They say a journey begins with a single step. Ian Boddy's journey began in 1979 when he walked into the studio at Newcastle's Spectro Arts Workshop. Intrigued by the sounds emanating from the banks of VCS3 synthesizers and Revox tape recorders, he started a 30-year odyssey of musical experimentation and adventure. Never following the mainstream or courting a band-centric musical path, he has nevertheless forged a truly unique musical career.
From the release of his first ever full album on the UK cassette label Mirage in 1980, Ian has gone on to issue 23 solo and 24 collaborative albums, performed over 100 concerts in the UK, Netherlands, Germany and USA, composed 11 library music albums for DeWolfe Music and programmed several sample CDs and virtual instruments for Time & Space.
In 1999 he founded the DiN electronica label, based in North-East England, which has since become synonymous with adventurous and eclectic music. There have been 35 titles to date, including albums by Chris Carter, Robert Rich, Tetsu Inoue, Mark Shreeve, Markus Reuter and Erik Wøllo.
Boddy's influence also extends into sound design where numerous musicians and film makers have used his sounds in their own music and soundtracks. He has over 300 library music tracks released via DeWolfe Music which are used worldwide on a huge variety of TV shows, documentaries and films.
These statistics are impressive enough, but what impresses the most is Boddy's sheer determination and presence of mind to follow his own musical path and create music and sounds that offer a very personal reflection of his own personality.
Pearl
Pearl is the 36th release on DiN and offers a retrospective of Boddy's 30-year musical journey. Available from 9th November 2010 in a limited edition release of 1,000 beautifully-designed digipak packaging, the music is split across two discs (with the first 300 being signed and numbered by the artist).
"Outer DiN" attempts to bring together all his work outside of DiN. It includes his solo work stretching all the way back to the early cassette releases, three DeWolfe library music tracks and an excerpt of his sound design work.
"Inner DiN" showcases both his solo and collaborative work on the DiN ambient label. Boddy has mixed both CDs into a continuous mix of music that provides a fascinating and unique way to experience the music of a truly original musician.
WIN signed, limited edition copy of Pearl
The first 300 copies of Pearl will be numbered and signed personally by Ian Boddy. Enter a simple competition to win the 1/300 copy of this disc (plus Ian's four current DiN releases: Slide, Elemental, Chiasmata or Aurora). Simply try to guess the name of one of the tracks that will be included on Pearl and from which album it originally comes. Only one track name per entry/person is permitted. Send your entry to pearl@selse.demon.co.uk
Closing date for the competition is October 24th 2010. The correct entries will be entered into a random draw and winners will be announced on November 1st 2010.
