ireallylovemusic meets ninja tune's strictly kev.
congrats on being such a force @ ninja tune - so many comps/mixes seem to have your involvement with them. yet a google reveals very little about you - is this avoidance of media exposure intentional ?
I suppose so, I’m perhaps not the most forthright person in this business and don’t intentionally seek attention. I’m eager to do as much of what I want for as long as I can get away with it and don’t feel the need to self publicise myself any more than necessary at the moment. I am working on a pretty extensive website that will eventually shed a bit more light on things which should be up some time this summer though.
how come you avoided all the media overload in the mid 90's when dance music went into celeb overdrive ? did you not fancy that fat boy slim lifestyle ?
I (or we- as in ninja tune) have never been particularly into that side of things, it’s a bit of a turn off for me actually. I’m definitely not out to be a celeb, imagine trying to shop for records when everyone knows who you are? Nightmare, I just want move ahead the way I am, getting better at what I do by gaining knowledge and skills and if I’m largeing it down some nightclub then I’m not doing that.
tell me how a normal day @ office works out for he who is known as Strictly Kev ?
there generally is no normal day – for instance today: I got up and did the usual round of emails and ebay checking, started messing around with a Palm pilot I’d been given, synching it up to my computer. Had some lunch and went up to Holborn to the offices of a design magazine who are doing a feature on artwork for independent labels featuring work I did for DJ Vadim in a forthcoming issue. Gave them artwork and an extensive run through of the processes involved in this particular project and then went off to notting Hill to look for records and old magazines for a couple of hours. At 6.30 I headed to my mother & father – in laws’ house for an evening meal, talked over some designs I would do with my sister –in law for her wedding and came back home to a ton of emails. Designs for a flyer for a forthcoming Mark B single had to be finalized, requests for gigs in Greece and London, some voice over work I was doing for a friend in the US needed amending and this interview had popped in the in box. Perhaps not what you were imagining? Another day would involved anything from working out and recording DJ sets or radio shows, designing sleeves for Ninja Tune or actually making a new DJ Food record!!!!! (Heaven forbid) A million different things can happen all the time, meetings about the Solid Steel club we’re running, banter on the Ninja tune forum, record hunting, internet surfing, and the usual bill paying and day to day nonsense you get with every brown envelope that pops through the letter box.
cut-n-paste - a true form of music worthy of real exposure ? or is it always going to be kept within its limitations due to the stringent licensing laws ? or is the whole scene just a cheap gimmick to get attention for some dodgy riffs that no-one really noticed first time around ?
Like anything, when it’s done well, with a keen ear, a deft cut and dash of humour it’s as worthy as anything. Legitimate releases of big steals are always going to be problematic but we don’t have to worry so much about that now that the internet is here. Also the illegality of the artefact can sometimes cloud a persons’ judgement over what is good or bad but time is the true tester. If someone is taking a tiny slice out of the biggest load of hogwash ever committed to vinyl, recontexualising it into something a million miles away and gaining recognition for themselves and the original artist I’d say that was the ultimate in musical recycling.
have you always been a follower of the cut-n-paste genre or have you picked this up and decided to investigate further hence your recent mix compiling some of the genres best components ?
Tracks like Double D & Steinski’s Lessons were instrumental in making me want to become a DJ and getting me into hip hop. When I first heard them I understood them immediately, I got all the connections, the humour and I loved the rhythms. I was into early electro & rap but it’s far easier for a white working class kid in the UK suburbs to identify with Bugs Bunny chopped up over a disco beat than, say, Run DMC rapping about hard times in Queens, NY.I realized how this type of music was made instantly, the same way I worked out how the Djs scratched and I knew I could do that too with a bit of time spent collecting and learning. I’d previously tried the guitar and it just wasn’t for me, I’d loved the drums from as long as I could remember, especially on pop records like Adam & the Ants and here was a music that was all about the beat. It was also about lots of beats, not just the same one all the way through and I have a notoriously short attention span so I was always looking for the next thing. With these records the next change was usually only seconds away and the most unlikely things were being slung next to and on top of each other in a very entertaining way.
where do you stand on the copyright side of things ?
‘stealing is bad mmm,kay?’ I’m all for taking a bit of this and that, it’s not like artists haven’t been doing it for centuries. The best ones are the ones that don’t get caught because they make a little go a long way. Any idiot can take a massive chunk of a well known song, throw it in the mix and have some sort of hit with it. It’s not their song though and they will know that until the lawyer catches up with them. I’ve taken big samples from artists, I chop them up and around generally so that I’m taking the sound but not always the progression of notes the artist originally played. When it’s a big sample we pay for it and so we should, copyright is a protection of an idea and why should someone steal your ideas?
are you a supporter of the free for all mentality of the cut-n-paste brigade, or, would you feel personally aggrieved if someone took a bass line from a SK production and made monster money without getting the necessary ok from you ?
Of course I would feel aggrieved, especially if they hadn’t asked. Where there’s a hit there’s a writ the old saying goes but generally the cut and paste brigade aren’t making much if any money at all from their activities. For most it’s the first step on the ladder, for some it makes their reputation and the more successful they get the less they can take and the more original they have to be. This is the real test for most people, can they cut it (no pun intended) without someone else’s material, well known or otherwise.
which is your favourite cut-n-paste/bootleg currently ?
there is a great Craig David/ Antonio Jobim one by someone called ‘Fill Me Jobim’. I hate the original Craig David tune but it’s put over a gorgeous downtempo Jobim number that strips it of all it’s original pretentiousness and makes it sound truly new again. An inspired pairing that does the ultimate in the mashup/bootleg genre for me: seamlessly pair two very different musics to form a 3rd that could not exist in todays music scene whilst injecting a little humour.
what are the future plans for Strictly Kev ?
Food album / Food website / more design / constant Djing around the world / top secret audio project with a hero of mine / more radio mixes / constant search for more music both physical and digital
are you a collector obsessive a la dedicated ninja tunes fans ?
yes, very much so, to a completist, nerdy degree.
is the music you make created from within the depths of the latest version of protools or are you a turntable manipulator ?
It’s generally computer created, I see the turntable as a means to getting some sounds into the computer obviously but also the nearest thing that I could call an instrument with my ability to scratch. Not in the same way as someone like Kid Koala but as an accompaniment to the other music things I can do within the computer. I see the computer as the window to me having any sound or instrument I choose at my finger tips to manipulate in any way that either my imagination can dream up or the software will allow me.
and the one q that we all really want to know –is Strictly really really that strict ?
that’s ‘Strictly classified”
– ba boom – tish!