Me and Lego Breaks
by Mingus Casey
Me and Lego Breaks
You've heard people say trip-hop and drum'n'bass before, you know that it's taken a grip internationally, but you're not really sure of what it is, and you don't really know how well NZ is representing in the genre? Well, let me tell you...
The Wellington style is an evolution from heavy metal into drum'n'bass, taking the patterns you are familiar with from rock and adding to them with multiple levels of electronic rhythm. Lego Breaks is an alias for James Davenport, super producer for the Wellington Central scene.
James Davenport in a moment of time. He is short, with cropped blonde hair and blue eyes, somewhat stocky and dressed in a casual manner, a puffy jacket, hoody and jeans. His manner is mostly relaxed, as is his tone. Earlier in the evening he had been working for a small start-up, FireAnt technologies, in his role as a computer technician and developer, however I intend to focus on his ambitions regarding music, and especially his recent production under the Lego Breaks name.
Fireant is a small tech company based in Central Wellington that provides support and supply of Linux based servers to regional end users, his role consists of software development, technical support, web design and other related duties.
He feels like a neat, tidy person, with a good sense of humour, when asked “How do you see yourself?” he replied humorously, “Objectively.” His sense of perspective has kept him righted through a lot of struggle, ultimately leading to his current growing success as a local producer across multiple genres, “Drum and bass, then I got into hip-hop, then dub, I want to concentrate on more downbeat stuff, focus on dub, maybe open up into psi-trance, maybe be genreless.” His cross-genre skill at music is exceptional.
James has a lot of musical experience, especially with his high-school band, “Akula, that’s my high school band from third to seventh form, we were heavy metal, loud and aggressive with overtones of punk, but we could never find a decent singer, our band was always three members really, me Michael Zoias, and Nick Terezow,” although Akula has broken up Nick still has a band that practices in Lower Hutt, and Michael is lead vocalist for Transcending Mortality, a Sydney, Australia based heavy metal band that are opening for the American band Nevermore on their Australian tour, all the original members are still in the music scene and up and coming.
The highlights of his music career include “Getting tracks played on the radio, on Firm FM and Radioactive, getting tunes played at parties, getting my own tunes played at gigs, playing in bars” there is no one big break that he can define, rather just a mass of experience gained live and in studio over several years, that has now lead to some great music, with upcoming gigs at Happy and Valve in the near future.
Recently he has performed live at Bodega and Valve, with a gig at Happy tomorrow night, his gig style tends to consist of an ambient chilled out, almost trip-hoppish vibe, accompanied at times by skillful rapping or soulful feminine singing, especially by his girlfriend Renata, a long time ago James and I visited Renata’s place and that led to his current relationship in a round about way, which has led to a great deal of personal happiness for him, and some really good music.
Lego Breaks live at Happy
His life has not been without its trials however, and that experience has lent itself to his musical ability and creative expression, in his own words “so, bad stuff happening?” “Getting arrested… that was pretty low I guess,” he explained, before continuing with a slightly guilty expression, “Well the charges were burglary, climbing into construction yards and playing with the tools that were lying around, sort of treating the world like a play ground,” In response to these hijinks he was placed under a police curfew for several months and sentenced to community service, with a discharge without conviction.
The experience has impacted on James’s life in various ways, lending to his reputation as the opposite of the clichéd hip-hop stereotype of a hard core gang banging hustler type who won’t take nothing from no one and lays it down like the baddest producer west of the east side. Far from such clichéd and stereotypical angles lies Lego Breaks production, which achieves a clean image and a reputation for good beats and great live acts.
The cover of Lego Breaks first album
Another low point was James's last flat, 5 Governor Road, about which in part the song Flat-jam is about, “There was a flat you had a little while ago?” Yeah, I lived up in Northland; that turned to custard…” His flat in Northland, just past the Botanic Gardens was occupied by a mix of drug addicts, bums and professionals, which ultimately had negative impacts on some aspects of James’s life,
“What went wrong with it?”
“Well, flatmates that thought it didn’t cost to live in a flat, I was signed up to power and rent and on the lease, we weren’t supposed to have a pet but one of the tenants had a dog that wasn’t quite toilet trained… everything that could go wrong did go wrong… we even had a spider infestation.”
Regarding his emotional character and what he’d change about his life, he states, “I guess I’m happy when the people around me are happy, I’m quite content really where I am now,” when asked about long term plans re music, he hopes to continue to write music with hopes of taking it to a wider audience, with life and where he is, “Live on the good side as much as I can…” he says with hope for the future in his eyes.
“Light side brothers…?" I ask.
“Yeah”
When we got to the deep emotional issues, trust and betrayal, the conversations had overtones of his personal beliefs, “Why do you trust other human beings?” I asked curiously.
“Feelings I guess… It’s deeper than talk I guess, you get a feeling off other people who you can trust… It’s a good thing to trust.” And just as good a thing to be trusted, I think to myself later.
For more information on James and the Wellington scene, check the following links;
www.myspace.com/legobreaks
http://legobreaks.dmusic.com
http://zer0th.dmusic.com
http://grandfathertime.dmusic.com
www.barbodega.co.nz
www.radioactive.co.nz