Representative Albums: "Now, Listen!," "A Recipe for Disaster," "Now, Listen Again!"
Representative Songs: "Spiral," "Scratch Yer Hed," "Full Bleed"
Biography
DJ Food is a collaborative project between Coldcut/Ninja Tune duo Matt Black and Jonathan More, and second-half PC (born Patrick Carpenter) and Strictly (Kevin Foakes). Although the moniker originally referred only to Black and More's several-volumed series of stripped-down breaks records designed for deck use (i.e., "food" for DJs), club booking demands for the assumedly proper-named DJ Food dictated the pair make an ongoing project of it. Adding PC and Strictly to spice things up (and differentiate DJ Food from Coldcut when they played the same bill), the quartet released a series of 12" singles in various combinations starting in 1994 (including "Freedom"/"Consciousness"), with their proper debut full-length, A Recipe for Disaster, appearing the following year. The quartet also toured Europe, Canada, and America as DJ Food (mainly DJing) and regularly mashed it up side by side on Coldcut's weekly KISS FM show Solid Steel. PC and Strictly were also hired on by Warp Records to compile and mix a series of releases entitled Blech drawing from the influential experimental techno label's back catalog. More and Black continued to split their time between DJ Food and Coldcut, as well as the day-to-day operation of their immensely popular Ninja Tune and Ntone labels. DJ Food's second production album, Kaleidoscope, appeared in April of 2000 to warm reviews. A year later, the pair inaugurated a Solid Steel CD series with the mix album Now, Listen! ~ Sean Cooper, All Music Guide
Volumes 4 and 5 of the Jazz Brakes series, co-created with DJ / producer PC transcend the breakbeat compilation format to stand as artist albums in their own right. The later DJ Food albums have developed with shades of Latin, dub, techno, ambient, and Jungle flavouring the funk.
The 1995 album, A Recipe For Disaster was a conscious move away from the Jazz Brakes volumes to form more of an identity as an artist, and a remix album of tracks from all 6 LPs, entitled Refried Food was released the following year. Their last release, Kaleidoscope, featured guest artists including Bundy K. Brown (formerly of Tortoise, Directions in Music, Pullman) and voiceover artist and jazz poet, Ken Nordine.
With a seemingly single DJ name, it is often wrongly assumed that DJ Food is a single person. In fact, a whole host of DJs, producers and musicians have performed under the name, so the evolutionary nature of the DJ Food sound comes as no surprise. Matt Black and Jonathan More (aka Coldcut) were responsible for starting Jazz Breaks series in the early '90s. Along the way they met Patrick Carpenter, who, being listed on the liner notes simply by his initials, was often mistakenly thought to be a Personal computer. A loose collaborative team began to form as more like-minded people arrived at the party, including Paul Brook, Paul Rabiger, Strictly Kev and Issac Elliston.
Although keeping their hand in as DJs on the albums, Matt & Jon couldn't perform DJ sets twice in one night under both aliases of Coldcut & DJ Food, so they handed the mantle of live DJing over to PC and Strictly Kev. Later, PC became so busy with The Cinematic Orchestra that he decided to quit, at least temporarily leaving DJ Food as a solo project.
In addition to The Cinematic Orchestra, PC also recorded with J. Swinscoe under the band name Neptune. Strictly Kev has recorded under the name Flexus.
Album discography
Jazz Brakes Vol. 1 (Oct 1990, Cat No. ZENCD 001)
Jazz Brakes Vol. 2 (Sep 1991, Cat No. ZENCD 002)
Jazz Brakes Vol. 3 (Jul 1992, Cat No. ZENCD 003)
Jazz Brakes Vol. 4 (Jun 1993, Cat No. ZENCD 006)
Jazz Brakes Vol. 5 (Oct 1994, Cat No. ZENCD 010)
A Recipe For Disaster (Oct 1995, Cat No. ZENCD 020)
Refried Food (remix album) (Jan 1996, ZENCD 021)
Kaleidoscope (Apr 2000, Cat No. ZENCD 047)
Refried Food was re-released in 2003 as a double CD, with additional remixes.
DJ Mix albums
Blech II: Blechsdottir (1996, released on Rough Trade in Germany, Cat No. RTD 126.3175.2)
Mixed by PC and Strictly Kev.
Plastic Apple (Oct 1996, released on Aura Surround Sounds, Cat No. SUCD 005)
Disc 1 consists of a 56 minute mix by DJ Food. Discs 2 & 3 are by the artist MLO
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