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Shades’ 90s boom-bap, hip-hop influence is prevalent throughout their half-time songs. During a Twitch.tv livestream a user asked “do you go for specific groves or do they happen by accident?” and responded they “have a natural inclination to play these kind of boom-bap like New York rap inspired, kind of hip-hop kind of beats” (Depauw & Dennis, Shades (Alix Perez & Eprom) - Livestream 2020).

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Flag of the Ethiopian Royal Standard used during Haile Selassie's reign, often claimed by the Rastafari

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Themes of Rastafari influencing label 'DMZ'

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Themes of Rastafari influencing label 'DMZ'

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Recounting his family being “a mix of Seventh Day Adventist, Pentecostal and Rastafarism.” “I grew up in a world where some people believed the government was using people - like mental slavery to  build up their empire.” Speaking about ‘DMZ’ “it’s never really been a war thing, but to set our minds free from outside forces that control our thinking.” (Jenkins, 2021).

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Cover of Wayne Smith's 'Under Me Sleng Teng' vinyl record

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Coki recounts “I’ve always grown up listening to reggae, dub, dancehall.” Saying he “used to copy bass notes'' stating he’s building one that’s “on a kind of ‘Sleng Teng’ bass note” the first fully electronic reggae rhythm, created for Wayne Smith ‘Under Mi Sleng Teng’ 1985, “and you do these things because that's what you like.” (Muggs, 2013).

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Big Apple Records in Croyden, considered the hub of early dubstep

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Garage/Drum & Bass(Foundations of Dubstep)

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Garage/Drum & Bass(Foundations of Dubstep)

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Although Coki says he felt like a spectator at garage raves (Muggs, 2013), it was influential on the creation of dubstep. “Dubstep back in the day was two-step”, “and the drum patterns are kinda like broken-beat-” states Benga in an interview featuring Skream “basically like underground garage” Skream interjects. “Really it was trying to create someone else's sound.” “And you just got it wrong, but then Artworks was like ‘you need to keep on going down that route because you’re going to start something else” concludes Benga (Das-Hassan, 2008).

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Spiral Tribe, European free party movement in the 1990s

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Julian cites “Spiral Tribe’s” tapes as his first experience, stating “it was a musical awakening for me; discovering how looped music could make me travel in my own mind.” (Riitijoki, 2020). Niko similarly was given a compilation CD commenting “I could not say exactly which artist was on this compilation”, “it was a real revolution.” (Riitijoki, 2020).

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Album cover of Nirvana's debut 1991 album 'Nevermind'

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Julian comments “I fell in love with rock and metal because of my father.” Discovering Iron Maiden and AC/DC when he was 9 “that was a real kick in the teeth”, discovering Nirvana amongst others in his teens (Beale, 2022). Niko recounts “my big brother gave me Nevermind by Nirvana”, “I was hooked right away”, “a lot of my influences come from that music.” (Beale, 2022).

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Title drop of the television series 'Little House on the Prairie' 1974-1982

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During a studio session they heard the same auditory hallucination through a bass sequence sounding like a voice repeating “Walnut Grove”, a reference to the village in ‘The Little House on the Prairie’, television series broadcasted in their youth (Riitijoki, 2020). Research into the series and original books found the real life family ‘the Ingalls’ eventually moved to a village called ‘Burr Oak’. further research into the tree of the same name and the Native American stories surrounding it the two realised the parallel between this and the kind of storytelling they wanted to present to listeners (Beale, 2022).

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Screen capture of Andrei Tarkovsky's 1979 motion picture "Stalker"

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Shades have expressed their mutual appreciation for the science fiction and horror works of Stanley Kubrick, Andrei Tarkovsky and Ridley Scott (XLR8R, 2019). Their track “Threnody” could equally conjure imagery of the horrors of deep space, a dystopian cityscape, or even the surreal, alien experiences of a “Guide” traveling through an “Exclusion Zone”.

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One of Gustave Dorè's sketches depicting 'Chiron' in Dante Alighieri's 'The Divine Comedy'

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Shades are guided by imagery, drawing from the renaissance of neoclassical and gothic themes to establish the visual dimension of the project (XLR8R, 2019). In particular Gustave Dorè’s illustrations in Dante’s Divine Comedy (Depauw & Dennis, Shades (Alix Perez & Eprom) - Livestream, 2020). “The name ‘Shades’ draws from ‘Dante via Dorè’ as well as ‘Chiron’, ‘Geryon’, ‘ The Serpent’ and other works that reference antiquity.” (XLR8R, 2019).

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Digital Mystikz ( Mala & Coki ) - DMZ Live Recording @ Transmission Leeds - February 2006

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Coki represents the foundations of production I’ve explored and would like to build upon. His signature bouncing groves and recognition as the grandfather of LFO manipulation in bass sound design as well as Reason being his DAW of choice influenced my choice to incorporate Reason native synthesizers and audio effects and emulate his sound.

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Album cover of Shade's 2018 debut album 'In Praise of Darkness'

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Shades represents my desire to work with analogue equipment in combination with DAWs to broaden creative possibilities. They also evoke visceral emotions that align with the kinds of emotions I tend towards in production such as foreboding dread, dark occult themes and discomfort without sacrificing catchy groves and interesting sound design and drum programming.

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Album cover of Burr Oak's debut 2023 album 'Somewhere We Belong'

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Burr Oak represents the definition of the forward thinking style of neurofunk I aim to create. The blend of aggression in their sound design and overall sound, technicality in their drums and FX and the blend of this with melodic elements to create a story, despite neurofunk often considered one dimensional emotionally speaking.