In the early 1990's I DJ'ed at Heaven ("Europe's biggest gay night club"). Under the name of Ian D I played the main floor between 10pm and 4am every Saturday for nearly 3 years. This eventually led to my taking up a full-time job in the music industry between 1994 and 1996, becoming a music journalist for the American dance music magazine Dance Music Authority (DMA), remixing several Top 20 records, and producing three of my own singles through Media/MCA Records. Highlights included getting my first record to no. 1 in Israel (which sounds impressive, but probably means it sold about 20 copies!), visiting Top of the Pops (and realising how very shabby it is in reality!), and getting several of my remixes played on 1 FM (a.k.a. BBC Radio 1). Heaven had hit a bad patch and was struggling when I started there, with attendance figures down to an all-time low because of their obsession with being "credible" (whatever that means!). I was very lucky to have a champion in the form of Alan Purnell who was in charge of all the technical staff at the nightclub at the time. Alan fought most of the horrid, political battles that were required to get me a "trial" slot, and continued to fight my corner during my first year of residency (sadly, he left Heaven at the end of my first year there). My time at Heaven, politics aside, was exhillerating - there is no better feeling in the world than having "control" of the dancefloor in a club the size of Heaven, playing music you love and which you know people would not be hearing otherwise. I had met Alan when the digital scanner I used to produce photo's for my dance music newsletter broke down. A mutual friend, who I'd bought my computer from, suggested Alan, who lived near me, could help and I gave him one of my mix tapes at the mutual friend's behest, in what turned out to be a VERY lucky break for me! I am immensely proud of the fact that with Alan's support, and within just a few weeks of being given the prime slot on the main floor, attendance figures had climbed to over 2000 a week. They managed to stay there week-in, week-out of my three year tenancy (I'm bragging here, in case you hadn't noticed!) As a result of the visibility of working at a high profile club like Heaven, together with general music industry buzz around my "controversial" DMA column which continually bemoaned the "Emporer's new clothes" mentality of so-called "Underground" music, I was approached by two separate sets of producers who were interested in working with me. The first of these was Peter Pritchard, who ran the UK branch of the Italian Media Records label of which I was a fan. The second comprised Phil Harding and Ian Curnow. They had worked at PWL for legendary dance producers Stock, Aitken and Waterman, and were now working on their own under the name of The Power Syndicate. Ultimately, meetings with these two sets of producers led to a series of remixes being released under my producer nom-de-plume of Primax. Until this point, DJing and writing had been a hobby. I had been working as a mainframe (CICS) Systems Engineer throughout the 80's and early 90's, but in 1994, when my partner Mark became terminally ill and was undergoing frequent chemotherapy, I gave up my "day job" in I.T. to try and spend more time with him. I also formed my own company Prime Cuts Ltd to capitalise on possible income from DJing. The name came from the title of a free dance music review newsletter I had used to help promote the music I played at my first gigs at The Paradise Club in Islington (where I promoted a club called Pulse), but which I continued to produce when I started at Heaven, and which ended up being distributed through specialist dance record stores in Birmingham, Manchester, Blackpool and Glasgow. It was through this company and my dance music journalism that I took up a full-time job at Media Records and condensed the company/newsletter name and slogan ("Prime Cuts - to the max!") to come up with my adopted remixer name of Primax. The remainder of this section of the site will, when I get time to update it, detail the remixes I worked on, the real stories behind them and some of the stars and industry figures I met. The ultimate aim here is not to harp over past glories and imagined slights, but to give some warnings for those naive enough to want to work in the music business. I was very lucky and had some success, but there are a lot of less lucky (and far more talented) people who have been badly burnt by the industry. My best advice to anyone considering a career in the music business is to remember that the "music business" has very little to do with "music" and everything to do with "business". More worryingly, record labels are staffed, for the most part, by A&R men who, if they were working in any other industry, would be fired for gross incompetence! Stay tuned! There is more to come as this site develops.... Email: ian@iansmith.co.uk