No. 20: Jamz Supernova
Remaking the media from the ground up with the Future Bounce impresario
Here we go! Not only are we back into regular posting, but it’s back to fortnightly Monday mornings. We are basically superheroes!
This one was always going to happen, mainly because the chance to chat to Jamz Supernova (aka Jamilla Waters) is always a tonic. I’ve run into her a few times at festivals, I did a bit of biog writing for her partner Sam Interface and his Jus Now soca-rave project, my friend Jabru recently built their studio, just last year I interviewed her specifically about her Future Bounce project – and every time we’ve crossed paths, she’s been generous, interesting, informative and super fun. And that’s exactly what she’s like in her work, too.
Through the labels, in clubs and on radio, Jamz is an exemplar of the kind of curator (yes I said the word, but she is) who serves as a guide through the information glut of the digital age. She can take in experimental electronica, in-your-face club / bass music, vernacular sounds from all over the planet, jazz, soul, R&B, hip hop and more under her aegis, but never feel like she’s eclectic for the sake of it: her selections sound right because she’s mapped out a space where they make sense together.
Hearing her followed by Gilles Peterson on BBC 6Music on a Saturday is one of the greatest adverts for old-school linear radio that exists today: the similarities and contrasts between them, the amount of knowledge on display, the intergenerational partnership – between them they do that exact thing we’re always trying to do here of mapping out the territory, but above all else they give you five hours of immense pleasure, of music that makes you feel like humans aren’t such shabby creatures after all.
On top of all her other activities, Jamz has just launched the first season of a podcast Between the Lines where she goes in depth with musicians about a single track. This hyperfocus is the perfect counterpoint to the radical diversity of her playing and programming, and a sterling reminder that breadth and depth aren’t exclusive when it comes to knowledge and understanding. And it is a natural showcase for her as a conversationalist, which as you’ll see there very much is. Jamz is spectacularly affirmatory: her answers always tend to be of the “Yes, and…” variety. Like I say, a tonic. See for yourself!
OK one question I always ask people is: can you remember the first time you heard music that you felt that you could join in with or that was part of something bigger, that you could be part of?
But you know what, I find that question hard, because I feel like I've never known a life that hasn't revolved around music. But I always remember, I must have been in reception, or nursery, and I remember the girls that were older were in the playground, and they were singing and making up this dance for this song. And then I went home. And then I heard the same song. And I was really annoyed, because I couldn't join in, they wouldn't let me join in because I didn't know the song. And so I was just sort of watching them, I had FOMO of like, not knowing the song. And I remember running home. And then when I got home, my mom used to have an alarm radio. And the radio was just on all the time. And the song was playing. And I was like, “Yes, this is the song! Yes, I've found it!” and I could have only been about four or five years old. But that feeling like, “Aha! Now I know it!”
Do you know what the song was?
Yeah, it was Blackstreet – “Don't Leave Me”. That one.1
Amazing, so you were digging from day one.
Yeah, and I had that feeling of being overwhelmed by not knowing the song, I feel like it was a physical jealousy and rage that I felt. But yeah, I was buying tapes from five as well. Going WH Smiths and getting... it might have been the Spice Girls, or I’d mention the Space Jam soundtrack I had as well. My parents met… I found out recently they met at a Latin night when they were 17 in Birmingham. So I feel like even though they got pregnant and had kids quite early, and they couldn't necessarily partake in the next wave of rave culture, they made the parties at home instead.
So, did you grow up around people actually engaging with music, partying to it?
More so like, kitchen dances. Yeah, more kitchen dances, Saturday night, music's loud, that's kind of what I grew up listening to. Not necessarily having people “over” in that way, but more often their own entertainment.
And you grew up in South London.
Yes, my parents were in the Midlands. They moved down to London when I was two. And my mom went to drama school. And then we grew up in like, always south, so like, Catford, New Cross, Sydenham, Anerley. Lots of different places in south east. But one thing that I have always sort of referenced about south east is the sound system culture that you just hear everywhere. Whether it's in the school playground, whether it's the cars driving past, whether it's your neighbour having a barbecue. You hear the diversity through the music that's played in the air. I could never live anywhere else that's not as diverse as what it feels like where I live.
Yeah, for all people talk about gentrification, Rye Lane still has that so much. Every single shop and food store is blasting music.
Even under the bridge, there used to be in Peckham... Because the first raves that we could go to were when we were 14, they were like dancehall raves, because they just let you in, and at the time I didn't really like dancehall, but it was because I couldn't dance. (laughs) That was the reason. But I loved the feeling of the bass, and I liked the idea of how a DJ created the night. But I remember we went out in Peckham, underneath the bridge there was like a club in one little door, you'd go upstairs and it's carpeted and stuff but it was like a proper little shebeen. There was one down by Millwall as well, down by Bermondsey way. But there was a few, there was a club called Le Fez opposite Goldsmith's, which is now a Sainsbury's. I learned what a multi genre night looked like going from Dancehall to UK funky to soca. They'd always end on classic r&b tracks and soul tracks at the end. So that was my first experience of seeing how a night was carried.
Yeah, actually I remember it was a real education when garage came along as a mainstream thing and the first couple of garage nights I went to, they weren't really actually garage nights. It was just a lot of r&b and bashment and everything all in the mix, and really skilled DJs as well. Then seeing Heartless Crew and things like that, you know? It's an older party culture.
Yeah. And they would have seen it from their parents, going back to how my parents would play music at home, it was very much in that spirit. So even when we did have family functions, everyone wanted to play their music. So we're going from like Bob Marley to The Carpenters to Sinead O'Connor, then into some Gregory Isaacs, you're going all around. And then I wanted to put something I listened to on, my uncle wants to play some d'n'b…
Were your family from a Caribbean background then?
Yeah, so my mom is Jamaican and Irish. And then my dad, I didn't grow up with my dad, I didn't live with my dad, but my dad's Cuban and Jamaican.
That's a healthy mix of party cultures and musical cultures there! I've been looking into how much the Cuban influence on Jamaican music was from day one, Rocksteady and everything. It was as soon as I started listening to the drum fills in ska, and I suddenly realised they were just like old Cuban ballroom pre-revolutionary records. And then you find out that Rico Rodriguez and all these famous Jamaican musicians were Cuban or part Cuban.
There was a lot of mixing in between before the fear of communism and America's influence on Jamaica, there was a lot of crossing between. And I think when I found that out it was like, “Yeah, it makes so much sense.” They're three hours away from each other. Why wouldn't you?
It's no wonder that Dancehall then went back to more Latin countries, because it's got that Latin syncopation in it, in those kick drums. And likewise, the Irish connection, like, the Irish Jamaican connection isn't just Guinness.
Haha yep, It goes so far back. It goes back to slavery of course [winces], but also all the way through, even how we grew up in the UK, you know, “No blacks, no dogs, no Irish.”
And Country and Western! Sinead O'Connor was such a deep reggae head as well.
Yeah. And even my dad, he bought that tape, I remember him having, you know, that Sinead O’Connor tape. And my nan met my granddad on my mom's side. So she, an Irish woman, loved reggae. She met him at a blues party in Handsworth.
Excellent. So, Alexis Petridis… when we first came up with the idea for the blog that became the book that then became the blog again, I was describing what we were trying to do, and he said: “So it's occult social history”. “Occult” not as in wizardry or whatever, but occult in its literal meaning of “hidden”. The stuff that's under the surface - and as soon as you start talking about where musical influences come from, you get these little hidden connections that make us all what we are.
It's like our DNA, but also, you don't know it when it's there sometimes. You don't see it when it's in front of you, it's only in hindsight that you're like, “Oh, okay, that makes sense now” or “I understand that now.”
So in a super multicultural area, did you have sense as a kid of other friends having a different relationship to music given their different households or whatever?
Yeah, so in New Cross, you've got like two halves of New Cross, you've got Telegraph Hill, and then you've got... we call it Monson, like behind the Sainsbury's. So I grew up in Monson, and then I had a lot of friends at Telegraph Hill, but there's like a big disparity between wealth, but you kind of go to similar schools. So that I remember other friends who had more traditional music experiences, even by the time they were like eight, they were like, grade seven on the piano, learning the instrument to a different level and understanding classical music. And then there was other households that were, through learning instruments, maybe the drums, now they're super grungy, they're really into grunge culture, Linkin Park. Linkin Park were massive and Green Day were massive when I was at school. But then it was interesting as well, like, noticing the differences between Caribbean and West African people as well. Our next door neighbours were West African, and completely different to us in every way, what they ate, what we heard, how they partied, completely different.
Were you hungry for musical experience from all these things? Did it feed into what you were into?
Yeah, I just wanted to party. So I'd go back to Birmingham every holiday to see my cousins and stuff. I had an older cousin, Cherie. And she was 16, 17, so she was going out. My uncle used to run the doors in Birmingham at all the clubs. So she would always get to go out if he was working, or if he had somebody on the door there. And then I would just get, again, that FOMO. I'd be like, eight, watching her get ready and just being pissed off, like, “What's it like? What are you going to hear?” I wanted to know what was going to happen and watching this beautiful woman get ready and then vanish, in a smoke of perfume she's gone, and then not back to the next morning, and then telling me, whispering to me how good it was in the same bed. So I really wanted that partying experience. I really wanted it, even if when I got there, I sometimes found it a bit overwhelming, which you would at like, 14. And you could only afford one drink. And the adults there… I was a wallflower. I was just watching.
And if you weren't much of a dancer, and it was dancehall dancing, that's quite something to have up in your face!
Yeah, so I was definitely just like against the wall. But watching. I think I was definitely an observer. I think just in terms of sharing music, though, I feel like I was always a sharer of music. Like if I came across something, or you know, we were kind of big into bootleg culture. So I kind of would often make CDs for my friends as well. If I had an album or my mom had an album, then my uncle was gonna come down and dub it or vice versa. There was a circulation of sharing music.
Was your mind set on being involved with music or clubs or those kind of social worlds early on? Or did you have other ambitions?
I wanted to be a TV presenter at first. Because everyone was like to me in school, “You're so bubbly, you should be a TV presenter” Because I grew up watching MTV Base and, like, The Lick. It was always to do with music. So I was like, I can't sing, not gonna be able to sing, but maybe I could talk about music and be a part of it. I didn't really think of radio, I don't know why radio never crossed my mind. But TV was the most literal thing, I used to watch T4, Freshly Squeezed, MTV, MTV Base, The Box, all those music channels. I could sit there all day and watch them, and then like it'd be such a great moment when you'd have, like a deep dive, like Trevor Nelson with Mary J. Blige, or someone like that. I even went on to do work experience at MTV Base and Channel 4, Freshly Squeezed and seeing how music and entertainment worked together, but it was only when I went to the BRIT School that I saw... I went to go and just have a little look around with a friend, I wasn't gonna go there. And then I saw the radio studio and I was like “Oh my god” like, ding! This is better, closer to who I am then probably TV, so that's what sold it for me.
What about more grassroots media as a kid? Was Channel U2 or pirates or anything part of your life?
Yeah, Channel U definitely. I wasn't really... my dad, I had to wait because he had Sky and I didn't have Sky at my mum's. But he's religious. My dad's a Jehovah's Witness. He became a Jehovah's Witness when I was five so I'd have to wait for him to go to the meetings for me to watch Channel U (laughs) But I remember there being like Crazy Titch on there, you know, early N Dubz, Bashy. And Me and my brother would watch Lord of the Mics. I've got an older brother, he's two years older. So he would bring home the Lord of the Mics DVDs, and then that would be some of our Friday nights at home. And then pirate radio I got into when I was 13. I used to live down by Millwall, and I think it was Freeze FM or something like that? It was the first time I heard Donae’o, the “Bounce” song3. I heard Baby Blue, I heard Sway. For some reason it felt like every time in the morning I woke up the same song was playing, and I was like, “Oh my God, that's so crazy.” And this is before I knew what a pre-record was. Every time I was doing the same thing I get in the shower the same songs playing like “What?”
Groundhog Day, pirate Groundhog Day
Yeah exactly, no one's in yet, too early.
I'm just looking at my grime DVDs on the shelf now, that era was…
[peering] I Got Lyrics?
Yeah. I'm trying to remember all of them, because there was all the Lord of the Mic ones, there was Risky Roads, Practice Hours... It was such a unique way of seeing into a culture. I’d just moved to London at that point, I was definitely an outsider as far as anything like that was concerned, but to get this really up close lo-fi view into, like, not just the tracks, but people's lives was wild.
Yeah, being in the basement4, and also seeing like... you know, to us it was like watching boxing. You don't know if someone there's gonna flip out. Have you seen the one where Bashy gets like super in his head and he goes off and he starts having a moment because like him and Ghetts, it just like, explodes. He's like, “Nah, man, you can't talk to me like that.” That for us, it was like watching boxing. It was sport.
That's really interesting. In any kind of creative thing, you're only as good as your last output. But with clashing there's so much more at stake.
Yeah, yeah, definitely. Your manlihood, your masculinity as well, being on show, you know.
Yeah. So, I mean, you mentioned masculinity, and pirates and everything were a very macho culture, all male lineups, and competitive in that macho way. Did you think “Oh, there's barriers up for me”?
I just didn't think that I couldn’t! I didn't think of it, it didn't come into my head. Like I'd go and watch DJs and never thought there aren't women, I didn't think that, and then I honestly feel like realistically, the first woman that I experienced as a DJ, not like a presenter but as a DJ behind the decks would have been Annie Mac when I got to the BBC. So I would have been like 19, 20 and then I was like “Oh! There's a lady doing this!” Because a lot of DJs that were on 1Xtra by the time I got there... No one was specialist. No one was specialist, they were all daytime. So it's like women do the daytime thing, you know, the entertainment. And then the men do the specialist. That's kind of how I saw it. Because even people like Jenna G5, I used to grow up listening to her, but she was in the daytime. It wasn't a specialist show. I know there was women there definitely, your Sarah Loves and stuff. I'm not discounting that. Even Flight was there, massive shows, that just probably because of the times I was going to bed, I wasn't hearing. But when I got to 1Xtra, and I saw what was happening at Radio One and I saw Annie Mac and she's like this powerful woman who's deep in electronic music and everyone loves and respects. I was just kind of like “Wow”, I was kind of shocked. I was shocked.
I think it's understated how revolutionary she was in a lot of ways.
I know she's an obvious person to say, but she really was the first person, you know....
I mean, I remember when it was kind of like a symbolic changing of the guards when her and Pete Tong swapped places on a Friday night.
Right!
And suddenly she was then the headline show and it was like a generational thing. It was like a diversity thing as well in terms of the music because she was bringing all of that kind of nu rave and electro and all of that stuff where he represented the old house and techno generation.
Yeah. And that was around the time that I started working there. So you were talking about, like, 2010. And then she was selling out KOKO. Now people are selling out KOKO a lot, but it was crazy, like 1000 people, you know?
Yeah. And building her brand outside of Radio One as well was very, very interesting. Because, and I wrote a piece for The Guardian about it6, about that time, that you had Rinse, Red Bull Music Academy, a whole set of things that an artist would orbit, and Annie Mac Presents was another brand amongst all those. Someone like Katy B would have these relationships with all these different entities, as it were. It felt like a shift away from the monolithic big media brands maybe?
Yeah, definitely. Subculture and ownership. The idea that you could have ownership was like “Oh, okay!”
Did you have any kind of battle plan by this point? You've gone through the BRIT School and then decided radio was for you?
Yeah, so I had a big battle plan. I was like, right, I'm gonna leave college, I'm not going uni, don't want to do that. I know everything [laughs]. The BRIT school is amazing. I know people think we're just like, twinkling jazz hands. But you were doing everything on a micro level. We had TV studios, we had radio studios, we were running outside broadcasts, we were throwing parties, we were doing what I do now, or what I went on to do, just on a smaller scale, with lower stakes. But it was still the same thing, same desk, same recording things, same way of editing, we were doing it. So I was like, “Right, I don't need to go uni, I just want to get straight stuck in.” And so I did work experience and then ended up with the BBC on the last one that I did, and then basically never left.
But I thought “I think I'll be there for like, two years, and I'll be 21, and then they'll decide that I should be on air.” And then it just didn't work like that at all. Because I wasn't good enough. Because I hadn't had the experience, and this is a national station. And I had to grow. That's when I joined Reprezent7, at the same time. So I joined Reprezent. And initially, because I loved listening to 1Xtra, but I LOVED the access to the music, like imagine that I'd come from the Limewire days, or the YouTube ripping days. And now I get to the BBC. And there's all this access to music, like I can pretty much find any song and if it's not in the system, then it'll be in another system. And if it's not in that system, I can find it on a CD. And one of my jobs was, we were digitising the shows. So we were putting all the old shows that were on CDs into the computer to archive them. So I was getting to listen to all this spread of shows from the last sort of 20 years as I was digitising them. I could write down song names, there was tracklists as well, which we wouldn't always get access to, and then people like Mistajam who were doing these multi genre shows, like if he had a Jam Hot, I could just find it and take it (laughs) because it's there! I know it's terrible, but I did. Then I'd make all my own CDs and then go to Reprezent and play the music. So I started to figure out who I was and what I liked. I was sort of doing it very much like a mirror to his show. I remember Dubphizix and “Marka”8, loving that, even Jus Now… now obviously Sam Jus Now is my partner..
“Reader, I married him.” [laughs]
[laughs] But I was a big fan, I was a really big fan of Jus Now and I remember playing “Tun Up”9 on Reprezent. And also around that time blog culture was massive. So there was a blog called PinBoard, and that's where you'd find out about your new SBTRKTs and the Jessie Wares and Donae’os before they were being played anywhere else, and some of the American stuff. Iman Omari is a name that springs to mind. Sort of like the alt-soulful stuff. And then SoundCloud, that was just the biggest revelation, and I actually remember, I didn't really understand how SoundCloud works, in terms of I didn't understand the copyright of music, essentially, coming from bootleg background. So basically one day Trevor Nelson gave me a Robert Glasper CD of a new Robert Glasper and I thought, “Oh, I'm gonna upload it to SoundCloud.” I basically tried to rip the whole thing and upload it to SoundCloud and then couldn't understand why I was getting blocked and threatened. I think it was the Black Radio album.
Yeah, the amount of people that were ripping promos, the leaking just went crazy. I almost got into so much trouble because one PR company failed to register my change of address and they were just sending like Adele and Sugababes albums to the wrong address and if that ended up online, I would have been dead.
Yeah, of course they were watermarked as well... But I just remember that then SoundCloud being like... that was actually something... so I was learning at 1Xtra, but they weren't on SoundCloud. And they didn't know what's happening on SoundCloud, and they didn't know what was happening in the blogs. I felt like that was my one up on them. Like I've learnt here, now I'm telling you, you know?
Yeah, definitely. And the blogging culture, there was a lot of fear amongst old school media, right through the noughts. I remember being told everything is flooded, that everyone's overloaded with information. It's all gonna kind of somehow splodge together into one undifferentiated mess. Or only pop music matters nowadays, there's no underground because everyone can have everything all at once. But that blogging culture, which leads directly to what someone like you, or Sherelle, or what lots of modern DJs do, gave people actually hyper-specific knowledge...
Yeah, oh my god. And we could connect with people from around the world, like at one point my whole identity was SoundCloud. I remember when I had too many copyright strikes. I was in Berlin, and I wrote to the headquarters, like “Yo, give me my account back, I just built like 5000 followers, I can't lose it, this is my life.” It was massive to me. And part of it was that every artist that I was playing was from SoundCloud, every artist that was doing guest mixes was from SoundCloud, so I'd play them on Reprezent, and be like “Look, here's your chance to get played on UK radio”, but then I'd put the show on SoundCloud, and then they would repost it. So there was this kind of cyclical circle that I'd do for two years, and every show that I did on Reprezent, would go on SoundCloud literally within hours, and then start to get listeners and things like that. So it was this really special sort of DIY time and feeling like I had friends all around the world, that I could crash on anyone's sofa, you know?
And the comments, the fact that the comments are so visible by people's little icons popping up gives it, even though it's not real time, it gives it an interactivity that's a bit like radio.
Yeah, yeah, definitely. Definitely. And I felt like that idea of learning how to build a community basically started from there. And that opened me up even further to electronic music, because I dabbled... I loved UK funky, but a lot of it was the vocal stuff that I loved and probably the classics, I was probably more of a mainstream UK funky raver by the time I was old enough to rave legally, and then with the SoundCloud sort of edit culture, because I think a lot of it always started with r&b for me, so again, the UK funky vocal songs, but then the some of the edit culture, and then going a little bit deeper and a little bit further, and then basically finding yourself in a place that doesn't have a remix or have any words or have any samples within it at all and then being like “This is sick, I want to play this” or “I want to work this into my sets.” So I definitely feel like it was a gateway for me in electronic music to what I liked.
Yeah, and of course funky was, at that point, really melting into the 130 BPM post dubstep Night Slugs... There was that wicked compilation that Soul Jazz did. Something Box.
FWD? Isn't it the Plastic People one?
No, no, no, it was white and red. It was called something like Speakerbox or something like that10. It was Kris Jones, who used to manage Benga, and it was all that sort of Hardhouse Banton really deep instrumental UK funky. You would hear all of that stuff next to... and Roska and Cooly G of course were crossing over into that world as well.
That's kind of what I came to on the other side of my 20s, was going back to all the things that I would have missed when I was a bit more oblivious to what was happening, you know? Yeah. And going to Bristol helped actually. The first time I went to Bristol I was like, 24, and I was like, “Oh my god, it's like, cool music everywhere!” you know?
Yeah, yeah, because Bristol.... it's weird that jungle never left Bristol.
Or grime, to an extent.
Yeah, true. So were you also doing the club DJing and building that at the same time?
Not really, no. I wanted to. I wanted to be a club DJ. I was just sort of playing for friends really, initially. And whoever would have me but the sets that I was (playing), I don't think they were that... they were probably very edit heavy, multi genre style vibes. And then I shifted, I got put on a different direction again, going to 1Xtra, getting a show on 1Xtra. Initially it was a daytime show, then doing daytime, and then doing the specialist, and the only space for me which I wanted to do was like an alternative r&b show at the time. But there was always the part of me that... I don't want to play r&b in the club. I just find it really boring. Never really enjoyed it. Now I can find a viable edit, but I just never enjoyed mixing r&b, I just didn't find any joy in it. Like, you know, it's quite quick, it's verse / chorus, you really really have to know the music, there's not that much spontaneity for me personally. So I always wanted to play electronic stuff out. But I didn't get much of a chance to. I'm trying to think when I did start, I think it was when I started my own night. I was like, “Right, well, no one's booking me, so I'm gonna book myself next to people that I would like to play lineups with”. So we had like Roska, we had Branko11, we had some guys from Amsterdam, FS Green12, Full Crate, on that kind of tip. We had Star Slinger13…
So these were people you'd been making contact with through essentially playing their music on radio, at what point did you start to have this kind of wider world view, because Branko obviously connects into the global stuff that you're well known for now.
Well I didn’t get to travel much growing up and I didn’t know anyone who had, so through music and the internet I was able to immerse myself in different parts of the world and learn even if I didn’t have the means to physically be there. But the big thing I think was working on Toddla T’s show. I worked on Toddla for a couple of years as an assistant producer and then as a producer. It was definitely working on his show. And again, having access to his music, which he was more than kind to share. And we talked about it and I'd ask him questions about it. And then I could kind of go on my own little wormholes from it. And there was an element on SoundCloud anyway, some of the baile funk stuff, even then there was loads of baile funk edits that were flying around, we didn't know what it was exactly, or have the term for it, or even the real origins of it, other than it's a sort of Brazilian beat, but we didn't really know how deep it was in Brazil, I think a lot of people were just kind of jumping on it. But I think yeah, working on Toddla kind of led me to like your Brankos, your Enchufadas. And also at that same time there used to be, I don't know if you remember this guy called Benzi14? American guy.
It rings a bell.
He used to do like... you know, like, Diplo had his show, and then they'd have the two mixes in the show. He was one of the regulars. And I think he used to do like a kind of brostep mix. But he had this incredible online music sharing site. And anybody could upload to it, if they were members.. he basically created this network of people, so he gave me and Toddla free lifetime access. So we could just go on there, and then it was all in genres. And then you could find music on there to play out, promos and stuff.
There's a few of those that DJs and labels run. I guess they’re a bit like the record pools of old. And also the torrent places like Oink and WhatCD and stuff like that. They became real communities of... because you would know uploaders you would start to recognise names.
Yeah exactly, it's not like as illegal as previous activity (laughs) like, you knew them. And then it was just organised. So helpful.
Yeah. And those were such repositories. And a lot of them ended up getting shut down. Oink certainly did. And that was one of the biggest repositories for musical knowledge because people would digitise, they would take such pride in digitising not just the music, but all the artwork and all the credits and everything. So people could learn so much in that era. I'm sure there are still corners of the internet that exist.
They exist somewhere yeah, maybe not as neat, but they definitely do. But I just loved the fact that you could be like, “Okay, I've heard this baile funk thing being said a few times now, let me click on this folder”. And then all these baile funk songs would appear or…
And it's funny, actually, because every so often it'll roll around, like baile funk is the new thing, and then there'll be a hype cycle. But actually there was such a continuity, because all of that stuff you're describing goes back through a decade at least, in the early 2000s, and MIA, and all of the nu rave stuff, there was a lot of the Brazilian stuff going on in that15. So there were foundations to that sort of incorporation, I guess. On Reprezent, did you feel that there was like community building going on within that as an organisation?
Definitely. 100%. I mean, pretty much everyone I know, in my circle of friends through music and it came from Reprezent. Sherelle used to help out on my show a little bit and film some club nights for me. Munya Chawawa was on the station at the same time as me, Martha16 used to be... Martha, because there was quite a bit of an age gap at the time between us, she was on after me with her school mates. They would be in their uniform. I would have been 19, they would have been about 15 I think. And it was one of the links that they had with the school that these girls could do a show. And then they each... Henrie17, Henrietta was part of that cohort with Martha as well. So, yeah, a lot of people that I interact with kinda often or see out and about came from Reprezent, Snoochie Shy as well. Yeah, I could go on. Jeremiah, Kenny…
Did it feel... because I mean, most of those names you've mentioned are women, did you feel that there was something kind of quietly revolutionary, or loudly revolutionary, even going on?
I don't know if we thought about it like that, necessarily. I'm trying to think of what the steps were between someone like, say Annie, because there were steps in between... I got quite friendly with Madam X18 early on in my 20s, and she was already DJing on a kind of underground level, and then your Barely Legals and Flava Ds. There were those people that I saw over there, that felt like a kind of natural progression, then you had your Monkis, your B.Traits, then suddenly there's loads of people around, so didn't feel necessarily revolutionary, but just more in terms of like, nobody really cared and they were just going to do it anyway.
Which is crazy. I mean, I think being the older generation, having grown up with the music press of the 90s, there was always like, “Is this the moment for women in dance music?” or “Here's some great women in dance music”, patronising articles, and then when it finally came, because it was a huge wave, actually, within a decade, things were completely upended, no-one wanted to write about it, because all the previous attempts to write about representation of women in dance music had just looked ridiculous in the past.
Yeah. And I think it was just kind of like, everyone will talk about that is “How hard is it to be a female DJ?” is the most annoying question that probably every woman has heard. And the idea of the female DJ being the brand, like it's your genre. “Oh, she's a female DJ.” You know what's like, even inspiring me right now is the producers and the level of music that I'm hearing in my inbox. Like right now, it blows my mind. I'm not a producer, I don't have much of an inkling to want to sit and learn a DAW, but I listen to people and I'm like, “Oh my god, this is insane”, man or woman, but like, they tend to be women at the moment. And I'm like, “This is the best thing I've heard, this is exciting me. I want to play this right now.”
Yeah. I mean, it's difficult for artists out there because there's so many. There's so much. This is an underrated fact I think, that there's so much brilliance, it is actually hard to be heard amongst it. I watch my son… my son is 14 and producing, and just the access to knowledge that he has, through YouTube and Reddit, he was able to become amazing. Like he'd have professional mixdowns within six months of starting to do it. I wasn't pushing him at all, but him and his friends, and he'll just be like swapping stems with some random kid in buttfuck Arizona who has to hide his dubstep from his parents because they think it's devil music.
The access is great, and the speed of technology, that's another thing as well.
Yeah. And it's only getting more mental because of AI and because of the ability to rip vocals and all the rest of it is
[Coughs] not that we would... but maybe for a cheeky edit in a set.
Completely. I mean, I'll send you them what I did with Arlo Parks on a Soul II Soul beat (laughs)
Oh I'd love to hear that. Yes please.19
One of the most legit criticisms I had over Bass, Mids, Tops was, I'd only ask the questions about gender to the women, which is fair - but then again, you were part of a big wave. So that's why I raise it.
I never understood why we shouldn't... You know, I understand why people didn't want to talk about it, I do understand that, because I think if that's the only line of questioning that you're getting.. but I also think it's important to talk about as well, for me personally, I think it's important to talk about, I saw Annie Mac, and I was like “Fuck this, I'm doing it”, you know, that was it. And then I never really thought about the barriers. Because I think also I already knew that there was always going to be barriers as a black woman. So I was always taught that whatever I wanted to get into, there will be barriers for me as a black woman. So it didn't really make me think twice or walk into a different thing, because I already was told from very young that I have to keep my head high. And I think Sherelle can probably attest to that as well.
Yeah. So as you got into the club DJing, you're throwing your own parties. Was that with the Future Bounce brand by that point?
Yeah.
So that's where your aesthetic found a central point?
Yeah, from the radio to having a moment in the club. And I had support from Reprezent that sort of helped me mould it into a club idea. I remember we made a mix CD that we were going to give out and invite people to the party, things like that. So the first one, the first party that we did, loads of people from Reprezent came to it and supported. But for me bringing together the life of what I was doing on the radio, but in a club setting, giving me the chance to actually DJ because no one else was going to put me on, and separating myself a little bit as well on the BBC.
And did you... I mean, exactly in the way that Annie Mac Presents gave her identity, did you find that it kind of helped you sidestep the genre questions having that name?
The Future Bounce name? Even the lineups, because I start to notice that the lineups that I'd put together, I'd get rebooked on those lineups in other places. So it almost felt like a little bit of a magic manifestation, if I put my name next to Roska, probably next year I'll be put next to Roska. you know, same with Branko, These people are still people I play with to this day. But it was like planting the seed that I could be on those lineups, and worthy of being on lineups with these people as well. And then it allowed me to side hop genres, people expecting me to only play r&b, but she's already got this night that's doing other things, too.
Right. So you didn't have to go “post dubstep r&b-influenced global jazz fusion” whatever.
Yeah, I didn't have to say it. And I think that's what's always been nice. It's been a longer road, I think. I think when you play across the board, or you're not always specific in one thing. And especially if it's sort of sub sub sub... it's not just r&b, or it's not just hip hop, or it's not just techno, it's not just house. I think when you operate in the sub genres, it can be harder to blow up, if that's what you want, to blow up, because it's not straight and linear. And there's a level of explaining to people. But I'm glad that everything that I've done has led me to a place where it makes sense to me. And it's starting to make sense to other people now. (laughs)
So most of the stuff we talked about musically has either been broadly club music in that kind of multicultural club / bass sense, or broadly black music, as in soul / r&b type stuff - “urban”, I guess. What point did you feel that you were also overlapping into what you might call the Giles Peterson world, that kind of jazzier side?
Again, it came from SoundCloud. So I started playing this guy from Montreal. I can't remember his name exactly. But he was making, like, SoundCloud music with loads of jazz elements. And there was a guy working on my show called Jesse Howard, and he'd been going to Steamdown and a couple of the stuff that was happening in Lewisham, maybe at The Fox & The Firkin, but he was like, “You know if you like this, you should check out like Ezra Collective?”. And then he played me Ezra Collective and I was like, “Oh, this is pretty sick. I want to play this one 1Xtra. No one else is playing it. I think we should be playing it” Also I never thought of jazz in that way. I'd never seen young black boys play jazz. So I was like, this is really intriguing to me, or to see people that look like me, and from similar areas, have these magic skills that I've never seen anyone have before. I was just really taken with it. So I started playing them on 1Xtra, that was like 2017, I think. And then started playing more of it. And the more you play, the more you get part of it, and they hadn't had the support on 1Xtra. They wanted the support. They wanted a black station to acknowledge that they were black music makers. And I think sometimes that 1Xtras view was very narrow at the time of what black music could be, and if it didn't fit in these boxes, then it's really hard to get a look in.
And it's crazy, like now, Ezra Collective did a Radio One session for Jack Saunders' first show. They're bonafide... transcended... It's incredible to watch and to see but those sorts of things. And then I started going a little bit left. Then I was like, right, black music needs to be like that. So I started playing punk, I was the first person playing Hak Baker20. I was quite early on people like Greentea Peng. Obviously that does fit on 1Xtra but she wasn't getting played. And then I just was, hell for leather, I'm going to play as much weird black shit as I can. And it probably wasn't even that weird, but in the confines of 1Xtra it was. And then that's kind of when 6Music were like, “Oh, you seem to be playing a lot of artists that we're playing”. And first, they wanted me to cover the Funk & Soul show. Because I'd already had that r&b pigeonhole before, I was like, “No, no, thank you. That's not, that's not for me right now.” And then the Gilles slot came up, and I was like, “Yeah, that's me. That's what I'd like to be.”
Yeah. It's really interesting. Because just as you were saying that... Elijah has been posting a lot this week about 1Xtra, Capital XTRA and those constrictions on what black music can be. And it's so important to have somewhere that showcases variety. We've finally got to a stage now where there is a kind of... I don't know if this is the right word, but black alternative music finally, whereas once you just had Tricky, and then you had Kele Okereke. Now you've got Dean Blunt and Space Afrika and...
So much, yeah. And that's not to say they weren't there. But in terms of being able to have a wider community and to get the kind of support in order for them to sustain. That was hard. But yeah, they were there before, but now they're able to come through as themselves, rather than coming through... I dunnno…
...having to force themselves through the NME / alternative identity, I guess.
Yeah, definitely. And I think what would happen is a lot of people would fall through the gaps. Like, that's not 1Xtra, that's not Radio One, or Radio One think it's too black and 1Xtra think it's not black enough. So I felt like I was on a crusade. And I was educating myself. All the music that I play, that I learn about, I am learning in that moment, and I'm not going to be scared to tell you I wasn't listening to Night Slugs at 16, I listened to it when I was 25. And I was like, “Oh my god, I missed this.” Because you were in bodycons dancing to “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes”21 the funky version, that's why you missed it (laughs) I'm not scared to be upfront and open with it. I think there's just too much... (groans)
Right. It's part of our mission to tell those honest stories, because it is just as important that you went to the naff indie club or the cheesy funky club, or whatever it is. Because that then is part of the story of the music. It's interesting to see where have been the crucibles of what you're working with now. Everyone knew Plastic People was important. But we only realise as time passes how important, because so many of those jazz guys got their breadth of musical influence going and dancing to Theo Parrish at Plastic People or to Benji B or whoever it was.
Yeah. Deviation was like Mecca.
And it just showed people those different ways of joining the dots in a way that doesn't mush it all into mush.
Yeah, exactly. And I think I still love somebody that is able to do that, like I watched Gilles play on Sunday, and for me, he is the best to do it. The way he connects, the way he plays, what he plays, how he gets in and out and stuff. There's so much passion and love of what he does, and love of the songs that he's playing, that it kind of overshadows everything. You're just in that moment. And you might not even like the song, you might not even like the song, you think “This is weird, where the fuck is this going?” But it's the passion.
Do you mean in the club or on the radio?
Both. But I saw him at a DJ set.
Right, it's funny that the only times, just given the nature of my job, the only times I ever see Gilles play it’s abroad, it will be because I'm at the same festival or whatever. And it's just amazing to see how he... there is such a focus on taking the message to the people in that way that is just such a pleasure to receive.
Yes, exactly that. I had a gig at Cross The Tracks22, I'd just sort of come back from being... summer was... it was a really busy summer, but I just had had a baby. So she was about five months, Forest. And I don't know what happened, I just suddenly had all this like big anxiety. I didn't know what to play, all my family was there and they drunk all my rider. (laughs) And I just couldn't think how to start, and I was coming off the back of Channel One. And I just couldn't think where to start this set. Then Gilles was playing in the tent nearby, and I had a bit of time, so I just went and watched him. And then he started super weird, like some super-left percussive song to start with, and then was playing like different jingles in between it and he just did what the fuck he wanted. And I was like, “Oh, okay, it's fine… What Would Gilles Do? Alright, cool.” And then I just started my set with like, a palate cleanser. I didn't play reggae like that normally. But I played a reggae song, and just let it play to the end, and I was like, “Right. Now, let's go!”
Yeah. Nice. And who else around you do you see who gives you hope, or who is creating their own spaces, or just pushing things in the right directions?
I think, for me, I love seeing older women as well, because I do think there was a big chunk of time that we didn't see that. You know, we talked about the waves, but there were women that had been in previous waves that were not getting… that had become invisible. So I feel like seeing your Paulettes23, your Marcia Carrs24, even Mary Anne Hobbs, seeing Nemone. Yeah, seeing older women, I'm just like, “Oh! Let's go all the way!” I want to be as old as a Rodigan and play, I want to still be on air like Annie Nightingale was. Still be DJing, even if people have to wheel me out like, let's go! I want to still have that. Still do it to the end. And I think we're seeing people that have been able to, or are going on to be able to, because I think that was sort of missed at one point in that lineage. And then I think who else do I feel like.... I thought of someone the other day but it's gone out of my head, there was literally somebody that I was like, “Ah, I really rate that.”... Do you know what, Niks, the Black Artist Database25, I like what she's producing, I like what she's doing with the Black Artist Database, I like how vocal she is. She's not just like a producer / DJ, she's like a community leader as well. I find her really inspiring. I find Sherelle a force of nature, and I love being around her and we can reminisce on when we were younger, but I'm inspired by her. And I feel like people like that, I want to keep up with you know? Like, in a fun, competitive way, but not in a “Why do they have that?” way but in a running mate kind of way. Like I like finding running mates and being so inspired that I want to go and have a mix or…
Yeah, watching what her, and what Errol and Alex26 are doing, in terms of putting themselves into big institutions, putting themselves into those museums and cultural institutions and stuff on their own terms has been really amazing.
Yeah, definitely. And then you can find that... also inspiration, I feel like, for me, it's kind of working my way backwards as well. You know, filling in some of the gaps, and finding the joy in that, to go back and learn about things and do deep dives on things. I've done a lot of new music. I've been a big part of new music, new music, new music, shouting about new music. But I do feel like a majority of my time now needs to be going back, or or listening to things that I haven't listened to, like I'm finding more inspiration in that than going through the last seven days of Bandcamp. I'd rather pinpoint a wormhole... like the other day, I wasn't really feeling anything that was new. There is stuff in there, but if you're doing it every single week, it can sometimes be a bit like, “Do I like this or am I just trying to fill a space on the show?” So I was like, “Nah, fuck this. Stop, just stop for a second.” I started reading this article about Danyèl Waro, this maloyan artist from Reunion Island. And I was like, “Oh my god, I've never heard of this before. Never heard this music, actually never really heard of this place. It sounds pretty cool. Let's go on a dive into it.27” And then that sort of thing inspires me to make the kind of radio that I want to make, as long as I'm learning, and the people that are listening are learning, and people feel heard and seen. And those are the kind of messages that I got during that time.
Yeah, I think it's one thing that you learn when you're over glutted with music, sometimes you just have to focus on one thing for your own sanity, or just to cleanse your ears or whatever.
Right, and then this week, I was like, “Actually, there's loads of great new stuff!” I just needed a moment, maybe once a month now I'm gonna have like, the wormhole. And I'll just pick a thing, and that's half an hour of the show.
And it reminds you as well that every serious musical work of merit could be all you need. Just that one thing. I remember years ago talking to Graham Coxon from Blur, and he just said, “You know, if I lost everything, lost all my records but my Beatles record, say, I would happily listen to my Beatles records forever.” Or there was one I can't remember, some Scottish folk guitarist he’d gotten into and he was like, “I could sit with the box set of that and listen to that forever.” And it's like, yeah! You don't have to have everything all the time.
No, definitely not. I mean... don't get me wrong, everything's still archived. I still got it. But yeah, I think it's just taking your foot off that pedal as well. And I think that's how taste is developed too. Otherwise, we're being carried, and I feel like taste has been like... For me, every time I've been strong in my taste, that's when I've had the most success in my career is, when I've said “No, I'm not into that”. Or “I think I'm gonna take a risk on this because I believe in it.” And I feel like my taste is like the most important thing that I have. And if it gets tainted by rushing through trends, or just following what's happening without thinking or critiquing, or looking around me, then I think I'd lose that. And that's kind of partly why I left working at major labels, because I was like “You're just tainting my taste.”
Yeah. You don't have to think of that as good taste. You're not saying “My tastes are superior”. It's just saying this is... you know, it's an overused phrase, but this is my truth.
Yeah, definitely. And that's what people resonate with I think.
Well, I haven't asked about the label, but we kind of covered that when I spoke to you for Sound of Life. I'll link into that, so that we've got you talking about the label, but how do you balance all of it? Does it feel balanced at the moment, the label and the radio and the club DJing, parenthood and everything else?
No, not really if I'm honest. Like, I feel like it's always a bit swings and roundabouts. That's one thing I know, I'll give myself grace that... I always say, my phrase is “Not all plates can spin at the same time”. So in the last five months, different plates have taken different precedents, and that's maybe why I felt like at one point, I focused on the podcast, and radio took a little bit of a backseat, but at the beginning of the year was really focused on getting all the label releases ready, so I forgot about my DJing and I hadn't been hadn't even just had a mix for fun, you know? And then now Summer's coming so now DJing is going to be at the forefront and then maybe I might have to pause on the podcast. Nothing happens at the same time. So there's always that feeling like time is running out but then also I have a bit more perspective, having a family and having family life at six o'clock, you know what? It's not done. It's not finished... It is what it is. I'm not gonna interfere with dinner time or bedtime to do that one last email. It can wait.
Yeah, it's a glorious realisation, and actually means you end up doing the thing that you're supposed to be doing better… eventually.
Exactly, like the other day I had all this admin stacked up, and I had to help my mom with something. so I did it from hers, but the stuff that had been on my list for a month I did in one hour. So I feel like the best thing that I can do now is lean into the weeks when I'm super productive. And give myself grace for the weeks where I'm a little bit slower, my brains a little bit somewhere else. I think as long as I feel like I'm creating something for me once a week, away from other people's agenda, then I feel quite fulfilled.
And is there an ambition? Or have you now got all the things and it's just pushing them forward? Do you have big goals?
Um, I don't really know. to be honest. I love where I'm at. I love what I'm doing. And even with the DJing, I think it would go into quite interesting territory with the DJing. I think due to the lack of clubs, the cost of living will have enough of a knock on effect on the DJing. But I find joy in playing small clubs. I like small clubs, I like small venues, I like small, intimate spaces, I want to play a bit of a longer set. So maybe me leaning into going more grassroot is not a bad thing. I think as long as my ambition would be to make money elsewhere. I don’t know in what, but make money elsewhere, so I'm able to just enjoy the radio and the DJing without the pressure of having the financial pressures of it. Of having to do this gig, or having to be the biggest DJ. I don't think I want to be the biggest DJ anymore. I think at one point, I did want to be the Annie Mac of DJing and but the older I get, the more specialist I get, the more curious I get, the more that means that I'd rather pay to nicher crowds, which means they're not going to be in their tens of 1000s.
Yeah, and you know, what did Plastic People tell us? That a 200 capacity club can change the world!
Definitely. Yeah. And I think that intimacy and the way that you play when you are in this close knit vibration of people, that's what I'm striving for. And that's what I think is real longevity. There's longevity in that, and it shouldn't be snuffed out. Obviously people have ambition, that's great as well, if you want to be playing to millions of people, but I feel so disconnected in those moments. ,
Yeah, well, amen. I mean, if we need anything right now, it is supporting the grassroots culture across the board, whether it's... the last person I interviewed for the for the Substack was Jude Rogers, and she's doing it in a little Welsh town with folk clubs, and noise gigs and whatever, whether it's playing jazz and broken beat, or whether it's playing folk, whatever, we need that so much now.
Yeah, all do our bit. Definitely.
Fantastic. Well, on that beautifully positive note...
Yeah, that's perfect. Thank you so much.
THAT one. It’s a banger.
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