House of Leeds rises again

Adrian Frater, News Editor

Western Bureau:

Seven years ago when the House of Leeds Recording Studio, based in Little London, Westmoreland, opened for business, it created quite a buzz, attracting several top-flight recording artistes who wanted to work with its engineer/producer, the dynamic David 'D-Mo' Morris, who was only 16 years old at the time.

However, in the ensuing years, the entity - which has been the driving force behind 2010 Linkage Awards' Artistes of the Year, Derrick 'Iyahblazze' Fowler, Ajay 'J-Yungg' Richards and to a lesser extent, Melvin 'X Facta' Morris, the elder brother of D-Mo - has slowed down considerably, losing much of the buzz it had generated.

"We slowed down to reorganise and work out some kinks … . Now, we are fully refocused and ready to go," said Noel Morris, the CEO of House of Leeds. "Our mission is to become one of the top, if not the top recording studio in Jamaica."

Having seen the vast sums of money his father invested in making the House of Leeds a state-of-the-art operation, the versatile X Facta, whose scope of competence includes recording artiste, engineer and producer, says he is determined to make the company successful.

"We are fully equipped to take on every aspect of the recording business," said X-Facta. "We record, mix, master, stamp, and distribute," X-Facta said. "At the House of Leeds, we cover all bases - from the studio to the streets."

X-Facta said he was particularly pleased that the House Of Leeds one-stop operation was totally family-driven as in addition to him and D-Mo - who is also seasoned at engineering, creating rhythms and playing live instruments - another brother, Chad Morris, who is integral to the business, is a gifted graphic artist and a budding singer.

"As a family, we are working together to re-establish the name House of Leeds," said X-Facta, who has several recordings to his credit and has had the distinction of performing on top-flight shows such as Reggae Sumfest and Western Consciousness.

With X-Facta and D-Mo both having solid fan bases on the Internet, they are quite hopeful that the work they have been doing with artistes such as Dwayne Stephenson, Droop Lion, Luton Fire, Iyahblazze, and X-Facta himself, will hit fertile ground and give them a strong foothold in the music industry.

"We are now recording new material on a regular basis …. We recently released two songs, one called 17 Miles, which was done by Iyahblazze, and Brave, which I did," said X-Facta. "Both songs are getting very good rotation on local radio.

EXCITED ABOUT ALBUM

Among the many projects on the drawing board, X-Facta said the company was most excited about an upcoming album by Iyahblazze, which is being designed for the international market

"The album is already named. We are calling it World Cry," said X-Facta. "We have already mixed and mastered songs like Armageddon and Caa Work, but we are not rushing … . We are not going to release this album until we are satisfied that it is the way we want it to be."

While recording studios and related entities are now a dime a dozen in Jamaica, the Morris family believes the House of Leeds is a cut above the rest because of what it has to offer.

"We have a 24-track board with additional capabilities. We have Pro Tools HD, we have high-quality graphics, professionally labelled CDs, we record dub plates, we produce jingles … . You name it, we do it," said X-Facta. "It should also be noted that we have the capability to do live-band recording as well as digital."

While the Morris boys are all in the 20s, their father has been surrounding them with experience over the years. Their circle of friends includes world-famous saxophonist Dean Fraser, master guitarist Lincoln Thomas, singer Tarrus Riley, promoter Worrell King, and the Big Ship captain, Freddie McGregor.