Biography
Aligned with plunderphonic marauders and dancefloor agitators such as Stock, Hausen & Walkman, Kid-606, and DJ Olive, Manchester's V/Vm ("volume versus mass") unit delivered a timely kick to the rear of an increasingly solemn late-'90s dance landscape, divided between mindless club trance on one flank and self-serious bedroom boffins on the other. The duo of James Kirby and Andy McGregor (aka Jansky Noise) issued a run of recordings famed for crude yet lovingly detailed packaging, extreme scarcity (limited to 100–500 copies in most cases), and, frequently, sonic content that mounted a ferocious attack on copyright statutes and decibel thresholds alike.
Kirby and McGregor established V/Vm Test Records via the five-track 12" Up-Link Data Transmissions in 1997. Their subsequent outing, the "compilation" Privileged Frames for Reference, set a label precedent by interleaving cuts from established producers (including Jega and Datathief) with assorted V/Vm productions and those of associates released under pseudonyms. Chart Runners, the project's debut LP, surfaced in mid-1998. The further compilation 0161 emerged as a co-release with Manchester's Skam, another collector-oriented imprint, while a split single with Third Eye Foundation appeared on Fat Cat Records. V/Vm Test Records issued its first compact discs in 1999: the compilation AuralOffalWaffle and the Caretaker's artist album Selected Memories from the Haunted Ballroom. Later that year Kirby embarked on a U.S. tour, after which the label received official remix commissions ranging from Hawkwind to Madonna. Additional compilations—The V/VM Christmas Pudding, The Green Door, Hate You—appeared across 2000–2001, followed in early 2002 by the two-volume set Sometimes, Good Things Happen.
Kirby and McGregor established V/Vm Test Records via the five-track 12" Up-Link Data Transmissions in 1997. Their subsequent outing, the "compilation" Privileged Frames for Reference, set a label precedent by interleaving cuts from established producers (including Jega and Datathief) with assorted V/Vm productions and those of associates released under pseudonyms. Chart Runners, the project's debut LP, surfaced in mid-1998. The further compilation 0161 emerged as a co-release with Manchester's Skam, another collector-oriented imprint, while a split single with Third Eye Foundation appeared on Fat Cat Records. V/Vm Test Records issued its first compact discs in 1999: the compilation AuralOffalWaffle and the Caretaker's artist album Selected Memories from the Haunted Ballroom. Later that year Kirby embarked on a U.S. tour, after which the label received official remix commissions ranging from Hawkwind to Madonna. Additional compilations—The V/VM Christmas Pudding, The Green Door, Hate You—appeared across 2000–2001, followed in early 2002 by the two-volume set Sometimes, Good Things Happen.