BETA Records - Your music matters!

I am Dejan Djordjevic, a male musician (lead and background vocals, keyboards, synthesisers, acoustic guitars, e-guitars, percussion and e-percussion, sequencer- and computer-programming), composer, author, sound engineer, and producer. I started writing my own songs when I was 14, in 1979, and I have an original song portfolio of a few hundred songs (music and lyrics; I was never bound to just one music style like rock, pop-rock or synth rock), and I have co-written another hundred works as well as re-arranged, performed, recorded and produced several cover versions. I am self-taught in singing, in playing keyboards, playing guitars, playing percussion, sound engineering etc.

I was born 19 November 1965 in Paracin, Serbia, Yugoslavia. I grew up in ugly West Germany (my displaced childhood) where I lived for almost three decades before I moved to the United Kingdom for good, 1997. My most recent pseudonym is TRON, that I started back in December 1987 in 7830 Emmendingen, West Germany (my former recording studio was called "L-Sound Studio" and I moved it to the United Kingdom when I settled down in Welling, Kent, in 1997 where it was until December 2004). My other pseudonym under which I am still releasing my works is SYNTHETIC VOICES (started in December 1979).

My new TRON Compact Disc-R digital audio album is called THE GERMANS ARE SCUM, finished in November 2008. As TRON is my pseudonym, I used to occasionally feature co-writers and session musicians for stage and for studio recordings, I was once again all solo on vocals and all instruments, and did the sound engineering and production, too. Years ago I used to be more into band-sound and sharing the instrumentation by involving session musicians, but I personally prefer the sound of my own music whenever I played all instruments myself, including the drums/percussion, which are basically all sampled e-drums/e-percussion and I play them on a keyboard with MIDI-connection and record them on seperate tracks on a Sequencer/HardDisc digital audio recorder. Most music fans/listeners seem to prefer my works where I played all instruments alone, i.e. my song IT'S ABOUT TIME was No 1 in W-Germany when the people didn't even know that for this song behind the name TRON was only one man: me, Dejan Djordjevic; once they found out through radio interviews and printed media they quickly wanted to forget all about it. This was the main reason why labels who released my songs preferred to promote TRON as a band rather than as a one man project.

Inspiration; I get sudden brilliant ideas for new music to compose and record. Imagination is more important than knowledge, and is definitely more important than style; and I find it a little bit irritating that for every of my works I upload on the Internet, I have to pigeonhole my songs and treat or classify according to a mental stereotype. When I write my lyrics and compose my music I do not think of style and I am not bound to one style, otherwise I don't think I would have carried on with my music for so long, as it is exactly 30 years since I started creating my own works, back in 1979. British and Celtic music and lyrics are influential to my songs. 'The Beatles' were an important early influence to the way I heard, felt, and composed music; so were 'Emerson Lake and Palmer', Jean-Michel Jarre, 'Fruupp' and the 'Rolling Stones', and I recorded cover versions of their works as demos to get pub-gigs; and later in the early 1980s 'ELO', 'Asia', Mike Oldfield, 'Saga', 'Simple Minds', Ofra Haza (my favourite female artist), as well as 'Ultravox' (they were ok but I didn't think they were that great until I heard the ULTRAVOX QUARTET album in 1982) - I recorded and performed my versions of their songs 'Private Lives' (unlike all my original compositions, the lyrics for 'Private Lives 1982 The Truth' are not out of my own diary and nothing I experienced myself. I have never been in the army or done national service. When I recorded my cover version of 'Private Lives', I decided to change not only the arrangement, but also wrote completely new lyrics, a fictional story as if I was a 16-year-old soldier in the British armed forces during the Falkland war in 1982, because I actually was still sixteen at the time of the Falkland war in 1982), and "Rage In Eden", my "Private Lives 1982 The Truth" making their original sound like a demo; and a live at rehearsals-1995 version of "Vienna" which turned out quite good, but, I must admit, bloody Vienna means absolutely nothing to me whatsoever; plus my songs "Love", and "Love (Chapter 2) No Worries" are both based on Ultravox' "Your Name", and although I liked their band sound and most of their works, I only liked the sound of their works starting with producer Sir George Martin, from 1982 on, once I saw the music video to "Reap The Wild Wind" with the Royal Air Force Spitfires and Battle of Britain scenes giving the band a clear 'Allied' anti-German character which is what I like; and I recorded and performed my versions of their song "Hymn" featuring Paul Samson on e-guitars, as well as their song "We Came To Dance" featuring Midge Ure on co-vocals and Warren Cann on additional e-percussion, and their song "Dancing With Tears In My Eyes" that didn't turn out as good as their original. You can watch my promotional music video of my cover-version of Ultravox' HYMN here on my page (please note that the quality is not as good as my original video master, and also that it was filmed in 1990, so I looked a bit younger back then); I kept it all straight honest white, resembling Heaven, the abode of God and the angels; white like the white cliffs of Dover in England, United Kingdom (you can find the same music video also on Paul Samson's Myspace.com page, but the quality is the same and nothing like my original video master; the URL is http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=31821534). A fan once wrote that my song BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES AGAIN "is a song Ultravox wish to have written as it beats most of their efforts" .. I don't know, maybe, maybe not; but I definitely know that their 'Quartet' album is an album I used to wish I would have written.

My works are royalty free since I have cancelled my contract with the GEMA in 2008.

I am creating my sound by playing instruments like Synthesisers (Moog/Sequential/Roland/Oberheim/Solina), Keyboards/E-Piano/Sampler, Acoustic and E-Guitars, E-Drums/Percussion; and I am using computers (digital recording/sequencing/mixing/mastering/editing), a 2"inch 24-track Otari MX-80 tape machine (for additional sound recording with tape compression), mixers, amplifiers, condenser microphones for vocals, and for instruments/percussion (condensers and dynamic microphones), as well as effect units (Lexicon PCM-80, Eventide H-3000 SE), and compressors (TL-Audio 5051 full valve compressor, DBX- and Drawmer M-500 compressor/limiter/gate/de-esser/expander).

On this page I made a collection of my tracks available for free listening and free download (titles are in no particular order): VERISMILITUDE TO A STORY, A DAY TO NUKE GERMANY, BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES AGAIN , HEY HAVE YOU CUT YOURSELF? , COOLING GRADE , PRIVATE LIVES 1982 THE TRUTH (my cover version of "Private Lives" but with new fictional story lyrics I wrote, and I actually recorded it twice, the first one was with lyrics in 3rd person, I was singing in 3rd person, and this new version I sung in 1st person) , DUNKIRK 1st DEC 2005 , TITO CHAPTER 120 COMMUNIST PARTY YUGOSLAVIA , BEAUTIFUL JEWISH GIRL (dedicated to Ofra Haza) , DEJA-VU , AMAZING GRACE (lyrics and music for "Amazing Grace" were written and re-composed/re-arranged by myself, Dejan Djordjevic, based on and inspired by the Scottish folk song "Amazing Grace") , THE GOOD OLD EMPIRE HITS BACK , FEELING LOVE MY OWN WAY , TOP DOG NERO , THE WOODEN THE SILVER AND THE GOLDEN CROSS , THE GERMANS ARE SCUM , PIMP ALEKSANDER , HITLER'S SONS , THERE IS NO PROMISED LAND (dedicated to Ofra Haza) , LOVE (CHAPTER 2) NO WORRIES , THE SEA AROUND BRITAIN (I was inspired by the moving picture soundtrack of one of my favourite movies "The Dambusters") , SPEAK (live in session 2002) , COOLING GRADE (instrumental) , RAGE IN EDEN (my unplugged cover version recorded live in session 1997 in Welling, Kent, UK - I was performing to an audience of only two women!) - DESCENT DOWN BY THE RIVER (live session 2002) , OCEAN (live session 2002) , and - ETERNITY (YOU ARE ALONE) (live in session 2002). All songs are taken from my new TRON Compact Disc-R digital audio album: THE GERMANS ARE SCUM, as well as from my two new TRON single/ep BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES AGAIN, and BROADEN HER HORIZON, which I finished in November 2008 in Denzlingen, Germany, before returning with my dog Nero to the United Kingdom where I found new accommodation in Canterbury, England, renting a bedroom from 1 December 2008. While I was still working on my TRON album THE GERMANS ARE SCUM, I thought: let's do more of that damage to the fascist Germans, just self-defence as their aggression and attacks against me and my music never ended, but instead of their blind physical onslaught I'd keep using my brains and my abilities as a songwriter and composer and show that ugly German fascist society that pen and paper are stronger than the gun; I recorded my works on my own recording studio equipment which is still left in my parents' flat in that ugly Germany, God damned Denzlingen. I hate Germans because they are evil, Lucifer's henchmen, fiend of hell. Some American sent me an email saying that my song "Beautiful Jewish Girl" sounds a lot like some Yankee-doodle track, I forgot that tune's name, but it must be coincidence.

My song "Britannia Rules The Waves Again" is the title track taken from one of my two new CD-R digital audio single/ep: BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES AGAIN, which I also finished in November 2008 to accompany my new TRON album THE GERMANS ARE SCUM. This version of "Britannia Rules The Waves Again" is my latest new arranged and new recorded version (November 2008) of one of my first own compositions; I wrote my song "Britannia Rules The Waves Again" in December 1979, I was just 14 years old; the harmonies I wrote for my composition were inspired by the Russian national anthem. I first released it in December 1979 as a mono demo recording simply on MC in my name DEJAN DJORDJEVIC, and soon later on MC under my first pseudonym "Synthetic Voices", which was my first battleship against the Germans who were superior only in number but could never reach the quality of my works, so they started stealing. I additionally uploaded one of my streaming music videos to my song BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES AGAIN which is a promotion video I done in 2008 to introduce my song and how I recorded my new 30-year-jubilee version of it; my introduction is followed by my promo video of my same work featuring my recording from 2006. - - I wrote a song in 2005 called HITLER'S SONS, which is against the rise of German Neo-fascism; here is my 2008 info music promotion video to my song HITLER'S SONS. - - Done music and video to my song LOVE (CHAPTER 2) NO WORRIES in 2004 and final editing in 2007, but it remained unreleased until 2009 because of my own private reasons (additional images added 2008 when re-edited for release as promotion music video for my TRON album THE GERMANS ARE SCUM). I first released my song LOVE (CHAPTER 2) NO WORRIES on my TRON Compact Disc-R digital audio album THE GERMANS ARE SCUM, November 2008. - - My song "Eternity (You Are Alone) - live" is a live session recording and also featured on my single/ep BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES AGAIN; my original three recording studio versions of my song "Eternity (You Are Alone)" were previously released in 1996 on my TRON Compact Disc digital audio single/ep IT'S ABOUT TIME (featuring two versions), and the album version of my song "Eternity (You Are Alone)" was finally featured on my TRON Compact Disc digital audio album SYNDICATE, released by Mystic Records, United Kingdom, 1997 (Catalogue No: MYS CD 111). And I have also made my song WATCHING THE WORLD from my TRON Compact Disc album GIVE US (released 1994, Catalogue No.: SMMCD191165), as well as all my 14 songs of my TRON: SYNDICATE album available on www.betarecords.co.uk/tron.dejan.djordjevic (or on www.betarecords.com/tron.dejan.djordjevic); vocals, all instruments, sound engineering and production by myself, Dejan Djordjevic, 1995-1996; except: additional sequencer programming on "London Labyrinth" by Damir Oberst (we co-wrote together my TRON song I FEEL FOR YOU which is featured on my TRON album AUSLAENDER, and we worked on a lot of trance and techno stuff using different pseudonyms, but I chucked him out of my studio moments after I realised that he was no friend of mine), backing vocal on "It's About Time" by Cecile Verny, backing vocal on "Never Forever" by Elsa Kiefle; bass guitar and acoustic drums by two Kraut POWs I took while in W-Germany (Dede and Chris); lyrics and music written and composed by myself, Dejan Djordjevic; except music for "Never Forever" co-written by Paul Samson. - A typical example for what type of trench warfare Germany has constantly been for me was when my song IT'S ABOUT TIME was a No 1 Radio Hit in W-Germany's SWF-3/SR3 newcomer rookie charts 1996..and my TRON CD single release IT'S ABOUT TIME was at the same time refused in the record/CD shops and by distributers throughout Germany, so I couldn't profit from my song's popularity..and I never received royalties from the GEMA for any of the airplay either..strange, isn't it! I wrote a song the same year about my experience with the Germans; it's called SWIMMING WITH THE SHARKS and I released it a few years later on my TRON album AUSLAENDER.

If you want to hear how my TRON Compact Disc digital audio album AUSLAENDER from the year 2000 was kicking in, it's with my song "Deja-vu", which is also featured here as an older bonus track of mine on this web page (it is meant as a fair warning for the Germans how history will most definitely repeat itself); and you can listen to it on this page (CD released 2000 on my own label Silver Moon Music, Catalogue No.: SMMCD2001; vocals, all instruments, sound engineering and production by myself, Dejan Djordjevic, 1999; except acoustic drums: Jamie (slow part)/Greg (fast part); bass guitar: Mark, and additional rhythm e-guitar in fast part: Stephen. Lyrics and music written and composed by myself, Dejan Djordjevic). Also a song I co-wrote with Hike in 1984 called GOODBYE CRUEL WORLD is here for free listening, this old studio recording where I played all instruments and sung the vocals while Hike played the e-guitar was released on Compact Disc on my TRON album "Young Europeans" (Catalogue No.: AU-31330CD); and here's also WHEN THE DAY GOES as well as my song OUTSIDE: IN THE 'GONE EARTH' from the same TRON album of mine. Here's THE MAN THEY CALL HORSE from my TRON CD album SPEED OF LIGHT (released October 2001, Catalogue No.: SMMCD2002). A few songs from my TRON Compact Disc digital audio album TPOH7-CLEAR AS A MOUNTAIN STREAM are also made available here for free listening (released December 2003/January 2004 on my own label Silver Moon Music, Catalogue No.: SMMCD7). Also a bonus track of mine here is called WE ARE THE ONES WHO LAUGH IN DREAMS, and is a song I entirely composed in December 2005 on an old laptop Toshiba I used to have, and I created this one by typing the notes via laptop keyboard into a free PC 'Emagic Logic 5' sequencer programme, an electronic music experiment to compose a song without using samples and loops, but without using a microphone, e-guitar or real synthesisers and keyboards either, and I used only free downloadable software-synthesisers one can get from the WWW, also for the spoken vocals saying "We are the ones who laugh in dreams" I used a PC-speech-synthesiser. The third bonus track of mine here is called SONG ABOUT MYSELF, DEJAN and I composed it on my Compaq Presario Laptop with 'Harmony Assistant' notation software triggering a software e-piano, 18/19 March 2009. And another bonus track FIRING ROUNDS INTO GERMANS, a dream come true: sitting at the good old Vickers machine gun with water-cooling system and in self-defence firing a few rounds at some evil German cockroaches, pure bliss; I made this track on my Compaq Presario Laptop with a free trial version of 'Beatcraft' software drums, 15 April 2009; it is one of the shortest tracks I have ever made, 19 seconds.- - Also featured are all five tracks from my TRON: WE CAME TO DANCE Compact Disc digital audio single/ep (released on Mystic Records, 2000, Catalogue No.: MYSCD507); the tracks are: "We Came To Dance", "Discover Peace Garden", "We Came To Dance (Earth Mix)", "Faraway Spaceman", and "Uranium (instrumental)". As for "We Came To Dance" it is not just me alone on vocals as I sing the lead vocals in the verses with Midge Ure, the man who actually sung the original "We Came To Dance" with Ultravox in 1982; the original version was produced by George Martin and released on the Ultravox QUARTET album on Chrysalis Records Ltd. For my TRON versions I played the synthesisers/keyboards, e-guitars, sequencer, some e-percussion and e-drums additionally to the acoustic drum kit played by former TRON drummer Jamie Winterton from London, England, UK. The bass guitar was played by Mark Landagan, and an additional fat rhythm guitar (the axe) in the choruses by Mark's brother Stephen Landagan, both former TRON musicians and initially from London, England, UK. I recorded it in my former sound recording studio in Welling, Kent, England, UK (although Mystic Records called it on the CD the "TARDIS, London", it was just a nickname, as it looked quite a small recording studio, not only on the outside, but the production and sound I mixed was always huge and international world standard; so that's why the "TARDIS"). Actually the e-percussion in the intro is by original Ultravox drummer Warren Cann who played the drums on the original version, but apart from that e-drum pad he hasn't performed on my version of "We Came To Dance", although even that was initially planned.

But back to my current TRON album THE GERMANS ARE SCUM. My TRON Compact Disc-R Digital Audio album THE GERMANS ARE SCUM shows a return to artistic top form for myself; if you play my album's opener, the 1st track "Hey Have You Cut Yourself?", you will know exactly what I mean; my song is pure self-defence (not against the guys from 'Radio Paracin' in Serbia - I thought they were Allies but I simply ignore them since their unorthodox pro-German approaches), my soundis like the tip of a heavy boot making its way through the air to punish any male German target available and set the beat for the battle to come; "Hey Have You Cut Yourself?" is the solution to the problem raised in my song "Come Sun, Come Rain" from my previous TRON album TPOH7-CLEAR AS A MOUNTAIN STREAM (released December 2003), and completes a full circle. As I already said, I finally finished my TRON Compact Disc-R digital audio album THE GERMANS ARE SCUM including my two CD-R single/ep BRITANNIA RULES THE WAVES AGAIN and BROADEN HER HORIZON in November 2008. My song "Tito Chapter 120 Communist Party Yugoslavia" is a little reminder for the Krauts how they got punished in the Balkans during the 2nd WW, and it also makes clear that the fight against the fascist German scum is still on, all the way to the bitter end. Allowing German bastards into NATO was an unpardonable folly. Tito was a great tactician and strategist and managed to organise his Partizans superbly when he clinched a breathtaking victory against the Germans during the 2nd WW, tempting the Krauts into the Sutjeska mountains of Yugoslavia, where only 20,000 poorly equipped Partizans punished 100,000 supremely equipped German fascist "Wehrmacht" soldiers, and so marked the beginning of the end of Nazi rule in the Balkans. After the British Royal Air Force eventually opened the 2nd front against the Germans in the Balkans by bombing their positions, Tito desperately waited for the Russians to open the 3rd front, but Stalin didn't, he went for the cockroach's head instead: Berlin. The Partizans were not only Communists, but also Orthodox, Celts, Protestants, and Muslims, all united against the fascist German Axis. They were fighting for Yugoslavia, once created not by Communists but as the Kingdom of Yugoslavia.

Pete Feenstra, who used to work at the Shepherds Bush EMPIRE theatre in Shepherds Bush, London, wrote in 2008 about myself and my music: "During his time in Germany Dejan was an important outpost for British Rock- and Pop-music, and often had musicians from the UK in his recording studio, too. When I first heard TRON live on stage and Dejan sung and played his songs 'It's About Time', and also 'Cruel World' followed by 'Britannia Rules The Waves Again', I and my mates thought Dejan was a Celtic geezer from Northern Ireland, somewhere Belfast way. We were surprised to learn he grew up in the South of West Germany, but his music sounds British, probably more British than many other more successful musicians born in England. Dejan Djordjevic's TRON sound was modern with his Synthesisers and E-Guitar work, a sound many found difficult to digest with its marching drums - more a sound to obey to, but his songs still gave you a touch of British Empire and somehow made you feel that Britain is still Great Britain indeed. When TRON was headlining the Shepherds Bush Empire, Dejan Djordjevic proved the greatest front man, vocalist and sound Minister on his instruments, in supreme command of his band TRON; the Kitchener of post-modern British Rock music, he is a man of strong and inflexible will, with a genius for organisation. The somewhat immobile nature of his German backing musicians was forgotten in 1999 once he had new session guys from London. Yugoslavian/Serbian born Dejan Djordjevic is polished in manners, courteous and accomplished, speaking English, German and Serbian fluently, although all his songs I heard were sung in English. After divorcing from his second wife, what made him lose his recording studio building and so his self-employment too, Dejan moved from Welling in 2005 and lived near Folkestone; but I think he still experienced very realistically the result of German poisonous plotting, and after another trip to Germany to work on his new songs Dejan has now (27 November 2008) returned to the United Kingdom, renting accommodation but no flat and no music studio. Dejan Djordjevic is the sole Commander-in-chief of his current battleship "TRON", and he was in supreme command of his personal overseas Euro-zones over there in the South of West Germany up until the mid 1990s. During his eight years in London, 1996 till 2004, Dejan still remained a member of the famous Bristol based "Extreme Voice", what connected him to artists like Ultravox ... In the early 1980s Dejan fought for the British flag side by side with British musicians before he had completed his teens. The initial sinking of his first three battleships "Synthetic Voices", "Eukalyptus" and "Lady", all within German waters, emphasised in the most vivid manner the price of English speaking/singing British Rock and Pop music command of the seas, and the terrible power of the hidden German techno-submarine. Dejan Djordjevic himself and the prisoners he took, a number of German POW session musicians, went with to the bottom each time. After his time as Commander of the light Pop cruiser "Lady", which was finally sunk by a German submarine in 1987, Dejan Djordjevic was at once appointed to the command of his new armoured battleship "TRON", which he also brilliantly used for British Pop and Rock coast defence. Notwithstanding the great numerical superiority of Germans, TRON harassed them so instantly that Dejan kept the ever increasing horde of Krauts in check. The Germans went berserk and tried anything to crush his recording studio in Emmendingen, spread lies, threw dirt, did the silly psycho games, didn't pay his royalties and didn't pay him for his work and concerts ... you name it ... The composer/musician/singer/songwriter Dejan Djordjevic has become the intrepid defender of the rights of the European citizens to freedom of speech during these constant onslaughts by the Germans. So courageously, indeed, did he keep his occupied piece of space and acted suddenly in the interests of music composers around the world, making the German spin doctors eat their own hearts out. But above all Dejan Djordjevic's TRON had indeed become the advance guard of the British Forces in the music struggle, with his never-to-be-forgotten feats of songs and deeds of brilliancy, and earned the admiration not only of Great Britain for the magnificent stand against the blind onslaught of the Germans and their death-dealing musical instruments." - - Thanks to Pete Feenstra for his updated critique, and this truly makes good that in 1997 prior to headlining the Shepherds Bush Empire my TRON project was promoted as "Germany's No 1 Synth-Rock band". - - - - - I am proud to be British although I am not born British but British by naturalisation; I am not too interested in politics at all, and if so, then only as an artist.

Please visit my page on "http://www.myspace.com/trondejandjordjevic" for more info about myself and my music.