Pariah was formed in early 1997 following the success of a mix tape submitted to Musik Magazine which was selected as the overall winner of their ‘Bedroom Bedlam’ competition of 1996. The contest had been won under the guise of ETP and represented their hard work as young DJs who had started on local pirate radio in North Birmingham some years before and progressed to playing small local parties and then on to their first club sets in the city.

 

The Pariah studio had been assembled and music was being crafted in their individual, futuristic style which first caught the ears of Doc Scott and Blame. The first release came through Wolverhampton’s Urban Flavour Records and received heavy support from Fabio, Doc Scott and Dr S Gachet. In the few years that followed music was released on labels such as; Funk 21, Nu Directions, Inperspective Records and Covert Operations. During this time Blame had been guiding and mentoring Pariah to the point of releasing tracks with his 720 Degrees imprint. This hadn’t gone unnoticed by LTJ Bukem who had already been giving solid support by playing Pariah dub plates at worldwide club events and Kiss 100 FM.

 

A firm relationship with Good Looking Records followed up until 2004. In that time Pariah racked up a weight of vinyl releases, featured on the much respected Progression Sessions series of mix CDs and travelled the country playing at Progression Sessions events including the Birmingham residency when the label came to their city. Pariah had always worked on a track by track basis when releasing with GLR and were reluctant to sign exclusively as it would still allow them to work with local labels that had helped them gain their early releases. The final tracks released with the label included a remix by Artificial Intelligence which made the Studio X album.

 

Drum and Bass had evolved and LTJ Bukem’s sound moved from Intelligent to a more mainstream, liquid style and was now selecting music from a more diverse range of producers. Pariah, now consisting of just Phil and Marc continued to DJ at events around the country and more releases followed with the Dutch Fokuz imprint, Camino Blue in Germany  and Nookie’s Strictly Digital. In 2010, work commitments for both meant a short break was needed.

 

Following more than a decade of activity in the scene the studio was shut but Pariah kept themselves available for the occasional, exclusive DJ appearance playing a mixture of oldskool and new to demonstrate their history as Drum and Bass selectors.

 

Paraih have now returned with a catalogue of music, old and new which have recently been released on Odyssey Recordings.

 

Now, in 2017 Pariah returns with new compositions that have that futuristic edge and a drive to push the boundaries of the Drum and Bass sound.