Tag Archives: dnb

Kosheen

Since their meteoritic rise to the top of the dance charts, Kosheen, consisting of singer Sian Evans, Darren ‘Decoder’ Beal and Markee ‘Substance’ Morrison has toured the world, playing hundreds of gigs to thousands of people. Their incredible live shows have wowed audiences and their releases impressed critics on all the major continents of the globe. The name Kosheen is, according to Morrison is a mutated version of Cochise, and also means ‘Old’ and ‘New’ in Japanese. That’s an apt description, because Kosheen has been around for a while now, and yet still manages to stay fresh and relevant in the demanding dance music scene.

Both Beal and Morrison grew up on a healthy diet of punk and brit pop. “As a teenager, I was listening to The Jam, The Smiths, Echo and the Bunnymen, Stone Roses, Happy Mondays,” confesses Morrison, but both grew into the burgeoning Bristol drum and bass scene, along side seminal dnb DJ Roni Size. They met at a nightclub where Morrison DJed, Ruffneck Thing. They also met Evans there, and the trio hit it off. With a view to make actual songs with a beginning, middle and end, rather than little loops and quirky vocals, they took the world by storm with Hide U, which charted in Top 30s around the world.

On the back of this success, the trio began taking their show on the road. “I think we’ve played nearly everywhere in the world except Outer Mongolia and Ecuador!” laughs Morrison. “In Asia we’ve played China, Australia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Japan, New Zealand. I love that part of the world!!” Travelling for such a long time and to so many places was “exhausting though”, he adds. “Especially at first as we didn’t get home for 3 months. We’re more selective now and space our touring out a bit to stay sane!”

Morrison relates on of his favourite on the road stories from when they toured Serbia in 2001. “Just after the Nato bombing!” he exclaims “We were kinda worried that they were gonna lynch us or something! All the bridges were destroyed and still sticking out of the river and stuff. When we got on stage and started our first song Catch, the entire crowd went mad and 20,000 people were all singing along. Me and Sian looked at each other like ‘Huh?!?’ Apparently our tracks were all over the radio! And when we went to the airport they were selling ‘our album’ at the airport, but it wasn’t even out yet!! And when you asked for it and they went in the back to burn it off and photocopy the cover!! Apparently we sold 50,000, but we never saw a penny though,” he laments.

The last album Kokopelli was seen by many to be darker than their debut Resist, and heralded the start of dnb producers using guitars. I asked Morrison if he has noticed the increase in guitars in dnb from the likes of Pendulum, and what he thinks this means. “Well I can only speak for myself, but the guitar was my first instrument and I write a lot with the guitar. But as kids of the electronic age we’ve experimented and fused the best elements of guitar with electronic production. I think on our new album we’ve reached the apex.” The new album Window on the World is long overdue, being held up with lawyers and contracts and the like, but is out early 2006 through Universal. “It’s the best thing we’ve done,” revels Morrison. “It’s more electronic, and the sound is awesome, it’s the kind of place we’ve been heading to and now we’ve reached it. It’s different to anything else out there, but unique quality music that people will appreciate.”

LTJ Bukem

LTJ Bukem is one of the most recognised names in drum and bass. People describe and compare styles of drum and bass simply by using the name “Bukem”. His vision of music and sound has led the drum and bass scene from its small beginnings in the UK into a massive international tour-de-force of respected dance music. Speaking to Bukem, or Danny Williamson, as his friends know him, you can’t help but notice the passion and eagerness he displays for this music. It’s why he’s been doing it for close to twenty years when many other DJs, Producers and Label bosses have given it up.

“I just love it!” he exclaims when I ask the question of why he’s still around. “I can’t think of many things, if any at all, I like better than listening to and playing and making music. Twenty years,” Williamson muses “it’s quite frightening that I have been doing it that long, but it seems like two years – I’ve done so much, but I can’t do enough, you know? It’s a mad feeling! I’m just very passionate about what I do, and it’s kinda frightening that I’m getting MORE into it,” he laughs. “For the last 10 years I’ve spent with my head buried in the record label, as well as trying to be an artist and DJ. I feel kind of refreshed now as I’m spending more time in the studio and doing those things I did these things for originally.”

Being around the music scene for so long, Williamson has seen a lot of changes in his time. “I’ve been travelling for years now, and I can tell you I used to sit on planes for hours and just twiddle my thumbs, watch the movie three times in a row, listen to all the CDs that were in my bag, and now days I sit and do so much on my laptop,” he begins “I think of start ideas for tunes, or do work for the label, catch up on emails, or get ahead in work, and that has changed everybody’s lives. And Instant Messaging has changed things greatly. Now I wake up and there’s 20 or 30 tracks sitting in my inbox that someone hasn’t had to buy a stamp and post, don’t have to buy a CD, they can encode it to wav, send it, and two hours later we can be talking about it. That’s absolutely crazy! And the whole virtual studio has changed things especially. You don’t have to have a double garage sized space to get all the things and sound in your tunes. It now all fits on one table! That has opened so many doors!”

Williamson’s passion from music comes from learning classical piano form an early age, and a family relocation that found Williamson in the tutelage of a very open-minded music teacher, Nigel Crouch. “If he wasn’t for him I wouldn’t have the musical ears I have now.” One thing Crouch did teach a young Williamson was “not to be frightened of listening to anything! People label music so much, which is something I don’t understand. People say ‘if it’s not that I can’t get into that, because it’s labelled in that way’ – that’s just ridiculous.”

Williamson also has an open mind in how to run a label, giving his artists a great degree of flexibility and support. “I would have the phone ring and promoters would ask for LTJ Bukem, and I’d say “yep, but I’m gonna bring Moloko, I’m gonna bring Blame, and you’ve got no choice in the matter”. Sometimes they couldn’t mix. Who would pay ME to DJ if I couldn’t mix, but that’s the type of thing I did for my artists. It was good thing to get them out there, get them known, but I’m not sure I’d do it the same way again. Obviously my record label won’t promote itself, and playing that music is a big part of that. I’ve always put a big emphasis on getting my artists out there to play, and if you don’t do that how are people going to hear you?”

“It’s got to start at that grass roots level, and you’ve got to do the small clubs of about 200 people in Adelaide and Hawaii,” he continues. “And you absolutely have to do that – I don’t see any other way of doing it. You can’t wait around 2 or 3 years until someone brings you out for a big do where someone wants a drum and bass tent or whatever. I think you need growth, it needs to be an organically grown thing, and that’s what Good Looking is all about.”

Bukem is also all about his DJing. “I still get a thrill DJing”, he says “There are two kinds of thrills for me. I love the mixing – I love the art form of it, so every time I play it’s like a challenge for me – will I be able to pull off this mix as well as I would like to? And when you achieve that there’s nothing better. The second thing is the people and their reaction. I’ve spent years playing new music, often stuff for the very first time to their ears, and them getting into it is awesome,” he says excitedly “And I still get nervious before I play – I need my 5 or 10 minutes where I have no one near me where I get it all together and I’m like “right, let’s play this set!” he adds.

Hooligan Soul

The Hooligan Soul boys Grif and Pab have been causing havoc around Adelaide for a number of years now, DJing around town at various venues with various amounts of success, as well as playing live with some of the most important drum and bass DJs to visit our shores. These bad boys of beats look like they’re about to take off both figuratively and literally, with the continued promise of a new album, a possible tour of Hong Kong, Singapore and South America and with Pab just coming back from a successful tour of Bali with Aphrodite and DJ Rap.

We caught up with them fresh from an exhaustive night at Mojo West at the surprisingly popular Hooligan Jam. “Yeah, it’s going pretty smooth, the last vibe was absolutely rocking!” Pab enthuses. “It’s the only place in Adelaide you’ll hear proper UK Garage, and the last one we kinda got a bit adventurous and dropped a bit of Grime and 8-Bar in there too, and the crowd dug it! Nice and busy, it was cool.” Their other gig, Wednesdays at the Cumby, is also going along strong, and both the boys hope that this will continue over the summer months.

The boys have been hard at work on the album, due out soon through 618 records, out soon. “We’ve been promising it would be out for god knows how long now, but we SWEAR this time we mean it when we say it’s almost ready”, they vow. “Other then that, we’ve been pretty busy with shows and what not. We got our Wednesday night thing at the Cumberland, Mojo, Rukkas as well as various shows at Traffic. On top of that, Pab’s just come back from Bali, and we’re both going back in a couple of weeks, and Griff’s just recorded the new Beat Smugglers album, and they’re on fire at the moment as well. We’ve remixed Mobin Master recently, and we’re also working out a remix for the Jungle Brothers. We’re in the process of sorting out shows in Hong Kong and Singapore too at the moment, PLUS Pab is sorting out some stuff in South America. So yeah, we’ve been pretty busy lately.”

The Hooligans describe they’re sound as “Our own”, to raucous laughter. “I guess it’s a kind of like the link between the smooth, rolling “Liquid” stuff and the harder, gutsy sound. I know it’s a cliché but we don’t want to be classified as one thing. Guys like Marky, Stamina MC, Moving Fusion, Grooverider, Marcus Intalex, and Calibre, they’ve all given us really cool feedback, saying our sound is really unique. And I don’t mean in a “um… yeah… wow guys, that’s really… umm… unique” way, when people just say that because it’s shit,” they laugh. “I think Marky’s been playing Runaway, and apparently Rider was battering a tune of ours we handed him at Winter Enchanted last year. To be honest they probably don’t play much of our stuff though cause we’re too slack to send them new stuff!” On the local front, it’s a little different. “Some play our stuff, some don’t. Skyver & D-Jon play our stuff, Mark 7, MPK and Patch play it a bit… but it’s kinda weird. We guess they got their own tunes they want to play, cause they complain we don’t give them our tunes, but when we do they play them fuck all!” they laugh.

Their sound, like most performers, has developed as they’ve grown, and now they even dabble in a little hiphop and 2-step. But the boys claim that the main thing to change “is the sound quality. Our first tunes were musically watertight, but they were mixed like utter poo. We’ve got the mixing part sorted now; it’s just so much cleaner! That’s the only real thing really, our style has probably changed in subtle ways, but we’re still the same team of village idiots making what we like to make.”

The boys, and Lexy, the lead female singer, are looking forward to playing interstate and overseas. “I just returned,” Pab states. “I had two shows in Bali which I found out were the best two shows Bali has ever had, and they’re up for Event of the Year awards there. I represented Hooligan Soul, and the entire Adelaide Massive”. But the boys won’t be lugging their equipment around, as was so common in the past. With CDDJs, it has become a thing of the past to see Grif lug in two mixers and a PC. “It’s too much of a headfuck, and to be quite honest, we both like DJing and MCing more.”

 

Nubreed

I had a chance to chat to Nubreed’s Michael Walburgh aka Mykel just after Easter, the first Easter they had off in over 3 years. These hard working Melbourne lads have not only been touring extensively over the last few months, but been busy in the studio recording their first full-length album – The Original. Known for an awesome live show, and deep, nasty basslines, Nubreed are the darlings on the breaks scene, both here in Australia and abroad.

Walburgh says that having time off over Easter was a good chance to catch up on what’s happening around the place. “There was a big 33 1/3 show up here in Melbourne with Freestylers, Uberzone, Grass Roots; and the drum and bass crew – Pendulum, and Shapeshifter. It was a really mad weekend!” he enthuses. “I met Uberzone back in Miami a few years ago, and we were talking about hooking up and doing something, and now he’s got some new releases and is itching to get stuff heard and work with us. Aquasky were down here too, and we hooked up with them too.”

This is pretty much how Nubreed got out there in the first place, just by networking and being in the right place at the right time. “We put together a demo show reel and I had the fortune of being in Miami with Rennie Pilgrim, Danny McMillan, Tayo… everyone who’s anyone in the breaks fraternity was there. I got the chance to pass the tape around and through that we got lots of good recognition. And I suppose Adam Freeland, touring with him when he came down a few years ago,” he adds.

Nubreed are as well known for their bootlegs as they are for their originals. Bootlegs are illegitimate recordings of artists, and Nubreed have done a range of stuff from Alanis Morrissette to old school hiphop greats. They’ve done legitimate remixes, such as the awesome Born too Slow by the Crystal Method. “We’ve done a few live booty’s, stuff that works really well live, that we don’t sell or whatever. They came about from the Phil K / Nubreed shows that we did a few years ago,” Walburgh explains. However, the album is full of brand new material. “The Album is a catalogue of or work since about 1997. ‘The Original’ is all new material, and the second disk is mixed by our mate Phil K, and has lots of the vinyl only, hard to find recordings for your CD buying community. On the album we try to morph ourselves in all the directions we’ve wanted to go. We wanted to elaborate on the vocal tunes for this CD release.”

I had to know if they preferred making original tunes, or doing the covers. “It’s all part and parcel of it all. You have to be able to sustain a living. We don’t have any part time jobs, so we try to keep any avenue open to us. It’s a balance, you’ve got to do as many remixes as you can to keep yourself fresh and out there, on the dancefloor and in DJs boxes, but at the same time keep your ideas that you’ll think will work in circulation for your original material.”

Nubreed are keen to get back on the road again with their new live show, one which now features a drummer. “We’ve been so bogged down by the machine behind getting an album actually out there, the artwork, the legals, and so on. We’ve been working on a new live format too. We’ve got a new drummer!” he says excitedly. “That’s worked really well, and we’ve got a lot more options open to us with the drummer. There’s obviously a lot more album based material in the show, so there’s going to be a lot more depth to it. It’s not going to be a straight dancefloor set, which is what we usually do in clubs and dance arenas. This will be a chance to do OUR show, really get into it and play a lot of the older, unusual stuff as well as the new stuff. Dave (the drummer) has played for Wicked Beat Sound System and On Inc. If anyone has met Dave our drummer he’s quite infamous. He’s a great energy; he’s the equivalent of Animal in the Muppets,” he laughs.

“We’re beat orientated anyway, and the only reason we haven’t crossed over to a 100% live format is because we didn’t want to have to compromise on our production values of what we produce in the studio. With software and the money we’ve made and saved over the years we’re at a point where that’s now possible. Dave’s a lovable larrikin type. The three of us (Nubreed) have been together for the last 15 odd years, we’ve known each other forever, and for someone else to come in, despite the odd teething problems, is really good. It’s added a fresh and new approach for us.”

Luckily this current live arrangement is coming to Adelaide, most likely in a smaller, more intimate venue like Traffic, rather than the raves we’ve seen them play at in the past. “Every time we’ve been to Adelaide it’s been at a rather large gig,” Walburgh says. “Its mainly Blake (DJ John Doe) who has really spearheaded us there in SA, he took a punt on us – he’s got a real diverse edge in what he listens to. We slipped really well into that vibe as we do tag some drum and bass on the end of our usual set. He saw a vision of what could be, and it worked really well. One of the best gigs we ever did was at Stardust with the Ez Rollers and Shimon. That was great – you had a really energetic crowd, they were there for it, it was just a mad vibe to be caught up in all that. You caught us at a good moment,” he laughs, and then adds “that’s the thing with Adelaide you never know what to expect.”

 

French Maid Alliance

The French Maid Alliance consists of a bunch of mates, some of whom are some musical performers, some just regular punters, who know what they want in a good night out. Dale Tiver is the main organiser, and we spoke to him about the coming party simply called “Blind”, which is supporting the Royal Society of the Blind. The name French Maid Alliance is a nod to the Adelaide rave party crews. “You know the ones with super cool mechanoid Lego men, Transformer logos, and the like. I wanted to turn that on its ear a little bit and make it all about fun”, Dale says cheekily. “‘The French Maid Alliance’ just makes people do a double take, and I hope it encourages people to find out what we’re about.”

So what, exactly is the French Maid Alliance about? “I have had strong ties in the local club/music scene for years,” Dale begins. “I hosted an event just over a year ago called Deliverance with MK-1 and Yoshi, and I had a French Maid giving out free chupa chups, CDs and other treats all night. It was a night where I called in a lot of favours from friends and did everything I could to make it feel like a party, not just a regular club night. For some time I’ve been searching for a formula that could turn the love I and many of my fellow party organisers have into something completely positive,” he continues. “A night that supports musical talent over the established pecking order, and was more about having a good time rather than making money. After spending some time with Rotary, it dawned on me that fundraising for a charity was the perfect way to go.”

Organising any party is hard work, and organising one for charity must be quite a chore. Dale says: “in my experience people don’t mind giving their time to help others if it is well organised. When I put pen to paper and realised what I could create by channelling even a small portion of Adelaide’s musical talent into a charity event, I started the search for my charity. The Royal Society for the Blind were the first organisation I thought of and right from my first approach, they were completely supportive. They agreed that the use of French Maids and other fun devices was the perfect way to counter the stigma that charity events ‘can’t be fun’. They made available all their useful contacts and have been involved in approving every step in the promotional process.”

As for past charity events, the Adelaide dance community has strongly shown it’s support for this event, with all DJs and performers donating their time for free, and others offering free advertising. For example, DJ C1 and Noddy have designed all the flyers and magazine artwork. “There was a lot of work involved in that,” Dale says, “and they deserve credit for the time they gave for nothing”. Further support comes from the kind people at Cadbury/Schweppes and Diageo (the company that distributes Smirnoff/Archers) who Dale says, “have been great from the outset. Both have donated free stock and their time. As a result there will be a launch for a new Archers product on the night and the first 400 heads on entry will receive an Archers drink, Pepsi and a chupa chup”. Other help has come from Blake at Traffic for providing the venue, and “the rest are all my good friends from Adelaide Massive website (www.adelaidemassive.com). There are a lot of little things to do for a show of this size and I can’t thank them enough,” Dale adds.

Dale’s strongest musical passions lie in drum and bass, breakbeat and live funky acts, so that’s what will be represented at the first party. Yes, Dale has already decided to do some more shows for charity at a variety of different venues, to keep the idea fresh and fun. “To be honest, there are a couple of acts that couldn’t do this show due to other commitments and I can’t wait to roll out the next show,” he says enthusiastically. “I hope to be able to organise these kinds of shows three or four times a year. I have four or five venues I’d like to try, a long list of charities I’d like to assist, and a heck of a lot of talented musical performers I’d like to big up. Hopefully Adelaide gets behind the whole ‘having fun that helps people idea’… I think it’s a winner!” he adds.

The live area inside will consist of Kumfy Klub regulars the New White Sneakers and The Break, playing live funk. Mojo favourites and SA Dance Music Awards Best Live Act 2003 Hooligan Soul, and The Jupiter Sound Project will be performing live Drum n Bass with live vocals, live instruments including Saxophone and Classical Guitar. MC Hype and his brother Piers will do some beatboxing to alongside DJs John Doe, Lachlan Pender and Funky J, performing breaks sets. Techno will feature early in the night care of Fenetik and DJ Anarki, and Mal Chia.

The outside area has the cream of the Adelaide DnB crop, including the SADMA award winners MPK, Patch and Noddy, Canada’s DJ Static, Drumsounds C1, 5158 record guru Mark 7, D-Jon, inbound’s Filter and Fiction, Altitude’s Jayar, Adelaide’s producer extraordinaire Skyver, Turbine’s Khem and Ozone, Rukkas’ Phink, alongside Adelaide Massive favourites Solace, Lucas, Frost, Harass, IQ, Del, Trucker, and Spark. Lyrical accompaniment will be provided by MCs G-Swift, Pab, Stryke, Pase, Mennan, XPress, and Mission.

Also, thanks to the performers and the kind donations of many others, a team of highly skilled French Maids lead by Tasma will also be working very hard at giving out free CDs, tickets to up coming parties, lollies, fruit platters, and many other freebies throughout the night. They will also take care of any dusting that may become necessary! Visual effects will be provided by Yasmin, with Fire Twirling by Toby. There will also be special guest appearances and prices for best dressed and most enthusiastic are also on the cards!

Aphrodite

Aphrodite, aka DJ Aphro, aka Gavin King, is recognised as one of the main players in the global drum n bass scene. He’s been rocking the funky beats since the early days of the rave scene and was instrumental in shaping the early sounds of jump up jungle. No drum and bass anthem set would be complete without a few of his tunes in it, and they’re welcomed by old and new school alike. Alongside fellow partner in crime, Micky Finn, he runs the Urban Takeover label which is dedicated to releasing tracks by new and established talent of the drum n bass variety. Aphrodite Recordings is King’s solo label released on V2 Records, and has over 40 releases on the label.

I interviewed King from his hotel room somewhere in the US as he was nearing the end of an intense tour, and he sounded tired and distracted. He did a show the night before in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and says, “it was really really good. Last night there were about 250 people, and they were bangin’ to it, so when the house lights came up they were all still dancing, with encore and cheers and stuff.” That sounds like Adelaide, where you can get 2 -300 dedicated junglists out on a Wednesday night to see an international. “I haven’t played in Adelaide for yonks, years and years!” he says, “so it will be good to get back.”

King is well renown for using hiphop samples in drum and bass: in fact at one time that’s all jungle seemed to be – a phat rolling bassline, a sped up breakbeat, and some hiphop vocals. “They love the hiphop samples”, King says of the American audience. On his last project, King moved away from samples and had some old school masters of hiphop perform on his album, including Schooly D and Big Daddy Kane. “I think they may have heard some remixes, and became interested”, King says of the team ups. “I met Schooly D thru a mutual friend in Philadelphia, and Big Daddy Kane was hooked up thru the record companies”.

The drum and bass crowd is a fickle and cliquey crowd who seem to have a new hero every week. King used to be king of the beats and his tunes used to rock the dance floor every time someone dropped the needle into the groove. However, in more recent years, especially in Adelaide, he’s fallen out of favour. Some claim it’s because “all his tunes are the same”, claiming them to formulaic, cheesy and bland. Yet hearing his latest stuff, one would have to disagree, because King’s new stuff is quite different. “I generally ignore the message boards and press”, King says of the attitude toward him. “Now again I go look on them, and it’s pretty silly because someone will be saying I’m absolute crap, and someone else will be saying I’m brilliant, so, obviously none of these people know what they’re talking about” he says gruffly. “I play music for the crowd in front of me, to try and get them going. If they go off to them then that’s good.”

This last statement is also the way he makes music. He says he doesn’t sit down to specifically write a happy or bouncy tune, but rather he makes tunes in order to get people to move. “Making an album is hard. You’re stuck in a box studio for a couple of months at least, and… well it’s just a lot harder [than touring]”, he says. Despite the negativity aimed towards his style of music, he is one of the biggest selling drum and bass producers, and his last album even outsold Baby Spice’s solo effort. “I don’t really care that I’ve outsold Baby Spice… or anyone else… I just make records for the love of it,” he says of this achievement.

A lot of drum and bass DJs are embracing CD technology, and it’s not uncommon to see someone like Pendulum perform a whole set purely off CD. As it is well known that King plays a lot of dubs, but he still prefers vinyl. “Generally I don’t use CDs; I’ve just started too, but I prefer acetate,” he says. “Because I’m old school!” he laughs. CDs also allow DJs to grab tunes off the web, and play it to a crowd hungry for the latest banger. “There’s good things and bad things about people downloading my tunes and playing them out. The bad things are obvious, yeah?” King says. “My last album sold 2 or 3 times less than my first, but people seem to know Aftershock more. More people know the tunes, which I find bizarre! For example, in January this year I played in Russia, there were 3-4,000 people to see myself, Goldie and Technical Itch… it was a massive show… and they all know drum and bass and the tunes, and I don’t know when I last sold a tune in Russia! It’s all due to downloading.”

King is known for playing a good vibe that ranges from classic to upfront and exclusive dubplates. Earlier in 2003 he released the ‘Urban Junglist’ compilation on his Aphrodite label which features Peshay, High Contrast, MC Fearless and Skibadee as well as a some new original talent making their release debut’s on the compilation. King is heading to Australia for the ‘urban junglist tour’ to rock the crowd.