Audiation Magazine AM012 Print | Page 36

36

www.AudiationMagazine.com

MC VAPOUR

Tell us about yourself and Taylor Made Music

Well, if i start explaining from the beginning of my journey we’ll be here for weeks haha, i’ll just skim the edges...

Im Vapour, the MC best known for my UK Garage Anthem from the year 2000 called “Move Your Body” or as its more popularly known “I Remember When I Was At School”. And a number of pirate radio rips that made the internet and went viral back in the early 00’s. Started in 1998 on Force FM, built a fanbase bigger and quicker than I ever could’ve imagined at that time, with what people call my “Skippy Flows”. Once my first release sold over 5000 vinyl copies in 2 weeks and made the leading commercial garage compilation of the time, my career was pretty much underway before I was even able to realise that I had one! Over the years, while on my journey I watched and learned carefully, as thats my nature....

Cutting an extremely long story to a very short one, 17 years and 3 solo albums later, here i am with my own record label, Taylor Made Music which has really only just begun. I want to start signing new music on the platform as well as using it to release my own. The label caters for both Dance and Rap genres, which I feel covers quite a lot of modern music. The label will also be a platform where a lyricist like myself doesn’t have to water down the content in order to make the shop shelf.

How did you find your niche for MC'ing and get into the music industry?

When I was at school... (no pun intended)... Me and my mates were heavily into Jungle music. We used to swap tapes and be ‘Walkman’ crazy. Jungle gave me my first real insight into DJ’ing and MC’ing. The first MC’s I heard were local guys messing about on Unity FM which was an amateur pirate station in my area, then came Boogie Times Record shop in Romford, then came tape cassette packs with MC GQ etc etc.

Before long I met someone on Force FM and that was it. I would write lyrics down and literally practice them live on air, it was just a hobby, I didn’t decide wanted to be an MC until I started getting unexpected respect and realising that I already was one.

As for the music industry, I wouldn’t necessarily say that I'm IN IT, I would say that I'm someone who has put so much time and effort into music that I am more recognised BY IT. This is the reason I have my own label. The music industry in my opinion is more the machine behind what goes commercial or gets supported by media, and is a part of the game that I've never really been part of. Most of my success has been without support from commercial or industry standard radio, TV channels, award ceremonies and Internet platforms.

Ive often felt like a kind of underated underdog who is underground, but who everyone has heard before, or is aware of.

‘Dexplicit’ once said... “Vapour doesn’t have a following, he has a Cult”.... haha.. I like that quote.

What makes a good track, and what do you look out for when listening to submissions?

I love such an array of music that it makes that question a hard one to answer...