Strictly Kev

The stalwart Ninja who stepped out of the shadows after years of steady DJing with Coldcut on numerous club gigs and their weekly radio show 'Solid Steel!' Kev met Matt Black at the 'Telepathic Fish' ambient parties of the early 90's, started designing artwork for Ninja Tune and paired up with PC to form the public 'face' of DJ Food on 4 decks in clubs around the world. After working on various Food and Coldcut related studio projects with PC (Recipe for Disaster, Journeys by DJ, ColdKrushCuts and the Blech mix compilations for Warp) he is preparing the next course...

Now working on the next DJ Food album himself, expect more of the same from the man who penned tracks like Nevermore and The Riff, among others, from the last album Kaleidescope, and is responsible for the incredible Raiding the 20th Century - A History of the Cut-Up mix (so popular it crashed boom selection's server when posted on the premier bootleg site).

DJ Food has been many persons, of who we will come to in a moment. DJ FOOD is best described as Food for DJs, simple as that, just flip it around and it begins to mean something entirely different.

Originally produced by Coldcut the DJ Food project started in 1990 with the release of Jazz Brakes. Jazz Brakes Volume 3 being the label's most successful early album. Not only are they effective collections of breaks, loops and samples ideal for mixing, remixing and producing - but also fine collections of funky jazz & hip hop tunes, that cut it just as well on the discerning dancefloor as in the safety of your own home... Since the growth of the abstract hip hop scene recent years the Jazz Brakes albums have proved to be ahead of their time Jazz Brakes Volumes 4 & 5, co-created with DJ/producer PC, are collections of finely crafted tunes that transcend the breakbeat compilation format to stand as artist albums in their own right. These latter DJ Food albums have developed with shades of latin, dub, techno, ambient, tribal, african and jungle flavouring the funk. The October '95 album entitled A Recipe For Disaster was a conscious break from the five Jazz Brakes volumes to form more of an identity as an artist, and a remix album of tracks from all 6 LPs Refried Food was released Feb '96. A new Studio album is being prepared by PC and Strictly Kev in various top secret kitchens across London as you read this. They are collaborating with various guests on this including Bundy K. Brown (ex-Tortoise, Directions in Music, Pullman) and Ken Nordine (60's word jazz poet).

But who makes this food then? We know that Matt Black & Jonathan More (aka Coldcut) were responsible for starting the DJ FOOD series of Jazz Brakes back in the early 90's, and along the way they met Patrick Carpenter (PC) who was commonly misconstrued as the computer that they made the tracks on for a while. A loose collaborative team began to form as more like-minded people arrived at the party; Paul Brook, Paul Rabiger, Strictly Kev and Issac Elliston to name a few.

Whilst keeping their hand in as DJs, Matt & Jon couldn't and didn't want to DJ twice in one night under both aliases of Coldcut & Food so PC & Strictly stepped up to represent the Food club-wise. This was the score for some time, until PC became so busy with his involvement in the Cinematic Orchestra that he decided to depart to concentrate on that, leaving Strictly Kev to carry the mantle and really come into his own.

Kev now DJs out regularly, travelling all over the world and creating a stir wherever he plays! He is amazingly versatile, both in the variety of tunes and his skills on the decks, playing a mix of jazzy, funky breaks, bootlegs, hip hop and usually building the set to a drum & bass crescendo that has the crowd going nuts.

He has also becoming reknowned for his soundtrack performance to the Monkees' insane surreal movie 'Head'. An astonishing 90-minute three-deck real-time rampage through 60's psychedelia, soundtracks, humour, military bands and other crazy tunes, he shows exactly how it should be done in terms of balance, timing and sheer accuracy of deck craftsmanship.

The man is a joy to watch and great fun to dance along to - look on ye mighty DJs and despair!

"Instant doubles of any track! Want to try a juggle routine with that great break on the £100+ 7" you just bought from ebay? Record it in and get going..."

For booking info and gig list check out: http://www.codaagency.com/djfood.html