Mike Norris aka Fort Romeau is a UK artist based in South London. Mike began making music at 14, inspired by the slow jams of Air’s Premiers Symptômes and the warm analogue sounds of Autechre’s Amber LP he began creating, “just loops of noise and atmosphere, just playing with the sound directly.” Later, while at university in Brighton, he began DJing at clubs and the experience of being enveloped in the sound had a profound effect on his attitude to music-making. In Mike’s words, “I started really thinking about the visceral quality of the sound all my favorite music had – this deep, thick quality that just absorbed you.” Shortly after leaving university, Mike began working with the band La Roux, playing keyboards and programming the band’s live show – all the while developing his own musical practice between sound checks and airport stopovers. It wasn’t until the band stopped touring that he was able to concentrate on his music full time and, having become used to working within the limitations of a slow laptop and a pair of headphones, changed his ethos to music making “you have to learn to be very efficient, its is pretty frustrating but you live within the limitations of your equipment. That’s what really defines you as a musician I think. I only have one synthesizer, a Yamaha DX7, and this LP is really the product of me interfacing with that one synth and a 7 year old laptop.”

vinyl / CD