Selecta Bence

I started out as a guitar and bass player (and background singer) in a high school teenie band named Cunning Dorx (whose alternative pop rock hit "The Blue Rider" got good exposure through FM4 a few years ago).
Cunning Dorx was really where I started writing songs and lyrics.

A few years later I turned away from Alternative Pop-Rock and took more interest in Reggae, Dancehall, Dub and Electronic Music of all sorts.

I joined the band Blockwerk as vocalist and front man and started writing songs in cooperation with the other band members. Those tunes were more of a Reggae/Dancehall, Drum 'n' Bass, Soul and World-influenced Electronic style.

Blockwerk was an interesting mix of different people with different musical backgrounds and ideas. In 2004 the band managed to land the Electronic Reggae hit "Inner Peace" / a cover tune of Jamaican Reggae artist Volton Craggie ("By His Deeds").

The song made it into the top 10 of the FM4 charts and got good airplay. Blockwerk released all its productions on its own label Oddtime Records (owned by Ingmar Versolmann and co-managed by myself) and performed quite a few gigs inside and outside of Austria during those years...

Other artists like Peter Natterer, Onjel, Audiospam, Phazes, Jackhead and Jiri Malakoff also became part of the Oddtime Records family and started releasing single tunes, EPs and Albums.

After a most influential trip to Jamaica I started my own record store in Vienna, named it Badfish Records (based on the tune "Badfish" by Sublime) and started importing and selling 7 inch vinyl from Jamaica. Badfish Records store also had its own sound system, so I toured around, dj-ing with Mightyjust and Coleman and became Selecta Bence.

It was through Blockwerk that I got to meet Ulf Lindemann a.k.a. [dunkelbunt]. We played a gig at the same venue once. A coop started and I contributed my vocals and lyrics to two of his known tunes "Smile on your face" and "Roll Away".

Both Blockwerk and Badfish Records faded away eventually and I moved on to producing my own electronic music. I got married, became a father of two and turned into a so-called "bedroom producer" with a regular full-time job and thus not that much time for music any more.

I never gave up the DJ-ing. Even during the three years I spent in Dublin, I always stayed active behind the decks. Way back in the beginning / during the times of Kruder and Dorfmeister in Vienna / it used to be Vinyl and CDs, then strictly Vinyl on Technics1210 turntables, later time-code Vinyl and eventually digital DJing.
I just recently started DJing with STEMS which is why I decided to release some of my tracks as STEMS *mp4* as well.

I was lucky to meet many interesting fellow DJs and hobby producers over the years of which I'd specifically like to mention Phazes a.k.a Jan Bozek and Christian Camille both of which I was lucky to produce a few releases with. (Phazes - Boomerang, Christian Camille - Potlatch, DUBVIE - Ich bin dein Vater).

With all the records from so many different genres, with the turntables and the obtained other music equipment my love for music never deteriorated and in the back of my head I kept dreaming the dream of releasing my very own album someday - so I kept working on it...

Now - in late 2016 - it's finally done and here it is:

BIG BIRD small cage - a one-man-show production more or less.

Each tune a new experiment, every song a path leading into a new direction. No clear concept, no beginning no end, no plan or great ambition really. It can be compared to a foto album: each page showing a happy family photo from lots of different vacations with subtitles in different languages...

I tried to put a good amount of humor and emotions into it. Although it might be a strange and totally non-mainstream journey for the listener, I still hope you'll dig it and get into my groove!