39 (Jul 2001)

John B

Issue 39: John B

John B's version of drum & bass stands out because of its detailed, directed and delicately assembled production. While some drum & bass producers use dirty beats and dirty samples, John B's cuts have a meticulously clean feel to them. His cuts are always crisp, and nothing seems left to chance. Every sound - from the chimes, to the whistles, saxophones and, of course, the bass and the drums - seem arranged by a tireless perfectionist. 'Future Reference', his new vocal album proves that John can create a lot more than clean beats, but also soulful, sexy, and satisfying music.

John's rise to the top of the heap in drum & bass has been well documented... DJ SS gave him a deal with Formation and Goldie offered words of encouragement that led to releases on Metalheadz. John B quickly became one of the most respected producers on the scene all while still at university studying Cell Biology. His vinyl releases now are too numerous to mention, but John has released three albums so far: 'Visions' (1998), 'Catalyst' (1999) and 'Redox' (2000).

People might get a sense that John's a bit of a studio geek because of his high concept second album, but John's a normal guy really who loves to hit the sauce, and big, loud drum & bass clubs like any self-respecting DJ. John doesn't hide out in the studio at all, quite the contrary. He DJs all over the world, on a recent weekend he went to Thailand and Singapore, and is in North America touring almost constantly. He is a regular at all the d&b nights in London out dancing along with all the punters. Even though John loves to play, he is still an intellectual.

For example, whatever the fad of the moment in d&b seems to be John will always offer up a well thought out and timely comment on vinyl. Take 'Up All Night', his take on the old skool trend. Instead of just doing a remix, John took the kernel of the idea in the old skool trend (to make a dancefloor ready vocal track reminiscent of early jungle) and came up with something completely new and fresh.

'Future Reference' builds on another current theme in drum & bass production, making tracks that have more traditional song structures and pretty vocal arrangements, something that had been out of vogue. While drum & bass never completely stopped making vocal tunes, the kind of vocal tracks produced by the dark, techstep movement were nothing like the vocal tracks of the old skool jungle days.

For a while vocals were used more as sounds like the bleep to add texture to tracks than something to sing along to. While drum & bass became more technical, a lot of the party vibe left the scene, and the popularity of drum & bass in the eyes of the masses dwindled, according to some people. Meanwhile UK garage came on strong, and a lot of the women left drum & bass for the more sensual, vocal and danceable rhythms of the 2-step movement. This version of events is open to debate, but for whatever reason, as garage's popularity blew up last summer some drum & bass heads murmured about wanting to 'bring the ladies back'.

John witnessed these events unfolding in London first hand on the dancefloors. England was awash in vocal fever, and feeling the times a-changing he jumped into the studio to make some vocal tracks that eventually led to his upcoming album. 'Future Reference' tries to mix catchy, accessible songs (instead of abstract tunes) with futuristic d&b beats.

"I wanted to do an album that was a lot more accessible than anything that I had ever done in the past," John explains, "and vocals was a way to do that. Since I got a lot of new studio equipment I was able to do all sorts of things with vocals like multitracking, and sound design that I had never been able to do before. I wanted to do an album that flowed together instead of being separate tracks, and to do some catchy tracks instead of the same old instrumental dancefloor tracks."

John doesn't think that songs with vocals are going to save drum & bass, but he does hope to put out some vocal music that puts out a more positive and uplifting vibe: "I want to make the music more light-hearted and less anal. But just because there is a vocal in a track doesn't make it a good one. A lot of vocal tracks are wack."

John B's critics charge him with producing music that is a bit too much on the light side, and not rough enough (or something) to be drum & bass. But John still makes hardcore dancefloor ready d&b, and no one should lose sight of that just because some of his d&b comes down more on the experimental side. To appease the nay-sayers who like their drum & bass straight up, no ice, he has created different labels so that he can release tracks under his own name on labels with defined styles.

Beta Recordings is his flagship label that showcases the straight dancefloor stuff he still makes in abundance. It has releases by himself, Exile and Nu/Tone. The website for the label is a clearinghouse for everything John B and is updated frequently - from live dates to links, a discography, MP3s and a diary section.

His second label is the Tangent imprint which has just put out its first release, 'No One Like You' / 'It's So Real'. Tangent encompasses the non-classicly dancefloor tracks John says sound more melodic, jazzy, musical, soulful, and less predictably like drum & bass.

His third label is Chihuahua, strictly for latin tinged d&b. "It's going to be really fun, I am looking forward to doing it," says John. "A lot of people take the piss, but latin drum & bass hasn't been done before properly. I did my first latin tracks about three years ago with 'Salsa', but I've waited to put out more latin tracks until I felt people were ready for it. Now there is more of a latin-friendly environment with the success of people like Marky and V's 'Brazil' EP.

John's commitment to pushing the genre in a new direction seems to continue at a breath-taking pace with so many labels, releases and tours. His motto could be, "changing the face of drum & bass from a grimace to a grin." The tracks on 'Future Reference' all sound energetic and emotional in a positive way. It's the kind of record that might sound like it could be too light, since it's just vocals, for some trainspotters. But the album's production and song structure are so good that there is plenty for the most snobbish d&b listener to pick apart. It takes vocal d&b in a new direction, away from its cheesy past, and into a future where vocals aren't a novelty in d&b but a respected component carefully crafted into quality tunes. This album will probably pave the way for a slew of imitations, but even if they aren't as good at least we will all have this album to go back to and sing along with.

John B takes us through his mix...

1. Oh No! - Pharoahe Monch, Nate Dogg, Mos Def (John B Smooth remix)
This one has just come out as a 12" on Rawkuts, the d&b sister label of Rawkus. I've been playing out in New York quite a few times over the last year and I've got to know DJ Seen and the guys over there pretty well. I'm always trying to do different things with d&b and figured the link up with Mos Def et al. would be a great opportunity to do a proper hip-hop/d&b tune and Nate Dogg's vocals in the chorus lend themselves very much to the kind of style I'm trying to develop right now. It's also a good chance to get more people into drum & bass, they're likely to pay more attention when names like that are involved. (Did this remix on Christmas Day too... howzat?!)

2. Forever - Influx Datum
I've loved this track ever since Marco and Gavin played it to me in their house in Miami. I got over there a week before the WMC this year and hung out with them for a while. It kept on going round in my head for the first few days I was there, whenever I was trying to get to sleep. Hah! It's coming out as a 12" on New Identity, the B-side is lovely too - it's great to hear really melodic stuff like this coming out of America, in fact it's great to hear it coming out, period...

3. Perfect Combination - Carlito & Addiction
I'm really into what Carlito & Addiction are doing at the moment - I think people are finally starting to pay some attention too. I seem to end up playing two or three of their current tracks everywhere I go - I really admire the balance they get between the laid-back vocals and musical side, but still keep it moving and punchy and crisp enough to work in a club - it's hard to master.

4. Spread Love - A-Sides
I was playing in Toronto a couple of weeks ago - Carl Collins from Hardleaders has been over there for a while and he popped up and gave me this TP. It's definitely one of my favourite tracks Jay has done for a while. Again there's a good balance between the musical side of things, but with a bouncy, driving beat rolling along. I love the 80s-style beepy arpeggios later on, reminds me of 'Shannon' a bit. Mmmmmm.

5. The Summer - Juju
Lovely filters on this one, I love it when tunes like this come through the letterbox. I met Juju for the first time in March over in Miami - I hope the San Francisco boys send me more of this stuff, it's ace! Apparently Renegade are getting ready to release a lot more singles and a compilation album sometime in the autumn - I'm about to go in the studio this afternoon to finish off my contribution...

6. Passion - High Contrast
High Contrast is a new guy who's just signed up with Hospital and has got heaps of great tunes on the go right now - this one's coming out as a single soon and I heard a little rumour that he's doing a remix of the Hatiras/J Majik 'Spaced invader' tune, so that should be fun. I really like the way he uses lots of little disco snippets and house-style filtering, but in a more high-energy upbeat, party-vibe kinda way - the more tunes out there like this, the happier I'll be - it makes a great positive change for d&b.

7. Ticker Tape - Exile
By the time you read this, it should be out in the shops. It's the second release on Beta from my mate Tim (Exile) who's up in Durham struggling with his finals right now. I think he's gonna do a masters in Electro Acoustics next year, so he'll be able to spend even more time designing plug-ins and experimenting with fourian synthesis. Tim goes really deep into his sound design, we started a track together over Christmas and ended up spending the first three days solid just designing the sounds, crayzeeeee! He's got a great double pack coming out on Moving Shadow really soon too.

8. Forever - John B
This is the hard dancefloor mix of 'Forever', taken from my new album, 'Future Reference' - this version is only available on the limited edition double-pack album sampler, which is coming out on July 9, the week before the full album release. It's my little sister, Hannah, on the vocals, and lots of multitracking computer trickery going on too. I played this as my last track at Movement two weeks ago and they lovvved it! I put a extra couple of bars silence in before the second drop to freeeak everyone out, and it seems to work... I made quite an effort to take it more in the trance direction too, I wanted to capture some of the energy you get in the build up and transfer that into a d&b environment, hopefully without the cheesy 909 snare rolls though. I'll have to see what it sounds like at 33 and send it over to Paul Van Dyk... Ha ha.

9. Grand Central - Nu/Tone
This is the first release on Beta by one of my old friends from University, Dan Gresham. I met him when we both started on the Student Radio station there, he's big on jazz and funk stuff too, the other side of this 12" is a lot more 70s car-chase Mission Impossible styleee. Randall and Grooverider have both been playing this a lot - it really works if you need a mad Amen cruncher to wake people up.

10. The Gate - John B
This one's the latest single of mine to come out on Beta (in the shops now), I thought it was time to do something a bit harder than normal - but still keeping lots of interesting other sounds going on. I enjoyed sorting out all the atmospheric sounds - this was one of the first tracks I did streaming a lot of the audio straight out of my hard disk. I'm planning on doing a remix for release sometime in the autumn.

11. E.Spresso - Nu/Tone
Dan sent me this track a few weeks back, just before Miami and I've been playing it everywhere I go ever since. He recorded all the guitar and percussion live, I really like the loungy latin vibe he's got going on here, it's a fun tune, nice and funky for the summer - it's going to be the second release on my new Chihuahua label - no-one's got these tracks yet, I'll be waiting till the carnival before I let them off. The first release will be two of my tracks, 'Ay Caramba!' and 'Tequila Slammer' both reworked versions - the originals are on the new album, with cute Spanish vocals by Miss Olivia Lopez...

12. Loophole - Majority
I went out for a few dates in America again through April and picked up this promo in a shop in Gainsville, Florida - I love it! Apparently the guys that made it are from Sweden. I love the way it's so fluid and musical, it's different from so much other stuff in the way it's not recognisable built around any loops - there seems to be very little repetition, all the musical parts work well with each other and keep on developing through the track. Lovely!

13. What's On Your Mind? - John B
This one's on my new album, so you can have it by July... It was great working with Nathan Prime's vocals - I used lots of mad EQ effects and multitracking to give them more space and swoosh them about a bit - I finally figured out how to do the garagey 'autotune' effect on his voice too, I'm really pleased how this tune turned out. I'm getting some remixes done and we're gonna put them all out as the next single straight after the album. There's a nice radio mix too, just in case Sarah Cox decides she lurrrves it...

14. Run Out Of Time - John B
This is another one off the album and it's going to be on the pre-release sampler too (the full length 12" version anyway). Although tracks like these aren't the kind to get mad rewind demands when you play them out, I think it's important to try and represent something from the other end of the spectrum whenever I get the chance, (besides, harder tracks have even more impact after you've brought it down a bit). I played this at Movement a couple of weeks ago and I think the people in there really appreciated the change in pace - I've been saving this one for Fabio, the TPs arrived yesterday so I'll be interested to see how it goes down at Swerve...