Mark Broom

British DJ and producer Mark Broom has led a remarkably prolific and versatile career for over three decades, producing hundreds of releases ranging from club-ready techno and house to left-field electro, downtempo, and IDM. An early association with Plaid resulted in the formation of Repeat near the beginning of the 1990s, and Broom additionally worked with producer Dave Hill on numerous projects, including Sympletic, Rue East, and Midnight Funk Association. The two also co-founded Pure Plastic and a handful of sublabels, and contributed heavily to Baby Ford’s Ifach imprint. Along with James Ruskin, Broom explores broken techno and IDM as the Fear Ratio, and abstract hip-hop as Deadhand. As a solo artist, Broom made his full-length debut in 1996 with the Detroit-influenced techno of Angie Is a Shoplifter, and he continued releasing a reliable flow of club-tooled singles and EPs, punctuated by the occasional mix CD or additional full-length, including 2021′s Fünfzig, a mixture of dub and house, and 2022′s 100% Juice.
Broom discovered house music when vacationing in Tenerife in 1989. Upon returning to England, he bought his first turntables and started collecting vinyl and producing music. He became a regular patron of London’s FatCat Records, where he met Baby Ford and Plaid’s Ed Handley and Andy Turner, then of Black Dog Productions. Broom’s first two records, both released by General Production Recordings in 1992, were co-produced by Handley and Turner, and the trio also formed the Repeat project together, releasing their debut single, “Game Shows,” the same year, and later issuing the full-length Repeats on A13. Broom formed the Pure Plastic label with Dave Hill in 1994, and the two collaborated heavily, with projects such as Eco Tourist, Voyectra, and Sympletic releasing material on Ford’s Ifach label, and the left-field breakbeat project Midnight Funk Association making its debut on Mo Wax in 1995. Sympletic surfaced on Warp with 1996′s At Long Last EP, and Broom’s acclaimed debut album, Angie Is a Shoplifter, appeared on Pure Plastic the same year. Midnight Funk Association joined the Domino roster with two 1998 EPs, Sexy Way and Byte the Bullet, and the full-length Coffee Shop Rules appeared three years later. The same duo also released two full-lengths and numerous singles of harder-edged techno as Rue East.
Broom continued releasing solo EPs as well as collaborations with Ben Sims, Percy X, Ford, and several other producers, appearing on labels like BPitch Control, Soma, and 20:20 Vision. He also participated in 5 Mic Cluster, a new wave-influenced group who released Crystal Mic on Output in 2006. Broom founded Beard Man in 2009, and his first appearance on the label was a split single with German producer Jonson. Broom’s second album, Acid House (at least the second half of the title is accurate), appeared on Saved Records in 2010. He collaborated with James Ruskin, releasing two EPs on the latter’s Blueprint label. The duo then formed the Fear Ratio, an IDM-leaning project, issuing the full-length debut Light Box in 2011, and later surfacing on Skam with releases like 2015′s Refuge of a Twisted Soul. Broom and Ruskin also released abstract hip-hop as Deadhand; eccentric rapper Sensational and Warp alumni REQ appeared on the duo’s 2021 full-length Meanwhile, issued by Seagrave. Broom kept up his prolific run of singles, appearing on labels such as Cocoon, Token, and Robert Hood’s M-Plant. His third solo full-length, an exploration of house and dub titled Fünfzig, arrived on Rekids in 2021. The Fear Ratio’s fourth album, Slinky, appeared on Tresor in 2022, and Broom released another Rekids LP, 100% Juice. ~ Paul Simpson