The Cardiff man responsible for one of the biggest hits of the 1980s – Wales Online

Eric Martin is in lockdown, holed up at his studio in Newport, self-isolating from his family after developing a persistent cough.

The Cardiff-born musician is protecting himself and his loved ones. Given he suffers with asthma, hes not taking any chances.

Now living in London, he found himself at his studio in south Wales when Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the UK was going into lockdown.

I came down to the studio before lockdown measures were put in place, but then I developed a few symptoms so decided to sit down here for a bit and do a few things around the studio, he says.

This is the trouble now, everyone is stressing that theyve got it. The common cold hasnt gone away, the flu hasnt gone away, none of these things are going away. So when we get the symptoms now, we think its coronavirus, dont we?

You have a cough, you think, Bloody hell, its Covid. A lot of it is psychological. But just to be on the safe side, I decided not to go back to the family in London just yet, so Im sat here in Newport isolating myself. I have asthma as well, so its difficult to tell when my chest is feeling the way its feeling.

The name Eric Martin my not be immediately obvious to those outside the circles of electronic music, but in the guise of MC Eric of Technotronic he scored some of the biggest hits of the late 1980s and early 1990s.

Technotronics debut single and biggest hit, the worldwide dancefloor filler Pump Up The Jam, which sold 3.5 million copies worldwide, propelled him and his band to the upper echelons of global fame.

For three years, between 1989 and 1991, Technotronic scored six UK top 20 hits, performed in front of thousands at the largest arenas, appeared on the biggest TV shows and supported the woman who was then undisputed Queen of Pop Madonna, on her Blonde Ambition world tour.

Not bad for a young lad who grew up the youngest in a family of 13 in a terraced house adjacent to the River Taff in Cardiff.

But then its been some journey for Eric Martin through plenty of highs and lows but now, at 49, hes found peace with his past and he is ready to revisit the heady days when he pushed the musical envelope as a dance music pioneer.

However, he could count himself lucky to have had a career at all. There might not have been any future for the young Eric when he almost met an untimely end due to a traumatic incident which has stayed with him his whole life.

On his third birthday he nearly drowned in the Taff, but survived thanks to his teenage brother, who jumped in to rescue him.

Me and and a neighbours kid, who was about the same age as me, we both wandered across the road towards the river, he recalls.

This was 1973, it was the days before the banks of the Taff were reinforced with concrete after the flooding in Cardiff in the late 1970s. Back then the bank was grass and mud. All that was there were railings that you could climb through.

One of my toys fell into the river and I tried to get it. At that age you have no concept of danger. I slipped and fell in.

Alerted that he was in the water, his 14-year-old brother Christopher ran across the road and dived into the river to rescue him.

It was almost a double tragedy.

The tide was high and it was very fast-flowing, he remembers. When Christopher jumped in, he almost died too. It was a very scary, scary thing.

Erics brother was awarded an accolade for valour by Cardiffs Lord Mayor and the pair ended up in the local newspaper as a result.

Although he was very young, Eric confides the incident has haunted him his whole life.

It was frightening, really frightening, and Ive suffered with recurring nightmares ever since, he says. Ive received counselling because of it. It doesnt happen as much as it used to. I might get it maybe once a year. But when I do its horrible, like a form of PTSD.

The frightening thing is that its the same dream every time and apparently thats quite rare for it to be exactly the same dream every time.

I remember one day when I was about nine, talking to my mother about the dream, and she said, Eric you cant really remember that day, can you?. When I told her that I could, she asked me what I was wearing and I told her right down to the colour of the socks I had on. She couldnt believe it. She was in shock and said that was exactly what I was wearing.

The dream starts on the riverbed and my feet are in stuck in the mud. Ive got the mind of whatever age Im at when Im having the dream, but the body of a three-year-old. My body isnt strong enough to get me out. The dream is so traumatic, it takes a few days to recover from each one.

When I asked him what his childhood was like growing up in 1970s Cardiff, he answers: If you would ask me 20 years ago you probably would have got a different answer, but with age comes reflection.

I grew up in a house on Fitzhamon Embankment, which is still the family home my sister has it now, he says. There were 13 of us and I was the youngest. However, the beauty of it is that at no one time were we all there. There are 22 years difference in age between myself and my oldest sibling.

My childhood was happy up to a point. My dad died in 1978 from complications due to diabetes and that rocked the family to its core. In those days the man was the breadwinner, the knowledge base, or at least thats what it was perceived to be.

To a point that was the beginning of the end for me, because I was sent everywhere after that. Thats why people have always had a difficult time pinpointing where Im from when they talk to me.

I am Cardiff born and bred and proud as hell of my roots. Ive always had my ties in Cardiff. I have family members who have never left. But it was very hard on my mother being widowed with 13 kids. It was very difficult for her.

My mums siblings and my fathers siblings did what they could to help us all. As a result I was sent everywhere. I grew up for the most part between Cardiff and London.

London was where I finished my schooling, staying with relatives. Then there was a stint in New York and a stint in Jamaica, but always with members of the family, aunts and uncles.

Returning to the Welsh capital in the mid-1980s after finishing school, he started to find his feet musically. There he found one nation under a groove and a city marching to the sound to its own beat as the rise of rap, hip hop and the nascent house music scene filled his head with endless possibilities.

I was 15 years old and said to myself, This is my direction, this is what I want to do, he recalls. I felt like I was a part of a movement. I wasnt alone. It seemed like everyone in the city wanted to be a breakdancer, a graffiti artist, a DJ or an MC.

Hip hop culture took over UK and I was really pleased to be a part of the initial movement in Wales.

Hooking up with another young rising star from Cardiff, renowned DJ and producer DJ Jaffa, the pair headed to London. Finding themselves a manager and recording a few demos, they signed a deal with Jive Records under the name Just The Duce, putting out two tracks on a compilation called Def Reggae.

When the duos two-year contract ran out, Jaffa returned to Cardiff, while Eric stayed in London, where he was about to get his big break when he began working in Jive Records recording studio.

I was always at the studio and I was persistent, so they let me become a junior programmer, he recalls.

It was there he honed his skills and his formative musical education was formed making connections and learning at first hand - be it production or synths and guitars.

I was able to to sit in on some really cool sessions with producers like D-Mob, Paul Schroeder and Dave Stewart, all of those people who were at the top of their game. At the time I was still only a kid, still a teenager.

When you see somebody at the top, it doesnt seem as far away as it actually is.

The mid to late 1980s was a boom time for British hip hop, rap and the emerging house scene and Eric wanted in. He never doubted his opportunity would come calling.

Over the years Ive been asked things like, Did you know you were going to make it?, Did you ever doubt yourself?. To be honest with you, Im not a professional boxer, I didnt believe I was going to be champion of the world, it wasnt like that. It was literally a case of not even considering that there was not a place at the table for me.

I wish I could look back and say, Yeah, the winds were blowing in from the left and I had 2 in my pocket, but the truth of the matter is I did not even consider failure.

People like me were getting deals and they were putting tracks out. The Cookie Crew, The London Posse, all of these different people who were my age, who were from the same sort background as me, so I never considered that it couldnt be done.

Meeting Belgian musician and producer Jo Bogaert at the studio, the seed was sown for what would quickly blossom into Technotronic.

Jo was milling around the studios, looking for people to write with. He had ideas in his head which he wanted to come to fruition and he was looking for something other than what he was getting in Belgium, recalls Eric. I was put in a room with him and we played around with a few things and had some great conversations. We talked about what bands each of us liked, what sort of influences we had.

I was really pleased he liked black music. He was the first Belgian Id ever met; to that point the only thing Id learnt about Belgium was King Leopold, he laughs. Jo was a big blues fan and that was really cool because I grew up with blues and gospel, so we had some common ground.

Also being in the studio had given me lots of confidence. I knew my way around a studio and I really believed in myself.

Then Jo had to fly back to Belgium, so I thought that was the end of that. However, a few weeks later I was asked to fly to Belgium to work with him and thats how it all kicked off.

Eric is quick to point out that the idea of Technotronic came from Jo. And as far as calling cards were concerned, there was no greater introduction to Technotronic than their colossal debut single, Pump Up The Jam the all-conquering dancefloor anthem that ruled the charts as the 1980s turned into the 1990s.

As a mighty statement of intent, as a new decade dawned, it was pretty irresistible. Eric recalls the moment he first heard the track in its raw form.

Pump Up The Jam was first released in the clubs as an instrumental, he recalls. I was in a club in Antwerp when I first heard it played. When I saw the response, it was incredible.

Then I heard the vocals going down and the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. I said, My God, thats astonishing. I guess everyone has one of those moments in their lifetime. That was my moment.

Pump Up The Jam is the opening track on Technotronics debut album of the same name. It reached number two in the UK in 1989 (kept off the top spot for two weeks by Black Boxs Ride On Time) and hit the same spot in the American Billboard Hot 100 in early 1990.

The song was later certified triple platinum, selling three and a half million copies globally. Despite falling short of the top spot on both sides of the Atlantic, it scored number ones in Belgium, Iceland, Portugal and Spain.

Described as a fusion of hip hop and deep house, its an early example of the hip house genre and is seen as the first house song to become a hit in the US.

Everything that we were doing during the debut album project was driving me insane, Eric remembers. I was listening to cassette tapes in the car after every session, sitting there thinking, This is amazing music, I hope they get this on the radio. I would love it if it got on Radio 1, imagine that.

There was some initial controversy when it was discovered that model Felly lip-synched the vocals in the video to accompany the song. The vocals were actually performed by the third member of Technotronic, beside Jo Bogaert and MC Eric, Belgian MC Ya Kid K. As a result, the artwork to the bands debut album, which had featured a picture of Felly, was changed to feature Ya Kid K instead. The album was a multi-million-selling success, selling an eye-watering 14 million copies worldwide.

The three of us just clicked, says Eric. The dynamic, that chemistry, I vividly remember that feeling when we were about to take on the world.

As Technotronic scored hit after hit with follow up singles Get Up! (Before The Night Is Over) and this Beat Is Technotronic, the Welsh musician readily admits he was living the dream.

The youngster was soon to experience how hard he was to be worked when he recalls the story of his first time in America and an intervention from his worried mum back home.

It was a strange time, he recalls. My mother never interfered with my business, except one time. When we first got to America they sat Ya Kid K and me in a limo they gave us two itineraries. Were looking through them and I kept seeing the letters TB. And I thought, What is that, is that like To Be Confirmed? Thats tbc, whats TB?. So the record company guys said, Oh yeah, were going to train you to go to the toilet, TB stands for toilet break.

The itinerary was rammed. You got to remember Pump Up The Jam was pretty much the biggest song in the world at the time. The itinerary was so mad within about two months I had lost so much weight, my mother saw me on television and she made a phone call to the manager and said, Send him home, youre working him to the bone, you should be ashamed of yourself.

When youre young you just get on with it, dont you? Youre not aware youre not eating enough, until your mother gets involved, he laughs.

When I ask him about the high point of the years with Technotronic, hes quick to pick out one poignant moment which meant so much to him the first time he appeared on Top of the Pops.

This wont mean much to a lot of younger people now, but Top of the Pops was everything, he says. It was the only music show on television to watch. And everybody watched it. It was an event. All the family sat down to watch Top of the Pops on a Thursday night.

I remember one day when my dad was still alive and I dont have many memories of my dad, but this was one of them. He called everyone downstairs and said, Ruth is on television. He thought hed seen my sister, who was a jazz singer in London at the time, on Top of the Pops. We all came running but it wasnt her. He was so disappointed.

I remember I was sitting on his lap and saying to him, Ill get on Top of the Pops, Dad. This was in 1976, so I was six years old, but in the end I did get there and do it for him.

When I finally got on Top of the Pops I was going nuts, he adds. We were in New York and I was like, Im flying home, man, to do Top of the Pops (its worth noting that he sounds just as excited relaying this to me as he must have 30 years earlier).

The rest of the crew were like, Top of the what, who?. They didnt understand what it meant to me, but by that time wed already had a number one in a few different countries, so they thought it was quite strange that I desperately needed to fly home to do this Top of the Pops.

But for me and to anyone else in the crew who were British, they understood why it was such a big deal. Doing Top of the Pops for the first time as a youngster was incredible.

There were so many other highs as well, like appearing on Saturday Night Live in the US. Every country had its own big show back then and I think we must have done them all.

A few days after his first Top of the Pops appearance, where Technotronic performed the the single Get Up!, he was back at the BBC for an interview with a very young Phillip Schofield on much-loved Saturday mornings kids show Going Live! Their next meeting was to be very different.

A few weeks after being on the show I saw Phillip on Goldhawk Road in Shepherds Bush, which is near to the old BBC Television Centre in White City where they filmed Going Live! Eric recalls. Hes pulled into a petrol station on Goldhawk Road, which is a mixed-race neighbourhood leaning more towards the black side of things.

Our office was just round the corner, so when I saw him I shouted out, Hey whats up, man?. He was like (sounds terrified) Im fine, Im fine. He didnt even look at me. I was like, Phil, its Eric, Technotronic, Im black on weekdays, man, he laughs. You should have seen his face. He was then all, Oh hi. Whats up, how you doing?. I tell you, its as funny now as it was back then.

If life was surreal enough, it was to take a turn for the unreal when a phone call out of the blue to the bands manager rocked their world.

We were in America touring and enjoying the success of the album when our manager got a phone call from Madonnas manager Freddy DeMann. At the time he was Madonna and Michael Jacksons manager. He informed our manager that Madonna was in love with our album. Apparently she used it to do aerobics to. She also wanted to know if we would like to go on tour with her.

The tour in question, the Blonde Ambition tour, which included three sold-out shows at Wembley Stadium in July 1990, was the Queen of Pop at the height of her fame. Unsurprisingly, when they finally realised the phone call wasnt a hoax, Technotronic were more than ready to be caught in the eye of this particularly welcome storm, happy to be picked up and dragged along in the superstars sizeable wake.

I said to our manager, Why are you even asking us, I hope you said yes immediately.

I was a fan of Madonna. I liked that she was a force of nature, one incredible track after the next. And she insisted that we would be the only support. So we did it without hesitation.

Obviously her camp knew there were tickets going to be sold because we were on it. So it was a clever move.

Everything Eric had ever wanted had come true, but he tells me what was more important to him than global success was being able to look after those who he loved.

Being able to do right by my family, he says. My mother was quite sick for a number of years, so being able to get her the care that she needed and see to that she was well, being able to make sure the house was paid off. They were the high points. Thats what I was raised for. Family has always been close. Being the youngest, I was always a mummys boy.

Yes, I could go out with my mates. I could wake up in the morning and say, Hey, lets go shopping in New York and just fly there and have a shop. None of that resonates with your soul.

So, yeah, youd be happy to come home with some new sneakers from Sixth Avenue, but that wont feel anything like the feeling of your mother sitting you down and telling you, Im well, son, the house is paid off, I love you. Thats a different level.

But thats all my family in general. Thats what were all like. As the youngest sibling, I was able to watch my older siblings showing that same kind of benevolence and kindness.

When the end arrived for Eric and Technotronic after three years of unbroken success, it ended with rancour and a row over the way the musicians bandmate Ya Kid K, who was then about to have Erics child after the two had formed a relationship, was being treated. As a result the Welshman left the group. A year later the Technotronic project fell apart.

As much as there was success in abundance for Eric, there was something of a heavy burden to pay. He spent many years coming to terms with seeing the best and worst of humanity at close quarters.

What Eric tells me reminds me of this oft-quoted maxim: The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and good men die like dogs. Theres also a negative side.

He says: The significance of those songs, what they meant then and how theyve stood the test of time, I feel grateful and humble, but Im also just as baffled by it as anyone else.

But when you talk about fame and how it affects certain people, you dont know the true character of someone until they have everything. Thats when you find out the true character.

Since those days its been a journey of self-educating. I was young when I had all this success, but there wasnt anything in place to let you understand what you are going through. Who else was a pop star around me? It wasnt like I was an electrician so I could go and talk to my brothers mate down the road, who was an electrician. It was difficult for me.

I didnt realise I was surrounded by a small percentage of honest people and a much larger percentage of people who had their own agenda. These were horrible, horrible people.

He describes the financial legacy of those days as being signed up and stitched up. Of unscrupulous dealings behind the scenes.

I was young and impressionable, he adds. Its a well-worn story. The way I explain it is this to the average dude I earned a lot of money. If you sat that same average dude down and told him, Okay I got this much, but they got this much, then that average dude would be ready to take up arms on your behalf. The difference was massive.

They could never get away with those deals now. So much exploitation took place in the 1980s and 1990s, but I dont want to come across like Im complaining, because I dont think like that. Everything I have done has been a part of my journey.

Eric was only 19 when global fame came calling. He willingly admits his experiences left him with serious trust issues after leaving the group.

I remember thinking back then that these people have given me something I never used to have, theyve given me scepticism. I used to take people on face value. Im a loving person. But then I started looking at people and not giving them the benefit of the doubt, asking myself what they wanted. Its a horrible way to behave and thats when you realise you need time out.

He concedes: It did take some time for the stigma of being part of such a huge machine to wear off. But I was back in the studio within months doing my own thing.

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The Cardiff man responsible for one of the biggest hits of the 1980s - Wales Online