Submitted By: Wanchope

Genre: Breaks

Date of Set: Apr 7th, 2007

Filesize: 79.97 MB

Total Downloads: 17

The Rogue Element is 25-year old producer Ben Medcalf. His fascination with music began with piano lessons at the age of seven, moving through various different instruments until his early teens, when he settled down behind the drum kit and started his first band. This band proved to be the embryonic stages of more than just Ben's career: playing guitars was the future electro-house producer and DJ King Roc, and on bass guitar was Jarman, now a successful drum and bass DJ and producer signed to Renegade Hardware.

The band split up in when Ben left for university, during which time he decided to become a session drummer. While at university his love of rock music had branched out into a strong interest in drum and bass and breakbeat, and as a result he began playing live drums alongside DJs at drum and bass raves. Upon graduating in the year 2000 he moved to London, into a shared house with another old Portsmouth friend, the now Ministry resident Tom Neville, and future collaborator Tom Real. While living here he attended Drumtech school of music, where in addition to drum technique he learned the ins and outs of music production, which swiftly developed into an obsession. A growing dissatisfaction with drum and bass and a keen interest in the work of then-emerging breaks artists such as the Plump DJs and FreQ Nasty prompted him to start making his own breakbeat and electro-house tunes in Tom Neville's kindly-loaned studio, until he finally got round to buying his own gear.

With his own studio now, Ben continued in this vein until his first full release in October 2002 - the bass-driven tech-house stomper 'Funky Dirt' on the now-defunct funky Nukleuz offshoot 'Beautiful Records'. Since then Ben has had a number of 12' releases on various indie labels, including MN2S sister label 1Trax and Functional Breaks. In April 2004 he signed an album deal with the reputable and eclectic Exceptional Records label. His first single on Exceptional ('My Style'/You Know That Sound') received widespread acclaim from the breakbeat community (The Crystal Method, Rennie Pilgrem, DJ Hyper, DJ Quest) and was played on Radio 1 by Zane Lowe, Annie Mac and Annie Nightingale. The forthcoming single 'Calm' has done the rounds on promo and has also received Radio 1 plays from Zane Lowe and Annie Mac, and has been played by Eddie Temple-Morris on Xfm. DJ support has come from the Plump DJS, DJ Hyper, Atomic Hooligan and the Breakfastaz.

The Rogue Element's debut album is due for release at the end of summer 2005 and will include elements of hip hop, rock and house music in addition to breakbeat. Ben lives in North London and apart from producing dance music writes the musical scores for documentaries. He is currently learning to DJ and expects to start playing gigs in the very near future.

Not available