(cont'd from part 1)
CL: Now, I know you don't like to be...you've been trying not to have any
labels put on you, but...
LV: But then that's one thing that everybody always says to me, everyone
says Oh, I know you don't like labels.... I mean it is true, the question's
fine.
CL: But I would imagine that the "trip-hop" label is being thrown at you left
and right! Do you not like that?
LV: Oh no! It'd be fine for some record, I don't mind records being
categorized, it's just that me...
CL: But you as an artist is something else entirely.
LV: Yeah, I'd never want to be known for one thing---well, maybe to one
person: someone that likes Plug, say, that doesn't like Wagon Christ; and
that'd be no problem--but I don't just want to be known for doing any kind of
certain thing. Apart from "techno"; I think that's a fine category. I think
it's really
broad, but it's gotten a bit narrower recently in people's eyes, but
originally it
was a huge category for anyone using technology, or electronic music. Those
ones are fine, but when it gets specific like trip-hop, or fucking...I mean
trip-hop,
God--nobody knows what it is! DJ Shadow doesn't know what it is, and he's
the original man! God knows. Bizarre.
CL: Do you see yourself as part of a scene at all?
LV: Yeah, definitely! A kind of bedroomy-type thing. All of the people I
know,
all of my friends make music in their rooms--I mean, there's not many because
I've only got four good mates--but that's the one I think I fit into
definitely. Mike
Paradinas [Mu-ziq], and Richard [James, the Aphex Twin], and Jeremy, who
can't really do stuff at the moment because he hasn't actually got any
gear--his
four track broke and he's got no money. But he lives with Graham, who's the
guy who does the Boymerang stuff, and Graham's got all the gear, so he does
stuff with him. But that's the scene that I feel part of, really. Quite
small. I'm
sure there'll be more people making it from their rooms in the future; it's
just a
shame you can't quite release it from your room yet! Cut out all the shit
with the
record companies!
CL: Given that, then, do you have plans to be doing other sorts of styles?
LV: No, I don't really think like that, I never sort of think
even...Actually, the only
time I do is when I've got, say, a Wagon Christ album: When that comes up
I'll
have to think Right, shit, I've got to do--because I don't want to do drum &
bass
stuff for Wagon Christ--I only do that kind of.... I don't want to do any
more
pseudonym stuff unless, I was thinking recently, I might at some point try to
have a commercial chart, go for a hit or something, yeah that'd be fun!
Because I used to be a pop lad when I was younger, follow the charts, and
there's still a lot of that in me somewhere, not wanting to be a star in any
of that
way because I really want to be background and have no credit for it at all,
but
just want to have a hit, sell loads of records, that'd be great. But no, for
the Mo'
Wax thing I just used the name Luke Vibert because I didn't want any more,
not
just the names but just anymore different things. Basically, even I think my
drum & bass stuff sounds like the Wagon Christ-y stuff. I never try and do
different things, just using different--not mediums, but--different BPM's,
basically, or something like that.
CL: You just do what you do.
LV: Yeah, but it's pretty much hip-hop and jungle and not much else. I mean
I usually--because I used to have just drum machines and no samplers--I used
to love making electro-y things, stuff like that, and I might well do in the
future,
but I've got no plans.
CL: Do you ever do live performances?
LV: No, I haven't yet. I do want to at some point, but I find it incredibly
boring
when I go and see people and they've just got a mouse or some
fucking...clicking on things on the screen. So I want to have a think about
it and
do something different, but I've got to start thinking about it now, really,
because
I know I'll put it off forever if I don't seriously think about it. But I'm
not sure what
I could do, really, that would be--it's just the visual side of it...
CL: But you have been DJ-ing some?
LV: Yeah, but it's totally different for me because I hardly ever play my
records at all, because I don't really make them for clubs, not in my mind.
I
have actually been to clubs where they've played one and I'm like Wow, no
way,
it worked!, but I never think of playing one myself. I play a lot more stuff
that's
made for clubs, like jungley, really spacy drum & bass sort of stuff which is
a bit
boring if you listen to it at home, in my opinion, but it works wickedly in a
club.
Or any kind of hip-hop I love to hear in clubs really loud, but I don't get
much of a
chance to do hip-hop, because over here it's a bit like (raspberry). They
don't
want to know, especially because I'm lazy and don't keep up with the records,
so I would never get to do a hip-hop club, so I only get to do chill-out
things and
then I can play hip-hop with loads of people sitting around thinking Ungh,
groovy. (laughs) But yeah, no I like DJ-ing, it's wicked. I just got a
little pissed
off recently because I've been going over to--like miles away in Europe--and
I
get a really lukewarm reaction, and I get really peeved when I've missed
three
days of my life on some shitty gig when I could have done a track, which is
what
I really like doing anyway. Because releasing it or not I know I'd be doing
that
anyway, because it's the only thing I can really creatively do, so.... I
really like it
when it's just casual--I can go over to my mates' houses and just play
whatever
I want; it's wicked.
CL: From what you've seen is that dance scene in England going in a good
direction? Is it improving?
LV: Oh, I don't know; I'd actually be a bad person to ask, as I go to hardly
any
clubs. I think it was better a few years ago, actually--I don't know maybe
that's
just because I used to go out dancing, and also because I didn't know so much
about how you make it, and wasn't so in on--not on the scene, but--knowing
what it all sounds like. And it used to be, things like LFO "LFO", when that
was
coming out, like '91, when Richard was DJ-ing at the Bowgie, and it just
fitted in
and was like (whistles)...I'd never really got so much into electronic stuff
before,
and that was the point that I got into acid rather than '88. I remember it
from
then, but I didn't really like it then, but when I got into things like LFO
"LFO" and
then found out that it was from before then, then I found the older stuff and
was
like Wow. I got more into acid then and it was my favorite for a year for
DJ-ing,
especially because it's nice and easy to mix.
CL: So you got into electronic music before you got into making it?
LV: No, I'd been making it longer, because I'd been in bands since I was
really young. I've only been recording since '89, but i've been in bands
since I
was fucking ten, in stupid bands, and making my own compositions, and plays,
and I used to get in that sort of fight a bit at school because I was never
much of
a writer or anything, or things like maths and English, I always hated them.
I
just got into theatre studies, music, and did a Peter Pan soundtrack which
was
hilarious. (laughs)
CL: Wow! You should put it out!
LV: I can remember it! One of them was totally--it was my equivalent of
sampling at the time--ripped off something else, and I claimed credit for it.
But
no, it's totally different from seriously thinking that I could put stuff
out, because
that's been very recent, like '91 and '2, more '92 when we realized that we
could
actually do stuff in our rooms. It was Richard that made me think that; I'd
always had some preconceived idea that you had to go into studios or higher
somewhere, and that always put me off, because you had to have a real idea of
what you were going to do, and I was like Fuck! We have to get all this stuff
ready and go in and do it, and that's always a bit nasty. And then Richard
was
getting stuff out and I was like Fucking hell, he's doing it from his room!
It
sounds really rough, and yeah, I was really pleased. It gave us the
thumbs-up
to start it out: we sent him a tape and he was just about to start that
RePhlex
company, kind of at that time, with this guy Grant who I went to school with
anyway so I knew him as well. So we gave him a tape and we should have had
the first release on RePhlex, but they just pissed us around a bit, and it's
annoying because that release would have been a lot more true to how I am
than, say, Sunset Boulevard or Phat Lab Nightmare. It was just a brekabeat
thing with bits of jazzy-type keyboards and things like that. But they
didn't
release that because it wasn't RePhlex-y enough or something. Then they
released Weirs a year and a half after, but that was really late because we'd
done all that stuff around the same time, '91/'92. It was a really old
album, and
I was a bit worried at the time; I thought Shit, everyone's going to think
it's crap,
but it got an OK reception at the time.
CL: Well I remember that was a great moment for me, when Richard started
putting stuff out, and you could tell that it was raw, not overly produced.
And
then you, and Mike...
LV: Yeah, Mike is wicked. I remember, because he used to do covers of
Richard's stuff. Richard has this tape--and I didn't know it was Mike, it
was just
this guy--who'd done "Digeridoo" and all these things on keyboards, playing
them, and it was Mike, it's wicked. (laughs) He's nutty, though, he sent
Richard like ten tapes full of stuff...which then picked through to make that
first
album.
CL: Do you feel like you're getting a lot of media attention?
LV: Yeah, I do, and I'm constantly surprised by it. I don't know, it just
doesn't
sink in. Because I feel exactly the same and everything. I just find it odd
that
there seems to be so many people who like it, but I think it is a lot more
things
like journalists--not the press, because that sounds nasty--but more
artistic-y
people who get into it. I mean, we don't sell many over here at all, it
doesn't
sell much to the sort of general public, but it gets really good reception.
All my
singles have been Single of the Week in NME, but then not many people buy it.
Not over here, anyway. I don't think the press over here have much control
over
it. I just sell sort of 200 more every release, I think. Which is fine by
me. My first
e.p. sold 250 or something, and that did surprise me because I though things
sold in thousands..I had this weird idea, and then saw the first royalties
thing
and was like Oh my God! And then if I sell a thousand I get into the indie
singles chart at number 50 and think Christ!, if I'm only selling that many
then
records can't sell as much as I imagine they do. But then there's more
people
in America, so the numbers would be seemingly greater, because there only
56 million people in the whole of Great Britain, but like 300 million people
over
there. I think the best thing for getting it around, anyway, in the future,
20 years
or 10, would be the Internet, putting tracks on the Internet...that'd be
crazy.
Available all over!
CL: Yep, that's going to be it! Are you active on the Internet at all?
LV: No, I'm not, but it's just because I'm lazy. I mean, I've only got a
crap-old
Atari as well, but I've got lots of mates with it so I go on it quite a bit.
Richard's
on it; he's on it quite a lot. He's been thrown off it loads, actually,
becauses he
uses bad language, telling them they're cunts or whatever, so he gets barred.
(laughs)
CL: Well, we'll be keeping an eye out for you! In the meantime, do you have
any famous last words.
LV: No. (laughs) I never do. I should think of things before, but
(raspberry).
(end)