Nu-Sound Crew II/ Magnus II - Nu-Sound Crew II / Magnus II

Dark Entries is excited to reissue a split EP of rare and out of print Detroit Electro jams from Nu Sound II Crew and Magnus II. Both were projects of mastermind Sam Anderson aka DJ Maestro. Growing up on the westside of Detroit, Maestro joined the Marine Corps in 1979 and was turned on to electronic music. One of his fellow Marines was a DJ from Brooklyn who schooled Maestro on how to mix records, blending dance songs seamlessly. While stationed on base in California, he set up a DJ crew called Nu Sounds and perfected his technical skills. He returned to Detroit in 1984 and auditioned for the Electrifying Mojo on WJLB. It was there that he met the Godfather of Techno, Juan Atkins, who introduced him to emerging new sounds of dance & party music. Juan showed him how to make and record music using a Roland 808 and 909, Linn Drum and a Boss DR-55 drum machine. In 1986 Maestro created a new alias for himself, Nu Sound II Crew, by adding a roman numeral II to his former DJ crew name. That year he self-released his first 12" single "The Speed Of Light" on Sound Wave Records. Only 500 copies were made and distributed by Juan Atkins' Metroplex Records. Influenced by Kraftwerk and Cybotron, Nu Sound II Crew created fresh, fast, dark electro beats with tough drum machines and lyrics about traveling through outer space. A second single was released that same year, "1001 Beats", a slower, deep and heavy vocoder track with guitar by Jerome Blackwell that riffs the Batman Theme during the break. By the late 1980s, Maestro was using different alias such as Sam and Dave, Zetta, and Magnus II to make it look like a lot of artists were on his new label Steppin' Forward Records. Magnus II was named after guitarist Jeff Magnus who plays on the sole 12" single from the project "Roctronic/Space Age" released in 1993. For this EP reissue, all 3 original mixes of "Space Age" are included: LP Version, Dub, and Remix. "Space Age" blends EBM rhythms with tough drum machine beats to create an electro hybrid somewhere between Belgium and Detroit. All songs have been remastered for vinyl by George Horn at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley. The jacket is specially designed by Eloise Leigh and features original illustrations from 1988 by Kevin Mann of an Egyptian pharaoh "steppin' forward" and the Roman numeral II. Each copy includes a post card with a photo of the Nu Sounds crew DJing in 1984.