SoundBluntz

Check us at Republik Nightclub in Toronto every Saturday night.

www.republiknightclub.com



Sound Bluntz

It's no mean feat to score a Juno award for your very

first song, much less take home a second "Canadian Grammy" the

following year for your sophomore single. But The Sound Bluntz'

rapid-fire success only whet the duo's appetite for an even bigger

challenge--bringing dance music back to old heights with their first

full-length Blame The Bling.



Swet and Lil' Pete

have been staples of Toronto's competitive nightlife

scene for well over a decade, whether spinning in the city's biggest

clubs or producing and remixing a solid set of booty-shakers.



Cory actually started out as a battle DJ in the mid-80s--an interesting

choice for the young teen considering his mother is related to

legendary Canadian pianist Glenn Gould, his great-uncle worked with

Dizzy Gillespie, another uncle played saxophone alongside Edwin Starr

(on "War," no less) and Cory learned to drum by jamming with yet

another uncle's funk band in his grandma's basement.



But once techno and house music spread out from Chicago and Detroit, Cory became

instantly hooked. The 18-year-old soon joined up with Chris Sheppard, a

Toronto radio DJ who helped spread electronic dance music throughout

Canada thanks in no small part to Cory's considerable influence. Though

the young DJ/producer was behind-the-scenes, Cory proved instrumental

in Sheppard's rise, mixing his syndicated radio show and dance

compilations (such as Pirate Radio Sessions) and co-producing several

of Sheppard's dance tracks (including the BKS hit "I'm In Love With

You").



"I immersed myself more into production because it was the

future for me to go to. I figured there's got to be more to it than

this. I knew I had the ability, I just needed the opportunity," Cory

says.



Using aliases such as Legion Of Boom, Laya, Lost In Vegas and

Cory Ca$h, he was soon producing his own club bangers as well as

remixing the likes of trance star Ferry Cortsen and house hero Armand

Van Helden.



But the stakes were raised after joining forces with

Lil' Pete. Needless to say, his nickname is a misnomer and Pete was

sizable enough to start clubbing by age 15. He soon jumped on the

Technics and then got into production. "I started out with a little

ghetto set-up in my bedroom," he recalls, "that's how everyone starts

off, right?"



Pete used to run Canada's number one DJ record pool

Bombs N Bass and those industry connections led to considerable remix

work, including TLC and System F. It also prompted a call from Cory in

2002 to collaborate on a beefed-up remake of Michael Jackson's all-time

classic "Billie Jean."



"Whamm-o, it won the Juno," Pete says proudly. "We brought it home on that one, it was the craziest feeling."



Like Tiga's "Sunglasses At Night," this dancefloor revamp was smash across

Europe, licensed to about 30 official compilations, including several

Ministry of Sound mixes (which sold a combined million copies) and

countless bootlegs.



"The reason you do a remake is that it's

already been a hit. You already got a few steps ahead," admits Pete.

"But with 'Billie Jean' a million people tried to remake it. We did it

properly. There's a difference."

In 2004, they brought it home again, becoming the first dance act to win back-to-back when the Juno for Dance Recording of the Year went to SB's "Something About You,"

originally recorded by English new wavers Level 42.

Since then, The Sound Bluntz have done the odd remix (The Ceasers' iPod hit "Jerk it

Out," Beastie Boys' "Triple Trouble) but mostly they've been busy

writing, arranging and recording their album debut.



The title of their floor-filling first single "(Maybe You'll Get) Lucky" proved

prophetic when they were able to collaborate with Australian pop star

Cheyne Coates (the former lead singer of Madison Avenue, the dance duo

behind global hit "Don't Call Me Baby") whose vocal style had initially

inspired the song.



They were similarly fortunate on their laidback

lead-off track "Lovely." The boys wanted somebody like Larry Braggs of

famed funk band Tower of Power to sing amidst the horn-drenched house

beats. So that's exactly who they got.



The album also continues their M.O. of updating old-school hits, include a heavily-filtered

foot-stomping take on The Cars' "Just What I Needed" and an

electrifying dance-rock romp through "Stepping Stone" a Paul Revere and

the Raiders' song popularized by The Monkees and later the Sex Pistols.



For the most part avoiding samples, Pete and Cory instead brought

in live horn players, bassists, organists and guitarists to be recorded

and rearranged alongside their battery of beloved analogue synths

(808s, 909s, 303s and the newer Roland XV 5080).

As befits any proper artist album, Blame The Bling crosses genre boundaries, offering

up chilled downtempo tracks, vocal house edits and even some comic

relief (hopefully techno heads have a sense of humour!)



Meanwhile, the clubbier electro, dance-rock and tribal tracks were first

floor-tested by Lil' Pete at Tdot hotspots like Tonic and the new

superclub Republik--"Any club I play 'Stepping Stone' in, I swear to

God people go nuts screaming, hands in the air."



Now they're working on spreading that same excitement outside the club district, where hip-hop still overshadows dance.

"Everything

goes in phases and right now the big thing is urban, hence Blame The

Bling," Cory says of their album title. But don't take their accusation

too seriously-- the SBs did whip up the hip-house track "Treat 'em

Right" with Chubb Rock's original 1991 vocals. "Hip-hop was a lot more

fun back then. There was no beef. Even the gangsta stuff was funny."

Of course, with a name like Sound Bluntz, the boys could easily be

mistaken for a rap act themselves, but Cory notes the clean-living duo

chose their nom-de-dance for a very specific reason.

"What's a blunt? What's sound? We are the high, you follow me? We're not taking the drug. We are the drug."

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