D&B in Focus: Lenore
No artist has changed the musical landscape of New England quite like Lenore. She’s been active in the scene since the ‘90s, and an early pioneer of D&B long before the genre became a household name. As well as her deft mixing style, Lenore’s legacy lies in her club night Elements – the longest running D&B night in Boston.
The Early Years
Born and raised in Connecticut, Lenore’s first foray into electronic music was through the queer Black underground in her home town of Hartford. She went to college in Boston, where she fell in love with ‘90s house which motivated her to start DJing in 1995. “I discovered Drum & Bass accidentally in a record store,” Lenore says. “I liked the artwork and the names of the tracks – I didn’t even know what genre it was.”
The first record she picked up was from Fabio’s label Creative Source. “It was totally up my alley,” she says. “Then I discovered T Power’s album The Self Evident Truth of an Intuitive Mind, and really got into the introspective, atmospheric direction that D&B was going in.”
After that, Lenore took a deep dive into D&B’s back catalogue. She devoured early releases from labels like Metalheadz and then dove head-first into New England’s underground, attending a night called Jungle Roots run by Al Fougy when she didn’t have school the next day. “I saw some great artists there like Ed Rush and DJ Trace, and Fougy also brought names like Goldie, SS, L Double and LTJ Bukem but I wasn't there,” Lenore says.
In 1998, once she’d graduated, Lenore noticed a lull in D&B club nights. “At that point I had been DJing Drum & Bass and had a whole crate of records” she says. “Drum & Bass was always relegated to the side room, so I asked the owner of The Phoenix Landing if I could throw my own club night there and surprisingly he said yes.”
The Birth of Elements
Two days after Lenore’s birthday in January 1999 she threw the first Elements rave with her co-founder Crook. “I had to learn what to do with bookings and logistics on the fly,” she says. “Back then, we flyered, so I would sometimes set my alarm at 1am and go out and promote.”
Despite not knowing how to run a club night, Lenore says everything just fell into her lap like it was the path she was supposed to be on.
Their early bookings included Dom & Roland, DJ Storm, Breakage and Total Science as well as Lenore and Crook. At the time, Lenore felt that she was simply filling a gap by starting her night, and once the scene picked up she wouldn’t need to do it anymore, but that never really happened, and the demand for Elements just kept coming. Lenore has a few theories as to why it’s been such a success.
“The sound system and the room shape is one factor,” Lenore says. “The acoustics work really well with Drum & Bass because there’s a lot of wood so you can really hear the intricacies and the percussion. D&B producers are some of the best engineers on the planet and the room caters to that.”
Lenore also believes the transience of Boston as a college city has helped keep footfall flowing, as well as the non-existent dress code so people can walk in right off the street. “Some people just walked in and haven’t missed a week since,” Lenore says.
“There’s a high turnover of people but it’s cool how the culture has stayed the same,” Lenore continues. “The artists say they like to play for Elements because the crowd is educated musically.”
Elements Today
Elements has been in that same 150 capacity venue every Thursday for over 25 years, and the club night has become a staple of Boston’s underground and a home for the East Coast’s D&B heads. Lenore now co-hosts with Furious, and despite having to close for a while during the pandemic, Elements made it through by live-streaming and opening their doors as soon as it was safe.
Lockdown bred a whole new wave of Drum & Bass producers, so when the world emerged, Elements was in a perfect position culturally. “It's great because you have something fresh every week so you can curate a set that's totally different and nothing ever gets stale,” Lenore says.
Today it’s one of the most loved club nights in the USA. They recently hosted the 30 year celebration of Dread Recordings, and they plan to team up with one of NYC’s legendary Loft promoters. “DJ Bruno has a new space that goes all night in Boston,” Lenore says. “He offered Elements our own room on NYE, so I'm very excited to be working with someone who is a significant part of Boston's electronic music roots and to bring together the underground house and jungle and D&B communities.”
And, of course, Elements will be celebrating their 26th birthday in January. “A lot of people say it’s their therapy, their church and their chosen family,” Lenore says. “And there’s never been a question of whether I want to continue, because the impetus is coming from the community.”
