Mark Rae, DJ extraordinaire was first exposed to the music scene as a young boy when he was trying to fall asleep and Reggae and Disco music would be vibrating through the lounge floor. His dad would also dance around to music in the 1970s, which made him realise that music was a very powerful thing.
In his teens, he listened to soul music, his favourite artists included Marvin Gaye and Johnnie Taylor and he regularly visited the record store Hitsville USA in Newcastle. With hip-hop on the rise, he began DJ-ing and he played rare groove selections at the Riverside in Newcastle, where The Smiths fans would tell him to stop playing American music, he told t5m.
He went to Manchester and spent his entire grant money at Ultimate Breaks and Beats (UBB) spinning records. There weren’t many DJs at the time, and so he taught himself how to spin, practising hours on end in order to perfect his skills. He played music like Trouble Funk and Public Energy.
