For DJ Brandon Block, even when his reckless hedonism led to hospitalisation, he continued to use drugs. What was his turning point?
Brandon Block – superstar 90s DJ and fabled hedonist – wasn’t about to let a trifling bit of lung disease stand between him and his drugs. Recovering in a hospital isolation unit, he chomped a hole in the protective screen shielding the outside world from his raging infection. At Block’s request, his pals dutifully slipped him wraps of cocaine.
It was 1994, and Block was at the height of his global fame, spending summers bouncing between villa parties and headline slots in Ibiza. The hospital stay followed an ill-advised swan dive off a ferry into Hong Kong harbour. Block’s battered immune system put up little defence against its filthy waters.
“If you knew me back then, you’d know it was a typical Blocko moment,” he says. “All my mates were telling me not to do it, but we’d been partying all night and I was off my head. It makes me cringe thinking of some of the stuff I’ve done. But I’m here – thankfully – to tell the tale.”
Block’s lifelong love affair with music began while he was still in school. By his late teens, he’d landed a regular gig spinning soul and funk in a London pub. He’d sworn off drugs at an early age after an unsettling reaction to cannabis, but the dawn of acid house in 1988 changed everything. “I went to a warehouse party, took an ecstasy pill and never turned back,” he says.
Three years later, Block struck out for the Balearic Islands. Soon he was co-headlining sets on the terrace at legendary Ibiza venue, Space. For a while, at least, he had the best of times.
“It was non-stop partying. I’d sleep maybe once a week,” Block recalls. “There seemed to be no consequences. I was in reasonably good health, of reasonably good mind. I felt I could stop whenever I wanted, but then there was one night when I knew I was in danger of tipping over the edge – and I went and did it anyway. I realised then that I had a problem, that I wasn’t going to be able to stop without help.”
Around the Block: Brandon now uses his platform to speak out on mental health issues
Soon, cocaine became a salve for the crushing anxiety that accompanied Block’s inevitable comedowns. The Hong Kong stunt cost him half a lung and still his infection refused to budge. Feeling his body slowly giving in to the onslaught, Block set sail for oblivion.
“I thought: ‘I’m ill and I’m not going to get better. I might as well carry on until I go,’” he says. “That was my mindset. I became a walking pharmacy. But I wasn’t dying, I was just putting myself through more and more pain.”
By 1996, he was hoovering up 28 grams of coke a day and needed three before breakfast just to prise himself out of bed. But the same year, in hospital once more with tuberculosis and hepatitis, Block had an epiphany. “I realised the only thing holding me back was my fear of living without drugs,” he says.“I let go of that fear, of all my anxiety, and had a moment of clarity: of sheer relaxation and happiness.”
Block detoxed under the guidance of psychiatrist Dr William Shanahan, now clinical director of the Priory Group’s addiction services, and who Block credits with saving his life.
Without realising it at the time, he applied a kind of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) to daily life, scrutinising his emotions, exposing himself to triggers and – for the first time in years – working through his anxieties instead of numbing them with drugs.
I realised the only thing holding me back was my fear of living without drugs. I let go of that fear, of all my anxiety, and had a moment of clarity
In time, he looked to voluntary work with the then drug and alcohol charity Blenheim CDP, before taking on a role in the NHS working with adults with complex needs. He achieved a qualification in health and social care, and began using his platform to speak out passionately on mental health issues.
Since 2023, he’s been an ambassador for the addiction charity SMART Recovery. Like Block, this free service uses CBT to help people address their drug use.
“I think anyone who’s been on a journey of recovery, or self-discovery, knows that you want to share your experience,” he says. “It’s innate within us as humans: you reach a place where you want to help people.”
So, does the new mindset mean the party’s over for Block? Well – not quite. The beat, it seems, does indeed go on. Barely a weekend goes by without Block taking to the decks.
“Everyone told me I had to stay away from clubs: ‘Don’t trigger the triggers,’” he says. “I thought: ‘Fuck that’ and went straight back in. The difference is, I listen to the music now. When you hear the words and the message of the songs you’re playing – it’s all love.
Anyone in the UK who has been affected by any of the issues in this article can find help and support at www.talktofrank.com/get-help
Find out more about SMART Recovery at www.smartrecovery.org.uk
Photography by Sam Bush
