Utah Jazz returns this summer with Vintage, the name of both his brand new record label and second album. We spoke to him to find out what he's got in store for us...

Your new album is the first release on Vintage, it's quite a big project to launch your label with...

I was a bit concerned about that but other than not having enough money behind me, as I have to finance it all myself, I don't know why it can't work.

I've got the profile, the contacts and all the DJs are playing the tunes. People are also searching more for artists than labels online and sales are so bad so I'm giving it a go.

I had plans for a new label because I wanted to get tunes out when I wanted and I thought I could just go straight in with an album.

Are you doing all the organisation for the label yourself?

Yes, most people do a P&D deal where you give the distributor the tunes and they do everything else but I'm not. Well, I am a bit as my distributor, ST Holdings, are manufacturing the vinyl and I'm manufacturing the CD. My brother has designed the artwork like before, all the mastering was done by Shane @ Finyl Tweek and I'm doing much of the promo myself alongside Laurence @ Electric PR.

Is the label just for your releases?

That's the plan. I did a few gigs abroad with Calibre last year and he was telling me about his Signature label. He said how he'd worked for loads of different labels and how it had got to the point where he had a fanbase and he just wanted to get tunes out with no fuss. I've got a bit of get-up-and-go and I'm happy to put the work in so it made sense for me too.

I don't have any grand plans to be the next Ram or Hospital or to have a massive roster of artists. Sales are low these days and releases are almost like a promotional tool now so if I put other people's music out it would just benefit them and not me.

The whole point of doing it is just to get my own tunes out. However I do get sent a lot of decent stuff and maybe if there's a bit of a break between say this album and the next one then I might put out some singles.

Did you approach this album differently this time?

Yes, it's still a liquid drum & bass album but I think it's more diverse than before. Sample wise it's pretty different, partly because I was having a laugh with my brother.

He's got a massive record collection and virtually every track on the first album had samples from it, so he was taking the piss saying I'd be nothing without his samples!

So I told him next time I wouldn't use any just to prove him wrong and out of the 14 tracks only two tunes have samples from his collection and the rest are from new sources.

I remember a few years ago you saying that you consider yourself more of a DJ than a producer and you only started making tunes to get gigs, is this still the case?

When I started out I just wanted to be a DJ so I spent time working out what these guys were doing to get bookings. I'd hear people do sets and they were not the best DJs but they had big tunes out and so were still getting loads of bookings. So the penny dropped and that pushed me into the studio.

It's still the same now, if I was Andy C and doing about five gigs a week then I wouldn't have the time or the motivation for the studio. I was massively busy touring off the last album for a year and a half but then other people bring out new stuff and it tails off a bit. So that motivated me to get back into the studio to do another album!

Are you ever tempted to go for a less sample based approach to making music?

There are pretty big samples on a lot of the tunes but some of them aren't as sample based with a few hooks played by myself. I still just fancy it though, people don't seem to do it as much any more and it's not trendy but it's what I'm all about and known for.

When some of my favourite artists have moved away from sampling I found something was missing and it suits me to carry on. What I would like to do is to get original samples from some other musicians, maybe like a funk band and go down that route. So I'd still be sampling which would help with publishing and getting tracks licenced.

Your love of bootlegs is also well known so what's the difference between a bootleg and a track with samples?

Bootlegs are just an unashamed rip-off / new version of a tune that people recognise. Many of the tunes on the album have samples from as many as five different other sources. I really wanted to put the recent Quincy bootleg I released on the album but I spoke to Ross Allen at Universal/Island and he said the best way to get it out was as a white label.

There may well be a couple of issues with samples on the album but it's not going to sell loads of copies. If a tune from it goes big then I'm hoping I can go back to the original artist and do a deal. It's a bit cheeky but hopefully I'll get away with it. The major labels and publishers realise projects like this are a labour of love though.

Have you had many major label remixes off the back of the bootlegs?

A few, I hooked up with Ross Allen and did a remix for him of Yo Majesty! I did a Lethal Bizzle remix as well. The Wiley / Rolex one I did was originally a bootleg but ended going official / signed to Warner and that's been licensed to a few compilations. Remixing is really good for exposure.

You can think you're big in drum & bass, not that it doesn't mean anything, but in the grand scheme of things a lot of people still have never heard of you. So many people have found my stuff through the remixes and bootlegs and are now avid supporters of everything I do. I'm hoping some more will come in off the back of the new album.

 

 

Tell us about some of the collaborations on the album...

The Jonny L collaboration is actually a remix of his track Dreaming and I was really pleased to get it on the album as he's one of my heroes. I've kept in touch and we're now going to be working on some new original material together. So I've found some samples and we're sending ideas to each other back and forth.

There's a track with a vocalist called Chelonis R Jones who's worked with Royksopp and MC DRS is on there too. I'd done this hip hop beat very quickly, it was like a three minute loop that I made in an hour and a half. He got the vocals back and it was amazing. This track has brought a lot more to the album. Rather than being a non-drum & bass interlude it's a full-on full vocal non-drum & bass tune. It's one that I'm most proud of.

The Ragga Twins collaboration might surprise a few people but that's why I fancied it. I was doing a gig in France and they were there. I'd made this tune that was quite "jungly" and I wanted to do a few tunes that were slightly harder. They did their thing on it and they've got such a unique style that I had concerns about it not fitting in with the rest of the album but it works really well.

There's another harder one I made with a producer called BMK, he's a newcomer and has had a couple of tunes out. He lives near me and he's been helping me with the more technical side of the album. I get tunes done fairly quickly and find samples but in terms of production I do struggle a bit. He's just finished a music production degree so I asked if he wanted to work with me.

So I would finish a tune and take all the parts round to his and he would put them into Logic and give them a boost and bring it up to today's production standards. Because he's a budding producer he really wanted to be on the album so he came up with a loop and I really wanted to do a throwback early 90s hardcore tune for the album. We just worked on the idea and it ended up being the NRG '93 tune.

Are you making any other styles of music?

Not really, the hip hop tune I did for DRS was one of the first ones and there a couple of other downtempo things on the album but it's inspired me to do some stuff. Next time I might do more non-drum & bass tunes and do what Klute does with his albums where he does a double CD and one is drum & bass and the other isn't.

What are you currently working on in the studio?

I'm not working on anything. I'm actually working on a pitch for an ad agency. Someone randomly contacted me and I'm doing almost like a jingle / dance tune for an ad pitch. I've made a couple in the past and they're something that I'm keen on because I don't have a clue what I'm doing and I like the idea of attempting something that I've never done before. If I'm lucky enough to have a family a couple of years down the line I am half thinking about other ways I can continue my music career without needing to DJ loads.

I love DJing but I'm very aware of how fickle things are. I can't guarantee that in five years time that the music I'm going to make will still be popular. If people don't like my tunes any more then my DJ bookings which is my prime source of income will go down massively. So while that side of things is still good can I look towards other areas where I won't have to DJ every weekend.


The album is released on CD on July 5th and is preceded by two sampler 12"s:

Sampler 1 (VTG 001)
A1. Take No More
B1. Bunny Boiler
B2. Skyward Bound

Sampler 2 (VTG 002)
A1. Comfort Zone
B1. NRG ‘93 feat. BMK
B2. Could You Handle It feat. DRS

 

 

Related Links:

• 328 Free Drum 'N' Bass Samples
• Brother Interview
• In The Studio: DKay
• Karton Interview
• 871 MB Of Free Samples

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