- Name: Skope
- Primary Location: Oakland
- Affiliations: Lightrhythm
- Releases: Hidden Partition:klick
- Website: lightrhythmvisuals.com
Skope grew up in New York, surrounded by music. His musician siblings impressed upon him the classic rock of Queen, Yes, and Kansas. Following their lead, he purchased his first piece of wax at the tender age of seven. Skope’s Dad was an avid organ player, and kept the venerable Hammond B3 around the house for many years. While taking up his first musical love, the drum set, it wasn’t long before his father’s taste for Soul really hooked him - the bop of Herb Alpert and the groove of seventies R&B like the Commodores.
It wasn’t until about 1982 when his parallel passions for graffiti art and break dancing began to consume him, along with the Electro-Funk and Hip-Hop that rocked the New York City schoolyards at the time: Afrika Bambaataa, Soul Sonic Force, Grand Master Flash. Skope became obsessively focused on Djing, and as the futuristic sounds of Electro morphed into other forms, his taste morphed with it into his next phase of parallel passions: House and Techno. He pushed these emerging underground sounds into after-hours clubs in Manhattan and warehouse parties in Brooklyn, alongside Techno pioneers Frankie Bones, Heather Heart and Adam X. In the mid-90’s, Skope teamed up with long-time graffiti partner-turned music producer Jeff Allen (aka Varathane, Brittle Ones), launched Hydrant Records, and moved west to San Francisco.
The pair operated Hydrant from 1995 to 2000, releasing a dozen records, including a seminal first release by experimental artist Proem. Hydrant broke up in 2000 with his partner’s return to Brooklyn, and Skope decided to focus on building up his own studio and production skills. That brings us to the past year, where his releases have included a downtempo single for an Emanate Records compilation, a late-night Techno 12″ (as Suffix) with new studio partner Jonathan Ojeda on the Spundae imprint, an experimental remix of Phasmid’s “Cooper Is On Bubbles” on Skylab Operations, and the recent 4 track “Buildings EP” on the Observatory Online imprint, which is an absolute fusion of Skope’s many influences.
While not losing sleep in his studio, Skope (aka Doug Eisengrein) divides his time writing music production articles for Remix and Electronic Musician magazines, engineering live sound, programming and designing for the web, and hanging out with his wife and two Feline friends.
