DUSTY OHMS: Romford’s ‘Hip-Hop Outlaw’

I caught up with Romford local Adam Crafts better known as Dusty Ohms, a self-proclaimed ‘hip-hop outlaw straddling the no man’s land of electronic music’, to discuss about the origins of his name, how growing up in Romford inspired his music style and more.

Crafts discussed the meaning behind his stage name. He said: “I wanted to do something where I could have an alias. The guy who did my illustration, my name was based on it. So, we had the idea of a like a cowboy. He illustrated, the cowboy blouse and everything and was like ‘yeah, that would be cool’.”

“I don’t know really, ‘ohms’ is something to do with music and quite a lot of my music has got dusty samples and crackly noises and things like that and I thought, that sounds like it could be a cowboy’s name and nobody would know that it’s me. People do now, but at the time when I meet people would think that I look like the illustration of the cowboy and they would be like ‘Ah! I thought you was gonna look like the cowboy in that cartoon picture!’ and I would be like ‘Nah! I don’t have that moustache and the cowboy hat’ because I wanted a character that looked so far removed from me that people would never guess it’s me. That’s the fun part. You could create a little character to make music under.”

Crafts also reflected how he initially got into the hip-hop music scene and credited it to his friends growing up: “It’s school really. So, in school I was interested in music- like Drum and Bass, Jungle and that kinda thing. My friend Dan, his brother had decks and I went round there and see them mixing. I had no idea how to do that. You couldn’t go on youtube or see how it was done until you round someone’s house. I was like ‘Oh God! This was what I wanna do!’ and I used to go round there and be there for hours to hear him playing music, then eventually you end up having a little go every now and again and be terrible. But from that I got the bug and saved up a lot of money, a few birthday and Christmas money so I could buy myself some decks.”

“from there it kinda just snowballed. Like a natural progression, a passion really.”

He also went into detail on how growing up in Romford and Essex impacted his music style and how growing up with people who share the same music style really inspired him: “There were some good little underground club nights and a lot of like-minded musicians around the area. I think, growing up there and having access and people around really inspired me. There was a record shop on Victoria Road that I spent so much time in, that was a nice little hub. So, I’d go down there, buying records and meet like-minded people. So yeah, I do think being from Romford and around all that being a busy hub for music did inspire a lot of what I do and I met a lot of like-minded friends in Romford and in Essex that I’m still friends with today, also my family was very creative musically so that also helps.”

I asked him about the creative process of his music, in particular the latest track he recently released called ‘Cypress Street‘: “Sometimes I’d just rehash an old project, Craig, my cousin, would come round and jam with the guitar and then that would just inspire me. I might take one little section of it and then turn that into a completely different track- it might just be a loop that never went anywhere and then years later, you might open it up and go ‘Ah! That’s a pretty cool little guitar riff” and then like, take that and build something off the back of it.

“I mean, I know some people have a clear idea in their head of what they want to make. Sometimes I’ll hear a sample, I might be listening to the radio and I’ll go ‘oh what’s this!’ and try and sample and shazam it. Other times I’d re-open an old project or noodle around on a keyboard and then make up a few loops or something and get inspired and once you get something fixed and you’re like ‘Oh I like the sound of that!’”

Just before the interview ended, I asked Crafts if he had any new material up his sleeve. He said: “I have got a few things actually… I was meant to do more stuff last year, but I didn’t release it, because of the whole Covid thing. I didn’t release much music as I would normally but I have got quite a lot stacked up”

“I’m working on an EP for a label called Foreign Currency which I’m quite excited about. On the label I run with my friend Gaz, we are doing a beat-tape, sounds like an album-led project kinda sketchy, beats that flow in together. Some of the tracks are only going to be like a minute and a half long but designed so you listen to it in its entirety so it’s a beat-tape- it kinda like flows into one track to another and it will be about an hour long. So yeah, I have that coming out later on in the year, I have the artwork done for that. Quite a bit lined up!”

Dusty Ohm’s music is available on Bandcamp, Spotify and Apple Music.