Fireside Chat

Daedelus

Ninja Tune, Los Angeles

Alfred Darlington isn’t your average cookie-cutter musician. From how he looks (early Victorian Dandyism), to how he makes music, to how he expresses himself and views the world, his is a very individual, a ‘bespoke’ outlook. Alfred was born in Santa Monica in 1977 to an artist mother and psychologist father. Musical from very early on, as a child he was classically and jazz-trained in a number of instruments – but his interests were a lot broader. Less a prodigy than a renaissance boy whose obsessions ranged from Greek legend to the mountains of Wales, until he was a teenager he was convinced he’d grow up to be an inventor. As a 15 year old though, he finally persuaded his parents to take him to Wales and whilst in a YMCA in London, he flipped the radio dial, found a pirate radio station and taped some UK rave and hardcore. Ever since then, Daedelus has been re-inventing the possibilities of ‘electronic’ music with albums on Mush, Plug Research, Laboratory Instinct and lately Ninja Tune. RBMA Radio caught up with him before one of his legendary live shows at Big Chill House in London and heard the man hold forth on music, technology, Victoriana and of course, his music!