Boom Bip
Bryan Hollon has had his dusty fingers in the crates of old vinyl for quite sometime. It wasn’t always like that. Before 1992, his life was mostly filled with guitars, drums and pianos along with the cassette tapes of Sonic Youth, Hendrix, Prince, Bowie and other musical heroes. "The times were a changing" and Bryan sought after a new medium in making noise, the turntable. In 1992 he set off on a path of discovering original hip-hop sample material on classic jazz and funk albums that littered the Cincinnati thrift stores. Once his arsenal was built, he began experimenting with looping and chopping the drums he discovered on the dirty "Headhunters’" record he claimed to be his favorite. Soon after he discovered a bass line on a Ron Carter record that fit perfectly in the groove of the sampled drums and then a string line from a David Axelrod album. The gates crashed open.
Bryan began doing his own radio show on WAIF-FM 88.3 called "Madstract" in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1993 and djing at coffee houses and small clubs in the area. This led to other club nights and opening slots for larger bands that came into town. His name started getting around town and people were taking notice of this quiet kid with impeccable taste in early instrumental hip-hop and jazz influenced beats. He needed a name for the flyers of the events he was doing so he chose "Boom Bip." This term was taken from the terminology of an early jazz vocalist for the sound of the drums. Ella, Joe, Duke and Miles had also used this term in describing the sound of the kick drum and the snare. These are the two drums essential in nearly every rock, jazz or hip-hop song.
