VIV HARDWICK talks to Loft Music boss Andrew Archer about Prince's Trust stardom.

TWO young Geordie music gurus have been asked to supply a letter for the 30th anniversary memento book being presented to Prince Charles to celebrate the 50th anniversary of The Prince's Trust.

Tyneside-based Andrew Archer and John Elliott, of Loft Music, have achieved worldwide sales in music as a result of start-up cash help from the trust when they opened their digital recording studios two years ago.

Now they're happy to pay tribute to the fund which allowed them to remain in the North-East and become part of a music and publishing community at King's House, just behind Newcastle's Centre For Life. Initially Loft got £2,000 from the trust in the form of a grant and £3,000 as a 'soft' loan plus money from Newcastle City Council as well.

Andrew says: "That helped and added to our original investment and we had about £8-10,000 to help us set up and add to the original equipment we had of £6070,000. Being able to get the loan from the Prince's Trust meant we were really able to set up our business properly rather than continue working out of bedrooms and spare rooms, which we'd been doing for the six years prior to that." He admits he's had a few years of sleepless nights as he and John have built the business, studios and workspace. "The three years since we started have been a pretty full-on activity and we've been doing 100-hour weeks since the beginning. What we found that initially one part of the studio was going to be available for bands and performers to come and play.

But the best use of our time was to work with artists on a long-term basis so that we can develop with them.

That's why we also set up a publishing company, called Roxx, to go with the studio, " he explains. Loft used its links with independent publisher Bucks Music to become established and take advantage of next-door rehearsal and live recording space belonging to Base HQ to keep the whole operation in the North-East.

"A lot of the music we do is with bands signed to small independent labels and we've had quite a lot of success with the artists we've worked with in terms of albums and singles being released, " says Andrew who has seen Loft's music being used as TV soundtracks for CSI (Crime Scene Investigation): Miami and New York, made by CBS Television in the US, which currently show regularly on five.

Sony Playstation have also used Loft's music for games. "CBS were really impressed with our album and chose music from it for the CSI show.

We auditioned through our record company, Global Underground, who are also Newcastle-based, but in terms of dance and electronic music they are probably one of the biggest independent companies out there over the past ten years. They are just releasing a ten-year celebration album at the moment, " he says, revealing that Loft has helped organise the TV campaign for the new release.

Trafik, whose album is called Bullet, is the band name adopted by the Geordie pair and they are also working with Peace Burial At Sea, a North-East post-rock punk band, and electronic folk music soloist Rachael Lamb.

Loft have also just signed two Australian artists, Nick Galea and Native, who are both up and coming electronic music producers. Both are creating new material rather than developing a sample from a well-known track. "Using, what you would call cheeky bootlegs, is the way to get yourself noticed. Trafik have developed Goldfrapp, The Killers and Visage tracks to gain the attention of DJs in the past. Chart-wise, Trafik put together an album called Electric Calm: V.3 which was Number 1 for itunes in Canada and Number 2 in the UK and Number 3 in the US. But these were all in the download charts, " he says, recognising that the North-East is in touch with the music industry's move towards the downloadable market.

"The future for Loft is that Trafik are producing another album and Peace Burial At Sea are putting the finishing touches to a self-titled album, which is actually their second rather than debut release. I have no idea why that is, " he laughs "but, they like to be different."

Loft are also working on audio projects to follow up the success of a CD made for South Tyneside Council which was a dramatisation of historic events from the region. "That was really successful and the tourism board of the council have been using the CD in support of its heritage trail to bring people to the area, " he explains having made the play with Tyneside actors using a script by Greta Craig.

Both men have lived most of their lives in Newcastle and always wanted to set up a business in the region.

Andrew's big break was supplying a remix track called Loving You More to a chart single for the artist BT while John was in a band called Sola Vox which was signed to Polygram. "Both happened in 1995-96 which spurred us on to keep working in the music industry, " he says.