VUDU

CIOBIN:  A little history of Vudu 
VUDU: Vudu was born and raised in Vancouver "Vancity"
Canada, and has been recording hip-hop since 1989.  A
long time!  Made, to my knowledge, the first two rap
albums to be released in Vancouver, with my sister,
Tara "Róisín".  Back then we were known under the
old-school names of Terror T and The Beat
Assassinator.  The first album was called "The Life
and Times", released in September 1990.  A local hit
called 'Total Kaos' came off of it, and we even did a
video for it, in the Spring of 1991.  Another first in
Vancouver I think.  It was played on the local Cable
TV station for years.  The second  album came out in
May 1992, called "Show 'N' Prove".  I was also DJ'ing
on the university radio station CITR-FM from
1988-1994, and sometimes in clubs as well.  We also
did "Str8 Frum Tha Ghettgo" in 1995.  It was pressed
to CD on my new label, Noizi Records Inc. 
I ran a small basement recording studio and recorded
friends rock bands on analog gear, which has now fully
evolved to hip-hop, dancehall and reggae on digital
gear.  My sister moved to the states and I worked on a
dub album (echo - "roots dub" 1999) and electronic
album (echozone - "852" 2000).   As for hip-hop, I had
changed my production style from relying on looping
rare funk samples and drum breaks to trying to create
my own original hip-hop music, and basically it took
me about 5 years to bridge that.  Basically trying to
find the right gear and saving for it, and coming up
with my philosophy of hip-hop music creation.  The
digital instruments that I could find just weren't
right at that time, and there was no internet like
there is now to research what everybody else was using
successfully.  Really living in isolation compared to
the global culture we have today. 
Anyways, by the time I got my sh*t together, plus a
Bachelors Degree in Physics and a Diploma in Computer
Science, all of a sudden there was a hip-hop scene
around me, but they were 5-10 years younger than me
and didn't know anything about my breaking the ground
for them.  So I feel O.G. but lack the respect.  So I
am still earning respect and payin' dues like all the
young cats just getting into the game right now.  But
I have the experience and some business abilities now,
so I can get myself above the competition by doing
things on a national/international level instead of
just burning CD-R's to hand out at gigs.  I also feel
that my productions have reached a consistently high
quality, just a touch below the professional studio
sound. (Gotta keep myself striving for perfection!) 


C: In which way this compilation was born? 
V: The Front & Center Westcoast Women in Rhyme, Vol. 1 CD
was born mostly out of trying to get my music out to
the rest of the world.  Up until about 2001 I had done
hip-hop beats strictly for my sister, Róisín.  But she
was passing on beats that I thought were good, maybe
not her style but might suit somebody else, and I was
getting a big pile of them.  So I started going to
local gigs and seeing who was doing what.  I gave out
my beat CDs to a few people, which happened to start
with a few girls who were saying something good, like
they were on a mission, not just running their mouths.
 After they liked the songs we did in my studio, they
got me in touch with other female MC's and it kind of
just snowballed.  There was a few guys I worked with
as well, but I just didn't want to be associated with
their mostly misogynist lyrics.  One funny guy I did 8
dancehall tracks for is OSC (Original Spoil Child),
who has his CD out now, "Fa Betta Fa Wurze".  Looking
back at my notes, it looks like I was going to put out
a generic compilation, but I noticed that it was
mostly girls so I just got a few more songs done, then
a few more, and had enough to make it an all women
thang.


C: Tell me something about hip-hop in your city.
V: I am definately not the best person to ask about this,
even back in the early 90's when I was helping put on
DJ Soundwars Chapters 1 (1990), 2 (1991), 3 (1993) and
every person doing or interested in MC'ing, DJ'ing,
breakdancing, and grafitti were in one spot at one
time, I didn't really know who was actually doing
something from who was just wearing the clothes.  I
can tell you that our highest profile hip-hop exports
from Vancouver right now are the Swollen Members and
the Rascalz.  Nelly Furtado did that thing with Ms.
Jade and Timbaland, which may qualify her as well.
The underground gets larger every year, and with
hip-hop culture touching everyone's cars, clothes,
hair, jewelery, and basically every part of the modern
lifestyle, that is no surprise. 


C:  Do you know something about hip-hop in Italy?
V: Sorry, I don't know a thing about hip-hop in Italy!
I'm sure it's thriving over there just as much as it
is here and everywhere else in the world.  It has
pretty much reached every corner of civilization 20
years since it was born - if it was a deadly virus
we'd all be dead!


C:  What do you think about mp3?
V: I have mixed opinions about mp3.  My "roots dub" album
did really well on mp3.com, and I made a few dollars
off that back in 2000 before they started charging
monthly fees to be able to get paid.  Also the 1
minute long samples of my songs on my website
(http://www.inthachamber.com) are mp3.  People can
easily listen to these because of mp3 compression.
Uncompressed audio files would be way too big to post
on a website.  So that can raise interest in my music
in a beneficial way.  On the other hand, at the end of
the night at the CD release party for Front & Center
Vol. 1 (Sat. Sept. 6, 2003 at the Purple Onion), a guy
approached me and said he found out about my CD
because it had been posted on the net at the end of
July.  Damn!  This was when I started sending out
promos to radio stations and music magazines. But I
guess it got him curious enough to attend my party!
And it probably didn't hurt CD sales, and made my name
and the artists on the compilation more well known. 


C:  And about women in hip-hop?
V: There is a good core of strong women in hip-hop in
general, from the Queen Latifah's to the Eve's to the
Truth Hurts, to the Trina's, and this is reflected
locally in Vancouver as well.  I would probably say
that the percentage is larger in Vancouver than in the
mainstream, but I am probably biased by seeking them
out and trying to get them all on my compilation CD.


C:  Have you performed live?
V: I performed live at the Front & Center Vol. 1 CD
release party (Sat. Sept. 6, 2003 at the Purple
Onion), mostly just coordinating the instrumentals for
the performers.  I did some live talkbox voice on two
songs, and joined my sister Róisín on the mic for her
two songs.  The first time I performed was waaay back
in May 1989, at a Nardwuar the Human Serviette gig,
where I did a one-man band thing with a drum machine,
keyboard, guitar, digital delay pedal, and mic,
perfoming a collage of Stetsasonic, Johnny Cash,
Public Enemy, and Joy Division covers!  I have also
done some on-stage backup up for my sister at the
legendary DJ Soundwars, the first 3 years, as well as
a few other shows back in the day.  So basically I'm
an old-skool head coming back onto the scene.


C: Who is the artist you like most and why?
V: Wow, that's a really hard one.  There have been times
when I have been a total fanatic over a certain
artist, or CD, like in funk James Brown,
Parliament-Funkadelic, and Zapp, or in reggae Lee
Scratch Perry, Scientist, and The Roots Radics, or in
dancehall Ninjaman and Beenie Man, or in R'n'B
D'Angelo, R. Kelly, Mary J. Blige, and Jaheim.  In
hip-hop it's Timbaland, the Neptunes, Dr. Dre, Manny
Fresh, Lil Jon & the Eastside Boys, L.T. Hutton, and
Jazze Pha, for the producers side.  Right at this
moment in time Jazze Pha is blowing my mind.  He is
the Dr. Dre of the South, making so many hits for
everyone.  Check out the Youngbloodz, Field Mob, and
the Nappy Roots for some of his tracks.


C:  Do you think that hip-hop videos represent the
real hip-hop?
V: That's a loaded question.  In my opinion hip-hop
includes mainstream artists.  So I think it does,
cause hip-hoppers make the videos.  You know that when
someone like Ludacris puts out a video that's exactly
the way he wants it to be.  But at the same time, you
must realize that, like all TV and movies, it is
staged, computer enhanced, and escapist in nature.  It
is a vehicle to sell records and raise the public's
interest in the artist. 


C:  In which way you live hip-hop?
V: I live hip-hop in a very unbalanced way, you could
say, but I feel it is up to the individual to embrace
what they enjoy.  I am strictly a studio
producer/musician.  I may come up with something that
I can take to the stage and tour with, that is a goal
of mine.  I have created beats for about 12 rappers in
the last few years, and in that way I contribute to
the scene and am an important part of it.  I feel that
I could not be as good at creating beats if I was also
trying to be a good MC, breaker and graff artist all
at the same time, but I appreciate all the aspects of
course.  I have maintained my aspect of contribution
to hip-hop culture for 14 years now, so it's all good.


C:  Tell me something about clubs and radios in your
city.
V: I have lost track of what is happening in the clubs
and on the radio in the last few years.  I know it
used to be really difficult to find hip-hop in the
clubs for a long time, then it blew up and now you
can't escape it!  As far as the radio goes, we got our
first urban radio station a few years ago, The Beat.
This scared a lot of the other staions, so they put
some commercial hip-hop into their formats to compete.
 Then The Beat had to counter by also becoming more
commercial, and I lost interest when the same few
songs were getting played to death.  But the smaller
community and university campus stations have been
holding it down for years.  I DJ'd on air for CITR-FM
(Universtiy of British Columbia) starting in 1988,
with a ground-breaking show called "Megablast!", which
was hip-hop and whatever else I found interesting such
as reggae, funk, dancehall, even noise!  As a matter
of fact, I first heard hip-hop on the radio on CITR in
1987 when I was in high school.  I became CITR's
program director in 1992 for 3 years and it was my
hidden agenda to get as many hip-hop shows on the air
as possible, not just the token one or two.  And to
generally diversify and get as many cultural and
ethnic shows on as I could, to break up the college
rock strangle-hold on the airwaves.  I think it
worked.


C:  Future projects
V: Right now I am still promoting Front & Center, Vol. 1.
 I spent a good 2 years creating it, so I think it
deserves a good push.  I have also been reviving my
back catalog of records, available online now at
http://www.inthachamber.com  The next release is the
instrumental version of the Front & Center CD, going
by the name Sound Barrier, Vol. 1, by Vudu.  I have
also been collecting all my recent reggae and
dancehall instrumentals together for another Vudu
release, Sound Barrier, Vol. 2.  The tracks on it are
very hip-hop informed; most of it was created on the
Akai MPC 2000XL.  That should be available by February
2004.  Next up will probably be the Róisín CD "Highly
Anticipated...", for Summer 2004.  I have been getting
into video editing as well, so we will make some
videos for the singles.  My long-range plan, as I
alluded to earlier, is to do a solo project where I
actually do some rapping myself.  I'm keeping the
details under wraps for now, but I have some very
interesting ideas to try out....  The name of the
project will be Rx11, after my first drum machine.


C:  Thanks and hello to
V: All the performers on the Front & Center CD, Tara,
John, Rose, and Edwige.

By Ciobin

Adam "Vudu" - vudu@inthachamber.com
http://www.inthachamber.com
http://www.cdbaby.com/vudu