By
Photos by Fred Shaw
August 2002

Q: On the CD version of the album, one of the discs is mixed and one is not. What were you thinking or feeling when you constructed the mixed disc and how does it differ from the unmixed half?

A: I think the difference is we put some of our tunes from our label Passenger on there. Really the reason for doing the mixed album is so you've got your unmixed one that you can listen to. But a lot of people these days buy mixes to listen to, they don't just listen to individual tracks. It's just a nice addition for whoever buys it. It's like a bonus thing they can put on and listen to the whole thing all the way through with a few extra tracks. It's got that kind of vibe to it. There was no sort of master plan behind that mix to construct it. If we were deejaying, obviously there'd be loads of other tracks in there as well, if it was a mix of other people's tunes as well. But that's purely just our music on there.

Q: You mentioned the Passenger label. What sort of music do you want to feature on there, and what do you feel you could give a showcase to there that wouldn't appear anywhere else? And is there anything coming up on the label you'd like to talk about?

A: At the moment we're the only artist recording on the label, but that's because we've been really fussy about what we want to put out on it. We've been chasing people and trying to get them to do stuff, but we haven't had the kind of stuff we wanna put out on it from anyone. It's because we're looking for a particular kind of vibe with it which is kind of like what we put out on it. We're looking for someone coming with a bit of a steppy kind of influence, but not like 2-step. But still quite tough. I find a lot of breaks can be a bit wishy-washy. Some of it seems to be lacking that kind of impact. With Passenger we just wanna keep it quite in your face, but still soulful and rolling. We just haven't found the right artists to do it yet. But we have a few people we're chasing at the moment. We get a lot of demos sent, and there've been a few people that have done some stuff which is really good, but it's not quite right. So we've gone back to them and said, "do a bit of A&Ring." If they're happy with what they're doing and don't wanna change it then fair enough. We wanna bring through some new talent because there are some demos we get, and you can get the vibe. They're well produced, but then they need a little bit more time because a lot of them are maybe young guys who haven't been producing very long, and they just need that little bit of direction and a bit of support. So we say, "Yeah wicked. Carry on doing what you're doing. It's not quite what we're looking for, but keep working and don't give up because you'll get there." We got a couple of people like that at the moment, but we'll get there. We just don't wanna put stuff out there that we're not into just to make money off it. We want Passenger to be a really strong label that we're proud of.

Q: How old is the label?

A: Passenger's quite old. I think it started in '98. We used to be signed to Polydor and we recorded an album for them, our first, "Orange Dust" that actually came out on Passenger. We were signed to Polydor, and we set up a sub-label with them because we didn't want our stuff coming out on Polydor since it's a major label. So "Orange Dust" came out on Passenger and a couple of 12 inches as well. Our first actual 12 inch release was by Total Science, and our second was by Forces of Nature. They used to be like a clean-up act, and they recorded for Good Looking and Do Nothing. They're kind of like ambient drum 'n' bass guys. Then we had two releases from a guy called High Towers. At the time Passenger was purely for anything we liked, and it didn't have any particular direction. Total Science did the drum 'n' bass thing, Forces of Nature did the deep house thing. High Tower was doing that kind of big beat/breaks stuff.

Then, once we left Polydor, we kind of stopped recording and gave up on Passenger. But then we started doing breaks, we re-launched it as the Passenger breaks label, so releases 5 to 8 have been by us, Aquasky vs Master Blaster. It's only really been a breaks label full stop for the last year and a half. So there's some old Passenger stuff out there on a totally different tip, but back then we were mixing all sorts of different styles together under one name.

Q: What projects do you have coming up in the pipeline?

A: We've just done a remix for Moving Shadow of Omni Trio's "Renegade Snares," which is one of the classic drum 'n' bass tunes from '95. We did a Voodoo Magic thing called "Lord of the Null Lines" a few months ago. That'll be out some time soon. We're remixing all Moving Shadow's back catalogue. It was cool to do the Omni Trio track because it's one of our personal favorite tunes from back then. Everyone who's into drum 'n' bass knows that track, so it was a bit cool to get to remix it.

We've got quite a lot of things we're concentrating on. Getting new artists to Passenger. We're gonna be recording some stuff for Passenger as well. I think we're gonna be doing quite a bit of drum 'n' bass. We're gonna kind of not sit back, but take a little bit of a break from breaks, and not produce it for a month or so, so we can do a bit of drum 'n' bass. It's quite nice to be able to swap between the two musics. You kind of get fresh ideas and vibe off each thing. We remember going out 10 years ago when DJs used to play all different kinds of music in a set in one room. Whereas in England now, every type of music has a separate room in a club. You can't stray from that path. I know people who are just not used to it. It's cool to bring a bit of that thing back into it. It's only because people aren't used to hearing different music in one room that there's such a shock if you do do it. But hopefully people'll start doing it again a bit more. Back then you'd hear people playing all different styles, whether it was a breakbeat, a house beat, or whatever. Anything goes. It'd be cool if that could happen again.

Q: What are the top records in your box at the moment and all time?

A: Well, we made the album for DJs and it's quite nice because it means we can play it ourselves. It's quite representative of the kind of music we wanna play out. I really like Zinc's stuff. I think his breaks stuff's really good. It's quite uptempo and it's got that bouncey kind of vibe to it, which is cool. I like Freq Nasty's stuff as well. He produces some really good music. He's got that kind of party vibe as well. I've seen him play and he doesn't play too dark. I mean, like I said before about DJs mixing different styles together, he's a prime example of someone who does that. He'll play a dub tune, then he'll play a breaks tune, and then he might chuck in a drum 'n' bass tune, or whatever he wants to play. He's not worried about being boxed in

So you need more people like that to break down barriers again which've been built up because everything's been so segregated into its little pigeonhole of what it can be and what it can't. I think drum 'n' bass is quite bad for that. Well, all music is. It all gets segregated into little bits.

Q: What goes into constructing a breaks set for you, and how would that differ from putting a drum 'n' bass set together? In your sets you sometimes go from breakstep to drum 'n' bass and back, with pretty fluid transitions. Do you find that's pretty organic for you to do, or is it challenging?

I quite enjoy playing with tunes I don't know as well. Well I know what it is roughly. When I've not really listened to it, but I know the vibe of the tune when you've just bought the tune, it's just nice, more exciting really because you don't know where the tune breaks down, what's gonna happen, and you always find that comes with spontaneous mixing. You don't know if you're gonna make it in time and get it mixed in, but it usually comes off pretty well. You tend to find that when you know tunes really well, you can put on a safe mix from breakdown to breakdown. It's kind of easy because you know what the layout is and you can put it in and mix it with the sound turned off really. But when you don't know the tune, and how it breaks down, you get these kind of mad, different sorts of mixes. You pull it all together and it sort've sounds better than when you've play a safe mix. And I think the excitement of you as a DJ comes across into the crowd as well. They kind of buzz off it.

Q: I love your Web site and honestly I think it's one of the best I've seen from any breaks artist both because it's so comprehensive. It even has a tips & tricks section for producers and breakbeat samples to download. Was the site intended as being somewhat educational?

A: Yeah because every producer has a little bit of knowledge and different way of doing things, and stuff they know that other people don't. It's good to pass it on, rather than to keep it to yourself. Then, if someone's got a problem, it takes us five minutes to say "Do this, do that, and come good." When we were designing the Web site we thought, "Well what can we put on it?" A little bit of tech help, a little bit of breaks since Brent has quite a lot of knowledge about breaks. People don't know where these beats come from. A lot of people just sample them off a breakbeat album or someone else's record. It's quite nice to be able to say, "Well that's from there," to give props to the guy who wrote the original tune or the drummer who played the beat. It's all getting used now, all these breaks from 20 or 30 years ago that have been around and been a major mainstay of most breakbeat music. It's something that's such a part of it, but a lot of people probably don't know these things so it's kind of nice to just show them. If you're there looking at our Web site, you don't just wanna know about us, what we do, what we eat for dinner. It's not very interesting. There's a lot of stuff that's connected to the scene that's really interesting.

Q: Who have you particularly enjoyed working with in the drum 'n' bass and breaks worlds have you particularly enjoyed working with? Is there anyone you'd like that you haven't had the chance yet?

A: Most people we meet, we deal with and get on with. Lots of people. Everyone's pretty much cool to work with. This guy Like Stratus from San Diego who's recording for us at the moment is quite cool to work with.

Q: Where do you most enjoy playing? Is there any particular residency or club you're especially attatched to?

A: As long as the crowd's good, I think it's cool. I don't have a particular place that we wanna play at. Everywhere we go really, as long as the crowd's good. I think that's what's important, not really the club. As long as it's got a good sound system, that's good enough. I think smaller clubs have a bit more of a vibe. It's always nice to get a small, intense crowd. It's always good fun to play at those sort of places.

Q: What's your sense of the breaks scene in North America? How would you compare it to the UK and Australia?

A: It's the first time I've been here [in North America] playing breaks, so I don't really know. I'll tell you when I've been around. I didn't personally play in Australia either, Brent did. But Europe is good. We get around Europe a lot and it's cool. I think it's a new scene. A lot of people don't realize how new it is. It's kind of growing at the moment, so I think there's a lot of potential there. In the next year or so it'll be interesting to see where it does go, what direction. The only thing that worries me a bit is the kind of house thing everyone seems to getting onto. Crossing over into house'll just kill it because it'll just get eaten up into the house scene. It could be a bit of a bad thing.

Q: What tips would you give someone who's just starting out as a breaks producer or DJ?

A: I don't know about specific tips. I think you just gotta follow your own style and stick to it. Don't try to copy other people. Like I said, we get a lot of demos and a lot of people just do copies of famous tunes. And you think, "Yeah, allright, but how about doing something from your own heads?" Don't be scared to try out new things because that's how new things get started. That's how things take off.

Q: Shouts?

A: All the people who are interested in our music, and all the people we work with. I can't really name them all because it would take ages, but the people who distribute our label, SD Holdings, they're doing a really good job. The people on our drum 'n' bass label, Stratus from San Diego, Tek-Ed. All the Aquasky and Botchit supporters, and everyone who's making the scene cool. We just appreciate people who support us because that's why we do it, to entertain people so it's nice to be appreciated.

For more Aquasky info and sounds, visit:
http://www.aquasky.co.uk/