6 Mix - 20/06/2010

Dave Pearce presents a 6 Mix special charting the history of the Street Sounds compilation albums which dominated UK dance music in the early 1980s. Started in 1982 by London based Streetwave Records as a way for people to get hold of expensive, rare dance and hip-hop 12 inch records only in available in the USA, Streetsounds compilation albums bought previously underground music onto Britain's high streets with a new album every three month. Street Sounds compilations soon became essential for anyone into hip hop, house, rare groove or electro music, at a time when the British charts were dominated by the New Romantic bands like Visage and Spandau Ballet. Founder Morgan Khan licensed early tracks from Grandmaster Flash, Afrika Bambaatta and The Fatback Back as well as opening the doors for US labels like Def Jam and Profile recordings, at a time when the UK music industry was still a closed shop for anyone but the traditional major labels. Morgan Khan joins Dave in the studio to tell the incredible story of how a Hong Kong-born Indian who grew up in 1970s London came to be so influential in the early days of dance music and how Street Sounds helped bring hip hop and electronic music to the mainstream. Dave and Morgan also play and talk about seminal tracks from the Street Sounds back catalogue including D-Train, Scott La Rock, Roy Ayers and Todd Terry.