Dopamine. It’s critical to what controls movements through the brain. It’s a chemical naturally produced in the body and is commonly associated with the pleasure system of the body. That’s what the dictionary says, but to those that have not had their breaks cherry popped recently will recognise the name Dopamine with the term “Australia’s next big thing in breaks”. 30 year old Dopamine, aka Matt Goddard, has been an overnight success in the breaks scene with his first release “Hold You” on Rennie Pilgrem’s leading breakbeat label, TCR. It’s been getting rave reviews and blowing up dance floors with major plays from the Plump DJs, Stanton Warriors and Tayo to name but a few. Quite a contrast to the Matt Goddard who was moshing to heavy metal in his adolescent years.

“I wasn’t into electronic music through my teenage years,” says Goddard talking down the phone from his studio in Sydney. “In high school I was learning guitar and drums which I picked up pretty quickly and I was just stuffing around with my mates in some bands, never had any major bands going, just the odd jam session in my room, after about 5 or 6 years I got sick of doing that. I started getting into hip hop and eventually discovered electronic music, giving in to all my mates who were listening to it at the time. From there I got a set of decks. I first started spinning gabba, hardcore, and gabba techno. Everything I listened to was heavy, like thrash metal, I used to mix thrash metal into my sets and obviously I never got any gigs from it cause no one wanted to hear that sort of thing. Slowly I started getting into house and dnb over the years, and about a year and a half ago my mates were listening to breaks, in fact it was a mate of mine Damo (Dirty D from Whomp) who was living in England at the time, he got in contact with me to say he was coming back to Australia and wanted to get a live thing happening. I said cool but I want to hear some of your music first, he sent me a couple of tracks and I was blown away – I knew that was what I wanted to do.”

Fate often plays a part through out our lives and if it weren’t for a skate boarding accident, then we may not be listening to any Dopamine tunes at all. “I was a keen skateboarder as well, and I had some extended time off due to  too many broken bones and bruises and I needed something to pass the time by. My girlfriend Robyn gave me her laptop and said “here write some music” and that was it, I spent hours and hours writing music and she got pretty miffed, but hey it’s her fault she got me into it!”

Dopamine has so many producers wondering what he does to get such a phat phat sound and on the TCR website it makes no secret that Dopamine is completely hardware based. “I use a Yamaha RS 7000 to make my tunes, I did start on software but there was always something missing from what I was making, I just couldn’t get the sound I was after. Damo’s stuff was absolutely shitting all over everything I was doing and he was using the RS 7000 as well. I used it to make a few beats and loops then I would arrange it in Sonar. Then it dawned on me to do everything with it. So I started writing whole tunes on the RS 7000 and noticed a big improvement! I still have bits of software that I use to mix down mates tunes as well as an outboard compressor that I run an Access Virus C through as well”.

Dopamine got a phone call early this year from the Godfather of Breakbeat, the man like Rennie Pilgrem who had heard one of his tunes played at a party in the UK and wanted to release it. That tune was arguably the tune of 2005, titled ‘Hold You’. “I had done two versions of that tune. The first one started out great but then everyone who had heard it didn’t like the second half of it and it kind of lost its energy, so I re-worked it and sent it to Clive Morely in the UK and he emailed me back and said “dude this tune is going to be big” and I was like “yeah right whatever”. He played it at a party in the UK and Pippa from TCR was in the DJ booth at the time and literally stole the CDR off him at the time and gave it to Rennie who called me two days later wanting to release it. The rest, as they say, is history”.

And history it certainly is, with major plays from breakbeat big guns, Plump DJs who also charted the tune in their top 10. Hold You also reached number 1 on the Streetwise Records Charts as well as a host of ‘big-up’s’ from the leading producers and DJs world wide. A spate of interest from other labels has set Dopamine up for a big future in breaks with a forthcoming release on Klaus Hill’s label Titlefight. “I really like working with Klaus he’s just so straight up and he’s been in the scene for so long and really knows what he wants. If something is shit he’ll send it back to you and tell you to fix it and you know if he says something’s not right , it’s not right. He’s been in the game for so long and really knows what he is talking about. Its good to have a second set of ears to give you feedback rather than your mates that say everything is good.  I have just sent him a new tune to be mastered that will be out in November. Its called Harsh. Klaus and myself have done a remix of it on the flip too. I’ve also done a remix of Klaus’ tune “Deep Space” that will soon be released on Title Fight too. I’ve also done something with the Whomp guitarist Dr Benwahh called “Kiss My Break” that will be out on Menu Music as well as a Karton remix for Sound of Habib that will be out in March next year.”

As well as producing under the guise Dopamine, Goddard plays in a 3 piece live act called Whomp. With this in mind could we be in for some live Dopamine sets as well? “At this stage I haven’t got any plans to do the live thing as a solo act. I’ve been asked this question many times and as much as I would like to, I am kind of dedicated to the band, there are elements that I simply just could not recreate without Damo and Benny. They both bring so much to the table, Benny is an amazing riff writer and writes the sickest and funkiest hooks, Damo is just an all round amazing musician and has this funky electronic edge to what he writes too. But you never know what might happen so I won’t rule it out now but at the moment I am happy doing what I am doing”.

And who wouldn’t be?! With a residency at the inthemix Breaks Forum Parties “Wanna Break” (formerly known as Kitt Katt) plus regular gigs at Chinese Laundry, Sublime at Home Nightclub as well as support slots for internationals the future looks bright indeed for Dopamine. “Things are going great at the moment, with the regular Kitt Katt parties as well as some regular gigs at Chinese Laundry and some more stuff coming up at Home in the future and of course I am coming to Perth for the first time in December as well to play at the night ‘Hydrophonik” which I really am looking forward to!

With new producers such as Dopamine bringing a fresh sound to the forefront, Aussie breaks is in truly great stead to come. “Australian breaks is in such good shape at the moment, and with Klaus moving to Australia a couple of years ago and establishing Title Fight Recordings I am really onto a good thing. Add to that there is some really good stuff coming out from up and coming producers as well. Teknic B is making some really good stuff at the moment and he’s definitely a name to look out for in future as well. Joules Fine (Rezinate) is also another, he makes killer warm up type stuff, with a jazzy dub sort of feel, oh and some guy from Perth called Karl Sav is making some good stuff too laughs.”

Dopamine will be touring the UK, Hungary and Sweden in February 2006, but locally you can catch Dopamine at the following venues in November and December:

11th November – Wanna Break?, Burdekin Hotel, Sydney
18th November – Forefront w/ EK, Chinese Laundry, Sydney
10th December – Hydrophonik, Blueprint, Perth
16th December – Ils, Chinese Laundry, Sydney
16th December – Wanna Break?, Burdekin Hotel, Sydney
23rd December – Sublime, Home Nightclub, Sydney