Deviant records / Trance Europe man dies

Rob Deacon - obit

Pioneering record and CD producer at the forefront of new music

Robin Gibson and Sarah Champion
Wednesday October 10, 2007
The Guardian


Rob Deacon, who has died aged 42 in a canoeing accident, was a true innovator in the independent music world. He helped break many artists across a vast range of styles and introduced a unique format with his 1990s compilation series, Volume and Trance Europe Express. He worked outside the mainstream, yet succeeded by the sheer force of his creativity, good nature, powers of persuasion and friendship.
Born in Sutton-at-Hone, in Kent, he spent three years in Australia with his family as a small child, before returning to attend a local primary school and Dartford technical college. He completed an apprenticeship with BT, but his true ambition lay in music and visual art. By 17, he had begun publishing his first fanzine, under the title Enzine. Before he was 20, he had released several editions of Abstract, a now highly collectable vinyl album featuring tracks by artists interviewed in an accompanying magazine. With striking artwork, and a quirky line-up of artists from the industrial, independent and 4AD Records scenes - Psychic TV, 400 Blows, Test Department, Wolfgang Press and Colourbox - it prospered.

Next came Sweatbox, Rob's own alternative label, which championed A Primary Industry, Anti-Group, In the Nursery, and most notably Meat Beat Manifesto, who were early pioneers of sampling in the UK music scene.
Rob's idea for Volume was to combine a CD of exclusive tracks with a full-colour CD-sized book of music journalism. In his tiny basement flat in Edith Grove, west London, he had spent months collecting music from the cutting edge. Old favourites, Wolfgang Press and Meat Beat Manifesto, mixed with indie shooting stars, the Shamen and Throwing Muses, and a contingent of dance and electronic-oriented artists, including the Orb, Nitzer Ebb and Consolidated.

Working on one of the earliest Apple computers, paid for by a Prince's Trust grant, he produced Volume One in an atmosphere of enthusiasm and optimism. It hit the shops in September 1991, and sold quickly. Volume Two featured Blur, Definition Of Sound, the Sugarcubes, Bomb the Bass, Nine Inch Nails and Pulp among its 29 tracks. Volume Three had Orbital, Moby, the Breeders, the Charlatans. Volume Four included Suede, the Aphex Twin and the Fall.

By the 1990s the music business had become an impersonal and increasingly money-obsessed place. Rob broke convention, continuing throughout his career to work with artists, contributors and business partners in a spirit of friendship and cooperation. He was changed by the dance music revolution, seeing in its gradual intermingling with rock a new vista of possibilities.

Thus, in 1993, he got together with Helen Mead to launch Trance Europe Express, followed by Trance Atlantic. This groundbreaking series not only defined a musical era but actually inspired it - capturing the emerging genres of techno, electronica and trance before they had been named. The CD-book packages introduced a dazzling array of artists. Sales hit six figures and the company grew rapidly.

Trance Europe club nights proved influential and led to the first-ever dance tent at a UK festival. Rob toured Australia to produce Trance Pacific; and then Japan for the beautifully designed Pacific State. The story of Berlin's Love Parade and Germany's early techno scene were captured in Berlin Unwrapped with Rob taking the photographs. He was never afraid to lavish time and money on even the most outlandish projects. He would not compromise production values. But the sheer extravagance of his compilations eventually became unsustainable in an era when magazines began giving away free CDs, and the company closed in 1997.

He continued with his imprint Deviant Records, releasing electronic works that were at the cutting edge in their field - Pentatonik, Node, Schematix, the Orb, Spooky and Witchman. It evolved into a bestselling dance label after it championed the little-known Paul Van Dyk, now one of the world's most successful DJs, and DJ Sammy, who went on to reach number one.

With the increase in downloads and yet more corporate consolidation in the music industry, Rob decided it was the end of an era, and chose to dissolve Deviant in 2006. He should have had more time to pursue his other enthusiasms - photography, visual arts, Chelsea football club and scuba diving. He is survived by his mother Doreen, father Dudley and sister Heather.

· Robert Andrew Deacon, music producer, born August 6 1965; died September 8 2007

did anyone get these compilation/book things? were they good

really, really sad. However, I doubt anyone in this section will have heard of him

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