This week Paul Woolford releases his debut album as Special Request, Soul Music.

A veteran of house and techno music, Woolford introduced his Special Request alter-ego in 2012, with a series of self-released 12″ singles. The project is heavily inspired by the pirate radio that Woolford grew up on; speaking to FACT in March 2012 he explained that “the attractive thing about pirate radio is that it sits outside of convention, so there are no rules as such, and this is a huge part of why this project exists, so even though there are familiar themes involved on these releases, the stark contrasts make the differences.”

“In terms of pirate radio itself”, Woolford continues, “the internet has changed the nature of it, but there was a time when it was pure community service. I stumbled across it purely by accident, from moving the tuning dial across the airwaves and the contrast between what was on commercial radio and what was being broadcast from PCR in Bradford or Energy, or Dream FM in Leeds was astronomical. There’s been a guy that’s basically always been involved around this part of the North, a guy called Shock, and he was involved all those years and continues to be these days with Radio Frequency FM, which I’ve been listening to of late. How many more unsung heroes must there be from across the years that have dedicated their lives to this?”

You can stream Soul Music now at Pitchfork Advance, read Angus Finlayson’s review of it here, and download Special Request’s FACT mix here.