Incubation is over part one.
Virus began life in the early parts of 1990. I had always loved electronic music. From as far back as 1984, I had recorded cassette based albums for my family and friends. In 1990 things got more serious. My parents, having given up on talking me out of music for a living, bought me my first serious keyboard with the promise I would get signed by having real gear. By 93 I had recorded a collection of dance music tracks called infectious and put it into the hands of label execs at what was then MYX records. Later that year I met Stefan and we set out to expand the sound and release our own cd. In the early part of 94 we released "analogue (orange cover)" as a limited run cd.
Cd in hand we set out to conquer Cornerstone fest. We arrived with boxes of cd's, t-shirts, thousands of flyers, and all of our gear for a live show. During the next few days we propped ourselves up next to our car on the walk way and busted out the boom box, jamming it for all to hear and selling our warez. The plan was going swimmingly. Next up was the unsigned band stage. We signed up on Saturday I believe and the crowd was an all-star cast of the fledgling electronic scene. We took the stage in a whirl of analogue sweeps from the pro 1 strapped to me like a guitar. Stefan banged away at the keys and pads and our first show went off without a hitch. It was a blast. The whole weekend we canvassed the events with flyers, gave out t-shirts, met a ton of cool folks.. P-sons, Luke from zero, Ronnie from the newly formed joy electric, Wally from detiaphobia, and the guys from situation taboo.
After cornerstone, Wally had approached us about signing to a label he was working with at the time. We sent out demos, talked, conspired.. Then one day I received a phone call from the Great Scott Blackwell. I was stoked to sign with Nsoul.. They were the first truly dance label in this market and we hit it off with him right away. So we closed the deal with Scott. We were signed. It was an amazing feeling and though it would turn a little sour in the end. I will still never forget the haze I was in for weeks.
First order of business was to re-release "analogue". Dance music is an ever-changing finicky market and since it's original release in 94 analogue was a little to slow. Not being one to repeat myself we upped the ante. Most of the songs were speed up and remixed, a few new ones added, and a couple with sample clearance problems were dropped. In 1995 "analogue (black cover)" was unleashed. It did well. People seemed to respond to our music. We received wonderful reviews across the board. We began touring what little we could, but the market for electronic dance music live was taken mostly by DJ's.. and nothing against DJ's, but we weren't.
Then it was back to cornerstone, only this time we were on the list! That was a cool feeling. We set up a booth in the merch tent. This time we had yo-yo's. Yeah baby! Again we had a blast hanging with the fans and the bands. We did a press event with us, P-sons, Joy electric, Echoing Green, Paradigm shift, and POP about the scene. It was pretty sweet. Then the big night came. We had the main stage at the rave tent. Before the show Ronnie had been going on about a Secret Weapon contraption he had under a blanket called the "Melody machine".. Brian was wicked curious and kept asking, but Ronnie wouldn't say a thing. Then when he went on stage and revealed the magic.. I almost fell on my ass. I can't tell you what it was but, it was an awesome mess of levers, lights, and imagination. Ronnie has always been a little too cool for his own good. LOL.
Then the moment came. The lights dimmed and the intro came over the speakers. We walked out on stage with the mining lights on our heads and BOOM.. there was this roar from the packed crowd. It was unbelievable. What an amazing night. We even had a little guest appearance from Mr. Blackwell on the congas. Good times. Everyone was so cool. The paradigm shift guys came in and dropped a KILLER demo on everyone. I told Scott he had to sign these guys. Still to this day one of my favorite albums. They played a killer set with the drummer from scattered few. We were doing it. All of us. It was great.
After that we dropped "Ambient Theology" , a ambient side project. I think our music always bent heavily in this direction. It was harder for us to keep the "Dance" music label than the "ambient" label. We had a even better reaction to this one. Over the years I still have people coming up to me telling me how much this record meant to them. I am glad Scott had the balls to release this one. No one had really done that in this scene. I think it's some of our best work.
As we played live we began taking the sound in new directions. We added real instruments such as drums, guitar, and bass. Then Stefan married Stephanie, the vocalist on "visions" from analogue. So, when the time came to record the next one, we wanted to expand even further and incorporate her as a singer.
In 1996 we released the double album "Odd". The fans and the critics a like seemed to take to this one. Disc one was more of what you expect from a virus record, slower dance tracks mixed with melodic electronic ambiance. Disc two was more of the band sound, or live sound.
More to come...
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