Shur-i-kan - Dark Energy Podcast - Feb 2010

Biography of Shur-i-kan

Shur-i-kan's trademark blend of musicality with cutting edge electronic production has been turning heads and gaining fans for a number of years now.

An accomplished keyboard player Tom cut his teeth working in various jazz funk bands in London and to this day is still a long time member of improvisional dance super group The Bays. As a producer however, Shur-I-kan was first discovered by legendary DJ Tom Middleton (Jedi Knights, Global Communication), who released the debut track 'Niomi's Dream' on the seminal Jedi's Night Out compilation for Mixmag.

Shur-i-kan has been a long time and key contributor to Jimpsters' Freerange Records label (voted Best British Label 2007 by DJ Mag readers) - a relationship that started with the dreamy jazz influenced 'Advance' (2001), and the more dance orientated follow-up album 'Waypoints' (2004) and continues with a string of classic house EP's that include 'Living Inside', 'I Want It', 'Special Powers' and 'Future Fantasy'.

Representing the deeper side of house, Shur-I-kan's distinctive acclaimed productions have been in heavy demand having remixed the likes of Akabu, Trackheadz, Miguel Migs, Milton Jackson and Fred Everything amoungst others. Recently Shur-I-kan has ventured into techier territory with his much lauded Berlin Rising EP on Defected imprint Physical Graffiti and forthcoming releases on Urban Torque and Winding Road Records.

Now considered amongst the top of the new wave of deep house producers/djs, Shur-I-kan with fans including Ben Watt, Funk D' Void, Spirit Catcher and Jimpster. Shur-i-kan has been building a reputation as a formidable and exciting international DJ and has traversed the world many times rocking crowds from Tokyo, to LA with his deep and jackin' sound.

Milton Jackson - Dark Energy Podcast - Feb 2010

Biography of Milton Jackson

Milton was born 1980 in a forest. He was found by bears who looked after him as one of their own. The bears gave young Milton a good life and taught him many things. One day young Milton wanted to create sound patterns and waves and asked the leader of the Bears if he could help him out. The bear was happy to help and so trotted off to PC World and purchased Milton a 90Mhz PC with 4Mb of Ram and a copy of Cool Edit 96.

Milton worked for hours effecting samples and batching them into loops. It is a little known fact that Milton actually invented drum and bass by time-stretching the 'Eastenders' drum roll up to 160 BPM. Historical inaccuracies aside, however, young Milton certainly developed a flair for producing some half-hearted attempts at making music. Sadly, as Milton grew older, he had to leave the forest and make his own way in life. He found himself in the evil world of club culture, presided over by the likes of Nick Sentience and Eric Clapton. Milton recalls,

'It was different in those days, Clapton and Sentience ruled over everything with an iron fist. Everyone knew that something had to be done. I mean, Clapton only let DJs play Layla over the top of an Expansions bootleg, he was sucking the life out of everything' And so, Milton decided the best way to change the world was by releasing some deep house music. Which he did. Thankfully Sentience and Clapton were banished after Milton's beats of doom opened up everyone's minds and such like.

With Milton's place in house history secured, he moved on to saving rainforests and small cats. However, he couldn't stay away from music for long and decided to build a new sound for himself by inviting 80's guitar wizard, Steve Vai into his studio to do a duet with Pop Idol star, Darius Danosh. With Milton on beats he was sure his project would never fail. Sadly, due to musical differences, Danosh and Vai just couldn't get along. Milton recalls,'It was a travesty, if the three of us had worked together properly we were well on our way to creating something along the lines of a House-Rock-Opera.'

More down than ever, Milton racked his brains as to what he could do next. The logical conclusion was to do a series of house 12inch releases for various labels. Each track representing a microcosm of Milton's experiences with Vai, Clapton, Danosh and Sentience. Milton was overjoyed, not only was he going to embark on creating the first ever house concept release schedule, he was going to be able to banish those inner demons that had plagued him ever since that fateful night when Sentience had sellotaped headphones to his ears and force fed him BK mixes.

Milton has an album out called 'The Bionic Boy'. Its great and everyone likes it ' even his cats who are respected DJs in their own right. He also has another record coming out soon, which everyone likes even more than the last one. Milton has done lots of other things which he can't be bothered typing again. Suffice to say they were all nice and furry. He also runs a label called Bear Trax.

http://www.myspace.com/miltonjackson