Afternoon tea with Darkus by Powerslave/Void
Hello and welcome to Versus issue #9, please can you introduce yourself to the readers?
My real name is Lee Harwood but probably more known around these shores (for better or worse) as Darkus/Haujobb. My former handle was Nemes!s which I used from 1994 to around 2002 before changing over to Darkus. I’m can still be found lurking about in the North East of England and depressingly now 38 years old! No longer the naïve and innocent 14 year old that first uncovered the amiga scene!
What was your first computer, and when did you get it?
My first computer was passed down from my Uncle and probably already by then a relic but I loved my Atari 2600 with ColecoVision expansion. Endless hours of fun with Pac-Man, Pole Position and Donkey Kong! Although I always consider my Amstrad CPC 464 as my first real computer. Not entirely sure when I got that but probably around the age of 11 (very early 90’s). Even then I started to tinker, making sounds and trying to copy BASIC code from Amstrad Action magazine!
What got you interested in the Amiga platform?
It all started when my local friends got A500’s as games machines for Christmas. Here I was waiting for Teenage Mutant Ninga Turtles to load on tape via Amstrad whilst they all played arcade perfect clones in full colour (well near as!). Santa eventually delivered my A1200 in 1993. I was in shear awe of how good this machine was! The joys of D-Copy and X-Copy soon entered my life too! With that along came a friend of mine who said if I went to a local computer club I could get my hands on an infinite supply of the latest games. Sure enough, off I went. To my surprise amongst all the PC gamers playing Theme Park, Duke Nukem and the odd Amiga guy, someone was blasting out 2 Unlimited music tracks (unashamedly a massive fan at the time) I eventually plucked up the courage to ask how he was playing what sounded like CD quality tracks from his Amiga. Cut a long story short, I’d stumbled into a demo scener called Messiah. Although he was not known or famous, he did give me a few copies of Amiga demo productions and before I knew it, I was hand writing letters to the address in the productions and slowly but surely being drawn into our demo scene world! Little did I realise I’d be still be involved 25 years later!
What groups have you been in/helped, of which you can remember?
Initially started up Prophets along with Messiah who I’d met at the computer club. We managed to round up a few locals. Mostly unknown people but we did manage to snare Violator and Nanook from LSD! Without going into too much detail, I eventually joined an established group called Anathema (Hi Michael & Shade) who I enjoyed some good scene years with, along with a few years in R.N.O. (Hi TBC) and Phuture 303 (Hi LFO). I doubt any of these guys will read this but if any of you do – those were some of the best times! I spent sometime failing at resurrecting Digital in the UK before eventually moving on Nah-Kolor, Freezers, Rebels, Nuance, Network and Haujobb. Spent most of that time writing articles for magazines and making music for the odd production. Alongside that I started an ascii group called Aerosol and music group called Poise Records. I guess I never left Haujobb so technically still a member since early 2000’s (Hello XXX! 🙂
What was the proudest moment in your career?
Releasing Devotion diskmag, even if I only managed one issue. I was very happy with way it turned out. I just wish I started that project 10 years earlier. If you guys read this, thank you to Xenon for the code, Adam/DCS for the graphics, Reed/Fairlight, Dascon/Essence, Tecon/Spaceballs for the music, not forgetting Magic/Nah-Kolor, Teis/Spaceballs and Makke for all the article writing help. Along side Devotion though, I was always quite proud of Aerosol – we made a decent mark on the ascii scene over the years!
Thinking back on the good old days, is there anything you regret?
As I briefly mentioned in the last question, it was only releasing one issue of Devotion. That was a big regret and also motivation was really beginning to wane at that time. I’d have loved to have the magazine in the late 90’s when I was still fully active and motivated.
Are you still active?
I keep an eye on Pouet now and again, the last piece of activity was in 2007 when I drew some C64 graphics over on CSDb website. Essentially lying dormant these days!
If not when did you stop and why?
Not entirely sure but probably somewhere between 2007 and 2008. I never really found an interest in the PC scene and as the Amiga scene slowly faded as did my interest. The Amiga demo scene did put one awesome fight and pleased to see it still lives on today. I’ll personally never forget my experiences with the scene and the many friends I’ve made, either in person or over great distances.
Any greetings/messages to old friends you would like to say?
Greetings to the few people I’m still in contact with, of course starting with Powerslave/Void! Genetix/Darkage, Wade/Fairlight, Sane/Fairlight, Dazzaboy/Neokortex, Zyx/Neokortex, Magic/Nah-Kolor, Skunkmasta/Poise Records, Leunam/Network. Magician Lord/Jetset (still stalking you on Facebook in the hope you’ll bring back my favourite group! 🙂 Chromag/Rebels (For the very very last time – can I have my original Chromagic disks back please?? 🙂 Special greetings to Michael/Anathema and Shade/Anathema who helped my first steps in the scene. Messiah/Prophets for bringing me into this underworld! A thank you to Dipswitch/Aerosol for keeping the baton and the group going when I retired 🙂
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