How did you first get into DJ'ing and who was your favorite artist at the time?
I first got into cutting and scratching when I saw Grandmaster Flash cutting it up in his mum’s kitchen on Wildstyle. Then when I heard DJ Cheese I knew I wanted to get into it. I used to scratch up on my nanners old high fi system, which also had a tape deck on it so I could kind of put little mix tapes together and give them to my mates at school. My favorite artist was Mantronix because I was well into my keyboards and synths at the time and they incorporated the synths into their tracks. So that with the scratching. Beats and mcing was a match made in heaven for me.
What do you listen to when relaxing, or are you always thinking of ways to use the music?
I listen to a lot of stuff from soul, hip hop, funk, punk and rock. I love The Clash, Radiohead, Gary Numan and 80’s synth music like Art of Noise too. I’m always listening to how things are put together even if its subconsciously just because of what I do, but its not a problem because I enjoy analyzing it as well as listening to it too.
You've recently started working with Serato Scatch Live, how's that working out for you?
I was one of the skeptics for sure but I got it as a present from my girlfriend so of course I gave it a go. What it is doing for me is adding a whole other dimension to my dj performance and show. Because my music is at times very busy with samples etc so it would have been impossible for me to try and perform one of my tracks live but now I have this it enables me to throw a lot more into my sets. I still use vinyl in my sets whilst using Serato as another layer but it just opens your world up to a million and one possibilities.
Now onto your recent work... You've just released the single Wildstyle Dream, tell us about the track and how its been received?
It’s definitely one for the B-Boys/Girls out there. I’m from the old school. I’m a former breaker and love the whole B-Boy thing so I wanted to do a head-nod to the breakers really. It’s fast and furious and Chrome (Def-Tex) does an amazing job on it. As soon as I heard his vocals I knew it was going to be a single. I worked on it with The Voodoo Guru and it turned out great. I defy anyone who doesn’t want to do a crafty backspin in the corner when they hear it! Ha ha. The heads love it for sure but need to see what the youngsters think of it, they need educating about the whole b-boy movement not just the ‘You got served’ movies.
Your new album, Audio Revolution is out very soon, you've been working on it for a long time now, what can we expect from it?
What I did was surround myself with various musicians to get just the right balance of hip hop sampling, production and live musicianship. The album contains straight up soulful hip hop as well as uptempo electro and an epic dj posse track called ‘Scratch Club’. This track took about a year to put together as I had to get all the parts from the guests who are all busy touring etc but there’s DJ Woody (UK Legend), DJ JS1 (Rocksteady Crew/Rahzel) J-Red (World ITF champ), Evil Ed, Krash Slaughta, 2 Tall, Eddie Skratch, Universon, Profound & Ironcyde and my man Royce Rolls. It was inspired by the Fast Show sketch ‘Jazz Club’ Grrrrrrrrrrrrreat! There’s tracks that basically pay homage to the 4 four elements of hip hop including Shake, Rattle n Throw which is tribute to the art of graffiti which I love. It includes a dope mc from LA called Shin B and features uk graff legend Temper on the spray cans. All in all I think this album will please all lovers of true school hip hop. There’s something for everyone! It’s frickin dope!
