ArtistInfo

Robert Soares

US
Producer

American label founder, producer, A&R, project coordinator, art director and writer. He began his career in 1983 in New York when recruited by J.D. Martignon, label boss of Midnight Records, to work with garage bands from that period and in 1989 recruited by Jean Georgakarakos as A&R for Celluloid Records. During this time he was promoting among friends his own bootleg cassette version of Head On - Iggy and The Stooges Live At The Whisky A Go Go 1973 which was highlighted by his cover design, featuring a photo of Iggy Pop´s head which was graphically turned into an American football and placed for Moe Howard of The Three Stooges to give the official "Kickoff" and in order to express that a powerful live reindition of Head On was being made available on this recording. During that year he won a CBS Records, double platinum A&R award for his work on the Lambada dance music explosion in Europe reaching #1 in the European charts. He coordinated vinyl-to-CD transfer on classic Celluloid albums and on those produced by Alan Douglas: Memory Serves and One Down by Material, Hustler´s Convention by Lightnin' Rod, the World Destruction EP by Time Zone, Doriella Du Fontaine EP by Lightnin' Rod with Jimi Hendrix and Suicide, Suicide's debut album for Marty Thau´s Red Star Records plus a 2xCD collection, Deconstruction - The Celluloid Recordings. In 1992 he released four major Brazilian music albums in the U.S. through Celluloid's alternative imprints: Daniela Mercury, Volkana - First, Heartbreakers - Blen Blen Club, and Canto Negro by tribal drumming pioneers Ilê Aiyê - featuring Caetano Veloso on vocals - portraying the futurist jungle/drum & bass movement to come. In 1993 he founded the Subharmonic and Strata imprints with bassist, producer Bill Laswell and executive producer John Matarazzo. The imprints released 21 CD's, and between 1998 and 1999 Soares and Laswell were to set up Ion for executive producer Norman Isaacs and Innerhythmic for the Invasion Group Music Management. Between 1999 and 2003, Soares coordinated Meta in Europe shortly before his venture into conceiving fusions of drum & bass with established genres as a tool for new music. In 2004 along with Bill Laswell and Submerged and under the influence of Futurism he created Method Of Defiance: a working method for artists to spontaneously blend electronic break beats and back beats with electric and acoustic instrumentation and forming a group under the influence of this method to redefine the dynamics of urban music such as punk, techno, jazz, contemporary classical, and the avant-garde. The original group played their first two gigs in 2005 at John Zorn´s Stone Club in NYC and consisted of Dr. Israel (vocals), Graham Haynes (trumpet), Bill Laswell (bass) Submerged (laptop break beats), and Guy Licata (drums). Between 2004 and 2008 he collaborated on the first four projects under the banner of Method Of Defiance: Brutal Calling with Bill Laswell vs Submerged, Inamorata by Method Of Defiance featuring Herbie Hancock, Pharoah Sanders, John Zorn, Masada String Trio, Graham Haynes, Nils Petter Molvær plus musicians from Miles Davis' electric period in interaction with drum & bass artists Corrupt Souls, Paradox, Amit, Evol Intent, Black Sun Empire among others, Profanation - Preparation For A Coming Darkness by Praxis featuring Future Prophecies, Rawthang and Monkey & Large on break beats with Iggy Pop, Mike Patton, Serj Tankian among others, and Lodge featuring Fanu on breaks and downtempo beats, Graham Haynes and Nils Peter Molvaer on trumpets, Bernie Worrell on keyboards, and Bill Laswell on bass. In 2016 he formed a power trio inspired by Chas Chandler´s set-up of The Jimi Hendrix Experience and by The Word of The Lord through Moses the prophet; Moses wanted to know the name of God who leads him to His enslaved people in Egypt and God reveals His name as "I AM" with an explanation: "I AM who I AM" (Ex. 3: 13, 14). The trio was named I AM LED with Andrei Andrei (vocals, guitar), Matt Renneke (bass), and Nico Rodrigo (drums) and disbanded in 2017 after finishing their first and only bootleg album, Seventy Sevens: an eight track recording rooted in black American music with musical foundations such as blues, rhythm & blues and gospel which rock & roll was built on.

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