BEAM 1.1 / REINFORCED

A Glimpse Into The Universe of 4 Hero and Reinforced Records.

4 Hero's music sounds like it was conceived on another planet. The London-based duo of Dego McFarlane and Mark Mac have always been just a few steps ahead of the game. With their forward-thinking approaches to previously unattempted fusions of music, this pair have etched themselves a revered place in the drum 'n' bass history books. Their story extends back into the late eighties where the early sounds of hardcore were just beginning to take form. Jungle didn't exist and the genre known as drum 'n' bass had yet to be coined. At that primordial moment, the horizons of this new electronic medium were boundless.

4 Hero began with four members. Dego first connected with Mark and his electronic engineering school mates, Ian Bardouille and Gus Lawrence, on the Camden-based pirate radio station Strong Island FM. What brought them all together was a mutual love of hip hop and jazz fusion. Before long it became apparent they needed an outlet for the music they had been producing collectively. The whole bureaucracy of getting with a record label was not a realistic option for them. The extent that these four immersed themselves in their art required complete autonomy. It was then that the seminal jungle/techno/hip hop/experimental label, Reinforced Records, was born. It went on to become a legendary source of electronic music with Gus and Ian focusing more on the business aspects of the label while Mark and Dego continued producing under the name 4 Hero as well as other pseudonyms such as Tom & Jerry, Nu Era, Jacob's Optical Stairway, Manix (Mark) and Tek 9 (Dego).

4 Hero and the Reinforced umbrella continued to enlighten the burgeoning jungle underground with a variety of artistic and technological innovations throughout the nineties. But it was their work in '94 on the ground breaking LP Parallel Universe that altered the face of jungle forever. This triumph merged free-form electronic jazz with glittering snares and stuttering breaks in a way that took drum 'n' bass into outer space. Both music consumers and peers alike were astonished by this absurdly futuristic concept album. Full-lengths weren't really being done in jungle at that time. What's more, in doing so they perfected the pivotal process of time stretching (a technique which allows samples to be stretched and mutated to fit any rhythm without losing their original pitch, i.e. no more sped up helium vocals). By this point no one dared doubt the supreme quality 4 Hero and Reinforced were capable of.

In the constant quest to alter musical conceptions, their work on 1995's truly unique fusion album Jacob's Optical Stairway on R&S combined techno, house, jazz and drum 'n' bass into an engaging whole that to this day remains a timeless classic and source of inspiration. In 1998, 4 Hero sought once again to change the way people thought of drum 'n' bass. The much anticipated Two Pages was released on Talkin' Loud that summer. Again, Mark and Dego had employed a basis of d 'n' b, but that was just a platform to launch their extensive artistic visions. This majestic conception crosses over into the realms of jazz and soul with ample amounts of full vocal tracks and wall to wall live instrumentation on 'page' one. The second 'page' departs on a deep journey into sublime futuristic jungle abstractions. The resulting Two Pages is a culmination of everything Reinforced had been working towards for the past decade.

Never content with one musical approach, 4 Hero has always attempted to incorporate the best qualities of acoustic instruments and jazz experimentation with today's high-powered music making machines. Serious music consumers are urged to search out any of the titles and labels mentioned here. 4 Hero does not settle for less than complete departures from what is taken to be understood about their music. The selections they've produced are quite possibly some of the more beautiful tones you'll experience this millennium. The depth to which 4 Hero and Reinforced have influenced the lifeline and progression of jungle/drum 'n' bass is truly unequaled. May they continue looking forward while exploding all boundaries...we'll try and catch up!

Live Interview with DJ Rebel of Reinforced Records
United States Debut on Future Breaks 90.3 FM
April 11, 1998

P U S H: Watch your heads! Goin' on here today we've got the entire Reinforced crew in the house, right here on Future Breaks FM . Right now we're going to be talking with DJ Rebel who was just pitching things up out there on there decks where we've got Stretch bustin' it out now. We want to send a shout out to Rebel -- Rebel how are you doing today?

R E B E L: Doin' fine man, real fine.

P U S H: These guys have just rolled into town, doing a little tour here in the States, they've got about 6,7 dates and they're starting things off here in San Francisco tonight. Just wanted to ask you a few things about the label. Real quick, why don't you give a little history to some of our listeners out there. How long has Reinforced been around?

R E B E L: Wow, well we're going back a bit, there! We officially started in 1989, but we were making tunes well before that, you know. So we've been going as a crew for a good 12, 13 years, now.

P U S H: Things got started way back then, earlier on you guys were starting out with some hardcore sound and things got meshing around in about 1992, 93. And then 4 Hero started breaking out with some serious business. Talk a little bit about Parallel Universe that epic album came out around the Summer of 94 and changed a lot of people's feelings about jungle.

R E B E L: The Parallel Universe thing I think was a stepping stone for a lot of people, and I don't think at the time a lot of people were ready for the album. It was a break from the norm to do something a bit more creative and a bit more wild, you know, and kind of dive into the whole electronic kind of area and start messing around with some breaks and sounds. A lot of this stuff was just totally created in our studio at the time.

P U S H: Indeed, the Reinforced sound has been progressive and has changed a lot of people's perspectives. You guys did some things with timestretching -- no one was really doing that before, we just had those crazy-ass Mickey Mouse vocals. Then in comes Reinforced once again, pushing forward the envelope of sonic magnetism. However you guys are here promoting new business. As I understand there is a new 4 Hero LP in the works. What's going on with that? When can we expect something there?

R E B E L: You can expect something by the end of June, definitely. We dropped the Earth Pioneers EP, I'm not sure if you've heard of that but that's just been released and that was a 4-track EP with lots of different flavors on it. But the LP's actually just being finished now and it's being delivered into Talkin' Loud and they're saying roughly about June. And the album, for us as Reinforced, is another stepping' stone. Believe me, when you hear it -- it's going to turn a lot of people off the war, man -- it's some new, pioneering business.

P U S H: Rebel, why don't you talk about some of the artists you have in the stable right now. We know that you have brought many, many classic heads out. For example, I'm sure a lot of people don't know but one Mr. Goldie got his start working with you kids way back years ago, known as the Rufige Kru -- who are some of the people you are pushing out now?

R E B E L: Right now the kind of people that we're pushing out are people like Alpha Omega, Seiji, G-force, Sonar Circle -- all these people have sent tapes to us, we've listened to the tapes and have heard a bit of a cutting edge with them, and it's like, not a lot of people sending tapes make the grade. These are the kind of people that we've listened to and have heard potential in their music so we've put them on board to do some stuff with us and it's paid off. Some of them are coming in with some really, really good stuff at the moment.

P U S H: What's going down with Leon Mar/Arcon 2?

R E B E L: Leon Mar -- I don't know if you've got a hold of his album last year, it was a really phat album. Listen up for more from him, he's going to be dropping some 12''s this year and hopefully in the next year or two he'll be dropping another album.

P U S H: Excellent, I know some people will be rushing out to pick that business up. Real quick -- what do you guys feel about the whole jungle scene beginning to explode here in the States and maybe switching some of your focus on to bringing some things out of Europe, out of the UK. What do you think? How has the reception been so far?

R E B E L: I think you lot took a long time to get onto it! I mean, for the US, you know, the hip hop movement and the R&B movement have been very strong phenomenon here, and then people like Prodigy and The Chemical Brothers are coming over and introducing the whole electronic kind of background -- a lot of the young, university kids have jumped onto that and have made people a lot more aware of the whole drum 'n' bass scene and electronic style of music. So it's all good, you know, and we're over here just trying to break new barriers as it were. A lot of people have gotten into things with Goldie signing the major deal, and getting promoted over here, and Roni Size. There is a lot of work being done trying to break drum 'n' bass in the US, you know, and we're just trying to reinforce that idea, and show people our history and how long we've been here as a record label -- we're deep rooted.

P U S H: Reinforced indeed, that is right. Remember Reinforced has been around since the 80's as a matter of fact. Well, well, well before anybody else was doing business we had Reinforced on the scene, changing times, changing things around...Allright, Rebel. Thank you and all the crew for coming through today.

R E B E L: Yeah, thanks man. We're goin' to bring on the flavour tonight!