Chk Chk Chk.

Have you heard the joke about Kentucky Freud Chicken?

It's mutha-fucking good!

Sasha

If iconism is the lifeblood of fashionable music, then Welshman, Alexander Coe, has been gnawing on its convulsing carcass for an epoch. The notorious demigod pseudonym he is most known for – Sasha - has long been synonymous with dance music’s holy trinity - DJing, remixing and producing.

Recognised as one of the pioneers of the 90s progressive house movement, Sasha was a predominant factor in the establishment of brands like Renaissance, Northern Exposure, Global Underground and The Essential Mix on Radio One. His chameleon attributes have also flitted between scoring console game and American TV show music to remixing such greats as Madonna and The Chemical Brothers. In 1999, he was bestowed with the Ericsson Muzik Awards ‘Outstanding Contributions to Dance Music’ accolade and, in 2004, secured a Grammy nomination for his reworking of Felix Da Housecat’s ‘Watching Cars Go By’. At the present time, he is the highest ranked British DJ in the world, according to theDJlist.com, a poll that is compiled with votes cast by the general strobe-loving public. That puts him above Cox, Digweed and Oakenfold. Basically, as credentials go, he has enough to keep him in socks and pants for the next millenium, or two.

Recently, from his studio in New York, he browsed with me through his most pressing of matters: his love affair with vinyl; the birth of his new baby label, emFire; and his feelings about the imminent homecoming event at legendary London haunt, Ministry of Sound.

‘Getting back into the studio and starting to produce again has been great’ he admits. This, he quantifies as the first time he’s ‘been back on a regular basis since Involver’, the breaks and progressive house compilation from almost three years ago. ‘It’s been great to get the music out and get a little imprint off and running’.

This is emFire, the label he personally founded in August of this year. It delivers a self-confessed combination of house, trance, and breaks. He makes no bones about the reasoning for the label’s timely arrival. ‘At the moment it’s just an outlet for me to put my own tracks out. It didn’t seem like it was worth taking to someone else because it’s a different world in the digital domain’. So far, emFire has released two of its opening trilogy pieces – ‘Coma’ and ‘Park It In The Shade’ – with the third – ‘Who Killed Sparky?’ – set to follow in January 2008. However, as Sasha rightly points out, these highly collectible, one-sided, laser-etched vinyls aren’t meant to compliment one another. ‘There is a sound to them that has some kind of continuity, but in terms of the actual vibes of the tracks, they’re all very different’. And it’s this diversion from any standard mould that Sasha is keen to continue on with as he doesn’t ‘want to define the sound of the label just yet’.

Despite it’s strinking market, Sasha openly entertains his desires for vinyl and sees the bulk of emFire’s sales emanating from limited edition 12inches. This is, he feels, is ‘the right thing to do. It’s an important thing to do’ and one that is keeping with a noble sense of autonomy. ‘It seemed that by doing it myself I would have more control. With vinyl there is a certain level of quality control that a piece of music has gone through that just doesn’t exist in the digital domain’. This ‘domain’, as he calls it, is one which bombards the recipient with choice and over-simplifies the process of issuing music. ‘Whereas, when you see a piece of vinyl you know that that piece of music is loved by the people whose hands it’s gone through. That’s why I’m still buying vinyl. There’s a trust level there’.

This step through the door of artistic direction was the catalyst for producing ‘a really beautiful concept for the sleeve on the record’. Working with design experts, Insect - the team recently associated with graffiti artist, Banksy - Sasha was able to retain the importance he placed on the ‘collectors item’ status. He wanted ‘someone on board in the art department who was really forward thinking and got the idea of doing a series of things’. At the time, he saw Insect as ‘really defining themselves’ and reveals that the work they returned ‘really struck a chord’ in him.

Now that two singles have been set free and another is near-ready to leave the nest, one eye is fixed on the horizon for Sasha. ‘We’ve got another load of music ready to go on it [and we’re] working towards the follow ups and the Involver record. I’m sure as we get closer to completing Involver - due for release next June - there’ll be more tracks popping out’. And just to whet the appetite’s of those die-hard Sasha loonies out there, how about this for an exclusive?: ‘If we can keep up some kind of regular schedule with releases, I think in the future we’ll probably get remixes of my tracks done and put together a compilation’.

Some expectant hand rubbing is also circling the ranks of Sasha’s army as they prepare for their prodigal son’s return to his rightful seat at the throne of Ministry of Sound. This is his first gig at the venue for a decade and, as he explains, the relationship he once had with MOS was indifferent. ‘That club was kind of part of what I was doing a while ago and then we parted ways for some reason. The club itself went off on a few different musical tangents and it didn’t seem like it was the right place for me in London for a while’. Some might question the logic, therefore, behind this unexpected appearance, whereas others would simply agree with his current view. ‘At the moment, with everything that’s going on with the whole King’s Cross redevelopment, it seemed like it was a good time to return’. But there’s more to the story than simple locality, the club’s beating heart is equally as important. ‘I haven’t had a set in London on a really great club system for quite a while now. The soundsystem at Ministry is fantastic. I’m just looking forward to getting locked into a long set’.

The extended set on December 15th is a meaty 5-hours and, as preparation, he shares the secret to maintaining a rampant dancefloor. ‘It’s a mixture of giving people what they want and teasing them a little bit. Not giving them everything they want at three in the morning’.

Once the DJing is over, however, he’s straight back to the other components in axis of employment - remixing and producing. But, as Sasha states, he’s wary of the dual-focused lifestyle. It provides a multitude of headaches as producing, DJing and remixing intertwine, ‘they do tend to eat each other. Whenever I tour too much my studio is neglected, whenever I spend too much time in the studio it’s hard to keep focused on my DJ set. Finding that balance between the two things is quite difficult’.

So perhaps this is Sasha finally admitting that he’s ready to call it a day. Not likely, he insists that the whole kit and kaboodle is still a huge part of his life and that he ‘cant imagine doing anything else right now’. If something were to come along that would defer his attention from DJing, he cites a big ‘maybe’ and then reassures ‘at the moment, I’m still fully focused’. Perhaps with a little bit of hardwork and overtime, he might even make a career out of this music malarkey one day.

Klaxons

Indie rave, is it? Electro punk, is it? Klaxons only have one album - Myths of the Near Future – so why are they claiming this mighty stage, this Academy of Brixton? Just look at it’s majestic vastness. Nothing but memories can fill a hole this big. The fear on these grinning faces says otherwise, though. That is heightened anticipation they’re drunk on, yes? Perhaps they’re dazzled by their own fluorescent jackets. Ridiculous! Nice, dry comfortable clothing is the way. Easy does it, people. Let’s get settled for the band. Here they come now. Dressed like Mad Max royalty and gay Robin Hoods. Hmmm, maybe nice, comfortable clothing wasn’t the best bet after all.

Whoooa, belligerent bass is kicking things off. Must be ‘The Bouncer’. Perfect for an ironically large crowd to chant ‘Your name’s not down, you’re not coming in’. The addition of a live drummer seems to be helping, those punchy warehouse beats are filtering right up to the rafters. The sirens are ringing out, it’s the second movement - ‘Atlantis To Interzone’ - and things are getting a little bit lively. Watch out, there’s a surge of ‘little people’ lurching towards the stage. Look at them, appearing from nowhere. It’s cetainly getting warmer now. Someone on stage is bigging-up the crowd for ‘making this dream come true’. So what’s the reward? Another bout of dynamo destruction, falsetto singalong ‘Golden Skans’. Boy, they’re tight. They bleeding should be. They’ve been playing these songs for a year and half now. There’s a fair few arms aloft, it’s a lushuous lawn of arms. The first shrieking bars of ‘As Above, So Below’ are sounding out and these kids don’t seem to be tiring. Bang, another song, this time the high-octive wailings of ‘Two Receivers’. That’s taken the sheen off the nice, dry clothing. This is breakneck stuff. Perhaps a breather is needed. Oh wait, maybe not. What’s this? Is it the synth-lovers perfect combination of rave, pop and heavy rock - ‘Magick’? Now, this is Klaxons at their chaotic best. Phew, the temperature is really shifting. This audience isn’t just participating any more, it’s performing a hedonistic air raid. Forget the lawn of arms, this is a wild plain violently swaying in a thunderous, klaxon-like wind. And the pits are getting ever-so clammy. Various neon missiles are being launched toward the stage, despite glowsticks being implicitly prohibited tonight, at the band’s request. They must be done by now, there’s nothing left to play…..EXCEPT the post-punk carnage of ’Gravity’s Rainbow’. Frenetic euphoria is everywhere, coated with a thick glob of sweat. Heed the warning of last song ‘It’s Not Over Yet’. Ha, it’s NOT the final instalment. That pleasure is left, rightfully, to the apocalyptic ’Four Horsemen Of 2012’. Then, yes, finally, it’s over. Breathe easy. Returning to life. That Mercury prize is definitely deserved.

DJ Die

Two conflicting worlds ‘reprazent’-ed on one fluid disc. This spliced double A-side comes courtesy of core Reprazent member, DJ Die, and his brand new label - Clear Skyz. ‘Slow Burn’ is an unrelenting drive into horror-flick intensity and long-haul growling funk. ‘The Reasons Why’, however, is a cheery glide into rapturous soul, thanks mainly to the vocal abilitiies of Bristolian scenester, Ben Westbeech. Such complexities can only do superbly on the UK scene. Hence, both tracks have already seen plenty of spin time in the places that really matter.

Velofax

Here’s one for you: what do you get if you cross a Frenchman, a Londoner, a couple of Channel Islanders and a whole host of musical flavours ranging from sharp, discerning electro krautrock to groovy, hook-heavy disco funk? You get part-time revolutionaries, Velofax, that’s what.

Ok, so the punchline may be lacking a little punch, but the band themselves definitely aren’t. ‘The best way to appreciate our music is to come and see us live’ claims James Bell, the fella charged with providing the Velofax spasmodic drums. ‘The live set is quite energetic, it gets people moving. We’ve got upbeat numbers and do quite well at winning a crowd over’.

A bold statement indeed, yet one that is totally substantiated. XFM's John Kennedy championed their eclectic electric cause early on, as did the Rough Trade record shops, and, as a result, their hard work reaped its rewards - small independent record label, Maven Records, came looking for their signatures earlier this year. Although it’s not exactly rags to riches, it’s a breakthrough nonetheless.

In days of yore, Velofax were but a small three-piece on the island of Jersey. In order to ‘try to step up a level’, the band performed a strewd relocation exercise to the mainland because ‘for the size of the [Jersey] land mass, there’s a high concentration of bands. The only thing it is lacking is a music industry’. Once in town, they acquired a keyboardist and from there the stringent work ethic fell into place. ‘You have to work your way up in terms of getting gigs and getting your name about. It’s a snowball process, really’.

Several delicious live slots have since materialised alongside the likes of Razorlight, The Futureheads and Datarock. And it’s this propensity towards the stage interpretation that drives the band toward their prog-rock destination. ‘At the moment we are writing songs in rehersals, so we’re writing them in the live format’ explains Bell, ‘for us, now, gigging is the important thing’.

The set up of the band is very conventional – guitars, bass, drums, keyboards, singing – but what they’re trying to achieve is ‘something that has a good sense of rhythm and sounds experimental, yet not run-of-the-mill’. Surely that’s House, Mr Bell? ‘There are definitely influences of dance music in there. Whether it’s with the bass lines or whatever’.

When the output has a myriad connotations the input must, equally, be one of dispersion. Bell calculates this in a simply equation - ‘if you added all our influences together it would be a ridiculous number. The interesting thing about this band is that each individual is different’. And he’s not even joking, either.

Baobinga & ID

Many of life’s most exquisite treasures are created in the fusion of certain blends: the aromatic richness of Royal Salut Highland Scotch; the roasted nuances of New Orleans Chicory coffee; the stunning tonal skin colouring of actress Thandie Newton. As a major player in the tapestry of life, dance music is equally susceptable to the whim of chance and theory. But, as Ed Bayling told me recently, there are times when it can be done incorrectly. ‘Bad breakbeat is tired, derivative, generic. Tunes that fail to move with the times’. Whereas good breaks come from ‘people that are offering something new’.

Bayling is the ‘ID’ in Baobinga & ID and, along with production partner Sam Simpson, is no stranger to the complexities of a fine blend. Their remixing proficiency has recently earned them I-DJ magazine’s ‘Tune Of The Month’ for their translation of Rico Tubbs’ ‘Knuckle Sandwich’. But the Mancunian duo are more than just interpreters, they are scholarly technicians with a keen sense of judgement.

Reflecting on the current state of British music, Bayling is adamant we’re in the best possible situation. ‘You don't realise how lucky we are to have the music culture we do. Radio 1 is playing T2. Minimal techno is packing clubs out. Dubstep is the hottest thing around, and Dizzee is vocalling that Benga and Coki tune’.

Although primarily anchored in the harbour of breakbeat and techno, the pair’s dominion stretches across the oceans as far as indie, acid house and Caribbean reggae. This distinctly international brew shines through on their debut album – Big Monster – which is due for release early next year. ‘This album was all about us taking the sounds that have influenced us and combining it with sounds that we wanted to hear but which weren’t really out there’.

'Jewelz’, the album’s acidic single, has proven to be a popular drop with many a big name DJ since its release. Although it was a precursor for their album’s deliberate distillation, it’s acclaim was not, according to Bayling, entirely pre-empted. ‘It's a pretty hard track with a real techno feel and we were worried that people wouldn't get it’.

The album is destined to provide a multitude of styles: the spirit of Chicago-house (‘Recognise’); the broken beat undertones of Italian-house (‘Like An Arrow’); and the Dutch love of techno (‘No Bright Lights’, a track that was constructed by needing to ‘take something that had the feel of a loopy techno record and the melancholy of stuff like Michel de Hey’). So, with such a miscellaneous menagerie of flavours, what would be the ideal conditions for listening to Big Monsters? For Bayling it would simply be ‘lying on my floor with the lights out, getting lost in the loops’.

HIM

‘The best reward is to play a gig’ says Ville Valo, in a low, raspy, smoker’s baritone. ‘To see how your music reflects on the people and how music is such a fucking universal thing’. Vocal-lyricist for self-proclaimed ‘love metalers’ - HIM – and beauteous demigod to a million wrist-slashing females, Valo is simply ‘killing braincells watching American TV’ when I catch up with him.

From his pre-gig Norfolk, Virginia hotel suite, he ponders the relationship his music has with time. ‘I can play a stupid little ditty called ‘Join Me In Death’ which I wrote on acoustic guitar twelve years ago whilst sitting in my first rented apartment in my underwear’. And the revelation? ‘Now, all of a sudden, 5000 miles away and twelve years on, there are people who are weeping when they hear it. Hopefully for the right reasons. As an achievement, that’s the kind of thing that never ceases to surprise the whole band’.

Valo’s band name is an acronym for ‘His Infernal Majesty’. Their latest, and sixth, album, is called Venus Doom. This album contains, amongst others, tracks entitled ‘Love In Cold Blood’, ‘Cyanide Sun’ and ‘Song Or Suicide’. Clearly, this is a man who could be construed as being ‘quite dark’. Unsurprisingly, Valo admits ‘there is doom and gloom all over the realm of music and I find that comforting. I was blessed with the opportunity of life kicking me in the face continuously for the passed ten years so I don’t have any fucking problems with getting myself into a dark place. The only problem is getting out’.

On various levels, the creative process in the construction of music has been very cathartic for Valo and possibly the only thing keeping him sane. ‘It’s been my lighthouse, my beacon’ he confesses, before launching into the complexities running through the new album. ‘It’s a bit more Sabbathy and left-of-centre than Dark Light’ - the doom-rocking album that crowned HIM the first Finnish band to go Gold in the US - ‘it’s definitely the most musical album we’ve done so far’.

The disregard for boundaries is the reasoning for the lean, but categorically achieved with an acutely insightful mind. ‘There’s a lot more instrumentation going on. On that level, it’s maybe risky. But what the fuck is risky anyway? Risky is about doing something stupid like going into a bar, drinking too much and seeing where you wake up the next morning’. A comment made all the more compelling when uttered by a man with plenty of experience to trade. His battle with alcoholism ended with rehab but the ‘risk’ was potently evident for much of his professional career. ‘We’ve played shit gigs. Most of them I don’t remember because of intoxication. I’ve heard terrible stories afterwards about how I’ve ruined everything because I’ve been so fucked up. It’s easy for me to say ‘I don’t remember, I am the Lizard King and I can do everything and anything’’.

With Venus Doom, this new-found focus has paid dividends for the band. It entered the Top 20 album chart on both sides of the pond. The level of expertise selected to guide the project was doubtless a bearing factor on its outcome. Producers, Tim Palmer (U2, The Cure, Ozzy Osbourne) and Hiili Hiilesmaa (Apocalyptica), are no strangers to the band having both been on board for previous HIM collaborations. Valo saw the opportunity as ‘a nice combination to work with two people who know us personally. We were able to tell them what we didn’t want. We didn’t have to explain everything from scratch’. This is a goal HIM have always aspired to and Valo frankly offers affirmation. ‘We thought it would be great to one day record with an English producer. We have, so a lot of dreams have come true’.

The adaptation to the live format has received a ‘surprisingly good’ reaction in the US. This comes after a lengthy stretch of touring that involved a headline slot at the European Give It A Name tour, a billing at the Projekt Revolution festival, and a prestigious airing as Metallica’s tour support. Yet although, to most, this might sound like the pinnacle of a musician’s journey, Valo keenly points out that the adventure ultimately isolates you. ‘It was crazy flying back home after being away for twelve months and not realising that this is the place where you live. It was illogical’.

Valo concludes that the tour has been so lengthy that ‘it’s all a big blur. We basically haven’t had any time off’. But he forgets that it isn’t over just yet. A UK tour beckons in December, as does Australasia come March 2008. At least it wont be dark down under. Or will it?

The Wombats

Blithe, juvenile, delinquents – three words most people would use to describe pop-punksters, The Wombats, since chatting with them recently. ‘Flatulent’ is yet another one. ‘Farts are magical things and humanity needs to embrace them’, admitted drummer Dan Haggis, before continuing, ‘we are a very flatuent band and our tour manager can back that up. We’re very proud of each fart. We cherish them and let them come out in all their glory’.

It was lucky for me, therefore, that the band were in Olso during our conversation, safely at the other end of a telephone line. This maverick Liverpudlian trio wear their youthful exuberance as a badge of honour and is reflected in their deliberate acronym name – ‘Waste Of Money, Brains And Time’. Yet, without this acute sense of mischief, The Wombats would never have been so successful.

Following several unsigned and self-financed EP releases, the surge of internet disciples grew to such a magnitude that it could not but help bring the record labels a-courting. Up stepped 14th Floor Records as the eventual victors in the race for signature acquistion and, as Haggis believes, it was because ‘they seemed to like all the quirkiness. They didn’t want to change us and no one has been telling us what to do’. Yet, despite this resolute allegiance to his employers, there is still a minor warning in the event of such an occurrence - ‘If they did, we’d tell them where they could shove their ideas’.

Haggis, along with bandmates Matthew ‘Murph’ Murphy and Tord Øverland Knudsen, have since become darlings to the industry. As well as XFM, NME and MTV2 displaying a zealous greed for their contagious indie riot, ‘Let’s Dance To Joy Division’, The Wombats have been on the receiving end of some serious Radio 1 backing. The culmination of which convinced Zane Lowe to chose each of their last three singles for his weekly ‘Hottest Track In The World’ honour. They’ve even shaken the hand of Sir Paul McCartney, which isn’t overly surprising since they formed in 2003 whilst studying at his Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts.

The fruit of these credentials has been an intense touring frenzy through Japan, China, the US, and Europe - fifty gigs and only four days off – as well as the recent release of their 'Guide to Love, Loss and Desperation' album. Although the title might not instill the images of fun and frivolity that the band are keen to exude, Haggis entertains the reasoning as ‘matching the paradoxical qualities of the lyrical content and the music. The album’s got this poppy, bright sound but the title misleads you into thinking that it’s going to be something different’.

Each track has meandering meloncholy at its very core but is discordantly wrapped with ‘quite dry humour’ and topped with an upbeat tempo. This is something Haggis wants to continue as the band have been writing a bank of novelty songs whilst on tour. ‘We’re actually thinking of making a Team Wombat: On The Road album’, he hopes. ‘We have a whole host of minute-and-a-half songs that we’ve done backstage and at various after-parties: ‘I Was Just An Embryo And I Cant Believe It’; ‘The Man Who Can Sing Happy Birthday With His Bottom Is The Best Man Alive’; ‘Get On The Motherfucking Bus, You Cunt’; and, ‘My Two-Day Sack’, which is a song about the bit between your leg and your sack when you haven’t showered for two days whilst you’ve been doing loads of gigs’. Hmm, charming. After singing the chorus of the latter’s immense opus – ‘Two day sack, stink so bad’ – Haggis adamantly believes ‘it’s a classic in the making. The whole of Team Wombat is going to retire and buy an island with the royalties from that album just from the amount of radio play it is bound to get’.

If this sure-fire, in-no-doubt-at-all idea miraculously fails to materialise, then at least the band can rely on touring to make their ends meet. Having co-headlined the NME Rock’n’Roll Riot Tour with The Enemy, it’s now time for The Wombats to rampantly go it alone. ‘The live stuff is all about people just letting go, abandoning all their inhibitions and just have a good forty-five minutes of pure sweaty fun’ explains Haggis. The sold out show at Koko on December 7th should be a defining moment, then. ‘Hopefully all the people who’ve got tickets have already got the album and want to go absolutely mental to every song’.

A scientific analysis of The Wombats would most likely prove nothing we don’t already know: yes, they are young; yes, they are dumb; and yes, they make fantastic singalong dance tracks that administer a healthy dose of tomfoolery to all. But is there more to these foppish munchkins than would immediately greet the eye? ‘We may look like three cute furry little animals’ Haggis draws on the connection with their marsupial namesake, ‘but we’ve got a darker side to us. We’re a serious band as well. We all read the newspaper every morning’. Ah, a breakthrough, a brief glimpse into the deeper psyche of a innocent pop band on the verge of greatness. Perhaps base.ad got it wrong after all. But wait. ‘Actually, no we don’t. I’m lying’.

Sia (Zero 7)

Although most of us wont automatically recognise the name Sia Furler, her voice will most certainly evoke a flash of memory. Her silky, sultry sounds have triumphantly conquered both sides of the musical pond through her major collaborative work with chill-meisters, Zero 7. Despite her enormous success with the group she has maintained a steady solo career for many years and is set to release a new album – Some People Have Real Problems – in January, on the back of a British tour. She spoke with me recently as she prepared to leave New York for the UK, by staying in bed and watching documentaries about gender disassociation. Her playfulness was immediately evident from the effect of her a strong South Australian accent combining with a chirpiness that was near the point of hysteria.

Tell me a little bit about your forthcoming album
It’s just another album. For me, it’s my job, the best job ever. I’m so lucky because it doesn’t really feel like work. There’s four cycles – you write the album, you record it, you sit around and wait for a while then you promo and tour it. Each album usually has a different feel based on where your life or your friend’s lives are at. This is going to be a more mature album because I’m more mature (playfully sniggers). There’s less drug references….no not really. It’s a broader brushstroke about love and life (now breaking into full belly laughs – can we take this girl seriously?). The artwork is the best artwork ever. We got all the kids on the website and MySpace to designed the artwork.

There were some big collaborations on this album, right?
I invited Lucia on ‘Little Black Sandals’ because she’s got such a good voice. And Beck has this deep timbre that he used on Seachange that’s really resonant. I felt that would go nicely on ‘Academia’ so I asked him and he said because he’s so nice to me.

Since the last album what have you learned as an artist?
I certainly know that I was miserable for Colour The Small album and I was singing really closed mic-ed. It was definitely a studio album and trying to translate live was difficult. I realised from touring with Zero 7 that I had a lot more fun on stage, I liked singing out. So with this album I wrote it a little bit less fragile. I wanted to sing big songs rather than intropspective, close mic, breathy stuff. I’ll always be grateful for ‘Breathe Me’ because that totally resuscitated my career and gave me an identity here in the US but it is quite a hard song to sing live.

Are you looking forward to you UK tour and especially the December 4th gig at King’s College?
I don’t really have a profile in England, I always play pretty small gigs. My favourite crowd is 1200-1500 jam packed sardines. And sold out. That’s when I feel like the energy is good because it’s intimate enough to have a conversation with the people in the front and the back.

Have you got better at live gigs as you’ve become more accomplished as artist?
Yeh, you get more comfortable. I don’t need to drink to stay on stage now. I’ve gotten older too and I understand more about how inconsequential we all are in the grand scheme of things. One shit note or one fuck up doesn’t make a bad gig. People come to be entertained and to support you and enjoy it. If you make a mistake and apologise, they’ll forgive you. That was the whole point to calling the album Some People Have Real Problems because it’s a note-to-self. It’s a reminder that some people don’t have rice or they have a terminal illness and here’s me and all my friends going ‘the traffic really sucks’. I’m starting to get rich, successful and famous but it’s starting to freak me out a bit because I don’t want to become a dickhead. I like to keep reminding myself that I am a human being and I’m part of a community. We’re all here to help each other evolve.

Zero 7 – do you consider youself ‘part of the band’?
On the last album I had more involvement on a purely contractual and financial basis. We were partners in that album, to a degree. I’m a bit sad about it but I don’t think I’m going to be doing any more stuff with them because it’ time for me to concentrate on doing my own thing for a while. Plus, now I’m getting really busy because here in America it seems they really like me.

Do you have any personal vocal influences?
My Dad used to play a lot of 60s girl band stuff in the car when I was growing up – like the Shangri La’s. Also Chrissie Hynde, Annie Lennox, Sting and my uncle Colin from Men At Work (actually her Godfather, they are not related).Even, when I was about 17, Mariah Carey and Lauren Hill. Oh, and Jeff Buckley.

Do you miss Rundle Street?
I really do. I miss the beach at Port Willunga. I miss sitting outside Al Fresco’s and having a coffee. I also miss The Carver Hut on Hindley Street and the bar that used to be called Q but it called Sugar or something else now. I liked to go there and play pool and have a dance. I want to go back.

Elektrons

Oh look, it’s another band from Manchester. What is it this time? A flash-in-the-pan Northern soul derivative? Perhaps it’s indie, tinged the Happy Mondays’ way? Or maybe, as their name suggests, Elektrons are a futuristic rendering of New Order’s electronica?

Not so simple, it would seem.

Proud of the myriad urban influences flowing through their upbeat debut album, Red Light, Don’t Stop, Elektrons’ heritage is wildly non-discriminative. Their eclectic compound fuses 90s acid, Euro house, Caribbean funk, East London grime and groove from both sides of the pond.

Originally known as the DJing partnership, The Unabombers, Luke Cowdrey and Justin Crawford’s leap into the production realm began in the basements and warehouses of the North’s most prolific city. ‘The word ‘underground’ is one that’s very abused’ Cowdrey told me. ‘It’s such a self-conscious word that it becomes a kind of self-parady, in a Spinal Tap kind of way’.

Moulded from the same counter-culture residue as Basement Jaxx and Bugz In The Attic, Elektrons philosophy, according to Cowdrey ‘is one which is rooted in the art side of things’. The term ‘outsider pop’ has been mooted several times in accordance with their music and especially with their latest summer-doused single, ‘Classic Cliché’. It’s an association that Cowdrey is all too happy to receive. ‘Outsider pop is a term that shows pop music isn’t always just about following the rules. Some pop music is mind-blowingly awesome - like The Beatles, Beyonce, Talking Heads, even fucking Justin Timberlake. It has depth. It’s populist. It’s accessible. It’s singalong but at the same time it’s fundamentally rooted in great black music’.

Being able to appropriate exactly the right sound was paramount to the track’s construction. Cowdrey explained that Mpho Skeef was chosen for the vocal because ‘She has that quirky, oddball, British sort of sound which doesn’t attempt to be American’.

That same avante-garde approach has provided the duo with a thirteen year clubbing residency at Electric Chair. In January 2008, though, that party is coming to end. ‘The moment an art form becomes comfortable is the moment to move on. We felt it had become velvet handcuffs. It’s a very positive thing, to be honest’.

In December, however, The Unabombers are coming to the capital. Cowdrey admits ‘London can be frighteningly average, but when it’s really good, it’s frighteningly good’. And for him, the Salmon and Compass, the venue for the set, falls within the latter grouping because it’s ‘a free-for-all, bass-bugging, disco pogo-ing, sort of affair’.

Classic Cliché comes out on 10th December
The Unabombers play the Salmon and Compass on December 1st

The After Party

Yesterday, at the magazine I write for, I was set the thankless task of coming up with the five best rock-based 'after party' tunes of all time. After conducting a small survey, this was the final result:

The after-party means different things to different people: all back to mine to get stoned and fall asleep on the couch; or let's dance on the table and crack on till Monday. There’s also the variety of musical tastes to consider as well as the varied states of inebriation to contend with. My selection below should help you get the right result at precisely the right times.

Kasabian – ‘Shoot The Runner’
If you’re pushing on into the next day and you’ve got a few gurning gremlins descending on your gaff, this middle ground between rock and dance should steer them safely through the blinding storm and onto your comfortable couch.

Blood Red Shoes – ‘It's Getting Boring By The Sea (Blamma! Blamma! Red Shoes Mix)’
Yeh, it’s a band with only two people in it and yeh, one of them is a girl of slight appearances. But looks can be deceiving because the first few crunching chords of this riotous banshee-summons will instantly turn your peaceful little living room into a full-on moshpit.

The Gossip – ‘Standing In The Way Of Control’
Before you’ve had time to dress your wounds and have a quick lie down, Beth Ditto’s gay rights anthem will pull you back into the maelstrom. If you’re not too far gone, try digging out the Soulwax remix to really give it some thump. Possibly the best piece of music in the history of mankind.

Dolly Parton – ‘Nine To Five’
The perky Tennessean’s classic homage to the working week is guaranteed to get a flagging crowd back up on its sore feet. Big thanks must be imparted towards 2manydjs (there they are again) for their ultimate after-party release - As Heard on Radio Soulwax Vol.2 – which mashed Dolly with Destiny’s and 10cc.

The Open – ‘Forever’
This is for when the party is, sadly, drawing to a close. The eyes are starting to hollow and the word ‘duvet’ is on everyone’s lips. Slip on this ethereal masterpiece and allow the Liverpudlian five-piece to gently glide you into a dreamworld soundtracked entirely by Talk Talk and early U2.

Here, in no particular order, are the ‘also-rans’ from the quick poll I took of various after-party regulars:

The Libertines - Can't Stand Me Now
The Verve - Bitter Sweet Symphony
Led Zeppelin - Since I've Been Loving You
Carl Douglas - Kung Fu Fighting
Clap Your Hands Say Yeah - Is This Love
Interpol - Rest my Chemistry
B-52's - Rock Lobster
Rammstein - Du Hast
Stabbing Westward - Save Yourself
KrissKross - Jump
The Streets – Fot But You Know It
The Pixies - Debaser
The Killers – Mr Brightside
Foo Fighers - Razor
Bon Jovi - Living On A Prayer
Chilli Peppers - Under The Bridge
Fat Larrys Band – Zoom
The Only Ones - Another Girl, Another Planet
AC/DC - Back in Black
The White Stripes - Seven Nation Army
Chumbawumba – Tub Thumping
Terrorvision - Tequila
Rolling Stones - Sympathy for the Devil
Any Placebo song
Any Pogues song
Any Scissor Sisters song

The Go! Team

Brighton’s ballsiest band rolls, yet again, into town for another animated pep rally with ‘Wrath Of Marcie’, the latest single from their Proof Of Youth album. This ordered bedlam flaunts the Go! Team stamp of distinction. This is due, in part, to Kaori’s distant resonant wailings and the hyper cheerleading rap of frontwoman, Ninja. Corralling ebullient brass, jaunty percussion and The Rockford Files theme tune, this textured fanfare puts colour into sound.

Listening without moving is simply impossible.

‘Wrath Of Marcie’, out November 19th on Memphis Industries

Goose

At any given moment, you can be beavering away, as busy as a bee, running around like a headless chicken. The lively, energetic and outright crazed work ethics of Belgian sleaze-mongers, Goose, provide yet another beast for the list of industrious kinship.

Since the 2006 release of their debut album - Bring It On - the wall of synth purveyors have been popping up with exponential frequency: on remixes for Shitdisco, Futureheads and The Cribs; jumping between Europe, Japan and Australia with scene-chums MSTRKRFT and Digitalism; and even during the high-fiving goal celebrations of the NHL ice hockey league. ‘Busy’ has so adamantly attached itself to the band that they even lent their name to a brand of free condoms at this year’s Pukkelpop festival.

Out of breath and chugging for air, base.ad recently caught up with lead singer, Mickael Karkousse, during a very brief work hiatus. “We arrive home, we drop our stuff, we go to sleep and then the day after we’re back in the studio. Then, at the end of the week, back on the road. That’s how it goes,” he confessed, with a lilting Dutch-French cadence.

Take a gander at Goose’s upcoming schedule and you’ll find November 22nd pencilled firmly into the never-ending tour. Along with YouTube favourites Ok Go and electro master Kissy Sell Out, they play the Smirnoff Electric Cabaret at Koko, which Karkousse promises “will have more like a New Year’s Eve vibe”.

This desire to party was precisely the catalyst that delivered the band to their current format. A decade ago they were a covers band, disillusioned with music and their hometown of Kortrijk, Belgium. “After a while we wanted to find our own sound and we knew there was something more than guitars. We really wrote this album out of something that we needed for ourselves. We didn’t tour a lot so our hometown was our environment. Our inspiration, the emptiness of the city. There was nothing going on”.

Their boredom was exasperated by the cost of expensive mic equipment and thus, four years ago, Goose made the experimental transition to computers. The result is layer upon layer of breakdown-and-crescendo electrock, both hardy AND magnetic. Ironically, considering their former apathy towards Belgium life, the album has since won them the Best Alternative accolade at the 2007 Belgian TMF Awards.

Now that they’ve recently completed the final touches to a Martin Solveig remix, work has begun on their second album which Karkousse hopes, very much, to be out at the end of 2008. “We’ve spent so much time at home in the past that now we want to be on tour all the time. The sooner we get the album done, the faster we’re back on tour”

The Rosendale

65, Rosendale Rd
Dulwich SE21 8EZ

[Fanfare trumpets]….“and the winner of the 2007 Time Out Gastropub of the Year Award is….The Rosendale in Dulwich”. Gasp!

Yes, this is true. The once-dodgy drug den and general working men’s grubby hideaway is now officially (according to Time Out) the best tavern eatery in the entire Greater London area. What makes this such an exceptional accolade is that The Rosendale had only been open for three months prior to receiving the award. Clearly, there must’ve been a dearth of worthy candidates before June 2007. Maybe London needs more gastropubs after all?

The Rosendale’s Australian proprietor, Mark van der Goot, is a former Mayfair sommelier with a sturdy award-winning pedigree – The Greyhound in Battersea forms part of his growing portfolio. Peering through the large Georgian bay windows of Ocado country – aka, South East London – he saw a vision of the future, a vision of a land filled with hope, promise and Molton Brown. He invested large wads of cash in The Rosendale’s refurbishment; he gathered together a team from The Ivy and The Ritz; and he created a wine list that had more depth than those that were on the Titanic. Yet, even with all this swaggery, and the praise that has since come with it, The Rosendale has the makings of a royal bore.

Wikipedia’s definition of a ‘Gastropub’ is a “public house which specialises in high-quality food, a step above the more basic ‘pub grub’….usually [with] an atmosphere which is relaxed”. This sounds about right for The Rosendale. Posh nosh and subdued environs is all it really knows.

The expensive overhaul has been taken straight from the ‘borough council’ school of design as the interior’s gaping void is as welcoming as a municipal building. The walls have been painted with ‘hint of bleak’ white, the furniture is upholstered with authentic ‘vapid’ brown, whilst the chandeliers’ extreme level of illumination provide the perfect conditions for a photo shoot. This is not a pub, this is a library.

There are a variety of signals that provide this scholastic facade: the difficulty in finding it; the lack of music; the removal of viable loitering areas. You cant smoke in the garden; the wines are displayed on a floor-to-ceiling bookshelf; and, when ordering, you should expect to wait an age for it to arrive, even if it’s just a beer in the ‘bar’. Simply find a seat, keep quiet and don’t ask any questions.

HOWEVER, there are two aspects to The Rosendale’s patchwork repetoire that allow it to hitchhike on the road to Zeitgeist, thumbing for arbitrary kudos: that be the food and wine, see.

The chef is confident in his creations and his menu boasts an eclectic awareness. Salt and pepper are banned from the restaurant because, obviously, you cant better perfection. His South African arrogance is legitimate, though, as each dish is prepared with precision and care. The quality of his ingredients is so powerful it should be floated on the stock market: royal parks red-legged partridge, dukka-spiced Kenzie Farm ostrich fillet; citrus-rubbed swordfish with grilled squid. The man even smokes his own fish, bakes his own bread and churns his own butter. Sadly, though, being a South African, the word ‘vegetarian’ rarely appears in his vocabulary. But with some careful pillaging of the menu - al dente ricotta ravioli with aubergine purée, skip the main, head straight for the poached pear surprise dessert – all is not lost.

The wines are equally extravagant. The wine list - a book of MANY chapters - is 31 (!!!) pages long. It houses over 500 bins - some sensible, some wacky, some ‘boutique’ in their appeal – spanning several decades. There’s a page of wines by the glass, 13 of each colour on show. Champagne, page of. Sav Blanc, page of. Malbec, page of. Shiraz, page of. Chardonnays get two pages and Cabinet blends get four. New world, old world, it doesn’t matter, it’s all there.

And so, the definition of a Gastropub on Wikipedia is correct, up to a point. It omits the lack of service, the hideous attempts at style and the whiff of an ostentatious bottle brigade. Otherwise 10 out of 10 for the wine list, 9 out of 10 for the (restaurant) food, and 6 out of 10 for the (bar) food, the location, the service, the décor, the atmos, and so on.

Double up

What has four legs and says 'Boo'?
A cow with a cold.

What has four legs and says 'Aaaa'?
A sheep with no lips.

Hadouken!

Politicians, environmentalists, citizens of Mother Earth, gather round for some important news: base.ad has discovered the world’s first truly renewable energy source. This scientific breakthrough revealed itself during a recent atomic demonstration at The Astoria. It was shown that with just the right quantities of 7-Up and Day-Glo, every teenager on planet Pop has the potential to power the entire European community. The first step is to simply fasten an electroconductive device to each youngster. The second is to introduce high levels of radioactive rave and grime. The explosive reaction produces gigantic measures of heat and kinetic energy, both of which can then be harnessed.

The level of anticipation was akin to that of the day before summer holidays, leading to all Dads and journalists taking safety on the upper balcony. Even before Hadouken! entered the arena, Late Of The Pier’s heavy doom-synth support resulted in a cascade of fluorescent colour being lauched towards the stage. It’s fair to say the kids were hysterically excited. And quite rightly, too.

The sold-out show amounted to only 45 minutes in running time, but any longer and Chernobyl would’ve looked like a picnic. In a room so hot even the air conditioning was sweating, Hadouken! appeared to the sound of sirens, useful in drowning out the high-pitched wails of their audience. Beginning with an assault on the mainstream - ‘The Bounce’ - the GameBoy geeks raced along at breakneck speeds, determined to make the wheels fall off. James Smith’s savage but sonic lyricism was flaunted in the Aphex-cum-Dizzee ‘Liquid Lives’ and the Sex Pistol anti-style rant of ‘Superstar’. With each passing moment someone’s life was in danger.

The pixelated punks lost their crowd, very briefly, during a crash test of new material. Smith opted to sing in showtune style, whilst his band did a synth rock impression of Europe stuck in ‘The Final Countdown’. Nevertheless, the lull gave medics the opportunity to extract the bodies of those that had perished in the carnage.

Singalong favourite ‘Tuning In’ and new single ‘Leap Of Faith’ brought the crowd back to a mere stampede. And only moments before they departed for bed - they all had school in the morning - the crowd endured the accelerated square bass lobotomy of ‘That Boy That Girl’, which would’ve made even The Prodigy cry.

It’s a little over a year since Hadouken! played their first ever gig. For a band that doesn’t even have an album release yet, this was testament to the capacity of the internet. Hadouken! and their generation have embraced one another with fierce DIY aspirations. That, plus the wear fluoro like they invented it.

Powerful stuff.

Dave Gahan (Depeche Mode)

‘Superstar Dies From Overdose In Hotel Room’ - a headline that appears with saddening regularity. Janis Joplin, John Belushi, Anna Nicole Smith - all tragically slipped away, alone in a haze of terrifying darkness. The same can be said of Dave Gahan, Depeche Mode’s turbulent vocalist. He too found himself in a hotel room, slowly abandoning reality, a fatal injection of cocaine and heroin coursing through his veins until his heart stopped and, officially, he died. But only for two expansive minutes as an unknown force looked down upon the ambulance and decided May 28th 1996 was not his time to perish.

Clearly, an event like this is bound to have a lasting effect on a mere mortal. The prolific scars left by such a trauma mean Gahan’s perception of time is heavy and complex. He spoke openly with base.ad recently about the introspective inspiration behind his latest solo album, Hourglass.

“It’s an album that deals with my concern about time, being where I am, working from that place. Rather than dwelling on the past, stepping into the future before it’s even come”.

Undoubtedly, Gahan is a serious man with some serious issues on his mind, yet he quickly points out how secure he feels with his present existence. “I feel like I’m in a really good place in my life. I feel very fortunate that I managed to crawl my way out of that hole. It could’ve easily gone another way”. He cites his family as the reason for his current happiness - “without them I wouldn’t be doing this, that’s for sure” – along with New York, where he has resided for the last ten years - “this is the first place that I’ve felt at home”.

With a hybrid mix of Basildon missed consonants and Americanisms such as “like” and “y’know”, the singer is keen to distance himself from the man he used to be. “Life catches up with you. I’ve always tried to avoid actually participating in my life. In the last five years I’ve felt a lot better about who I am”. He summarises, with a hint of mischief, “being able to reflect a lot more on who I am, the way I act, what I do and the trouble it gets me in”.

His problematic past includes an attempted suicide and a period when he would lock himself in a wardrobe for days. In the decade that has since passed Gahan has been entirely clean. Yet only now has he been totally free to write candidly. “It wasn’t possible for me to do that within the roles we laid out for ourselves in Depeche".

In a career spanning 27 years, it wasn’t until DM’s eleventh studio album - 2005’s Playing The Angel - that original Gahan material was first adopted. This, obviously, makes Gahan uncomfortable as evident from the restraint he displays when discussing the matter. “Making the first solo album [Paper Monsters] was definitely a step in the right direction and it enabled me also to come back to Depeche with some ideas which were embraced rather than….kind of….erm.…well.… it wasn’t immediately embraced but after we talked about it a lot I got to record a few songs on that last album”.

Although he worked with DM’s tour drummer, Christian Eigner, and guitarist, Andrew Phillpott, Gahan revelled in the autonomy afforded him on Hourglass. “My band contract with Mute was finished. I was kind of like a free agent. I think that has a lot to do with the way we were working as well. There was no one peering in and listening to what we were doing. With a Depeche record there’s a lot of thought that goes into how we’re going to do it, where we’re going to do it, who we’re going to work with. Demo-ing songs, all that kind of stuff. I knew I didn’t want to do that".

Gahan was adamant about executing a more primal work ethic for Hourglass, such as using his voice “in a more honest way”. This, he claims, is as a result of “years of singing somebody else’s songs and not having to be in that position. Being free to go where the melodies, or the lyrics, take me. If you get too precious about sounds or the direction of a song before you’ve even begun recording it, somewhere something’s lost”. It’s therefore quite clear that the liberty he experienced whilst making this album has helped him expose the fragility of his self-awareness as well as experience a new way of musical thinking.

Duke of Sussex

75 South Parade,
Chiswick W4 5LF

Opinions are divided on life’s many little quandries: are the New Zealand rugby team the world’s greatest underachievers; should we put Britney out of her misery and have her spayed; is the old ‘chicken cross the road’ joke just a poignant metaphor for human existence.

The newly refurbished and totally unrecogniseable Duke Of Sussex in Chiswick is no exception, either. Opinions are sure to waver somewhere between “who is to blame?” and “by Jove, my trousers have fallen off!”.

For the people that don’t know better – namely, all non-Chiswick residents – The Duke of Sussex will be a bit like the planet Mars: populated with alien life forms, a pain in the arse to get to and surprisingly underwhelming when you finally arrive.

To the locals, on the other hand, it’s all about the subtle differences. They’ll be lauding the recent tonal transformation from the gaudy orange and greens of yesteryear to the colour of the future….brown. Although, in the immediacy, this might not seem to fill your heart with glee, the locals will be quick to hail the splendour and the sparkle that accompanies the brown - chandeliers, solid red drapes, the bounty of ornate cherubs circling the dining hall, the grandiose garden bar complete with fairytale trellises and Victorian lamposts – such is the Duke’s new regal character. It’s worth noting at this point that Chiswick is 100% pure grade Posh. Residents have included the likes of Vanessa Redgrave, Patrick Stewart and Felicity Kendall. Sparkling brown is bound to be popular.

The division in opinion continues with the untimely death of Elvis night, leaving fans of The King ‘in the ghetto’. Likewise sports fans should be prepared for a mauling: pool tables, out, dining tables, in; enormous plasmas, out, piddly TV, in; large back room showing Spanish football, out, large back room serving Spanish Fabada, in. This is what happens when a borough’s favourite sport is rowing.

For food lovers, the dining experience will do just enough to ensure you’re utterly confused. Whilst perusing the big rustic Spanish-Brit menu you’ll want to use words such as ‘unusual’, ‘interesting’ and ‘weird’. But then you’ll realise there’s no recognisable difference between starters and mains, be it monkfish, rabbit or ‘red’ themed salad. The prolific use of lentils, fish and black rice will fuddle your muddle completely, but at least the staff can warm your cockles with their courtesy and their “I picked those blackberries myself” banter.

And then there’s the wine lovers. Those championing the Old World order, there’s a carafe full of laughs for you. 375ml servings mean sampling is almost mandatory – Mas la Pierre Muscat Sec, Vega Real Crianza, even a Gloucestershire white. But all you New World lovers with your oversized carbon footprint, sorry, you’ll have to look elsewhere.

As for freelance journalists, they’ll all agree that the addition of free wifi and a tidy sum of interesting beers means they choose to remain opinionless about the Duke of Sussex. 7 out of 10 if you’re local, 6 out of 10 if you’re not from Mars.

Seasick Steve

Strumming on his three-stringed guitar and stamping on his ‘Mississippi Drum Machine’ (ostensibly just a microphone in a box), Seasick Steve sings the blues. He has plenty of experience to inspire him, many of his formative years were spent as an American hobo. His first solo album, Dog House Music, has made him a recent phenomenon: an appearance on Jools Holland’s Hootenanny in 2006; winning the 2007 Mojo magazine Breakthrough Act Award; as well as playing more UK festivals than any other artist. No wonder his catchphrase is “It’s all good”.

Your name. Do you really get seasick?
Oh man I get real seasick. That’s a bad thing for me going on a boat.

Do you always take a plane?
Every once in a while I take a ferry but then I got to take a lot of pills.

Why do you think the people of the UK have taken to your music so well?
That’s a wonderment to me too. I have thought about it lately because a lot of people ask me what I think. There’s two things I’ve come up with: people are a little bit hungry, I thought that when I went to all these festivals, I see it in their eyes that they’re hungry for some primitive music. Everything is so fancy, all the bands come with the amazing equipment and all the roadies and all the fancy this. That’s all good and all that but then some guy just come up there and bang on the floor and take a pick on a guitar. I think there’s a lot of people who have never seen that before. They just seem like hungry for it. I also think that I play songs about things that just happen to me.

Tell me about these instruments you make - the ‘MDM’, the ‘three-stringed trance wonder’, the ‘one-stringed diddley bow’…
I made the drum machine, all it is is a box with a microphone in it. The three-stringed guitar I just got it like that from a friend of mine down in Mississippi. He got it at a junk store and then sold it to me for an extortionate price of $75. I just told him at the time that I was going to take it all over the world to play and tell everyone where I got it, who ripped me off, y’know? It was just a joke at the time. I didn’t think I was going play for anyone, anywhere. So I just started playing it, I brought the three-stringed guitar home and I started playing and my wife, she don’t say too much to me about what I do play, but she just turned to me and said ‘that guitar gunna make you famous’ (LAUGHTER). This is way before I even made the record so I said ‘You’re crazy, woman’, and she was like ‘you can say what you want, but you wait’.

You presently only have one solo album - Dog House Music - but there are some rumours that you are going to be recording again soon.
I have another record that I made three years ago. It’s the same songs, kinda like me, but I had a bassist and a drummer, that record is called ‘Cheap’.

With the Level Devils?
Yeh, yeh. And now I’m going to make a new record probably starting in November.

And is that just a solo project?
Yeh. I might have kinda maybe some drums maybe once in a while. I thought about maybe singing some tunes with maybe or two other people, just a little bit different but still pretty raw.

And are you going to take that similar simplistic approach to recording that you’ve used before?
Yeh, I am. I’m going to try to make a little bit different but it’s still going to be pretty simple. There might be a couple of songs on there that might be a little more complicated but I’m going to stick with the simple thing for the most part.

And what does that entail?
Not getting too busy, y’know? I don’t know yet. I made that last record on a four track tape machine with just two microphones in my kitchen. So I think I’ll do some recording in my kitchen again but if I want to use some drums on a song too I might go somewhere else and record, in a house or something. It’s not totally planned out yet.

So this solo venture of yours, how does it differ in the sound from what you did with The Level Devils?
When I did that record that was kind of a little band so that’s mainly how it’s different. I had a recording studio we did it in and on this record I didn’t even know I was making a record I was just recording in my kitchen because my wife told me to. I didn’t have no plan to put out a record, it happened after I recorded it that people wanted to put it out. She just kind of wanted me to record some songs like I do when I sit around the house and play, y’know?

You’ve had some tough times in your past, to what extent do those experiences creep into your music and your lyrics?
Oh, they don’t creep into it, they stamp all over it. That’s all I sing about is what happened back then. That’s all it is. I just write songs about things that happened to me, good or bad. I try not to make it too horrible every now and then. I just write about stuff. I just write what make me feel good but most of the things I write about are things that happened to me a long time ago. I got a song about my dog that died last year, so sometimes I write songs about things happening now but mostly a long time ago.

You’ve worked with a number of musical heavyweights, as a producer and as a session player, who were the most satisfying in terms of the end product that you made?
Shit, I don’t know. I like recording with all the young bands because they’re so excited about what they do and they think they just invented a new wheel, y’know? There’s a lot of energy. I got tired of it after a while but a lot of them young bands out there in America, it was real fun to see them come up with all their stuff and some of it was real original. It kept me kind of young. So working with these real young kids, even though it was kind of a pain in the ass sometimes, they keep you on your toes.

Is it right you once knew Kurt Cobain?
Yeh, I knew him. He lived in Olympia and he lived in Olympia and pretty much everyone around there knew him. It was no big deal to know him.

Who are you listening to at the moment? Which bands are you into at the moment?
I just listen to old music now. I listen to old Mississippi Delta music a lot like Mississippi Fred McDowell, Charlie Patton, Son House. I listen to that stuff a lot. The older I get the more I want to listen to old music. I like some of the old vocal groups like the Milder Brothers and Inkspot, old Nat King Cole Trio.

So how do you feel about bands such as Jon Spencer, The Black Keys and The White Stripes?
Oh yeh. I really like some of the stuff the Black Keys did. Also when Jon Spencer was doing that stuff with RL (Burnside), that’s what kind of got me going again. RL was doing that stuff with Jon Spencer and then he thought it’d get popular then they asked me to come and open some shows back in 96 and 97. So that sort got me playing again. So through Jon Spencer I kind of got going again. I really like the White Stripes and The Black Keys. I like some of these punk bluegrass bands, like how Black Keys are doing it. I like that stuff a lot, to me that’s the future. A lot of those kids really do understand what that old music is all about. They kind of jumped over all the boring blues that’s been going on for the last 20-30 shithole years. They pick up that raw delta element and then they rock it up into their own thing.

These gigs that you’ve got coming up in London, tell me a bit more about those.
The London ones are just the last ones of my tour. I’m going on a tour starting in Scotland. I was only going to play one at the Scala but it sold out right away so they booked another gig at the Scala and that sold out too.

And you’re playing again at the Astoria in January?
Yeh, maybe then all the people can come that didn’t get to go to them other ones. I’ve got a booking agent and they’re just trying to put me wherever they can put me. It’s just gotten more and more crazy though because the people wanna come so I’m all happy about that getting me a job.

So maybe by next Xmas you’ll be playing at the 02 arena?
(LAUGHTER) It’s funny, I played at a festival over in Holland in front of 85,000 people.

How did that go?
Yeh, it was all good. It doesn’t matter to me if there’s eight people or 85,000. I play the same. It’s just kind of funny to walk out onto a stage that big with that many people there and you’re all by yourself. I’m all good either way. I like kinda playing for a lot of people just because it gets around a lot more quicker. I like playing small places but you’ve got to play an awful lot of small places to get in front of 20 or 30,000 people. The festivals have been real nice like for me to get a lot of people to know about me just over a few months.

Good exposure?
Yeh, yeh, yeh. It’s all good, it’s all good.

Dan Le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip

Take one plain face and give it some large, knowing muttons chops. Take another plain face and add a weighty, insightful beard. Now put the first face next to an Apple Mac and the second in front of a pen and some paper. Ignite, stand well back, and enjoy the spectacle.

The first face is Dan Le Sac, a production robot from the planet Gameboy. He sees our world in binary code. For him, sound is merely a calculated output resonating from a user interface. He, therefore, only ever communicates through pings and bleeps.

The second face is Scroobius Pip, a pugnacious scribe with an arsenal of words. His pugilist blows come not from his fists, but from his mind. His wit is so sharp it cuts deep, real deep, leaving victims wounded and spurting jets of liquid hip hop.

At first glance they seem the most unlikely of pairings and at first listen it’s clear why they never work together off stage. Yet, as the inventor of the first peanut butter and jam sandwiches must’ve said, don’t knock ‘em till you try ‘em. And the masses do love to try ‘em. Glastonbury, Reading, Leeds and Bestival have all swollen with the hype surrounding this hairy, label-less twosome.

As a band, it was clear they were revelling in the headline kudos of Scala and it showed as they swaggered through a think-tank of rarities. Le Sac’s lo-fi Hot Chip geekery fused a kinetic structure upon which Pip delivered his poetic, belligerent sermons. Dishing out lesson after lesson, this was a vision of the future, machine telling man what he would otherwise not consider: the hidden beauty of Tommy Cooper’s death; the story of ‘Angles’, a suicide revenge murder with many points of view; the dissatisfaction of God with Man (“I was a simple being that happened to yield such powers, but I just laid the ground, it was YOU that built the Towers”).

Despite this, the lecture was not just insight and inciting: there was romance in ‘The Beat That My Heart Skipped’ as a naked electro thump coupled with Pip’s synthetic yearnings; there was political surrealism in ‘Fixed’ (“I got a holster, I keep biscuits in”); and there was infectious sarcasm in the novelty single ‘Thou Shalt Always Kill’ (“Thou shall not judge a book by its cover, thou shall not judge Lethal Weapon by Danny Glover”).

Due to the absence of a tangible album release (Xmas is the word on the street), the set list was Keira-thin. To flesh out the body of the show a few theatrical props were adopted – a Bible, an intricate detailing of the periodic table. These were then aided by a couple of surprising covers - Prince’s ‘Cream’ as an encore and Public Enemy’s ‘Bring The Noise’ in an old school mashup competition against supporting hip hop swingsters, The Anomalies.

Dan Le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip are not just a band. They are sent messengers, harbingers of computerised enlightenment. All hail the faces of DLS Vs SP.

Feist

If ballads were to take the form of liquid then the alt-folk fluidity seen washing over Feist’s audience recently could have filled an entire ocean. The experience was so aquatic in its inclination that the mermaid queen herself, Leslie Feist, covered her protruding tail with a floating black dress and an oversized whale of a guitar.

A packed out, and largely female, Shepherd’s Bush Empire had readied itself for the delicate siren by setting all phones to silent. Cast adrift somewhere between Kate Bush, Cat Power and Joni Mitchell, her fragile voice could only be sustained through the attentive gaze of the many.

Standing alone and shoeless beneath a shimmering disco ball, she commenced the underwater dream sequence with a shy quartet of slow numbers. Every time she surfaced for air, she constructed the swirling currents of ‘Honey Honey’ by layering repetitive loops of echoing wails. Steadily, she became enamoured with her sigh-heaving admirers and gliding into the uptempo beat of ‘Mushaboom’ she had them calling back to her in unison (had she not, the solo cascades of tender vibrato would surely have drowned in a sea of their own sameness).

The arrival of the highly adept and multifaceted band was therefore a grateful addition of pace. Combining brass, drums and a brace of piano, their wave of jazz created movement in the stream and despite a brief foray into seemingly ill-calculated blues, the crowd’s awe never faltered. Indeed, it was following the badass tale of ‘When I Was A Young Girl’ that the Canadian received her most convincing appreciation.

The whooping, hollering and open-mouth gaping continued after popular favourites ‘I Feel It All’, ‘My Man My Moon’ and cool-enough-for-Apple’s-latest-ad-campaign ‘1234’ were released. The similarity of these tracks to one another, and all three’s pressence on her latest album, highlighted the onlookers’ fishbowl forgetfulness. Although they sound the same, they’re actually different – a blissful disregard of the album’s ironic title, The Reminder.

However, if the hungry sharks circling the show were still too unimpressed to bite, they didn’t escape the net of gimmicks that she threw out throughout her performance: cover versions of songs by Sarah Harmer and fellow Broken Social Scenester, Kevin Drew; a four-part harmony involving all four floors of the “insane” Empire building; and a piano-playing marriage proposer that completely upstaged poor Feist, hook, line and sinker.

Tony Wright (Terrorvision)

Tony Wright was quite literally ‘between a rock and a hard place’ when we spoke recently - he’d just finished building a wall and was about to head off to his karate lesson. “I became the National Champion last year for my belt. I’m only a blue belt at the moment but I were a green belt when I won it. And me lad, he won the under 10s National Championships for the same belt as well.”

Nine years ago ‘Tequila’ made the ex-Terrorvision frontman happy. These days martial arts, dry stone walling and his new musical project, Laikadog, are more likely to make him feel fine. By becoming a professional waller after Terrorvision split up, Wright not only found a fulfilling way to earn a crust but also discovered a fresh musical direction. “We’ve done two albums now with Laikadog and I’m always inspired by the stuff around me. I must admit when I were in London I was aware of the fact that I was uninspired. If you only ever get up at two in the afternoon and hit the bottle sometimes you miss a lot of it so it were good to get up on tut moor. It were good to meet real people that didn’t have egos and get some hard work done, start grafting so you were tired at the end of the day.”

The moor in question was in Yorkshire and whilst working atop those blustery hills Wright chanced upon Paddy, a bass guitarist with a similar affinity for music. Within weeks they had created Laikadog, a “very bluesy” collective that was “less straight forward rock and slightly more rock & roll”.

The name derives from the famously doomed space-hound and Wright likens the band to the unfortunate canine. “We were about as clued up as a dog in a rocket. The dog didn’t know what any of the buttons were doing and it were floating around in outer space, not knowing which direction, not knowing what were gunna happen next. That’s pretty much us still to this day”. Despite this connection Wright displays nothing but admiration for his Laikadog bandmates. “Six months before I met Paddy I was sat at the Q Awards with a Spice Girl. There were more talent on top of moor that day I were building dry stone wall than there was sat at me table at the Q Awards, and I just thought ‘this is not what I’m about’. I’m not really about celebrating something that just celebrates itself. I’d rather go out and celebrate what it is all about and play it. And so we formed a band and we got like a load of gigs.”

Known for his caustic sense of humour (he was a regular guest on Nevermind The Buzzcocks), Wright confesses to being bewildered by the industry’s love affair with “up-your-own-bum, miserable piano-based dirges – your Snowplays, your Cold Patrols, your James Blunt. We’re dropping bombs on Afghanistan and Iraq and then coming home to listen to some sqeaky mouse singing sixth form lyrics about being beautiful. I just do not get that whatsoever.”

Indeed, it seems that this disenchantment with the industry could have ultimately caused the death of Terrorvison in 2001. “We’d sort of done what we had to do, as far as making records was concerned. We’d said everything that we were going to say as four people because we’d been together for 14 years. That’s two seven year itches, that’s quite good. We weren’t the same people as we were when we started and you grow in different directions, don’t ya? We all had different things we wanted to do and we sorta said that’s Terrorvision run its course recording wise. To tell you the truth, I think a lot of bands should split up. There’s no point becoming a parady of yourself. Like flogging a dead horse. I mean, Terrorvision were never a dead horse but I think if we’d carried on then that might’ve been the case. We did our own thing, we always did. It slightly started to stain me views on things. It were like when we first started everybody around us had enthusiam. 95% of the people that we worked with and alongside had the same enthusiasm as we did. At the end we didn’t have that enthusiasm. I prefered working with the people who like rock and roll, they weren’t bothered by that side of things.”

Regardless of how Terrorvision were fated to split, Wright still rejoices the times spent with the band and also looks forward to the gigs they are set to play in the future. “Everything were brilliant because we got told all the time that we were wrong. Rock magazines at the start would say ‘You cant dance to heavy metal, you’ve got to just wear your leathers and shake your head’. The indie magazines would just say ‘You’re not indie, you are corporate rock whores’. There were all these people saying this and then one day we walked out on tut stage at Reading and there were 30,000 people singing along. They had no interest in making money out of Terrorvision, there was nothing but the fact that they liked what we did and we liked what they did, and that’s why we did it really. We often get together and do the odd gig, in fact we’re doing three this year. Now, it’s just going out and getting all them people that keep going ‘Ahh, do another gig, do another gig’. So it’s often like ‘Yeh, alright then’, but we have a right good party and there’s no pressure on us.”

Sara Berg

This year’s award for the Longest Album Title goes to Sweden’s Sara Berg for When I Was A Young Child I Used To Feel Pleasure From Playing With Others.

Turgid or what?

Nope, Berg certainly wont be lighting up the 2008 Mercury Prize hotline. And the cover art depicting her as Joan of Arc - pensively gazing off into some fantastical future where she alone heralds musical sovereignty - is rather ropey too. Yet, listen closely and there are some glacier-pure moments on this album.

In ‘Young Child’ Berg’s dark electropop is reminiscent of fellow Scandanavians, The Knife. Whilst the frenetic synth-beats of ‘Babies & Beautiful Things’ almost smells of ‘Blue Monday’, only to be skewed by Berg’s Dusty Springfield warble.

Like Ellen Allien, only not as German. And not as good.

Andrew Weatherall

When Soma Records served up their dark electro Sci.Fi.Hi.Fi collection there was much dilating of pupils and gnashing of teeth. With Sci.Fi.Lo.Fi – the clever Frasier to SFHF’s dumb Cheers - the knowing reach into the record bag of cool is an honour rightly bestowed upon Andrew Weatherall. Yes, Andrew Weatherall of Bjork, New Order and The Orb remix wizardry; he of Beth Orton and Primal Scream production sorcery; he of Kiss FM migrainery.

Yet, do not expect bucketsful of synth and showers of orgasmic beats because Weatherall has shunned the blinding lazers and finger-pointing techno whoop-whoop. This enticing new spin-off is strictly organic produce, and in parts is a little tainted.

The choicest cuts of exotic meat have been culled and dished up in a roughshod chronology. The vinyl-only entrance policy begins with a fallout of obscure 50s bebop as Joe Boot And The Fabulous Winds swoon over ‘Rock N Roll Radio’ and The Rebs keep pushing the horn and double bass throughout ‘Renegade’.

Psychodelic 60s rockabilly gets an airing in (great name alert) Hipbone Slim And The Knee Tremblers’ Bo Diddley–esque ‘Snake Pit’ and continues through into the classic ‘I Want Candy’ by the blues-thumping Strangeloves.

Killing Joke, Primal Scream, The Fall and T-Rex provide the rump of the album but the tastiest morsels are closer to the bone: The Cramps rambunctious ‘New Kind Of Kick’; the Tropics Of Cancer’s murmurred cloudy mambo jive interpretation ‘Upside Down’; and Shockheaded Peters’ chilling Human League-do-Bossa Nova ‘I Bloodbrother Be’.

It is this inner selection of Nick Cave post-punk bile, and the B-movie artwork that encases it, that should relieve Tarantino of all sleepless nights spent worrying about his next movie soundtrack.

Overall, an eclectic blend that will end those Now That’s What I Call Music Xmas gifts you receive from clueless family.

Black Ghosts

Frightening fact (1): ex-Simian Simon Lord watched Hammer Horror movies from an early age and resided next to cemetery in a house plagued by poltergeist activity and pagan imagery.

Frightening fact (2): ex-Wiseguy Theo Keating’s Dad invented the Bio Activity Translator, a musical device that produced a low electrical hum when fastened to plant stems. Obviously, an odd pairing, so is it any surprise that together they create sinister pop noir?

The Black Ghosts’ ‘Some Way Through This’ is a ballad with a macabre twist - it provides a flagrant portal to the dingier parts of love’s psyche. Floating atop a trembling spine of Portishead orchestral strings, this louche requiem is hauntingly melodramatic – “If this house was on fire would you tell me your desire, if my hands were round your throat would you tell me what I need to know”.

With the addition of a few dark remixes and a video containing prostitution, theft, suicide and murder (acted out by stop-animation Lego) this single is implicitly disturbing. It’s like Tricky and Hot Chip meeting in the dead of night to make love on the grave stones of their former lovers - David Bowie, Datarock and Tiefschwarz.

Gallows

Riding the acclaim of their recent Orchestra Of Wolves album, ‘In The Belly Of A Shark’ is set continue Gallows’ pandemic success, capping it with a frightening air of British hostility.

Taking to the ears with a V8 engine of bass, it hurtles across the plains of Testosterone Valley at speeds far exceeding anything Johnny Cash ever mustered. It screams headlong toward a mountain of jealous introversion (the Shark), a dark and lonely place somewhere on the psyche’s dusty horizon (note: this isn’t a song about the actual innards of a shark).

At the helm of this incensed vehicle is the man-beast himself, singer/shouter Frank Carter. Charging down the shark, Carter screeches over blind rises of pounding drums, rounding corners paved with old-school punk and skidding through hairpins greased wth metal ferocity. Gased up on the blues-drenched funk riffs of Jet and The Films, and taking disorientating directions from Helmet and Grinderman, the peddle goes fully to the nose-bleeding metal with the help of some Sick Of It All and Ligthning Bolt frantic antics.

This abrasive steel-on-steel juggernaught is the best thing to come out of Watford since the Metropolitan fast train to Moorgate. Just be careful it doesn’t run you over.

Nate James

In 2005 Nate James was nominated for two MOBO awards. In 2006 he won the Best International Act at the Italian Festivalbar. In 2007 he released his second album, Kingdom Falls, on his Frofunk label. Base recently caught up with the electro-funk-soul star for a retrospective chat.

What have you been upto today?
I’ve been down the gym because I’ve a video shoot on Wednesday so I wanted to make sure I’m trimmed and toned and ready for the enslaught of the cameras. This is the video for High Times.

What does the video entail?
The concept of the video is basically a day in the life of me going from when I wake up to literally when I go on stage an perform. Basically having a camera strapped to my waist which is going to film me, head and shoulders, in various locations all around London. Which I think will suit the song. I’m really looking forward to it. It’ll be good to do a video in London.

Did you choose particular venues and locations in London that are special to you?
Yeh, I’m 27 so I like to go out and have a good time so there’s a lot of my regular haunts like Brick Lane, Camden, Shoreditch, Hoxton Square. Just the sort of places that I love about London. Obviously the sort of the touristy things as well like the Bullet and the some really good views from up high with me performing on roofs. So I had a lot of input into where we were going to film.

Your album has been out for a few months now, can you tell me a little bit about it:
It’s the first album I’ve released on my own label, which proving to be a very interesting experience itself. It’s great, I work with a good mix of producers and song writers that I’ve worked with before and a few people I’ve met through MySpace. I love the new album, it’s very me. My influences range through Massive Attack and Level 42 to Soul2Soul and D’Angelo and so on. I’ve tried to encorporate all my influences - whether it be D&B, dance, house, soul – into this album. It’s soul music with a twist. I’m really pleased with the outcome and the response to it so far it fantastic so I’m really happy.

It does have quite an eclectic range, it’s R&B, it’s electro, it’s soul, it’s jazzy, how do you describe it?
I just say experimental soul. It’s just soul with a little bit of a difference, a bit of spice. The thing is there’s Lemar and Craig David and I love what those guys do and I think they’ve got great voices but I find them very safe with their music, and I don’t mean that as an insult, they do the music that will sell to masses, it’s very nice and very sweet. I don’t want to sound righteous but I want to be distinguished as a new soul guy. They’re already doing that thing, it’s already been done, I’d rather do something a bit fresher, a bit different.

Do you think your music has evolved over your two albums?
As evolved as it can be over two albums. If I was the likes of Michael Jackson or Stevie Wonder, fifteen albums downt he track, it would be obviously a lot more noticeable. The first album was made with the intention of it being very reminscent of the Motown vibe. With this new album there’s no restriction for me because I financed it myself. I wanted to make an album that shows of me as a character and my different tastes in music. I think people have cottoned on to the fact that I’m a funky, excentric kind of guy and I think that comes through on the album.

Has that got anything to do with the fact that you’re half American and half British?
My Mum and Dad are very much into their soul music. I think the more eclectic ravers that I’ve found I liked are more from me just growing up. Looking at the music that’s been in the UK over the past 10-15 years there’s some amazing acts that you wouldn’t necessarily liken to soul or expect someone who loves soul music to actually appreciate but I do love everything from Coldplay and Linkin Park and Jamie Lavelle, the more sort of quirky artists that do things a bit differently.

Who are you listening to at the moment?
Ben Westbeach is in my iPod a lot at the moment. He’s wicked. He’s such a wicked guy and his whole vibe of just blending different flavours. He comes from a very D&B background and it’s very apparent on the album and it’s got some sort of Jamiroquai twist to it as well which I really like. Again, it’s a fresh sound, it’s something different.

Have you got any musical guilty pleasures?
I don’t sit in my house and listen to opera or anything like that. I’m quite random. If you were come to my house for dinner and you’d say “Nate, what the hell are you listening to?” “Ah, I got this CD in Japan. It’s Brazilian Boss Beat this, that and the other” “Oh, ok.” I’ve got mixed flavours, what can I say?

The last twelve months have been fairly big for you, talk me through some of the highs and lows.
The main low of the industry and doing it yourself and independently is the finance aspect. Don’t get me wrong, all the cheques come in and life is good but by the same token you have to watch what you’re doing very carefully because you could end up screwed basically. That business side of things detracts from what I love doing which is making the music and performing. That annoys me a little bit. But as far as highs go I’ve performed with Erykah Badu, Snoop Dogg, I’ve won awards in Europe for Best International artist, nominated for MOBOs and got my second album out. The highs, by far, outweigh the lows. I love what I do, it’s a dream come true.

You’re on the soundtrack for the new movie by David Schwimmer, aren’t you?
I couldn’t believe it, it was hilarious. My manager phoned me and said “You know Shaun Of The Dead? Well the guy who directed that is working with David Schwimmer and they’re making a feature film together called Run Fatboy Run and your tune is in it”. I was like “Naaaah”. I love what I do and I don’t see myself as a massive artist, this to me is a hobby, I love doing it. It’s fun, it’s enjoyment, I don’t really expect to get a lot out of it, it’s just me making music and doing what I love. So when things like this happen it’s like “Oh yeh, by the way, this big Hollywood movie is using your song” I ask why me? It’s a nice feeling. I’m a massive Friends fan so I’m hoping that Dave might drop me a line to say “Yo, love the album” but I doubt that’ll happen.

You’re very big in Europe and the Far East, how do you cope with that kind of fame?
It’s different. It’s kind of nice but it’s overbearing. For example I went to the Brick Lane festival yesterday and I had some beers with some mates and some people were like “Oh, I love your tunes” but the British are very conservative, they don’t say anything silly. They’re very down on the level whereas the Japanese, and the Italians especially, because I’m viewed as a superstar over there as in the likes of Rhianna and Lily Allen. It’s just like “AAHH, there’s Nate James”. It’s mad. It’s very bizarre. There’s nothing that can prepare you for that kind of reaction. I write tunes and I love what I do but nothing could ever prepare me for winning awards and fans downstairs in the lobby when I come down for breakfast looking quite crusty because I’ve had no sleep and want an autograph and a picture and I’m like “Are you serious? Look at the state of me”. It’s cool though. But sometimes I just want to chill out and be myself. It’s a cross to bear and it comes with the job.

You’ve got some interesting gigs coming up. The Bedford Bandstand event at the O2’s Indigo and then also the Royal Festival Hall. Tell me about those two.
The Royal Festival Hall is something for the police. It’s like a massive awards thing they do and they asked me to do a performance. So that’s cool. I love being onstage, I could be onstage in the basement of some shoddy house, I don’t care. As long as I’m with my boys and we’re performing it’s all good. I’m looking forward to the Indigo, that’s going to awesome. I went to see Prince the other week and went to after party and just watched this master at work. The Indigo rooms is such a cool little venue, so I’m very excited about that.

Have you got any collaborations lined up for the future?
It’s difficult especially with the artists I want to work with because I don’t really aim low. It’s difficult with people’s schedules because they’re so intense and everyone is left right here there and everywhere. I’m doing a show with Musiq Soulchild and Ginuwine on the 12th October and I’ve been a fan of Musiq for a while. The neo-soul boys there’s the cool cats and the safes.

What’s the best thing about Suffolk?
The atmosphere. It’s a peace haven for me. It’s just so quiet. A walk along the river is a real place to gather your thoughts and come back to normality and just chill out.

If I had your latest album on an MP3, what would be the best activity or situation to compliment your album?
From the start going through to the end, my album is a getting-ready-to-go-out kind of album. At the start you’ve got the more funky, uptempo vibe to get you hyped, to get you excited. Then you go out, you have a dance, you have a few drinks. Then you pull, then you take them home. The second half of the album is your real kind of smoochy soul-soul and then the last song is Therapy which is about a marriage break-up so maybe DON’T GET TO TRACK TWELVE! Just play the uptempo to get you vibed, the mid-tempo to get you laid, and then turn it off. Stop at track twelve or thirteen, don’t get to the therapy one. It’s a great tune but not appropriate for when you’re laying beside a girl.

Jamie Cullum Vs Roni Size

There comes a time in every professional’s career when it is required that you ‘take one for the team’ and do something truly awful that noone else can do. Gig reviewing is not necessarily an exception to this rule. On paper, a head-crunching, heart-palpatating Roni Size D&B demolition seems like the perfect justification for dusting off the old puffer jacket. But hang on, what’s this scribbled on the billing? Is it some kind twisted celebrity death match joke? Jamie Cullum? Supported BY Roni Size? Huh?

Yes, it’s true. This is possibly the weirdest coupling to be seen since Cullum and supermodel girlfriend Sophie Dahl, perhaps. Jim must’ve fixed it for Jamie to go head to head with Roni when he saw the elf-boy win a 2004 MOBO award, granting him the credentials to hang with the right homies.

This would normally be the point at which Roni Size would get an exemplary report and the shaggy haired, self-taught, platinum-selling Munchkin would get a slagging off. But (a) Roni only played for 25 minutes and thus didn’t really get the engine turned over properly, and (b) get this, Jamie Cullum was actually pretty good. Some might even go so far as to say great.

Fans of Cullum - most likely the plethora of civilised, wine-quaffing, groomed ladies in the audience, clearly not there to see Mr Size - were probably very disappointed when Cullum and his guest star – brother and bassist Ben Cullum – launched into a set that can only be described as dance music.

Their fidgety, techno jazz and space disco funk utilised cowbells, Ibiza pianos, looping beat machines, adventurous beatboxing and the quintessential solid bass. This free-spirited approach to dance was nailed down properly during a 20-minute improvised jam that included the electronic sax distortion of MOBO-nominee (and previous winner) Soweto Kinch and the trumpeting retaliation of Rory Simmons.

when Kinch asked the crowd to shout out four adjectives to describe the spectacle before them (to use in a freestyle rhyme), they proffered. ‘Mind-blowing’, ‘eclectic’, ‘heavy’ and ‘rocking’.

The slightly stunned audience was taken on a veritable journey through sound, stopping off at stations marked Groove Armada, Battles, Crazy P, Stereo MCs, Level 42, A Tribe Called Quest, The Chemical Brothers, Roy Budd’s Get Carter soundtrack and Soul Central’s ‘Strings Of Life’. The journey terminated with a smooth rendition of the Bodyrox club anthem ‘Yeah Yeah’.

The only blemish on an otherwise stellar performance was Cullum’s unsuitable Frank Sinatra cadence. Although he’s primarily a jazz musician, Cullum’s obvious technical ability and tapestry of musical influences could see him a regular crossover artist in the dance pages of base magazine.