Interview #61: DJ Format

Format's signature b-boy instrumentals, downtempo sketches and body rocking backdrops work seamlessly and, like few others, he retains a knack of simultaneously infiltrating the tastes of people who don't normally give hip hop a second thought, while turning the most hardened crate spotting freak into a salivating mess. Quite a feat.

We caught up with Format at his London studio preparing for a digging trip to Switzerland and sorting out his set for Wakestock ...

“I Like Music because… I was never going to make it as a footballer.” DJ Format

ILM: Your single, Separated At Birth is out now. Great track – can you give us your own personal description of its whole vibe?

Format: Yeah, without wanting to bring myself too much inline for biting someone else's style, I've gotta say, it was very much a nod back to the Beastie Boys in their heyday. I had already done 3 Feet Deep with Abdominal and D-Sisive and I was really happy with how it turned out. And I already had the music to Seperated At Birth that I'd done a while ago knocking about and wasn't really a finished piece of music yet and thought "hey, that would really be reminisent of something between Paul's Boutique and Check Your Head when the Beastie Boys were really messing around with breaks and kind of rock stuff." so I guess I was going in more of a slightly funky rocky direction. I can't really claim to have some really big story about it. It's not like I write the music, its all samples, so I just happened to find those samples and I liked 'em and you know ... I just like the way those guys are going backwards and forwards, its really an extension of 3 Feet Deep, even a bit more hardcore for me.

ILM: Just talking about 3 Feet Deep, you released that back in March (2005), written by you, Abs (Abdominal) and D (D-Sisive)...

Format: Well I kinda makes the beats and they write the lyrics...

ILM: Yeah cool, on that basis, can you describe the DJ Format music making process?

Format: Yeah, its not very glamorous, but quite simple to explain. I basically go out digging through piles of old records in all sorts of smelly dusty old places, sometimes in record shops and sometimes I even have to resort to going to record dealers. But generally speaking I kinda dig around for old things to sample and then something will just grab my ear.

With Seperated At Birth, for example, I first found that flute that goes through the chorus in 1997 or '98 at a record shop in Portsmouth, so you know it's just a case of when something really inspires you and you just kinda add things to it, basically that's what I did with that. And then I found that fuzz bass line that goes through it, I found that on another record. It was kinda weird because it had a strange time signature, it was in 5/4 or 7/8, I forget which, but it was certainly a bit of an odd bassline, I had to mess around and replay it a little bit. I felt it was taking shape similar to a Here Comes The Fuzz sort of feel and I was thinking at first it could make a really good instrumental, but I couldn't quite stretch it that far, and when I was looking for Abs and D to do another song for me after 3 Feet Deep had turned out so well, it just seemed like a natural song to pick. I then went back and reflected on it. There is a track on the final single release called 33% B-Boy and that was my way of going back and finally fullfilling the plan of making a good instrumental out of it. It was just a case of throwing in a few more breaks that I had that worked with it, and throwing in a few more cuts and scratches just to keep things interesting ...

But getting back to the process, it's just very much a case of me playing around with old records and seeing what matches with what and what I can manipulate to go with what. It's very much trial and error, a lot of perseverance, and there is definitely a large element of luck in there as well, I gotta be honest!

ILM: Your second longplayer If You Can't Join 'Em... Beat 'Em is also out now on Genuine / PIAS Recordings, can you tell me which track you had the most fun laying down in the studio?

Format: Ummmmmm, prrrooobbbaaabbblllyyy ... hmmm. Well when you say actually being there in the studio, it was funny because it was the first time I had done some tracks with Abdominal where I hadn't actually been there. That was just due to various people's schedules, timings and prices of flights [laughs] ...

I was going to say Rap Machine, that was the one I probably had the most fun making because it was the one I was happiest with the outcome, but I wasn't actually there in the studio when he layed his vocals down. It was good going backwards and forwards with him, you know, me finding the cuts, him writing a little bit and just updating me on the phone, me getting a bit excited and enthusiastic and then him writing a bit more. That was one of my favorite track/collaborations, but, like I say I wasn't actually there when he layed it down. I left that to his expert judgment and luckily he came up with the goods. Saying that, we did have a good laugh making 3 Feet Deep. I was there for that. It was the first time I had been in the studio and worked with D-Sisive, so that was good ...

ILM: Nice, well you’ve got plenty of live dates coming up. What do you look forward to most about playing live?

Format: I have got be honest and say that it's not my first passion doing live gigs. I'm more into getting out into the record shops, looking for records, getting home and digging the breaks out. Basically I get home in the studio and get them looped up, that is my passion, making the hip hop tracks the way that I do. The live performance side of it is not really something where you can have one without the other, unfortunately you gotta get out there and promote yourself, so what I probably look forward to is if I feel confident in the show we are putting on, which luckily I do at the moment, and going out to present it to people that want to hear it and actually enjoy it.

Glastonbury this year and 2 years ago was incredible and Leeds and Reading last year was incredible. We've been really lucky, we have just done a tour around the UK with Little Barrie who are really good and one of my favorite groups of the moment, a kinda funky rock band for anyone who doesnt know them. Before that we've toured with Ugly Duckling, who are one of my favorite hip hop groups, and before that we toured with Jurrasic 5 who are also one of my favorite hip hop groups. So we have been really lucky, we have just been in the right place at the right time and had some really nice people by our side.

So I've actually really enjoyed the touring experience so far, but I just want to get home and make music. The truth of it is I'm more of a - not shy person - but someone who keeps myself to myself and just gets on with the music back at home. That gives me the most pleasure.

ILM: Have there been any highlights as a punter going to see others play?

Format: Yeh yeh, lemme think ... I genuinely got really inspired every night watching Little Barrie play their live gigs before us. I had already been to loads of their live gigs before they toured with us because I was a big fan of their music, so that was really good.

And again, I hate to sound cheesy and predictable, but obviously touring with people like Ugly Duckling and Jurrasic 5. Those guys really know how to put on a fun and entertaining hip hop show, not only are the MC's great but the DJ's, Cut Chemist and Nu-Mark, put on their own little seperate show with turntables and percussion instruments. To see that is really inspiring, it's like, thank god there is still some inspiring hip hop out their being performed, because 9 times out of 10 when you do watch someone it's very disappointing, especially hip hop acts. People just stand there.

Other people I've been really impressed with have been The Aspects. Again, I don't wanna get accused of being too cheesy because they are my friends, but I do think they put on a great show. They've got a beatboxer called Monkey Moo who really gets the crowd on their side. Also Edan, I saw Edan up in Jazz Cafe he was really good, but other than that I don't go to much hip hop stuff. I'd rather go and watch some jazz or funk and relax.

ILM: So, you mentioned '33% B-Boy' earlier, can you tell me a bit more about that?

Format: Yeh, again I'm not even going to be ashamed to admit, it was a total nod back to the Beastie Boys. As an extension to what I was saying earlier about how I felt it did have that classic Beastie Boys feel to it. I wanted to do everything I could with it and make a good instrumental, pretty much a B-Boy mix. If you go back to the Beastie Boys 12 mix of Hey Ladies and Shake Your Rump, they did 33% God and Diss Yourself in 89, which were both kind of instrumental B-Boy mixes of Shake Your Rump and Hey Ladies. Instead of doing your traditional instrumental, they dressed it up and made a really good party instrumental out of it, and again I wanted to do the same thing. So it really was another nod back to the Beasties. One of their tracks was called 33% God so my own little twist on it, I was like yeah ok, 33% B-Boy, and again if you really want to get technical the whole Seperated At Birth story, and me being one third or 33% of the 3 that were seperated... I don't know I'm just making it up because its convenient really... in truth it was just a nod back to the Beasties.

ILM: You toured Europe in April/May. Did you get much of a chance to see any of the sights away from the music?

Format: To be honest, our tour was more UK really. We did do some European dates, Munich, Gothenburg, Paris and a couple of Dutch shows, so I guess we did a few but it was very low key. We did do some sight seeing but we weren't there that much. When we went touring with J5, that's when we really did all that for the first time. We went to some really beautiful cities, it was the first time I had been to some of those places, so that was nice.

ILM: You mentioned Glastonbury earlier, you played between Timo Maas and Goldie Lookin' Chain. How was that?

Format: Yeah, it was great! There was an element of weirdness when you're seeing Timo Maas, some German guy with a mullet playing basically, well I dont' really know how to describe it, it's all a bit hardcore and noisey for the average person ...

ILM: Did you check him (Timo Maas) out?

Format: God no! I stood there and waited for him to finish his set. I'm not going to lie and be polite and go "yeah, I checked him out and it was great!" No, its not my kind of thing, obviously I wouldn't want to be rude, but it's just absolutely not my thing ...

ILM: What about from the crowd point of view? Do you think, "is this warming me up or what?"

Format: Yeah, I think, "how are all the people in this tent that are going beserk to all this horrible rave stuff gonna give a shit about what I'm about to do." That's what you think, and then you start to get worried, you think "oh my god, how's this gonna work," but for some reason it did. 80-90% of the people stayed. It was still absolutly packed for us so we weren't complaining.

ILM: Cool. OK, your debut album Music For The Mature B-Boy became a word of mouth triumph in 2002. What do you think gave it that appeal?

Format: I honestly dont know. I put a lot of it down to just timing. I think people, for whatever reason, were just ready to hear some good light hearted party hip hop around that time, I don't know what it was but the people who heard it just seemed to get into it, so that was the word of mouth thing I guess, just people recommending a good album to the next person ...

ILM: Yeh, I was gonna say, apart from it being damn good of course ...

Format: [laughs] Cheers! I think, extending on the timing factor of it, I think I owe a large part of the success to the fact that we went out and played to our target audience with J5. It was perfect, the people that wanted to hear good party hip hop were at J5 concerts hearing the best party hip hop of the time and we were coming out doing a little warm up set. Nobody knew who the hell we were and I guess we won a few people over. That was definitely how I was saying luck and timing came into it, we were very lucky to tour with those guys.

ILM: You say your music “retains a sense of humour.” How do you achieve that?

Format: erhm, I honestly dont know. There's a fine line between sense of humour and cheesy. I dont know if I did it this time! I feel like I did do it the first time, but then this time you got a song like Ugly Brothers, thats the one I find a lot of people saying "ah yeah, thats my favourite one off the new album," and I think "well great! I'm glad people like it," but there's some of my best work there like Rap Machine and Seperated At Birth that seemed to have been a bit more overlooked. I get sort of parranoid, like, "oh god! the humour thing, I've gone too far with it," but at the same time Ugly Brothers, for example, is just like a light-hearted break on an otherwise fairly hard album, it's not quite as light hearted as the last one though, is it.

ILM: You supported Jurassic 5 on their European tour. Who is currently on your collaboration/tour support wish list?

Format: There are people I'd like to do certain things with definitely, but it's just not always possible. Just because you like someone's music doesn't just mean you can for various reasons, other peoples schedules etc ... I don't always think it's healthy for everyone to work with everyone else, it just becomes a little bit kind of played out, like you see every track on some people's albums featuring someone featuring so and so, which I'm obviously guilty of because I'm just a DJ and producer, so all my vocal stuff is going to be featuring somebody, but luckily I managed to retain some sort of continuity to the album so it didn't feel like that whole rent-a-rapper ... er I went way off the question then didn't I? ... What did you ask me again?

ILM: Just collaborations ...

Format: Ah yeah, people whose music I really like, for example Edan, for example Little Barrie, people like that would be nice to work with, but you never know if it would be possible. Quantic Soul Orchestra, I'd much rather go out and do a show which is like hip hop done by us guys, but then a live funk band, something like that for me would be a much better package. We do hip hop shows, like with Little Barrie and people come up to us and say, "why dont you have a UK Rap act opening up?" and I just think, "because I don't wanna ram a whole night of hip hop, just the same kinda thing down everyones throats." I wanted to make it a little more varied and a little bit more interesting, that was the plan.

ILM: I guess you’ve achieved quite a few of your ambitions ...

Format: Well I never really had any, I just wanted to put out a few 12" records. That would make me happy. I kinda did that a while ago and then the idea of an album came up and I was like ... "hmm, erhm, ok right, never really thought of that! I can't do an album full of instrumentals!" So thats when I had to start pulling the rappers in.

ILM: Did you feel under pressure with the idea of producing an album? With timescales, deadlines and stuff?

Format: On the second one yeah, but not so much on the first. The label had heard early demo versions of Ill Culinary..., Here Comes The Fuzz and Last Bongo In Brighton. I mean they knew what I was up to. It's not like I had already been out and was successful and they were trying to rush my record out, it was more of a case of, "ok let's see what you do and put it out." There was no real pressure there - it was more doing the second one, trying to get things going to follow the success of the first one.

ILM: Have you got any tips for DJs/Producers who want to make music and get out there/make it big? How did you get your big break?

Format: Just through absolutely years of doing it, and doing it for all the right reasons. It was just my hobby and my passion and I didn't just go out and play all the newest releases that I didn't like just for the sake of DJ'ing in a club. If I couldn't do it my way I didn't want to do it at all and I just kept on believing in my own belief and eventually the time was right. It did take a long time for things to come together but I wouldn't swap the way it happened.

So my advice would be just do it because you love doing it, and don't expect to get rich and make a living out of it, because most people don't. It's a personal thing; you just gotta go out and believe in what you are doing and try and create something a little different. I mean, what I'm doing isn't different, but that's only because I'm a boring, stubborn old dinosaur and I don't really like modern hip hop, you know, my music is different but it's been done before. I'm just extending the good work of the pioneers of hip hop from the early years to the classic years of the late '80's early '90's. thats the kinda hip hop I'm trying to build on.

The stuff you here now like Jay-Z, DMX - I don't even know what's a good example - 50 Cent, urgh god, the rapping is shit and the music is dog shit, I can't listen to any of that stuff. If I was a kid listening to music now, I would never be choosing hip hop. I fell in love with Run DMC, Beastie Boys, LL Cool J, thats the kinda hip hop that pulled me in, Public Enemy, 2 Live Crew, I was just into hip hop as it was being made in those classic years mid to late '80's and if I was a kid today listening to all this shit that comes out now, it just wouldn't do anything for me. So you know I'm just trying to offer an alternative sound for people you know. Hey! there is still some funky hip hop being made, you just gotta hunt for it a bit harder.

ILM: Whats in your CD player or on your decks right now?

Format: As we speak nothing, but The Outlaw Blues Band is just on the floor. It was the last thing I played to listen to just out of pleasure. I got a lot of records just scattered around because I was just getting my set together for Wakestock. I'm off to Switzerland digging for the next few days, and then I have to play this festival, so I was getting ready in advance. Yeah, I've just been listening to The Outlaw Blues Band, kinda funky, psychedelic blues on this one album. If it's not that it's pretty much a jazz kinda thing.