Affie Yusuf

Affie Yusuf

Affie Yusuf is a techno producer from Southampton, United Kingdom. He works across acid, techno, trance, house and deep house, and is associated with a long list of aliases including Indigo Kidz, Big Screen, EF.3.A, Levi Satchell, Lilac Road Productions, The Parkwalker, Sian Loves It and Waterboatmen.

Early work and labels

Yusuf begins as a graffiti writer and is involved in pirate radio as a teenager, running the RASE and ETERNITY stations and DJing electro and house. He starts making music at a local youth project in 1988, using a Roland D50, TR505, an Ensoniq EPS and a four-track recorder. He later buys a TB303 and an Amiga computer running Octamed, and his early work is shaped by the acid house scene in London and Manchester.

In 1993, he and Russ Gabriel launch Ferox Records, with Yusuf’s Acidwaves 01 as the first release. He issues two more EPs on Ferox before signing to Force Inc. He also founds 909 Perversions with DJ North to continue the Acidwaves series. Other early releases include an acid EP on Berlin Records in 1994 and three 12-inch records on Chemical Records.

House of 909 and later projects

In 1996, Yusuf and Trevor Loveys form House of 909 as a label and production team. The pair release EPs and albums including Future Soul Orchestra, Distorted Jazz, Children We Were, The Main Event and Soul Rebels, and the material is later reissued by Pagan Records. House of 909 becomes closely associated with UK deep house and is anchored by Yusuf.

Yusuf and Loveys also record as Traffik, releasing a deep proto-tech-house album on Pagan in 2000. He appears in other group projects including Machines Don't Care and Yusuf & Loveys.

Albums, aliases and production work

Under the alias EF.3.A, Yusuf releases a stripped-back techno EP before his first full album, The Volume, appears on Superstition Records in 1996. The album helps establish Superstition as an important techno label. Through the rest of the 1990s he continues releasing techno, house and acid under multiple names, including Lilac Road Productions, Big Screen and The Parkwalker.

In the 2000s, Yusuf steps away from music for several years because of health reasons, then returns in 2008 and helps found the Machines Don't Care collective with Sinden, Trevor Loveys, Toddla T, Fake Blood, Detboi, Hervé and Drop The Lime. Around the same period, he and Loveys launch the Tragic Magic label, releasing fidget tech-house and warehouse-oriented tracks.

Later activity

Yusuf later works with Mr. C of The Shamen and returns to acid in his later production work. He is resident DJ at London clubnight I Love Acid and appears on its charity compilation Acid Relief in 2011 alongside LFO, Ben Sims, Luke Vibert, Slipmatt and Mark Archer of Altern 8. He also works as a remixer, engineer and studio producer, solo and with Trevor Loveys, with remixes for Evil 9, Urban Revolution and GusGus, and production and engineering credits for Terry Francis, Eddie Richards, Dave Mothersole, Gideon Jackson and Mastik Soul.