Current Location: |
South Africa |
Prefered Hardware: |
Technics 1200's, Denon 5000's, DJM 600 Mixer |
Genre: |
BreakBeat, Drum n Bass, Down Tempo, Dub, Funk, Trip Hop and whatever else u wanna add! |
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Born Leyton Smith, Leicestershire, England, 27 July 1973. The family immigrated to South Africa in 1981 and settled in Johannesburg for 15 years. I worked at Musique, a record shop, from the age of 15 and took records home as pay for a couple of years. I worked at Musique; through the introduction of the compact disc and saw many styles change, for six and a half years. When an independent distribution company, Tic Tic Bang introduced Ninja Tune to South Africa in 1995, I asked for a job. I worked as Joburg sales rep for 4 years as Tic Tic Bang acquired the rights to distribute Rough Trade, Play It Again Sam, Kickin Slip n Slide, Instinct/Shadow, Moonshine, Ninja Tune and also released some of the finest South African albums of their time. Urban Creep, Battery 9, Henry Ate, The Awakening to name a few.
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It was during this time that House music/Rave culture exploded onto the scene. I had a great collection of music that was not 4/4 beats. I had started publicly playing music to people for R50 and R50 bar tab at The Wings Beat Bar in Braamfontein and it was here that I switched from playing just Indie Brit bands to Trip Hop and Breakbeat. With friends, I started a club night, called HEDPHUNK in July 1996. Soon after this I was resident at 206live, a landmark in South African breakbeat culture, which was also renowned for their support of live music. With 206's help I played at two I.C.E. raves to 3000+ people. 206 are responsible for 80% of the breakbeat/drum'n bass DJs that have visited our shores. Blunted Stuntman has been honoured to have complimented sets by (in order of appearance) The Runaways, Aphrodite, Derek Dehlarge, Mampi Swift, Jon Carter, Cut la Roc, Justin Robertson, Stanton Warrior's, Wagonchrist, Gavin Hardkiss, DJ Dov of Muti Music, DJ Craze, Dieselboy and Freq Nasty .
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Blunted Stuntman has toured nationally numerous times, that have included appearances at the Oppikoppi, Grahamstown, Up the Creek and Flux festivals. By August 1999 Blunted Stuntman (with friends) had opened District 206, a smaller, more intimate 206 in Cape Town, the Mother City. It was here that he connected with Krushed & Sorted, who started African Dope that needed help with distribution.
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Loophole Distribution has helped all five of the groundbreaking albums released through these times, including Krushed & Sorted, Moodphase5ive, Felix Laband, Max Normal and Algorythm Recordings. By the end of 2004 Loophole was helping more than 30 amazing South African releases in 80 various retailers. Loophole Distribution has merged with The Breakdown.co.za and a web-site should be up in 2005 with a full catalogue and information on the artists, albums and labels easily available.
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Loophole Productions handled the entertainment at District 206 on the weekends, with Friday nights UNDA (a breakbeat dancefloor that included Elektrik ZA, a showcase of South African electronica featuring small live performances) and Saturday nights OLD SKOOL RULES (a deep funk, acid jazz, rare groove, afrocuban beat experience). It expanded outside the city limits, to Stellenbosch, where he re-launched HEDPHUNK on Thursday nights. He hosted a radio show here for 9 months of Y2K. It was A Loophole in the Airwaves, a 2 hour show (midnight - 2.06am) that covered all sorts of breakbeats and dubs and featured interviews and guest DJ slots. He had help on the radio from some fantastic 206 resident DJs but did HEDPHUNK solo for six hours (great experience). Die Mystic Boer opened in Stellenbosch in … and Mystic Breaks had a solid dancefloor from 22h30 to 03h00 every Friday night for a year and a half. Cape Town still rocked, all along Long Street, playing in bars like The Lounge (Wednesdays with DJ Trouble), Joburg (rotating Saturdays with Boogieman) and Marvel (rotating Saturdays with Mix \'n Blend). Blunted Stuntman has played at other events like Offline, Pressure and Kiss to name a few. Blunted Stuntman has also been featured on 5fm’s Vinyl Frontier several times and Ubona on Channel O.
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Cape Town is famed for its party scene, where he was a turntablist in an 8 piece funk band called Golliwog. A 3 piece horn-section with huge age differences, a Norwegian gypsy jazz guitarist, the bass player from every funky band in Joburg since B-World, a 25 year old Indian jazz nut drummer (and many more to follow) and the entertainer, the Boogieman of all front men! Matress Mambo and Nasty have been released on magazine cover mounted CDs and the band played every festival in South Africa including the North Sea Jazz Festival, Cape Town 2002.
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Another fantastic opportunity arose when The Red Bull Music Academy™ came to town. In November 2003, although not chosen to take part, he volunteered to be a part of the radio station that was set up in aid of getting some of the Academy broadcast out to the vibrant Cape Town summer. SpectrumFM, Monday to Friday, 10am - 4pm, Blunted Stuntman had the pleasure of interviewing with people like Bob Moog, Paul Seiji, Amp Fiddler and plenty of the young academics that Red Bull had flow in from all around the world (DJs, producers, journalist, promoters, etc). |
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He has been involved with the Oppikoppi festival since 1997 and was stage manager on the 206 Dance Stage since 2002. |
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Blunted Stuntman in 2005 signed to the DJ Agency/Artist Management company, Two Twiggs Xperiment ( www.twotwiggs.com and www.breakbeat.co.za). In the hope of furthering his DJ career. |
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Blunted Stuntman plays a party mix of Big Beat, Nu-Skool Breaks, 2-Step Garage, Acid Funk, Jungle and chunky House for the dancefloor and some Hi-Fi lounge/dub, Ninja Tune/Grand Central Hip Hop, Jazzanova, Kruder & Dorfmeister style coffee shop beats (but Leyton can play anything). From a Festival to a Cafe, he has played South Africa. Blunted Stuntman has a British passport and wish s to abuse it, with his record bag in hand. . |
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To book Blunted Stuntman , please complete the form below. |
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