techno.
Enjoy x
AUDIO FARM FESTIVAL RESIDENTS 003: BRADFORD DAVE
Our third in this series of selectors welcomes Bradford Dave to the platform. A permanent fixture at Audio Farm festival since 2013, Dave can be found plying his trade at his Manchester throwdown, 'Sauce' alongside, co-pilot, Asher. You can catch Bradford Dave at this year's Audio Farm festival as part of the Human Shield party for our departed friend, Pete Mangalore.
For those that don’t know who Peter was and why we’re celebrating his life this year, can you give us a little story about him at the festival?
“I remember the first Audio Farm I played at, at the Work House and I was DJing on Friday night. The needles on the decks were fucked and the first 5 or 6 records I played skipped. The room was pretty busy when I started, but soon emptied with the ensuing disaster! To make matters worse, a pissed up lad was continually pestering me to let him have a go, I later found out this was Christian Wood (Il Bosco) of Red Laser fame, who’d been playing earlier. So while the records were skipping and the harassing became more persistent, I asked Pete Mangalore to help out - maybe find someone with better needles, or something, but he wouldn’t because he said it was too funny. He just stood and laughed at me! Typical Peter”.
So, you’ve been with us from the start. What makes you keep coming back?
“Why do I keep coming back? Because I keep getting asked to come back, so why wouldn’t I? It’s a great weekend and it’s testament to you lot for all the hard work you put in that it keeps getting better and better. When I saw the Forest Stage last year, I couldn’t believe how good it looked and I’m really looking forward to finding out what’s in store this year”.
You can catch Dave alongside Asher this coming weekend, instore at Eastern Bloc.
For more info, head here
ESSENTIAL DJ SNEAK
This year's Audio Farm Festival finds us playing host to one of the true heroes of the house music genre in the form of Chicago’s own, DJ Sneak.
It’s fair to say that even today Sneak’s influence still casts a wide shadow, with some of the biggest lights in music today still sighting DJ Sneak as a major influence in their work.
From Basement Jaxx to Daft Punk the accolades for Sneaks work are like a roll call for the who’s who in house music culture.
Now I’m sure everyone has their own favourites that have been left out of this list and it’s easy to see why with such a hefty back catalogue. So this is just a little snapshot of an epic career spanning the best part of 3 decades at the forefront of a style of house music full of soul, swing and viscous funk.
DJ SNEAK – WORK IT
Reeking of party from the word go , the first release on his own first label, Defiant Records, ‘Work it’ BW with the cheeky rag time sound of ‘Mutant Jazz’.
DJ SNEAK - MESSAGE OF LOVE
in 1993, whilst working in Chicago’s acclaimed record shop, Gramophone, Sneak met a young Green Velvet. This meeting led to a partnership that that went on to deliver many fruitful years of work together, including this debut release on Velvet’s fledgling Cajual label.
DJ SNEAK - MANOS QUE TOCAN (DEEP MIX)
One of Sneaks early outings on seminal New York label Strictly Rhythm this stripped back, percussive workout showed another side to Sneaks sound pallet.
DJ SNEAK – FIX MY SINK
Of all the monsters Sneak concocted, it seems this is the one that cemented his legendary status. Featuring vocalist, Bear Who, Fix My Sink came out in 2002 as a part of his solo Album Housekeeping on Credence and has never really gone away since.
DJ SNEAK - LOVE
Taken from the solid ‘Platforms’ EP in 1995 on 83 West records was an incendiary record for both Techno and house dancefloors alike across the world.
DJ SNEAK & ARMAND VAN HELDEN - PSYCHIC BOUNTY KILLAZ (PT-2)
1999 saw a release another collaboration with long time friend and studio buddy Armand Van Helden as part of his 2 Future 4 U EP, this mutated disco frenzy appeared alongside monsters like ‘Necessary Evil’ and the timeless house anthem, “You Don’t Know Me”.
DJ SNEAK - SHOW ME THE WAY
Never one to shy away from a big sample, Sneak took ‘The Jackson 5’s ‘Show You The Way To Go’ and turned out a mid-nineties house monster.
DJ SNEAK – ALL OVER MY FACE 08
Originally released in 95 as part of Da Pimpdoggin EP, this Loose Joints ‘All Over My Face’ sampling monster was updated to great effect some 13 years later.
DJ SNEAK – U CAN’T HIDE FROM YOUR BUD
1997 was a huge year for Sneak. Riding high with international acclaim. A wealth of remixes from Daft Punk to Dave Clarke and a member of DJ super-group, alongside Roger and Jnr Sanchez, as part of the S Men. To top it off, he goes and tears up the roots with this timeless anthem.
U can’t hide from your bud sampled teddy Pendergrass's "You Can't Hide From Yourself’
AUDIO FARM FESTIVAL RESIDENTS: HUGO
The second Audio Farm resident to step up takes the form of energetic party-starter, Hugo, with a voyage through a gloriously anthemic rollercoaster of hand raisers and foot tappers.
So how did you come to be involved in the Audio Farm team?
I met the guys from Audio Farm a few times at forest raves and parties and this one year my nephew Andy asked me to throw him a mega party at his house so we went crazy and decked his whole gaff out with camo by screwing heavy duty hooks all around his house. We even had a slip and slide into a swimming pool outside amongst other crazy fun stuff. Later that night I had a call off Tay Audio Farm asking if they could come round, an hour later they turned up with a rig and before we knew it the place was full on party. We called it ‘Smashed at the Brickhouse’.
I have been involved with the Audio Farm crew and their parties from pretty much the beginning. I was lucky enough to be asked by Ste Chesters to develop the first website, which has been redeveloped over the years and which I still look after today.
I’m also hands on when the festival build is on and help out as much as I can, as anyone who’s involved in running big events knows how much work there is behind the scenes to make these events happen so anything I can do I know goes a long way.
You’ve been playing for the event for a few years now, can you talk us through how you prepare to play at the festival?
One of my passions is finding decent music and not necessarily new music but great tracks that become almost archived, these are the tracks I love to find and add to my ever-growing collection. I have been collecting music now for over 20 years so organising my library is important to me so I can easily find the sound I am looking for when playing at any party or event. Most of my collection is digital now and I am currently migrating to Rekordbox as it just makes sense to do this as Pioneers’ industry standard kit uses this.
For each planned set I will collate a digital crate of tracks on usb and make sure I have enough tracks to play depending on the present crowd. From experience having a planned set from one track to the next never seems to go how you want it to, so by having a more diverse selection on hand gives you the freedom to change the mood and get more in tune with the crowd.
Could you give us a few of your favourite memories at the festival and are there any special tracks reserved for your Audio Farm set?
There are so many memories but my all time favourite was last year’s Audio Farm Festival at Cholmondley Castle. Mobius Loop were performing in The Nest, and up until that point the whole of the weekend was dry, we had a short down poor and soon we had mud. My daughter, Verity Mae who was 11 at the time decided to cover herself in mud from head to toe and join in the dancing at the front of the stage, it wasn’t long before she had an entourage of mud dancing tribal warriors joining in the fun. That pretty much made my weekend.
Regarding special tracks I do have a few, and I’ll definitely be playing a track by ‘Riva Starr’ called ‘The Loft’ which is a remix by ‘Emanual Satie’. I love the energy this track gives and the video below shows this energy and how raw parties used to be back in those days.
The track pretty much sums up what my set is going to sound like. If I have a fraction of that crowd dancing I’ll be happy.
[embedyt] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIiTqyjo2F8[/embedyt]
Do you think working for the festival has had an impact on your everyday life?
Not really although I am constantly tinkering away on the backend of the site. I have met and continue to meet the best people and for this I’m grateful. There are so many corporate festivals that are just money making machines and they can attract the wrong crowd, that’s pretty much the opposite for Audio Farm Audio Farm Festival as everyone there is there not only for the music and healing but to meet like-minded souls of a kindred spirit. One Love One Tribe X
Audio Farm Residents: Cy Humphreys
With it being an epic task to put on a festival with such a small team, none of the team has yet to put together a mix for our website in the 2 years. Not a one! Enter our resident house music botherer and Beatport underachiever, Cy Humphreys, who’s hastily put together a weighty mix from our farm to your table.
So how did you come to be involved in the festival?
“Well, I’ve been involved from the very start of the road I’d say. I first met the guys at gatherings and parties in remote parts of North Wales about 2007 - come to think of it, I distinctly remember my first ever encounter with Ste (Chesters) – him telling me he wanted to create a festival environment with some of the biggest artists in the world. You hear that sort of thing all the time and I laughed it off as easily. They set up shop in Withington and Audio Farm opened the doors in the Northern Quarter’s Moho Live, early 2009.
After a flurry of events with the likes of Derrick May, Shonky, Radioactive Man, Evil 9, I ate my words, moved up to Manchester and joined the circus. I’ve never really looked back. I’ve watched the rabble grow into a thriving, busy village of super-talented heroes make some truly breath-taking festival moments I’ll never forget”.
Like?
“The production value that went into the Forest Stage last year was outstanding I think it was a guy called Daniel Jacques that came up with the design. I apologise if I leave anyone out. Our décor crew like Sonya and Dawn, source such odd and unique pieces. There’s not too many times I walk round the site when I don’t have to do a double take.
Last year the crew managed to get hold of some of the set from the BBC show, Peaky Blinders, they turned a passport checking booth into a bar. I do get chuffed pointing it out to people like I had some credit in that happening. Reflective glory!”
What do you play at the festival?
“House and disco (no edits) with a bit of techno like Robert Hood or Anthony Shakir with acapellas, Rick & Morty clips. There’s no real standard format. But the bulk of it is house…… A few rave records. Everyone plays rave from time to time these days. I’ve got some stuff that I’ve made that’s exclusive to me that I’m too lazy to get released”
“I played a dubstep remix once, too.”
What are your highlights to check out at this year’s Festival?
“The line-up this year has to be a favourite from my point of view, as I own at least one record of every artist at the top of the bill. Carl Craig will surely be something special and I’m handing over the headphones to DJ Sneak this year, too.
As far as people off the beaten track so-to-speak? Someperson. He’s, like this dusty, Dilla-esque guy from round my way. Sam Watson is always good. We’re also having a Human Shield event to mark our lovely friend Pete Mangalore, who sadly passed this year. This will be a permanent fixture at the festival now as he was a highlight at every event we put on.
Errr, Barry Gammon and The Midday incident, as I want to know what Paul’s done with his viral fame after his offer of “12 free bales of hay” post went viral with hundreds and thousands of shares across the globe last winter. You’d think they didn’t have free hay in Japan, not to mention the delivery charge on that from Preston?"
Could you give us a few of your favourite memories behind the turntables at the festival and are there any special tracks reserved for your Audio Farm set?
“Last year, I did 5 back to back 18 hour shifts then went to warm up for Lone on the Forest Stage.
A few years ago a guy didn’t turn up for his set and Pete (Mangalore) came running past me saying ““Matt’s (Black Eyes) try’na blag it – grab yer records - we’re not gonna let that c**t get away with it”.
Once there he demanded we were doing it topless”.
I guess I’m known at the festival for playing the Ashley Beedle remix of The Streets ‘Weak Become Heroes’ as a closer”
Tell us about your mix?
It was recorded live in one take on a Sunday morning in Hoole with my girlfriend when we were dog sitting for my mate, Danny. He’s got some decent kit so I pugged in and played for a bit.
I’ve only got one turntable and no mixer at home so I took the rare opportunity. There wasn’t any planning that went into it (as will become apparent)
Intro with Amy Poehler.
D Train you’re the one for me
Gary’s Gang – Lets Lovedance (Danny Krivitt Edit)
Gene Chandler – When You’re #1
Dan Shake - Magic Marcel
Global Communication The Way (Secret Ingredients Mix)
Roman Rauch – Too Many Things
MF Doom- Devil’s Shoestring (Cody Currie’s Re-Jazz)
Kyle Hall - Tomorrow is the day
Mr G & G Flame - G’s Sound Dub
Anonym - Deep Ending
Round II – New Day
G Prod – D-Light
Kink – Chorus
Russ Gabriel – Change
DJ H – Come On Boy (Larry Levan Mix)
Marques Hawkes – Basement is Burning
Koenig Saatgut – The Spirit
Doc Daneeka - Never Wanna Lose Your Love
Duke Silver – DugOut
Unbreakable Kimmy Choir – Ellija Rise
HOME OF THE DRUM - BY NIGHT (SPOTIFY PLAYLIST)
Pulsing through the night, powered by a fusion core of molten Detroit soul, underpinned German engineering, 'Home Of The Drum - By Night', will be piloted by some of the most legendary figures the global techno scene has to offer.
To help get acquainted with the talent we've got on offer, we've decided to put together a very special 'Home Of The Drum - After Dark' Spotify Playlist, to give your ears a bit of a rub down.
This playlist takes a tour round a few highlights of our guest's prolific careers, taking in the likes of Juan Atkins' seminal 1982 record as Cybotron - Clear, as well as fellow Detroit resident, DJ Bone's 'It's All About'.
Scottish legends, Slam, have painted their way through seven shades of techno textures over the years, as you can see from their first release on their own Soma Recordings, 'Eterna'.
And we have XDB and his fist pumping, 'Indywa' whereas Fellow Freerotator, DJ October on the list with tracks like, 'Drama Queen'.
You can catch these guys alongside residents of some of the area's most respected party platforms. Manchester vinyl monolith, Eastern Bloc will be represented by Kerrie, *Means&3rd and Akram and front-running techno party, Meat Free will be in control of Saturday, with their residents: Blasha & Allatt Alice Woods and Lucy Ironmonger.
Liverpool's leaders in the underground and hosts of Friday's party, 303, take over with their residents: Kenny Muir Stuart Hodson and Gemma Muir. Not to mention our residents: Leon Mittenacht, Gary Sloan and Tom Houghton.
For more playlists from us and our guests, you can subscribe to our Spotify page. You can just cloick It's right there. It'd be rude not to.
You can also check out exclusive mixes and more music on our SoundCloud page.
HOME OF THE DRUM - DAYTIME
Edging closer and closer, like a stampede of colour, rhythm and sound, One Tribe is well and truly over the horizon and heading towards us at what seems like breakneck speed.
With all the music on offer, we're sure there's not a person here that's heading down to Cholmondeley Castle that hasn't got their highlights in the lineup. But just to help you out in discovering some new sounds to get your head around, we've put together a series of Spotify playlists with sounds of the artists that will be pumping out of the speakers.
We began by examining The Forest Stage's wealth of musical acumen with tracks by the likes of Boddika, Lone, Move D, Psychmagik and Roberto.
Next, under the melodic microscope, we have The Home Of The Drum during the daytime.
While seven shades of techno pulse through The Home of The Drum by night, the day belongs to a procession of eclectic sounds from all over the world.
Highlights include Stadium electro titans, The Egg, that will be taking us back to transforming car adverts in 2007 with their Radio One strangling 'Walking Away'. Wild Marmalade blend primal didgeridoo sounds with swingy chords in 'Redbelly'. Afriquoi lay down original uplifting and contemporary African influenced house. The Turbans give you a taste of traveller rave before the industrial revolution through their Balkan Beats, whereas the John Fairhurst's mountainous voice strides over a punchy, stripped back, Mississippi Delta groove on 'Hungry Blues'.
With only one track per artist on this playlist, these tracks are needles in the harmonic haystack, so a bit of extra research might advisable (with a great many artists not actually being on Spotify). And be sure to subscribe for future exclusive playlists from Lone, Move D, DJ October and Roberto and many more artists.
For more music and downloads you can head to our SoundCloud page for exclusive mixes by Luv*Jam, Duckett and live recordings from One Tribe itself.