About

Olaf Quintessa is the Second Life avatar of Matt Ford.

Olaf is the resident DJ and promoter of Fresh Static @ The Drome, and spins a mixture of techno, electro, and deep house. See the Fresh Static website for more info.

Olaf is also resident DJ for In Deep at the Southern Cross – Regular deep house session, Wednesdays at Southern Cross. Click here for more info.

Matt Ford grew up in a tiny village in the middle of nowhere in Yorkshire. After several years living in the Midlands he moved to London, then eventually migrated to a space port at the edge of the galaxy.

1993-1997: Studied mathematics at Warwick university and finished with a Mother of Mathematics degree (MMath). During this time he was involved in running informal poetry workshops + presented his own radio show “WashDup” – A two hour mix of deep house, techno, experimental noise and easy listening.

1996: Discovered the terrors of House of God, Birmingham – Underground techno night with the likes of Sir Real, Surgeon and Paul Damage at the helm.

1998: Moved to London to start work as a web developer. After some faffing around he got involved with the Spinning Room poetry group and also occasionally Torriano. Contributed to the Spinning Room anthology, and Spiral Bound anthology. Also invited to read at Poetry Cafe, London.

2000: Met Scott Hardy and helped set up dxdt – DJed techno on weekly internet radio show. Helped run the deep house party Crazy Log, and was resident DJ at Bluebeat. Also DJed occasionally at Family. Much veering between a love of deep house and techno + A few easy listening gigs at the much loved Departure Lounge.

2002-2004: Worked on MSc in Applied Mathematics at Imperial College, London. Final project a dissertation on entropy in one-dimensional dynamical systems.

2004: Moved to a space port at the edge of the galaxy, in New Zealand.