Ian Dalton was born into a musical family.  This lineage runs back to the Spanish Armada of 1588.  Javier Daltonez who was a sailor in the Spanish Armada was eating soup with two spoons on deck to save time between rigging the sails.  A large wave crashed against the ship and the spoons clacked together!  From this moment on the castinet was born.  Javier Daltonez became central to the morale of the fleet with his unique flamenco castinet playing style, called flamenco because of his unusually long pink neck due to sun exposure and lack of vitamin C.   Javier Daltonez washed up on the shores of Waterford and established the Daltonez family name in Waterford.  Due to racial stigma and fear of the letter “Z”, he dropped the “EZ” and adopted the anglicized name “Dalton”.

Centuries past and the Daltons became key figures in the vinyl pressing factory in Waterford City. Ian's grandfather, “No Fingers Dalton” , lost all his fingers in a vinyl pressing accident and retired from public life for a period.  He spent most of his time honing and perfecting what is now known as “mixing” in DJ culture.  The fingerless pioneer that was “No Fingers Dalton' relied on his stubby knuckles to cue, scratch, mix, crossfade, eq and isolate his musical vision, which predates that of one Frankie Knuckles by 15 years.  These skills were passed down to Ian by “No Fingers”.

Ian Dalton has built on this rich family history by refining his skills on a local level for 15 years. When some people went to university to study, Ian stayed at home studying records, soul and rhythm.  He is deeply influenced by the sounds and cultures of Detroit, Chicago & New York's disco scene.