Сoda Agency
By the time Roughneck Ting was up-and running, Glaswegian born-and-bred Mark(ee) 'Substance' Morrison had already been enthusiastically following the prototype jungle/breakbeat hardcore sound for several years. The move into drum & bass was as logical as his decision to abandon his love affair with the guitar in favour of the delights of electronic production.
Meanwhile, Bristol native Darren 'Decoder' Beale was also being seduced away from his career as a jobbing axeman in a series of skate-punk bands after college mate Geoff Barrows (of Portishead fame) introduced him to the delights of the sampler.
"I was becoming bored with the guitar sound and Geoff showed me this thing called a sampler, which I'd never heard of before," recalls Darren. "I was like, 'that's amazing, it's a band in a box'. I realised what you could do with it, started making electronic music and never really looked back.
After a short spell releasing hardcore records as Orca, Darren hooked up with Markee at Roughneck Ting and was soon an integral part of the crew. With the parties as a focus, Markee and Darren soon established themselves as stalwarts of the Bristol drum & bass scene; they were founding partners in Breakbeat Culture, the record shop that remains the city's premiere drum & bass outlet to this day. However, their hearts really lay in the studio and by the mid-90s they were making serious noise with cuts like Substance's Downright and Homeboys and Decoder's Circuit Breaker on their own Breakbeat Culture and Tech Itch labels.
But despite their love of the dancefloor-oriented tunes they were listening to, spinning and creating, both producers soon felt the nagging urge to try something different, spread their wings and take their music into new territories.
Meanwhile, up in the Welsh mountains another musical talent was also feeling restless.
After five years partying at events across the country, inhabiting a treehouse at the Newbury bypass protests, travelling around in horse-drawn carts and generally Iiving the alternative Iifestyle to the max. Sian Evans had finally come to rest in a commune in Wales, by now with a small son in tow.
In between her other activities, the Welsh songstress had continued to add vocals to a succession of dance tracks, as well as preparing a substantial stock of songs on her trusty acoustic guitar. And now she decided it was time to take her musical activities a little bit more seriously.
"I've experienced so any things in my life and that really helps out with my song writing," musses Sian. 'I lived in teepees and various communes around the country and they were brilliant times, but eventually I decided, 'Right, I'm sitting here playing with my guitar, but I want more from this, I can get more out of music.' So I had to take myself off the mountain, down to the city and start making things happen."
So we're back to that meeting in a studio circa 1998, where something a little bit special started to happen. First Markee, then Darren, booked Sian for a session and somehow they just seemed to click, so much so they had a tune down on tape just hours after they started working together.
Even at this early stage, it was obvious Markee and Darren had an uncanny knack for bringing out the best in Sian and, moreover, the trio found they shared a desire to push the boundaries of drum & bass and give breakbeat-loving clubbers something to hum along to. A vision was quickly formed of a dance outfit that would combine the techniques developed over five years of intensive drum & bass production with the three protagonists' deep musical heritage.
"We love songs and we love beats, it seemed obvious to put them together, reflects Markee. "We all understand songwriting anyway because of our backgrounds, it was an untapped resource and Kosheen has given us the chance to bring it out. We wanted to keep things wide open, I've never really stuck to one sound as a producer because I was always trying to do my own thing and Kosheen is about taking that idea to its logical conclusion."
