Very few artists can embrace positivity and happiness in such an unpretentious way as Mr Scruff does. It's not only humor we feel in his smiling and hopping potato comic figures, populating his albums' imagery, promos, concerts, t-shirts and countless merchandise. It is as if the man himself, and later ourselves, was populating an entirely different world. One of good vibrations, warm beats, happy walks, waving pals and blue skies. And the only untrue fact of the mentioned is the blue skies, but it doesn´t matter: the sounds this man creates are as warm as the ones we might very often have down here in Spain. But hey, shitty weather in Britain surely helps sharp creation !!
So, getting your hands and ears onto a new Mr Scruff release is as exciting and childish as getting yourself down to the local cafeteria to treat yourself with a good set of hot chocolate, cookies and muffins. The others might see you a bit basic and unsofisticated, but never mind them: they don't know what thery are missing! It's all about fun and good times.
Precisely: it was about time we had new material from the man. Not that he has been idle, with his regular sets around the UK, the festivals and the international sets. An activity well reflected in the sessions Keep It Solid Steeland the magnificent Southport Weekender Vol 7. But after the highly succesful Trouser Jazz (2002) the hunger for another set of funk, jazz and soulful beats was BIG. So, here it is -well, it has already been out there for a month -: Ninja Tuna (Ninja Tune). A perfect blend of classic flavours, warm recipes and a few surprises. From dancefloor fillers like "Donkey Ride" with the help of Quantic, to the always sharp and ready Roots Manuva in "Nice Up The Function", we have thirteen tracks where there's room for dark instrumentals or happy house-like snaps: "Get On Down". With the collaboration of vocalists Alice Russell, Pete Simpson, and Andreya Triana this is a winning return of Mr Scruff, filled with hits we will be dancing or whistling to this winter of banking panic and stock market crap.
Yes, it's hard to stay updated. The resources are easier than ever before in music history. Specially through the Internet. All those newsletters, e-shops, blogs, mags and portals. If you have a minimum serious interest to follow what's going on in music, and if your taste is open to just one band or one very specific type of music, you could very well feel overwhelmed. Furthermore, if you are downloading on a regular basis you are most certainly addicted to the gigabism. Just one, two, three, ten clicks and dozens of new albums are getting installed in your hard disk. More and more gigabytes of music: what for? Are you (we) really paying attention to THE MUSIC?
We all know this downloading craze is illegal and you could be prosecuted for that activity, but that doesn't seem to bother many of my fellow music bloggers who, in a vast majority, care more for linking you to the page where you can click and go then get it for free, than maybe writing a few lines, spending some time to understand and explain the whys and hows, the background, history or merely the feelings they had when they were enjoying the music with attention. It's the ultimate fab: mini-blogs. Ten lines or so basically saying "hey, this is quite good, I got it the other day: check them out!" Does it all have to become so simple?
Don't get me wrong. Use the freedom, space and opportunity blogging provides us all to express openly, and if you don't care much about the harm downloading and sharing is causing to the music, and stopped buying records a long time ago, it's not a big deal. You never really cared about music anyway, right?
The freedom and access this situation has created it should revert in some degree to the artists and companies who are offering such richness in terms of creativity and diversity. Every day, often every week I have the chance to listen to lots of new material that I either buy or receive - sometimes from labels or artists -. Then thanks to the streaming technology many companies, artists and sites offer I also manage to remain updated to most realeases who excite me under any possible genre under one rule: originality. Then also beauty and sometimes nonsense (the good old: "I like it"). But my point is, with all that considerable amount of good music in my hands, it takes a long time to enjoy and consider those works before I make a decision about an acquisition. The space at home it's limited too, but that's another story. But my buying rate has not changed: it has only become more accurate. I rarely find myself buying something I will not like. And that's the true freedom my friends. A collection that has a value not in the size (specially in bytes or external hard disks) but in the quality. But the most important thing: a collection to enjoy sipping every second of it with with wisdom.
Wednesday evening in Madrid: I just got home from a long day of projects, meetings, talks and foreseeing. There's a ton of new music waiting for me either in the computer, on the living room's table or lying around my desk. GREAT! There's a lot of pure jazz recordings in my ears these days, and that will be reflected on my Serie B's section for the upcoming issue. And that's the territory this week: it's deadline!!
I must confess I truly enjoy the time for selection every two months or so. With the general chaos of new releases, accidental purchases, recommendations and promos delivery it's very easy to overlook some great stuff that, shame on me, I might have only listened to a couple of times. So, deadline comes and it's compulsory to revise the basket. That's where I am right now. Revise, revise, re-listen, reconsider...
And this is when I get to this little wonder called Swing Out by the Bob Mintzer Big Band. Released last August through Mcg Jazz/Fontana, the recording marks more or less the 25th Anniversary of the project created by the astonishing (former Yellowjackets) tenor saxophone. Without a doubt one of the warmest and funkiest tenors brought out in the sometimes uncertain territory of the smooth jazz and post fusion eighties .But more than that: an amazing arranger for the big band set up (one of my favourites, together with Vince Mendoza, in the wisdom to preserve a touch of pop and crossover when dealing with orchestration). Lots could be said and written about these musician, who has been too often despised for many of his fusion adventures (not always unfairly). But what can you add to the music when music gets so vivid, hot and cool? Not much. Because this album breathes out in only 8 tracks a palette of colors and moods who will bring you, yes, to the architecture of mad counterpoints (irresistibe for Mintzer's arrangements) naming the album in "Swing Out", the crescent melodrama of the all time Metheny & Mays classic featuring Kurt Elling in "Minuano" or the contagious and pop revisionism of "Swingalang". More than anything, the excursion into this world of brass gold will leave you exhausted with emotions, smiles and swinging feet while wondering how does someone manage to remain so young and beautiful in a marriage of 25 years. Like most unique things in life it will remain a mistery.
Sometimes, there's more than meets the eye. In this case, more than reads the eye. In our current issue for the magazine Serie B I featured an interview with one of my favourite hiphopstrumentalists: the belgian duo 40 Winks. One page only for a conversation that lasted more than two minutes... For those who are fans, this is the full chat.
1. - First of all one of those unavoidable questions: why the name 40 Winks?
WEEDY: First of all we really liked the way it sounds, we had a good feeling about the name. When we formed 40 Winks in 2002, we had a very laid-back kinda style. And we were looking for a name to fit our music. ‘Taking 40 Winks’ is an expression for taking a little nap or rest. That’s what our music is all about: relax, vibe away on the music..
2. - I first heard about you guys when you released the album Sound Puzzle which it was your second LP effort after More Than Loops. I thought it was a very mature and rich creation for a genre (instrumental hip hop) sometimes considered in recession. I actually listed your album as one of the best in 2007. So, I was wondering if you can tell me how well the record went, sales and impact, and why did you move to a different label (you’ve done 3 albums in 3 labels)?
WEEDY: Maybe interesting to know is, at first we wanted to put Sound Puzzle on the internet for free, because we didn’t think there would be any record labels interested. But after we got a feature in multilink magazine in which we mentioned we were finishing up a new album,Rob from Multilink Magazine / Inmo Design hooked us up with Merck records who were immediately interested in releasing Sound Puzzle. Merck records, which was just leaving the music business around that time, was looking for one last surprise release as a farewell to the m3rck community. And we were basically there at the right place and time with our album.
We don’t have exact sales figures for Sound Puzzle. Like with a lot of our releases, we and the label agreed on a batch of free copies of the album as a form of payment. Because of this, we aren't up to date on the sales figures.
PADMO’: We have worked with contracts on more than one occasion, in which we would either get a percentage on every sale or even more after the break-even point. But with the safeties and assurances you get in such a contract, there's also some nasty obligations and responsibilities thrown in too. Typically in most of those contracts you will find a clause securing the record label of any costs due to legal problems arisen from the use of samples. Meaning, they're up for making money of your music which they know contains samples, but if any problem arises, you're on your own and you even get to pay back the label for all their losses.
Since we're not trying to make a living out of our music, we prefer getting a bunch of copies of our own album, to give to friends and family, to supply radio and DJ's, and to do even more promotion on our own. By doing this you leave a bigger impression on the music scene, than just waiting for the record label to do everything for you. In the end you've created your own new opportunity for you next album.
After all, this is all still pretty underground music and with modest sales and record labels barely breaking even, nobody is walking away rich from the table.
WEEDY: In the end, Gabe Koch (the head of Merck records) is the one who has put all his time and money in his label. So since we got our share, he's welcome to get anything out our album he can. There aren’t so many people these days who want to take the risk of bringing out non-commercial music, we respect that a lot.
Project Mooncircle has the same spirit like Merck: bring good music to the people, without doing any commercial compromising. So we were very interested to work with them. They asked us to do a track on the “Heart on the Right Spot” compilation, after that we got the chance to do a full album.
PADMO’: So with Swamp (on which we re-released More Than Loops) doing Japan-only releases and Merck stepping out of the business, this explains why we did 3 labels in 3 albums.
3. - The Lucid Effect is your new LP. Where does the title come from and what is your favorite track in the album?
PADMO': The lucid effect refers to lucid dreaming. A lucid dream is a dream in which, without waking up, you realize you are dreaming and you are able to get in control of your dream and what happens. We felt this album was more dreamy and experimental than usual for us, and thought the title fit well. So the title refers to the vibe of the album and us experimenting and creating whatever comes to mind (listen to "Input A"). Of course we also just thought it sounded cool and it's a play on the whole "sleep" thing (taking forty winks..).
WEEDY: Hmm, favorite track is difficult to say... We tried a lot of different things on this album: a track with live instruments, up-tempo tracks, jazz rhythms,… So it’s difficult to compare them. Actually, I don’t really listen to my tracks again. To me it’s more the process of making the track that I like.. I love making beats, but when they are finished I just move on to the next one. I had a lot of fun in creating "Input A" for example, because the rhythm was very new to me and the track was kinda created by coincidence. I think that’s something very important when you make beats: being able to hear usable things where you can build your track on. I’m not only talking about finding good samples but also the way you chop them up, the EQing, layering, and so on.. I always try a lot of different things with the samples and when I hear something that has ‘that thing’, I start building on it until I feel the track is good enough.
PADMO': My favorite songs are "Highwaves" and "Rap about that" because of the music video IWKN made for it. My favorite song to produce had to be either "Wizardry" or "One Way Ticket".
4. - You seemed to like simplicity. Very basic beats, patterns of ambient loops, conversations, loads of musicality. If you excuse me, almost ambient hip hop!! (but good, eh?). Again, not very much in fashion… Can you comment about the kind of sounds and references you like/aim?
WEEDY: When I was younger I only listened to Hip Hop. But these days I’m influenced by a lot of different genres. When you’re digging for records to sample from, you’ll come by a lot of dope stuff. It can go from jazz, soul, blues to psychedelic rock.
PADMO': Everything also started with Hip Hop for me. But by going to second hand records stores on a regular basis, you can't help but getting into a wide range of genres. While I'm no expert in other genres than hip hop, i'll try everything out from jazz and psychedelic rock to recordings of rituals and library music, it's sort of like a fetish. Haha..
I think that at first when you're digging for beats, you're impatient and skip over the music to find good loops and sounds. You're just looking for that quick fix, to make a beat. But after a while you take your time to listen more closely and you start to enjoy and respect the music for a whole lot more than just sample fodder.
When we come over a song that sounds perfect the way it is, we won't even bother sampling it, we leave those untouched. And by perfect I mean, when it sounds like what you'd wish you could make of it.
Every now and then we'll do a mix then, and we'll include a lot of those songs we couldn't or didn't want to sample (check out our site to download some of those mixes).
5. - I see a lot of jazz samples, even bossa, with a treatment I didn’t hear since the golden days of Dj Cam (he’s back in full effect now). I’ve read in an interview you did to Multilink magazine you don’t work or consider working with real instruments. Why is that?
WEEDY: The track “Highwaves” on The Lucid Effect is based on real instruments, it was fun to do but an exception for us.
I just love to create something new out of an existing track. The main thing with sample-based music is trying to be as original as possible with a sample. You really need to get all you’re creativity together and make it sound good. We don’t make it too easy for ourselves because we’ve always tried to break free from easy loops. With some beats it‘ll be very difficult to recognize the original sample.
Also, when you look for old records to sample from you’ll discover a lot of good music that you’ve never heard of.
But I wouldn’t mind working with live musicians one day, just to see what would happen. We’re going to make a remix for a Belgian afro-funk band, I’m curious what we’re going to make out of that. We’ll get all the different tracks of the recordings, so that’s a totally different starting point.
6. - I loved your track "Melancholia", from Sound Puzzle. Where does that voice come from? Can you confess the sample??
WEEDY: Hahaa, start digging! It isn’t an obscure record or anything; you can find it easily for a few Euros. By the way, it’s the same singer I used for the track “for the traveler” on Sound Puzzle.
Actually, "Melancholia" was also released on vinyl in 2005 on our EP ‘Extended Pleasure’ that was released on Escapism records.
7.- Can you tell us how much you work with original vinyl and how much digital stuff you buy or download? What is your production environment like in terms of hardware, gadgets, equipment?
WEEDY: I don’t know where other producers get their samples from, but for me vinyl is the best place where you can find unused and original stuff. I think it’s the most obvious place to search for samples. Also, Cd’s and mp3’s are mostly digitally remastered and I don’t like the way that sounds. Vinyl has an older and more vintage sound that I’m looking for.
As for equipment I have a very basic set up: Cubase SX, keyboard, mic, mixer and turntable.
PADMO': I almost exclusively sample from vinyl. It's the easiest to work with, you can easily skip through a song when you're working with it, this is not the case with a CD player.
I never buy music on mp3, I'd rather buy a physical copy and rip it myself. And i'd never sample something i don't own, i feel like owning an original copy of a song you sample is the least bit of respect you can show that artist.
Every now and then I read interviews with producers stating they'll just sample some stuff they downloaded, which makes me wonder whether they expect other people to buy their music when it's released?
As for my equipment, i also have a really basic set up: Wavelab, a pair of monitors, a turntable and mixer, and also an MPC 2000 and an SP 404 which are only used for sampling and not for sequencing.
8. - What is your position about the disappearance of the diggin culture, in the hands of digital downloads and postproduction?
WEEDY: It’s just an evolution I think.. There’s a whole new wave of more electronic beats and a lot of producers are searching for dope synth-sounds instead of dusty samples. I think that has a big influence on the whole diggin culture. But that’s cool, everybody’s looking for the perfect beat in his own way…
PADMO': I don't think the concept of digging is disappearing. Instead of digging for vinyl, it might be searching for dope Nintendo and Sega game sounds at the moment, but it's still the exact same search.
9. - Apparently you don’t tour or do live shows? Why is that? Aren’t live shows the only possible answer to the digital threat?
PADMO’: If we would work with live musicians, it would be logical to do live performances. But our music is sample-based what makes it difficult to perform live. We tried to do live versions of tracks one time for the interlude radio show. We worked with a sampler and scratched with the original records. But it didn’t have the effect we liked.
WEEDY: I think our music is best when you listen to it relaxed at home or in a bar or something. But besides our instrumental albums we also make beats for rappers sometimes, so I guess that is our live aspect.
10.- Your first release was with a Japanese label. Is your audience mainly there and Belgium? What is the feedback you get from your fans and what kind of audience are they?
WEEDY: I must say that since the release on Merck, we reached a different crowd. Before Sound Puzzle we had a mainly Hip Hop minded audience, but since the release on Merck records we see a lot of people who are more into the electronic music and also dig our stuff.
PADMO': Yeah, every label has its followers. With our latest release on Project: Mooncircle we've noticed quite some reactions from Germany and the UK. I think this is pretty cool, because both countries have really strong local scenes.
Japan on the other hand, is something else. I don't know much about it, but i do know that Japan is the lifeline for a lot of indy labels.
THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR LONG ANSWERS:…and best luck!
