HISTORY OF MICK ST CLAIR & ORIGINS OF SAINT RECORDS UK
Mick St Clair, the founder of Saint Records UK, has been a DJ, both on the mainstream and the Asian music scene since he was 15 years of age and is arguably the first Indian DJ in the world.
Mick started out doing English music roadshows in pubs and the club circuit. He has played at the same venues as bands such as Gladys Knight and the Pips, Dexy’s Midnight Runners, Aswad and UB40, to name but a few. Mick has countless awards for Best Asian DJ across the Country.
In the 80’s the Asian music scene came into its own on the club circuit and Mick was at the forefront, taking the club scene by a storm, performing with Bhangra artists such as Heera, Alaap, Apache Indian, DCS, Apna Sangeet, Sahotas, Malkit Singh, Chirag Pehchan to name but a few.
Mick later opened his own recording studio and record label called Saint Records UK which was used by some of the top Asian musicians. He is also a musician in his own right, his biggest hits on the Bhangra scene being “Ishq Di Gaddi” and “Meet the Saint”. He has done some remixes for other record labels which include smash hits such as the “Bhangra Top 10” (various artists), “Bhangra Top 10, Golden Star” (Malkit Singh), “House of Shah” (Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan), which won Mick a Gold Disc. Mick then turned executive producer and released some of the biggest hits of the 90’s, such as Satrang’s album “Bhangra Muffin” with the phenomenal track “Dhola Veh Dhola” (winner of Platinum Disc), “Dhol Blasters” (winner of Silver Disc), “Never Mind the Dholaks”, “Kickin’ Klassix” and “Sohne Munde Midland De”. He then gave us “Powered Up” (Shaktee) and “Are u Ready” by XLNC. The music just went on and on. Mick was at the top of his career. However, due to personal commitments Mick closed the recording business down.
In 2005 Mick went to India and was astounded by the talent that existed in that country. He could not help but to get involved again and met up with some of the most talented and high calibre young artists on the scene in India at that time. These artists were yet to be discovered by the UK Bhangra industry.
Mick recorded an Album called “Loud ‘n’ Proud” (Lehmber Hussainpuri, Manjit Rupowalia, Rai Kalsi and Sabar Koti are a few of the names on this album. The name Loud ‘n’ Proud summed up exactly what these singers were about. Once again, this album was a hit for Mick and in this age of internet, courted an awful lot of interest online. |