Doof

There are two artists with this name: (1) Nick Barber (born August 31, 1968), better known by the stage name Doof, is a London-based psychedelic trance musician. (2) An early 80s project of Phillip Johnson. (1) Doof's first official release was in 1993 with NovaMute, the dance-label run by Mute Records, a 3-track EP titled "Disposable Hymns to the Infinite". It was through Novamute label-mates Juno Reactor and Ben Watkins that Doof was first introduced to producer Youth (Killing Joke/Brilliant), Simon Posford (Hallucinogen/Shpongle) and the Dragonfly Records label.

(1) Nick Barber (born August 31, 1968), better known by the stage name Doof, is a London-based psychedelic trance musician.

(2) An early 80s project of Phillip Johnson.

(1) Doof's first official release was in 1993 with NovaMute, the dance-label run by Mute Records, a 3-track EP titled "Disposable Hymns to the Infinite".

It was through Novamute label-mates Juno Reactor and Ben Watkins that Doof was first introduced to producer Youth (Killing Joke/Brilliant), Simon Posford (Hallucinogen/Shpongle) and the Dragonfly Records label. Dragonfly became a focus for the newly-forming psy-trance scene in London in the mid-90s, debuting many seminal trance-artists including Martin Freeland (Man with No Name), Paul Jackson (Voodoo People) and Total Eclipse.

Doof went on to release "Double Dragons" as a 12" with Dragonfly in 1994, and to produce a series of tracks in partnership with Simon Posford, including "Let's Turn On", "Born Again" and "Angelic Particles". It was through his friendship with Simon Posford that Doof was introduced to Raja Ram (Shpongle/The Infinity Project/Quintessence) who later that year would start the highly influential trance-label T.I.P Records. Doof's "Let's Turn On" (co-produced with Simon Posford) became the second ever T.I.P 12" release.

This was followed in 1995 by another 12" for T.I.P (Angelina/Weird Karma), the "Born Again" EP on Matsuri and another 12" for Dragonfly ("Youth of the Galaxy"). 1995 also saw numerous Doof remixes, including tracks by Hallucinogen and The Infinity Project.

In 1996 the first Doof album Let's Turn On was released on T.I.P. Records and went on to become one of the defining albums of the early psy-trance sound. It was subsequently re-released in 2000 by Twisted Records, who also released the second Doof album It's About Time the same year. During this time Doof travelled extensively performing live sets all over the globe including numerous appearances across Europe, in the U.S, South America and Japan.

In 2001 he teamed up with friends Celli Firmi (Earthling/Soundaholix) and Mexican dj and promoter Xavier Fux (Zulu Lounge) to collaborate on the psy-house project Vatos Locos. The first Vatos album (Welcome to the Barrio) was released later that year by Sony Music. The second album (Attack and Release) went out in 2004 with Dragonfly Records. It was around this time that Nick began to grow disillusioned with the commercial and musical direction that the psy-trance scene was taking, and started to explore other avenues of musical expression. He is currently recording as one half of downtempo electronica project Third Ear Audio with Celli Firmi, and as a singer/songwriter is working on the first collection of his songs, as Nicholas Barber

(2) Surreal DIY project out of the UK in the early 1980s. Members included Philip Johnson (Deleted Records) and Paul Platypus (Exhibit A, Twelve Cubic Feet).