Interviews

This months guest really needs no intro to the Dream Chimney community, it’s our man Raj, aka the great Ray Mang! Ray has an amazing catalogue of production, remix and edit work, he is also a tremendous DJ and good pal. If you know don’t his work we strongly suggest you start checking it. On a recent trip to NYC we got to hang and talk about many things including our lifetime vinyl mania. Without further adieu here is Raj in his own words. - Dennis Kane

I grew up in Cambridge. In ’82 at the tender age of eleven, and soon after starting Secondary School I landed a job helping setting up (before school) and packing up (after school) a market stall owned and run by an Indian family selling all kinds of things from tourist tat to grandad shirts. I was really too young for the gig, but because I was tall I got away with it. Having a job meant for the first time I had some money to buy things for myself.

The same market had a great record stall called Andy’s. Andy Gray who started out selling second-hand jukebox records through market stalls went on to open many shops around the country. There was also a more specialist shop on Regent Street that I started to frequent a couple of years later called The Beat Goes On. That shop was part inspiration for the shop In “Hi Fidelity” (Author Nick Hornby lived nearby and was a customer) but I digress!

One of the market stall mates had an older brother who was bang into smoking pot and listening to Dub and Reggae. We thought this was all very exciting and wanted to do the same! This led to my first (of many) purchase from Andy’s Records stall on Cambridge. Scientist meets the Space invaders. Proper dub vibes and the jam “Dematerialise” was also responsible for blowing out the bass bin on my Dads stereo! The beginnings of a lifelong obsession.

Some other early finds:

• The Commodores – Machine Gun
• Grace Jones – Nightclubbing
• Gregory Issacs – Night Nurse
• The Specials – More Specials