The Foundation

About the author

A little about myself: Hi World, If have found this site you must some inkling of who I am, perhaps you already know me personally and wonder why I the way I am or you just want to know more about me and my passion called music and art? I have been plugging away at music from a very early age and am just plain having a blast discovering all the new ways to manipulate sound through technology, my informal education started with a tape deck and an acoustic guitar and 6 months to burn from a serious grounding I had received from my folks at the age of 13…I had snuck out of a friends house during a sleep over, and rode my bicycle to a girl’s house that I fancied in hopes of… well you know what 13 year old boys have on there mind… we had decided to go for a walk through the high school field looking for a private place to lay down and look at the stars, to our disappointment we walked right into a police investigation. Apparently the high school had been broken into that night and we became the prime suspects. Long story short I was brought home, my parents where woken up by the police and because of the embarrassment I had caused them I sentenced to 6 months in the attic with no phone, no t.v., no Atari, and no contact with the outside world. After a couple years teaching my self to mimic the music of : The Eagles, Van Halen, Iron Maiden, and Huey Lewis & the News, I joined a trendy band called Split Second. The choice of material was much better and the informal education was taken to the next level, I know had get a letter from the LCBO (Liquor Control Board of Ontario) so that I could be present on stage at the countless bar gigs I would do over the next 5 years or so (I was only 15 and the drinking age was 19) I would play Thursday, Friday, and Saturdays almost every weekend. What a blast to be doing such a cool job at that age, I am pretty sure after a year of this lifestyle I had decided that music was going to be what I was going to do for the rest of my life. Like any smart and ambitious young person I had decided if I was going to have any longevity with this chosen career path I might take it seriously and get a formal education. Humber College on the outskirts of Toronto was calling out for me and I had prepared a lovely finger style arrangement of Duke Ellington’s “Prelude To a Kiss” I would be attending that school for 4 years starting fall of 1988 as a Jazz Guitar performance major, I had met many of the people then that I still call colleges and friends and would work with many of them as we wove ourselves through each others lives through fate and good luck. I did take one year off in 1991 to entertain US troops during the first Gulf war, we dropped out around spring break and “griffted” our way through an audition and secured a 6 month contract as “Sister Moon” aboard a Cunard cruise lines ship to be used as a floating hotel in the port of Manama Bahrain. After completing the contract I thumbed my way through the country of Jordan, with side trips to Petra where I rode camels and camped with Bedouin Indians, I traveled across the Suez Canal and into Dahab (meaning Gold in Arabic) a trippy little community of Ethiopian Rastafarians, Israeli hippies, and international thrill seekers would gather under the influence of LSD and form moonlight drum circles. I also during this trip spent a couple months thumbing my way around Holland and Germany, I remember going to Berlin to see the remains of the “wall”…in short what a trip! Back to school this time I had chosen McGill and step up the education yet another notch, I had enjoyed some composition classes I had taken as electives while at Humber, so I thought I would audition as a Jazz Performance major, but take composition as a minor. Montreal was nice but cold and lonely with the language division at that time we where experiencing a national referendum, Quebec had wanted to split off as there own country and if you spoke English there you would have to be for a random shot to the face, this would happen three times in one school year after the third time I was arrested for “theft of electricity” while busking in the Metro with a stand up bass player, I was playing my 1964 Gretch Double Anniversary and needed some amplification to be heard. I decided that perhaps this wasn’t for me and finished up my last term and headed out west to visit my brother who was residing with a mutual friend of ours in Vancouver BC. I quickly fell into the life style of “the Drive” better known as commercial drive in the fall of 1993 (I believe) I had answered an ad in the Georgia Straight and joined a 8 piece world beat band called NGOMA (Dance Drum Party) this band gave me the confidence and understanding of writing and running a full production, we would tour endlessly through the Gulf islands and the interior of BC playing tree planter balls and luminary festivals, we even did an ambitious tour in a van with all the equipment and 8 musicians across Canada to Nova Scotia to attend and perform at the International Buskers Festival in Halifax. Because of the August humidity, cramped traveling conditions and my love for Jack Kerouac, I had once again decided to be “mad” and hit the road, I thumbed my way 6148 km across Canada to make it back just in time for our 10 days playing Batucadas at the Pacific National Exhibition. Around this time I started to feel the itch to step up as bandleader and showcase my many compositions that fell under the marketing terminology as “Acid Jazz”. Shazzam was born out of a hand full tunes and group of committed fellow musicians, we would rehearse for months at a time getting the sound just right, and would be playing some of the trendiest underground shows in Vancouver at that time, we would later have the honor of being the resident band for years at the Chameleon Urban Lounge in the basement of the Georgia Hotel, we would play fashion shows, raves, and after hours clubs. My drummer in Shazzam had introduced me to his room mate who I would become very close with over the next 15 years, he had a studio and I was eager to learn all about electronic music, sampling, and using sequencers to composes music. For the next 4 years I had a key to his apartment and would spend days on end learning new technologies. We still to this day have a studio not more then a block from our first one and continue to write and produce material. I also would start a short lived record label called Cache with my studio partner and a Doctor friend of mine who invest money into our dreams, thanks Bavin! We released one album under the artist name Hide’n’Seek, it did very considering we knew nothing about running a record label, it did get our foot in the door with some distribution deals and some heavy weights giving us a node on our production skills. After Cache seized to exist, I started my own imprint called PFB recordings, I took this name from my production company I used to throw Shazzam parties, we did a run of t-shirts and fitted baseball caps stickers, my brother would “bomb” walls around Vancouver with logos and cartoon characters he envisioned in smoke off the end of spliffs, I released two 12” on this imprint, both Shazzam songs with remix’s. Once again opportunity came knocking and this time it was in South East Asia in the far exotics islands of Thailand, I had been offered a resident dj position and sound tech job setting up a new club called Harmony on Ko Phan Ghan, this would be the fall of 1999. Of course I dropped everything to do with PFB and hoped on a plane with 6 or 7 other friends from Vancouver and got right to work converting an old Thai mansion into a club I would reside up stairs from the club in one of the two bedrooms. We where trying to get the club opened for the coming of the new millennium. What a night that NYE was the island had 35,000. International visitors arriving for the last party of the century, my folks even flew in the night of NYE, they told me of a story how they landed at midnight in Bangkok, jumped into a TUK TUK and while driving through downtown there where 2000 marathon runners parading through the streets, and the rest of the city was going crazy! After returning to Vancouver from the Asian adventure I had a brief stint as a music supervisor for a multi media company out of LA, I had the chance to work with Jazz Singer Nancy Wilson and the Emotions, I also was bought a full 24 channel pro tools rig and started to get a little more serious with my production values. All the while I had been churning out the house music for labels such as Om music, Village, Leaf, Toko, Play Records, and Bombay Records. I was soon asked to come on board with Bombay records as a partner and handle studio duties as well A&R demos that came across my virtual desk. Nav and I would take the trip to south of France and attend the music conference MIDEM, that trip was very exciting I would get a lawyer, and a publishing deal and once again the education would be taken up a notch this time from a business perspective as a label owner and international composer. Currently I am involved with a night club called Fortune Sound Club in Vancouver BC Canada, as a partner and resident DJ, I also have a sound company called Endo Sound and we have the contract to mix all the live acts that come through the club, I have had the pleasure of working with EPMD, Nice & Smooth, Warren G, Lil’ Kim, Pharoahe Monch, Breakestra, Who made Who, Har Mar Superstar, Slaughter House, Donnis, ZionI, Keys N Krates, Chin Injeti, Camp Lo, Beatnuts, to name a few. I am also extending my writing abilities and studio to exciting new singer David Morin, we are currently putting together a new R&B album much like D’Angelo’s Voodoo. That is all for now, I will be updating my site like a blog with new projects and stories.

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