si-cut.db aka Douglas Benford - biography
London-based SI-CUT.DB (pronounced 'Sye Kut Dee Bee') aka
Douglas Benford has had many recorded releases under many
guises: mainly as SI-CUT.DB, but also Radial Blend, Phoenix
Jig, Pantunes Music & Media Form (via Douglas's own
imprint Suburbs Of Hell), covering electronica/drum n'
bass/ambient, and then into microsound, glitch and dub...as
SI-CUT.DB Douglas also runs and plays at the SPRAWL club,
based in London, and it's label SPRAWL IMPRINT. The first
SI-CUT.DB release was in 1991, as SIDE>>CUT.DB (with
later off-shoots as LOVE>>CUT.DB).
For over 10 years Douglas has also run and DJed at the
London-based electronic music Sprawl Club and label with
Iris Garrelfs AKA BIt Tonic, which besides its regular
spots in Soho and Farringdon, London, have also held
specials such as the Interplay series (Spitz), Sprawl
Compass, GroundSwell at the ICA, Watermans (SonicRecycler)
& Colchester Art Centres, Tate Modern, plus Sprawl
events in Brighton and Leeds. Monthly Sprawls currently
resides at various venues in central London, and are linked
to the Sprawl Resonance FM Small Pieces radio show (in rota
with [no signal], Slow Sound System, HighPoint LowLife
& Dfuse).
Aside from appearing on BBC TV's News 24, SKY TV's "The
Lounge", KISS FM and other radio stations, Douglas has
turned up with his opinions in interviews on internet
clubbing and remixes in national newspapers The Independent
and Guardian. In 2000, Germany/French residents and some UK
cable/digital viewers may have caught Douglas Benford, Iris
Garrelfs and Stockhausen amongst others on "The Well
Tempered Computer - Are Computers able to compose?" a
60-minutes -documentary that took place on Culture-TV's
"ARTE". An UK ITV1 TV networked programme, MIXMASTERS
featuring Sprawl and Si-cut.db/BitTonic material was aired
in the UK in October 2001, repeated April 2002. Douglas
also co-ordinated/produced recordings for the Sprawl label,
such as the "Broken Voice" album, the "Chinese Whispers"
project. (involving Mike Paradinas, Si-Begg, T-Power, The
Sons Of Silence, and Stereolab, amongst others) and
overseen releases by Puppy (from Seattle), Freeform (Sub
Rosa/Warp/Skam/Leaf) on Sprawl, and the cut and paste
artist Osymyso.
In the late 90s, as SI-CUT.DB, Douglas recorded three
albums, and as part of Pantunes Music, a number of remixes,
and the odd Playstation soundtrack. In the past Douglas has
also remixed, produced, and collaborated with Andrew
Weatherall, Scanner, Momus, Sarah Cracknell (St Etienne),
Add N TO (X) and produced documentary soundtracks.
SI-CUT.DB was in the top 200 of US College radio acts
played in 1999.
SI-CUT.DB material by Douglas has been released primarily
on BIP HOP (france), ATC/BACKGROUND (germany), Fallt
(Northern Ireland) and Highpont Lowlife (US/UK). A 2nd
album by SI-CUT.DB & STEPHAN MATHIEU (mille
plateaux/orthlorng musork/touch) is currently being
finished. SI-CUT tracks have also appeared on French Label
DAYDREAM, SIMBALLREC, ECR, SPA.RK, WARP, FALLT, Taylor
Deupree's 12K Term, MINISTRY OF SOUND and others. A track
on is also Sprawl's infamous HMM album project alongside
VLADISLAV DELAY, WANG INC, FARBEN, DAVID TOOP, CARL STONE,
KIT CLAYTON, and FREEFORM, as well co-ordinating and
originating the concept, electronic versions of traditional
hmyns.
SI-CUT.DB/Douglas has remixed & also produced St
ETIENNE, Youth's (Orb) Dub Trees, Marc Weiser
(Rechenzentrum), UK's Posset, Dusseldorf's Andy Vaz, Jem
Finer, Latvia's Virac RT-32 telescope, Cologne's Big Chief
Electric and JANEK SCHAEFER. There have been SI-CUT.DB VS.
BITTONIC, and SI-CUT.DB Vs. SCANNER tracks on The Wire
magazine's WIRETAPPER CDs. In London & the UK,
Douglas/si-cut.db has played at places as diverse as the
Rumpus Rooms, the Electronic Lounge, the British Arts
Council website launch.
In 1998-2001 Douglas played at Futuresonic (Leeds), The
Monastery Of Sound (France), Batofar boat (Paris), Berlins'
Avantpop 2001 (with Matmos/Mu-ziq/kid 606/safety scissors),
and The Frigid Club, Sydney, Australia (plus radio
interviews on ABC's Other Worlds, Paradigm Shift at 2ser).
Si-cut.db has also played at Sprawl's GROUNDSWELL (along
with VERT, SUTEKH, FENNESZ, JAN JELENIK, DAVID TOOP and
HALLUCINATOR) event at the ICA, London in 2000. In 2001,
Douglas created a piece, and judged, for the Centre of
Contemporary Art in Glasgow (with BitTonic) alongside Evan
Parker, Tim Brady, Scanner & The Sneaker Pimps.
In 2001/02 SI-CUT.DB has performanced on tours in France,
Spain and the U.S. (NY, Pittsburgh & Chicago) plus
one-off performances at the CAMDEN REMIX, London and the
CCA (a sold out performance) and Deep Burnt festival in
Glasgow, TRANSMEDIALE (2002 with Pole, Rechenzentrum, Luomo
etc) in Berlin, ARS ELECTRONICA in Linz, AV LODGE in
Vancouver, and been interviewed by DE:BUG magazine
(publication in April 2002). Benford to presented a show on
the LMC's Resonance FM in London as well. A live
collaboration between RECHENZENTRUM'S Marc Weiser and
Douglas happened in November 2002.
In 2003, Douglas played Transmediale (next to Scanner and
David Toop) again, Link in Bologna, FRAC (Metz),
Arborescence (Aix En Provence), Ausland (Berlin),
Electronic Welfare (Dusseldorf), EXpo (Nottingham), The
Bunker (Tonic, NYC), Sintesi (Naples), Lemon Tree
(Aberdeen) & Colchester Art Centre; Works were also
played out at the 2003 Sonar festival in Barcelona. A live
Si-cut.db set was played on the "Didjilution" radio show in
New York on WNYU 89.1FM in late March 2003; si-cut.db's
soundtoys work was also mentioned in the Guardian
newspaper, as well as receiving a glowing review for these
tracks in THE WIRE magazine.
2004 performances were at Slovenia's Klub Gromka, Paris's
Capitales Sonores & Electronautes, and a London ICA
Kompakt nite next to artists such as AGF, Kaffe Matthews,
Taylor Deupree, To Rococo Rot, Thomas Fehlmann, Schneider
TM, Mitchell Akiyama, Scanner, Vladislav Delay, Buck 65,
Twine and in July, Pole. Further performances included
SYNCH (Greece), Recycl'art, Lille's Art Museum, and RIXC
(Riga).
2005 performances included the prestigious MUTEK festival
in Montreal, Basel International Art Fair, Liverpool's Hive
Club at FACT, Rhiz (Vienna), Tallinn, other festivals
including E-Life (Madrid), Dis-patch (Belgrade), Thames
Festival (Tate Modern Gardens, London), Bestival (Isle of
Wight) and Interplay 3 (London, with Stephan Mathieu).
2006 included performances at Sprawl's London Birthday, The
Sage(Newcastle, with Taylor Deupree, Pan Sonic &
Richard Chartier), Lovebytes festival (Sheffield),
Reykjavik (Sirkus and the SmekkleysaSM/Bad Taste gallery),
Switzerland (Chiasso's Transit festival), Italy (Pescara's
PEAM), New Forms (Vancouver), Sightsonic (York, as part as
the Touch label 25 performances) & France; Douglas also
produced and curated the successful SonicRecycler2 at
Watermans Art Centre, West London.
2007 so far has seen a SI-CUT.DB performance at the Tate
Britain (Arctic Circle event), London. In 2006 and 2007
Benford was short-listed in both the QWARTZ awards in
France and the Arts Foundation (London).
Douglas currently has on-going work with BENGE (sub
rosa/expanding) on TENNIS with releases on ECR (Germany),
Bip Hop (France), Spa.rk (Spain) and fylkingen (sweden).
The third Tennis album was released on Bip Hop, with an
additional album of Tennis remixes by OREN AMBARCHI, TAYLOR
DEUPREE, KIM CASCONE, SCANNER and others. Tennis have
played TATE MODERN, BBC'S MIXING IT, ARS ELECTRONICA, on
John Peel and had a track used in international touring
SONIC PROCESS exhibition (Sonar & Pompidou).
Benford's current approach to his SI-CUT.DB work tends,
with perfomances and recordings, to use a variety of
softwares (with generative and file morphing a trademark)
and sound sample source techniques (from improvised
recordings acoustic recordings and lo fi childrens
keyboards), which are then edited and sequenced.
...the Si-cut.db sound is 'constantly devolving'; Doug
appears regularly at the Sprawl, although states that he
has 'given up djing and has a constant impatience with his
own sound'.
Previous SI-(CUT).DB/si-cut.db releases have been played in
the UK on Resonance FM, GLR (Ross Allen), XFM (John Kennedy
& Flo-motion), John Peel, Surf FM, KISS FM, Radio 3's
MIXING IT, but also specialist radios shows all over the
world.
INTERVIEWS
textura
http://www.textura.org
miscreat
http://www.miscreat.com/forums/cms_view_article.php?aid=251
the milk factory
http://www.themilkfactory.co.uk/interviews/dbiw.htm
overload
http://www.overloadmedia.co.uk/archives/music/douglas_benford.php
bip hop webzine
http://www.pandemoniumrecords.com/bip-hop/webzine/sprawl.htm
loop
http://www.loop.cl/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=65&Itemid=26
pastis
http://www.pastis.org/jade/jan03/melodies/deux/memento-benford.htm
remote induction
http://members.tripod.com/~rem_ind/audio/sprawlfeat.htm
saccharine
http://www-student.newn.cam.ac.uk/~jlm39/intdone/sicut.htm
PRESS QUOTES on si-cut.db material:
"si-cut.db offer(s) futuristic soundscapes that
teem with prickly ambience"
TIME OUT, NEW YORK
"slithering crackles and fizzes...sweeping the audience
along with it"
THE WIRE
"magnificent" Keith Cameron
NME/XFM, UK
"Amazing......superb"
Nick Luscombe, XFM
"putting jazz to drum and bass and electronic minimal blips
to
forge yet another hybrid of new musics to melodic kinetic
and frenetic effect."
wReck thiS meSS Radio Show, Amsterdam
"glitchy warmly warped sonics"
TIME OUT, London
"an album that reveals new nuances with each play."
Alternative Press, Dave Segal, US
"....ambio beats and noise fest....marvellous"
MELODY MAKER, UK
"excellent...startling...ambient acupuncture of the highest
order"
THE WIRE, UK
"...a
subtly distinctive voice whose aquaintance you're
reccommended to make"
THE WIRE, UK
"radical but infectious"
TOWER RECORDS MAGAZINE, UK
"I call him The Dub Meister"
SCANNER
"abrasive muzak comparable to To Rococo Rot"
MAGIC FEET, UK
"imagine Squarepusher and Luke Vibert being normal. That's
what (si-cut's album) makes them look"
MUZIK
"...beat trickery....intricate beats....organic melodies,
provide a
modern tapestry that can be quite absorbing. Groovy
accesible
electronic mutations"
FLIPSIDE
"It takes real talent to come up with something so strange
yet likeable"
FUTURE MUSIC
"chic sonics...accelerated breaks...different and easy to
groove to"
MIXMAG