After Dinner Speakers: The Chemical Brothers, Jim Rogers, Quentin Willson

Ed Simons (tall, curly hair) and Tom Rowlands (taller, long hair) met while studying history at Manchester Poly in 1989. They'd come from the south to Manchester for the music and launched themselves at the club scene with a vengeance. From nights at the legendary Hacienda, to raves in Blackburn and misbehaviour at clubs like Justin Robertson's Spice and Most Excellent they soaked it all up. When they started to DJ ("borrowing' the name the Dust Brothers from the American producers of the Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique), they put their own spin on things. During their first residency at Naked Under Leather (as debauched as its name suggests) they established a party-starting reputation for going where most other DJs feared to tread: joining the dots between acid house, hip hop and rock.