Trance Awards

My Trance Story

Lange

The first 'modern day' trance music I heard was probably a Perfecto record. I was hooked on all the 'Man With No Name' releases etc and was hungry to find more music like it. Also Platipus and Hooj Choons were very influential to me early on. That was nearly 15 years ago, and I would never have believed then that in 2007 I'd be celebrating a 10 year career in the music industry! Of course there was trance (or elements of) before this time but this is where I cite the beginning. In those early 90's I was doing a music tech course in Salford. It was one of the first of it's kind. There wasn't much actual studio time though and I discovered it was unfortunately an electronics course in disguise, with just 1 hour in the studio and a lesson on 'Midi' some weeks! I saw the course through though and met people who introduced me to the gear i needed to make 'good music' (as opposed to the bad music I had been making with cheap 'home' keyboards). I bought a Korg M1 first and used it's onboard sequencer to make tracks then I added an Atari ST, Cubase, and a small Mixer. That was when I really started to learn.

I was a dedicated reader of 'Future Music' and learned a lot from them too. In fact they gave me another helping hand by featuring 2 of my early demos in the Magazine (with the tracks on a cover CD). The second one scored a result! Steven from Pulse 8 records contacted me saying they liked the track and asked if I could supply them with future material. I did, and eventually i sent a track (then entitled 'Reflections') and they liked it. The director Steve Long invited me to London and I met him and Rohan (from Urban Cookie Collective). They wanted to add vocals to my instrumental and a month or so later we had a 2 day session at some posh studio. I brought my small setup of gear down to the pro studio (that was costing £2000!) and we recorded the track. That track turned out to be Sureal - You Take My Breath Away. It didn't get signed straight away though. It was nearly 3 years before it got signed (after a re-recording in my home studio!) and entered the UK top 20.

I had other more underground material I wanted to get released and Steve kindly put me in contact with Kevin Robinson, then head of Additive/Positiva Records. They offered me my first record deal and it's exactly 10 years ago this month (October) that i signed it! From there, I started remixing for Additive, then Positiva and other labels, and had some early success with DJ Sakin - Protect your mind (no.4) and Lost witness - Happiness Happening (no.18). Thanks to these and massive support from Judge Jules on Radio 1, I finally made music my career; some 6 years after finishing University! Better Late Than Never!

Also my new album is out soon so very much looking forward to that! :)

« Back