Promoter/DJ/producer Ronan Keating is doing his part to kickstart the breaks scene in Galway, Ireland. His breaks event What the Funk? has been drawing a crowd that will have room to grow as the party moves to a bigger venue.

Q: Can you tell us a bit about What the Funk?

A: The event at O'Malley's [a pub in Galway] is a breakbeat, tech-funk night. We play breakbeat all night, until about 1:00 am, and then we kind of mix that up with kind of oldskool techno breaks for the last hour. The club finishes at about 2:00 am.

Q: What is the crowd like - mostly regulars or just people coming in?

A: Well, we did it forthnightly, so on other weekends it was a techno night so we'd get a lot of that crowd and we'd also get a lot of Ernie's crowd going to Jungle Fever [a weekly drum 'n' bass event at O'Malley's] because they're into breaks as well.

Q: What are the changes you are making in the event?

A: At the moment we're at O'Malley's, but because of the capacity is only 180 we can't really bring in much other talent because we'd like to have bigger names. We had Atomic Hula over a couple months ago at O'Malley's. We lost out on money because the capacity is 180 and we only got a 100 or so when the costs came in and all that it was a negative. So we can't reall y do that sort of thing at O'Malley's so we want to go somewhere bigger with a capacity of 300 or 400 where there is already a bit of a crowd. Cuba [a night club in Galway] is busy most weekends and the crowd is into the music, it's a funky vibe up there. So, it's kind of like, there are a lot of people I know that are into the breaks, but they won't go to O'Malley's because they don't like it, they don't like the place. People like the music and they like the crowd, but the atmosphere in there isn't the best at times.

Q: Do you plan on expanding your breaks events past Galway?

A: I'd really have to see how it goes. We just started What the Funk? in May, so we've just kind of been going with that. If it gets real successful we'll start doing gigs in Dublin. I've got a couple of connects up in Dublin so we'll swing a few gigs up there. Cork as well, one of the guys who set up What the Funk? is in Cork and he's setting a club down there at the moment, so we'll probably go down there and do some nights there under the same name, What the Funk.

Q: Can you talk about your view of the breaks scene in Galway?

A: There isn't really a scene at the moment except What the Funk. That's kind of the extent of the scene at the moment, you know. In Galway, back in about 1992 or 1993 a club started called Sex Kitchen, it was kind of housey and really funky stuff and it went on and was really, really successful. And clubbing kind of moved up a notch from there and people started getting into dance music and stuff, but since then, the cops came down really hard on that place because they had a lot of trouble with drugs and stuff. So everything that's been happening in Galway since then has been really commercial, except at O'Malley's. Like [DJ] Ernie started off doing a drum 'n' bass thing and that was one of the first kind of totally just into the music nights without all the bullshit around it. It's really good crowd with everyone into the music like, so we started playing i n Ernie's club, he plays hip-hop at the start and then drum 'n' bass and we played between with a breaks set for about an hour and people started getting into it and stuff so the owner asked us if we wanted to do our own night on Wednesday night and then he liked it so he asked us if we wanted to do a night every second Saturday. So, the breaks scene really - some places do kind of funky music, but none of it's nu skool breaks, you know. None of it's the kind of stuff we throw out. The breaks scene at the moment is just at O'Malley's.

Q: What about in the rest of Ireland?

A: I know there is a lot of stuff going on in the North, in Belfast and Derry. They get a lot of guys over playing in the Empire in Derry, they've got a lot of people over. Dublin has some stuff going on. Everytime I'm up there I see quite a few advertisements, there's a couple of record shops up there stocking a lot of breaks right now.

Q: What do record stores in Galway stock?

A: There are only one or two shops and it's mostly techno. There is a little bit of drum 'n' bass and hip-hop, but mostly techno. Most people in Galway are into house from the day of Sex Kitchen like. Same kind of crowd, same kind of age group. It's like the people that were going to clubs then are all just playing that kind of music. I suppose Ernie is the only other person in Galway that's gone into something new and done really well out of it, you know.

Q: Why do you think the breaks scene is so small?

A: I think it's probably not being played in as much clubs. I think most people I know that are into breaks have been into electronic music for awhile. They are looking for something a lot more interesting. As for myself, I consider a lot of the breaks tunes I hear to be a lot better produced then other electronic stuff that I hear and it's very good to dance to like. I think people who haven't had a lot of exposure to electronic music haven't gotten to the stage yet of where they appreciate breaks. In Galway it's definitely due to a lack of exposure and just probably not as high a level of interest in electronic music overall.

Q: Would you like it to be mainstream?

A: I wouldn't like it to be mainstream, but I'd like to see it exposed to more people. That's a hard question really. I'm sure there are a lot of breaks artists that have gone commercial and done pretty well of it. The scene I want to be involved in, I'd rather it wasn't overly commercial. When other things have gone commercial the quality has dropped over time so it would probably be a negative thing.

Q: Who are your favorite breaks acts?

A: When I first got into breaks, DJ Magazine did a thing called the D-Rom series and I got D-Rom 3 it was DJ Vadim. It was all this kind of scratched up hip-hop and it was really kind of good. And then next issue after there was an Adam Freeland half-hour mix and we listened to that and that's what got us into breaks. When we released a CD, a lot of the tunes were off that half-hour mix. I was into a lot of G-Stone stuff and I just kind of really got into the breaks after that. I used to play a lot of tech-house stuff and then I started mixing breaks on top of the tech-house stuff. Mostly people that got me into it were Adam Freeland, Rennie Pilgrem, Whole Nine Yards, the obvious ones that we had exposure to over here. But since I started producing my own stuff, I haven't followed one individual artist, I mostly just scour the 'net for songs and download stuff that I like, like TCR.

Q: How many breaks DJs and producers are there Galway?

A: Myself and my cousin Ruairi Leydon produce tracks together under Invisible Nipple and that's what we DJ under as well. Other than that there isn't anyone else that I know producing or DJing breaks in Galway. There are a few people that I know producing downtempo that is similar to breaks, but it's not really there yet. My other cousin Kevin Fanigan was into techno and then he got into the breaks and started DJing and producing. And there is this other guy called Adam O'Burke and he's been producing for years. I hadn't seen him in years and then one night he came into O'Malley's and he was like, man these tunes are really cool, I'm doing similar stuff at home, but it's more like he's a real musician and plays a lot of instruments, so it's very jazzy like and acoustic sounding. He plays a lot of live drums on his tracks. He's going to be remixing some of my tunes as well. I think there is definitely a lot more interest and a lot more exposure to breaks since we started doing it. There are a lot more people getting into it, asking where they can buy the tunes and stuff like that. There is a lot of stuff like funky break compilations and they're stocking them down in the shops so people are buying them on cds and listening to them. They're kind of going down pretty well. I think it really depends on how the clubs goes from here on, if we can get a bigger venue like Cuba we can a lot more people in terms of more people listening and from that like who knows, we'll kind of go from there.

Q: Do you have your own studio?

A: Well, I've got a very minimal studio - it's a PC and a synthesiser. I do most of it on the PC.

Q: You've got turntables set up too?

A: Yeah, two turntables and a PC and some CD decks. I'm building it up bit by bit. Right now I just use the software until it becomes limiting and then I invest a little more in it. I'd love to do some live stuff later, but it's impossible at the moment. Already we build a lot of loops and stuff when we're making tunes that get left over, and we pile them onto CDs and we start to mix them in with little samples while we're mixing to make it more interesting. But from there we'd like to start bringing in some keyboards and a couple of sequencers and just start playing tracks and DJing over them. I haven't really thought about it too much yet, because it isn't really possible with the set-up that we have.

Q: So what do you hope for the future for the breaks scene, at least here?

A: I hope to create a much bigger scene. And it's purely for my own enjoyment you know, so as long as I keep enjoying it I'll keep doing it and keep trying to make a successful night out of it. I'd love to go to a club in Galway that's similar to Sex Kitchen that I spoke about earlier. That was the kind of club that so many people would go to every weekend and they would never miss it and when you'd go you would know absolutely everyone there even though it was 3 or 400 people. There's never really been an atmosphere like that in Galway since except maybe Jungle Fever, Ernie's night. He's had a very loyal following. I'd like to create a vibe similar to the vibe back then at Sex Kitchen. Just a really cool kind of club where you get a lot of people that are interested in the music.