Artist Profile – Blean – (UK)
We support up and coming and breakthrough acts here at INSIDE DNB. It’s at the core of our philosophy. Blean is a UK based DJ and producer (that used to be known as Deazy – We’ve updated this interview post name change!) who has been on the 1’s and 2’s for over two decades, and has recently turned his hand to producing music at a professional level.
His sublime release ‘Open Your Eyes’ on DNBB records caused a bit of a stir amongst the liquid community, and here we catch up with him to hear his story, and to see what’s coming next!
Blean! Welcome to INSIDE DNB!
Thanks for having me mate! Been a regular reader of your interviews so glad to be a part of it!
You are from Kent in the UK and started off mixing UKG. Do you still have love the other styles, or is it DNB all the way now?
To be honest, I have a very diverse taste in music and can mix pretty much anything, but my heart lies with Drum and Bass when it comes to DJ’ing as it’s been a part of me since my younger years.
Outside of the Blean profile, however, is a complete polar opposite. I spend a lot of time listening to Chicane’s Sunset Podcasts which are full of eclectic classical and electronic music which helps me unwind and concentrate on other things in life.
My audio playlists really do vary, so one minute I’ll be listening to some filthy roller and the next I’ll be delving into film scores by Hanz Zimmer.
You mentioned that when you started spinning DNB, you were playing tunes belonging to friends from the likes of Moving Fusion and the Ruffige Kru among others. Many people often remember the period they got into DNB as their own personal ‘golden era’. What would you say are your stand out tracks from that period?
There are a few tracks that still remind me of the beginning of my journey. I could go on forever naming all the old school tunes we used to spin in my mate,s bedroom, but the most iconic one I remember playing was Q-Project – Champion Sound on a 10” Metal Dubplate. That thing was an absolute beast. I remember my mate playing it out one time but the needle skipped along, so he took the dubplate off the deck and launched it at the wall in a rage. The thing was solid and ended up lodging itself in the wall!
I think the first ever drum and bass track that I was played was Stand Bold by Sappo, and that shortly became a personal favourite of mine but, looking back at it, you can’t beat the classics like Casino Royale, Body Rock and Renegade Snares! Those tracks shaped drum and bass for me and got me hooked on it.
Twisted Individual’s ‘Tooled Up’ was your first official DNB purchase. What an LP to start with!
Wasn’t it just! I remember heading down to Deckadance on my usual Saturday afternoon trip to Canterbury and was just flicking through the vinyl and came across the LP.
I totally had to buy it solely for the fact that Twisted was sitting in a field of sheep with a gimp mask and straight jacket on! I gotta say that all the tracks on that album slap, but Throbbing Gristle was my go to back then – “That’s a question you should ask yourself Megatron! No, I’ll crush you with my bare hands!”
Tell us about ‘Dark Order’ then. This was a DJ collective you set up?
Dark Order crew was a collection of various DJ’s and MC’s from surrounding cities. We used to meet up round each other’s houses and just have massive play outs and record demo tapes.
We built up quite a following and after getting our names out there, we later secured various nights around the CT Postcode area. There were also a couple of cheeky nights downstairs in Alberry’s on a Tuesday night, packing out a wine cellar with ravers, but The Cue Club in Herne Bay was the place to go for full on rave nights back in the day!
The sound system was insane, the rooms were massive and it was slap bang in the middle of all the popular bars and pubs, so after they closed it was the perfect place to go to finish the night off with a bang! It was a very memorable and energetic time in my life that’s for sure.
There was also a stint on internet radio as well? This seems to be such a popular way in to the scene for many people. How important was this to your journey?
Yeah man, me and my mate OJ got chatting to these guys who ran an internet radio station called “Reputation FM” and asked about joining them for a mix one night. We found a studio round the back of Tesco in Whitstable where we used to spin and we must have done something right, because they wanted us back for weekly 2 hour slots.
That was a lot of fun to be honest…Two hours of playing nothing but dubs, making a fool out of myself on a webcam and just all-round enjoying life to its fullest!
Moving on to production then, this seemed like a natural progression from DJ’ing I guess?
Well, all my life I have been very in tune with music (excuse the pun)! I started at a young age with musical instruments such as the violin and piano, so the grasps of chord progressions and the melodical scales was kind of fixed in my mind from then.
I spent so long listening to the tracks that I was playing out and thought why not see if I can figure it out myself.
It was a challenge though right? Especially due to the lack of learning materials available back then?
Oh 100%. Back then we hardly had any tutorial videos we could refer to, and the producers back in those days were very reluctant to show you their secrets, so a lot of the time it was all self-taught! Playing a sound, tweaking little things here and there and just trying to figure out if it works best or not.
Even getting music out to labels was a struggle at times. The only real way we could to it was through AOL Instant Messenger, and even then it was hard to actually find the artists/labels tags unless you knew someone who knew someone!
What kind of equipment are we talking about here then?
Mixing wise, I remember being passed down a pair of Soundlab DLP-1600 belt drive turntables and a cheap mixer from Argos, which I had running through an old Kenwood Stack System, but only being a beginner they lasted me for a year or so while I got used to the art of mixing.
Then I moved on to direct drive turntables where I delved into a pair of Numark X2 Hybrid turntables and an Allen and Heath Xone 32 Mixer. Those decks were mad as they were the only ones at the time that had both a vinyl platter and a built in CD deck.
They came with this “Magic Blue Vinyl” that controlled the CD deck very similar to the Serato Control Vinyls you can get nowadays, but back in the early 2000s this was revolutionary!
Mate, for production it was basic for me, nothing but a banged up old desktop pc, cheap midi keyboard and Logitech PC speakers! I didn’t have the luxury of Studio Monitors. In order to check the levels I had to burn the tracks to CD and play them in the studio or my car!
You cite your parents as being big influences on you during those early years, in particular your dad. Having somebody behind you to give you that little nudge of encouragement can make such a difference eh?
I totally agree. My late parents both supported me in my music and always pushed me to go for it, even when I didn’t feel like I was any good.
My dad was the one who showed me to love all forms of music and, whenever he was home, there always used to be some form playing around the house. I owe a lot to both of my parents because if it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t have the expressive emotions I get from music.
My dad sometimes used to come upstairs, sit on my bed and say “Go on then, play me something you made” and he would straight up be honest with me and say “Finish it” or “Ditch it”
Tell us about your dealings with Macky Gee then. This was way back before he broke through?
Macky Gee!! Well, when I first started producing I remember meeting him through myspace and we built a good friendship back in the day, chatting daily either about music or just sharing rants!
We both used to be bedroom producers and bounce tracks back and forward, working on little collabs here and there. I’m pretty sure there is a link out there that I found the other day with some original tracks we used to make (see end of article).
I remember once driving over to a community centre in Medway and did a guest mix on a radio show. I can still picture how mad it went when I dropped a dub I made called “Right Before Your Eyes” which was an absolute stomper!
Like many that don’t work full time in the business (myself included), family life takes priority once partners and children come along. You had a break from the scene in order to focus on this, but were you still keeping an eye on the scene?
Around the same time that I met my girlfriend, I also got some bad vibes from the Drum and Bass scene and had a falling out with a certain producer which spread to a lot of negativity.
It was at that point that I wanted to step away and look at life in a different perspective. A few years later we were married and started our own little family of Deazy’s! Having children and juggling work became in a sense two full time jobs, so I didn’t have much spare time to work on music, but I still kept a keen eye on the different genres making breakthroughs.
You had a couple of UKG releases once you’d re-grouped but then sadly lost both of your parents, who were a real driving force for you. It took a while to come back from that?
Yeah, I dabbled a bit in house music under the alias HiDefinition, releasing a few tracks on Wolfrage Records and Truespin. Trying to find my steps again, I also tested the waters in the Bass House and Garage scene, with another DJ/Producer who was actually my barber at the time!
We formed a duo act called LeBonVie and started working together to make a couple of tracks. We made a couple of tracks and managed to secure our first release on AIA (Artist Intelligence Agency) with a track “Believe Me”, followed shortly by our “Feel Inside EP” through Immoral Music.
We did a couple of local nights with a DJ collective called Like Minded Music including Pasha in London but, as you mentioned, the loss of both of my parents took a huge impact on my drive to do anything.
When you did come back though, you discovered the musical beauty of liquid DNB. What was it that got your attention so badly that it made you decide to make music it in that vein?
Liquid drum and bass has always been a part of my life from the very beginning. I always used artists like Omni Trio and High Contrast as a way of escaping from reality, but I was never brave enough to try and produce it because it is such a technical sub-genre to master.
I suppose back then, it was all about jump up, and liquid didn’t have much of a say in the scene. Nowadays its totally different and liquid seems to be taking over and I couldn’t be happier about it.
You track ‘Open Your Eyes’ is an absolute stunner, and that got signed to DNBB records?
This was my first release from returning to the scene and why hold back? There’s nothing better than putting together a track that gives you Goosebumps just from the sheer beauty of the melodies, however it was originally going to be an instrumental.
Playing it to a few fellow producers, I agreed with their advice that it needed a singer, so I reached out through a local Facebook Buy/Sell/Swap page and connected with Jessica Florence from the off.
She is an absolutely incredible singer and we hit it off from the very start because, not only did we both share a passion for drum and bass, but she also admitted to S.P.Y being one of her favourite producers.
Shadre & Salvage and Diligent Fingers have both been instrumental in your development during the later stages of your journey. They are all beacons for the northern DNB scene. How did you get around to talking to them?
Yeah, I owe a lot to the boys. Shadre & Salvage followed me on SoundCloud. I reached out to them just to say thank you, and we just started talking from there really. They made me realise that the scene nowadays is nothing like what it was when I was younger.
There seemed to be no secrecy with offering advice, helping out with track elements or screen sharing production tips. They also got me involved with a few Discord channels, but mainly introduced me to Diligent Fingers who is one of the most humble and down to earth people I have ever met. (We love those boys here at INSIDE DNB and support them to the max).
There is also a free download available for another of your tracks?
There is indeed, however this isn’t due for release for another couple of weeks so watch the socials, as it will be a great welcome back to the scene!
You’re also streaming on Twitch alongside a radio show you’re currently hosting. We have Twitch DNB at our core here at INSIDE DNB, so tell us a bit about your Twitch journey, and the radio show, and any other plans in that area?
Twitch DJ’ing is great fun I’m not gonna lie, however I add a bit more humour than some of the current drum and bass DJ’s out there, as I have invested in a green screen and taken a lot of influence from John B’s streams. (we also love John B here at INSIDE DNB and his streams are something else altogether. You have to check them out people).
I currently have a layout that involves flying a tie fighter and landing on different planets full of random dancing celebrities, so make sure you check them out because they are definitely worth a look haha!
With reference to the radio show, I reached out to the Canterbury University about potentially hosting a weekly drum and bass show on the student radio and they welcomed me with open arms.
They provided me with full studio training and my own security entry card, so all blessed there. Something must be going well, because I also won an award recently at the KIC Awards for best newcomer!!
I am also currently working around video streaming my radio shows, so listeners can get involved in the chat boxes for shout outs and requests, as well as putting out on socials for unsigned artists and upcoming DJ’s to get in contact for guest mixes and weekly showcases. I’m very exciting to see what happens in the future on this one!
There are some new tracks in the pipeline then, and you’re branching out into other sub genres of DNB. What do we have to look forward to over the coming months from the one like Blean?
I’ve got a couple of tracks in the pipeline that are coming out over the next year, not just by me but also collabs with various local artists, singers and MC’s who I have met along the way.
I am definitely not committing myself to one sub-genre, as diversity is the key to success in my eyes. Look at some of the producers at the moment like Kanine for example. Dropping some absolute stompers in the jump up scene but then pulling out some electro/neurofunk bangers too.
All I can say is I’m not going to hold back this time. I’m gonna powerhouse through and keep learning while I’m going, because the scene is thriving right now. To me it’s all about the music, so if anything comes out of it at the end, it’s a bonus.
I just love doing what I do and I would like to think I make my parents and family proud, because that’s all that matters to me!
FIND OUT MORE HERE:
Blean (@bleandnb) • Instagram photos and videos
