Daddy
G aka Grant Marshall hat mit seinen Tätigkeiten beim
Wild Bunch Sound System und vor allem am Mikro von Massive
Attack neben Smith & Mighty, Tricky und Portishead
den Bristol-Sound geprägt und Musikgeschichte geschrieben.
Der unverkrampfte Umgang mit Musik und das Zusammenmixen
von Dub, Disco, Funk, Reggae und Hip Hop zu einem wahrlich
einzigartigen und elektrisierenden Stil hat bis heute
nichts an Ausstrahlungskraft verloren. Nun gebührt
es ihm, einen weiteren spannenden Teil zu der DJ-Kicks
Serie von !K7-Records hinzuzufügen. Dabei ist ihm
eine tolle Zusammenstellung gelungen! Der Mix macht's,
heißt eine Binsenweisheit, und gerade hier werden
die Qualitäten von Daddy G deutlich. Nachdem er nach
einem Intro von Tippa Irie & Philip Levi zunächst
mit Willie Williams' "Armagideon Time" und "Rockfort
Rock" der Sound Dimension dem Studio One Respekt
zollt, geht es fröhlich weiter mit Funk (The Meters
- "Just Kissed My Baby"), Triphop (Tricky -
"Aftermath") und natürlich einigen Titeln
von Massive Attack. So sind zum Beispiel deren Remixe
von Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's Meisterwerk "Mustt Mustt"
und "Face A La Mer" von Les Negresses Vertes
(!) zu hören. Alles in der Tradition des weitläufigen
Bristol-Sounds. Dazwischen gibt es immer wieder klassischen
Reggae zu hören. So stimmt Barrington Levi sein "Here
I Come" an und Johnny Osbourne reitet mit "Budy
Bye" auf dem Sleng Teng-Riddim. Zusätzlich gibt
es eine französische Version von Dawn Penn's Klassiker
"No No No" zu hören: witzig Melaaz's "Non
Non Non" im modernen Gewandt! Zudem sind Aretha Franklin,
Letfield, Badmarsh & Shri und Foxy Brown zu hören.
Wie gesagt, der Mix macht's! Im Interview spricht er über
die
ausgewählten Acts, Einflüsse und Hintergründe,
über Massive Attack, Wild
Bunch, DJing und die 90er.
At last a Daddy G "DJ Kicks" - How did it come
about?
So
the DJ Kicks thing is kind of a mmmm…a DJ orientated,
it's a good little series you know. So I wanted to make
a sort of more DJ reflective thing rather than, sort of,
getting really obscure and picking all these obscure tracks
that no fucker would know, cause it´s not really
about that. I just want to put a nice selection of tunes
that you could listen to over and over again and not have
tunes that would date. More of a classical feel rather
than a topical feel.
How
did you meet Stefan from !K7 Records?
I
know Stefan from !K7 and I know some of the Terranova
lot. Yeah, so it's basically through the Terranova lot
who live in Berlin, that I know cause I used to DJ with
this guy called Kaos from Berlin and he obviously knows
the !K7 lot and he told me that they wanted me to do a
series. Never really had the time to do one before you
know. Or the sort of the information really yeah cause
we were gonna do this on our own label called Melankolik
for Virgin once…me and [3-] D do a Wild Bunch stroke Massive
sort of all the tunes that have influenced us and we got
a list of about 300 records but that never really happened.
Do
you ever see the original Massive?
I
still keep in contact with them, yeah, but not that much.
I think the Wild Bunch per say circa 1986 don't really
have much to do with each other, I don't see Tricky much
I don't see Mushroom at all.
What
influenced the Wild Bunch?
Oh
God, that's how we all got into it! We were sort of punks
and stuff like that, we used to go to a lot of the reggae
things and so there was a cross pollination of the reggae
and punk thing at the time. So it did in Bristol actually
get a lot of punks going into reggae sound systems and
stuff like that. And that was a really big thing to go
to a sound system and to see wall-to-wall speakers and
stuff like that it was amazing. We were all into our sort
of reggae at the time, so to have your stomach blown through
your mouth by bass was amazing. Seriously you used to
go to these halls and they literally had 8-foot speakers
double speakers you know. You know double speakers sort
of 20 or 30 of them all plastered around a room. Yeah,
you do still get it but not so much now. Everybody in
St. Paul's, years ago back in the 70s and 80s…well yeah
in the 70s and 80s especially down at St. Paul's were
members of sound systems. So that's what we wanted to
do when we wanted to get into this sort of thing but in
a different way not as a reggae thing you know, Miles
and Nellee [Hooper] and stuff like that and they ex punks
as well… and we started the Wild Bunch. The main influence
at the time was hip-hop, cause hip-hop and scratching
and stuff like that came around and that blew us away.
How
long have you been a DJ?
I
was DJing years ago very young, in the early 80's I was
DJing down at The Dugout and that's where we started playing
first, as the Wild Bunch and The Dugout was this seminal
club which was in Bristol where everybody went. Especially
back in '77 when it was like punks, bikers, dreads, you
know just a whole cacophony of people in this one place.
It's surprising how so many mixtures of people in that
one place don't actually erupt…I think a lot of people
were into spliffing, so it kept everyone tranquil.
Was
there an influential Record Shop?
Yeah,
well I was paid to do it, I used to work at Vital distribution.
They originally started in Bristol and they actually started
at a shop called Revolver Records. Just an amazing shop,
they employed me to sell reggae and hip-hop and stuff
like that. That was the first time Bristol really had
a shop that gets all of your imported records and that
was really kicked us off cause I worked in a records shop
and I had all the choice of the records, that was a really
good thing for us, cause there wouldn't be anywhere at
all in Bristol where you could buy records, especially
imports and Jamaican imports and stuff like that. Revolver
was the shop now I've been into the sort of DJ thing from
14.
Other
influences, sound systems or parents?
My
folks were kind of into it, we used to throw parties at
the house I remember there was an old geezer we used to
know, this guy called Sunny in Bristol, he had this sound
system and at the time sound system wasn't about big speakers
and stuff but you had the most powerful gramophone. So
everyone had these 1960's gramophones with amazing speakers
that were imported from the States and they had an amazing
sound. What these guys used to do was drive these gramophones
around in a Ford Anglia state. Bring this gramophone into
people's houses into parties. You know it was like a massive
Ottoman, four guys bringing this bloody gramophone; "right
where do you want us to put it. In the corner right",
and we set it up in the corner and play the records but
you know for the 60's you know cause remember blues parties
originally weren't like... When my parents came over in
the late 50's from Barbados and there was a lot of West
Indians in Bristol, there wasn't anywhere for them to
go. The British culture really hadn't really catered for
the new influx of West Indians they didn't… there wasn't
any social infrastructure for them. So they made their
own parties you know what I mean, they which became, called
Shabeen's and Blues parties and you used to get the whole
neighborhood turn up on Fridays and Saturdays at somebody's
house. Parties would be in the basement where people played
dominoes and stuff like that, there would be a bar on
another floor, just take the whole house over for a party
for the weekend this is where all of these people with
their big sound systems used to come and bring them -
bass in your face from the time I was six and stuff like
that, it's amazing it really was.
Who
were Sound Dimension?
Sound
Dimension were the backing band of Sir Coxsone. They came
under different names, in fact they've done quite a few
covers of JB. All those Jamaican artists were influenced
at the time of what was going on in the states, you know
what I mean, so all that stuff was straight from the R'n'B
stuff that they took a whole line you know what I mean
took as in rock steady they took that sort of ethos of
music and changed it but you know they were just copying
originally the Jamaican original back to Coxsone who was
one of the original sound system guys in Jamaica who started
it all off with Duke Reid. They would just go to America
and brought back loads of imports from the states, in
the end it was about economics really. Just fuck it, let's
make our own, that's how a sort of reggae thing came up
really and it was basically trying to copy the R&B
stuff from the states and slowly but surely they were
able to get their own flavor.
Willie
Williams
Stone
cold classic. The Willie Williams thing was like a tune
I always remember from the old punk days you know what
I mean? I was really quite impressed that The Clash did
a copy of it and it's really good as well. And it's always
been sort of a classic Studio One record, cause I wanted
to start this whole thing off with Studio One really cause
that's my first love of music, you know, old Jamaican
Studio One music…and also tribute to Sir Coxsone as well
cause he died earlier this year…and it's good really,
because I've got Horace [Andy] and that's where Horace
began his musical career. He used to tell us stories about
how Coxsone used to have his Talent spotting days on a
Sunday and how Horace would turn up his yard in Jamaica
sit around back in the recording studio, you know, where
all the auditions going on in the studio, there where
people in the back auditioning and Horace was like out
there one day and Coxsone was like "right little
boy sing, let me hear your voice" and Horace had
to audition and he was like "you in there, in the
studio, I'm going to write something for you and then
we're going to record". I think he recorded his record
from being talent spotted I think he was recorded 2 days
later. It's amazing. Every Sunday they had an audition
to sing and if they were good enough you know they would
sort of be taken on and be put with people like Jackie
Mittoo and Leroy Simmons who were the main songwriters
and musicians in that studio.
Are
you a fan of Soul Jazz?
Yeah,
I am, totally. Cause' eh, actually I've got some soul
jazz music; I actually asked them for their permission
to license this. Cause they own the whole Studio One catalogue,
which is a really brilliant thing. You know, there's always
a great market for the old Studio One stuff. People still
want to know the original roots, cause nowadays you're
getting a lot of dance hall stuff and a lot of the rhythms
you're getting now, are kinda just do overs of what were
around maybe 20 years ago. So it's still a bit like the
hip-hop thing, you get a lot of samples, and then everybody
wants to know where that original source came from or
whatever. And for reggae music, you'll find that Studio
One, as with you know the JB's or stuff like that is the
original source for reggae music. The JB's is the original
source for hip-hop, JB's beats first, and it moved on
from there.
Melaaz
With
the Melaaz thing, it was like... that was a brave copy
of a Studio One record, which was obviously Dawn Penn's
"No No No". And when I heard that, I think it
was 10 years ago, I was really quite taken back that they
actually attempted to do a version of that, it's actually
in French, which added a bit of exoticness to it.
Tricky
You
know, I haven't really seen eye to eye with Tricky for
years. He's always in the papers, so any time he gets
the chance to slag us off, he always does, which I find
funny. He's gone a bit a stray now, you know. But I love
that "Aftermath" you know. I'm not actually
sure how I got that, cause of I think during the Massive
thing, Tricky decided he wanted to go off and do his own
thing. And we were like "yeah all right Tricks, go
on then". But we never thought he could do it, we
used to take the piss out of him really. And I remember
actually getting hold of these white labels, he gave me
all these white labels, and I thought it was shit when
I first heard it and it's only now I didn't realize how
much of a great record it is. It's actually one of the
records that I keep in me box. I totally dismissed it,
I don't know why, I guess because it's Tricky. I didn't
realize that he was quite a formidable talent really and
he still is you know. Sometimes he channels his energy
in the most negative ways, you know. I was actually sort
of clearing my records out when I found it a couple of
years ago and I thought, fuck me this was wicked you know
and it's never left my box since.
Portishead,
Massive Attack, Tricky happened all at once?
It's
a great thing obviously when you have three acts from
your own town which are doing the business, you know what
I mean. It's nice to have a bit of a force going on. Well
the Tricky thing, I tip my hat to him because he actually
went off and did his own thing, he could of stayed under
the wing.
The
Meters
You
got the Meter's thing with "Just Kissed My Baby"
that's just an old stone classic. But also it's like we,
sort of, like Aaron Neville as well he's one of our heroes,
you know what I mean. So we've always wanted to work with
him, hopefully one day that will happen. And that one's
for my daughter really, "Just Kissed My Baby."
And then there's Nusrat I kind of rate that as one of
our best remixes, because we did that for Peter Gabriel
at the Real World Studio.
Massive
Mixes
That's
a funny thing actually, because those last two remixes
are late to mid nineties. And that was the time we were
doing a lot of mixes. We haven't done remixes for ages,
or should I say any good ones. Not so much now I think
people think we're too expensive as we are not asked to
do too many, but I really enjoyed doing all those tracks
there because we were asked to do a lot of world music
remixes and that's what we were all about at the time,
getting with other people from different countries and
adding a bit of flavor.
Nusrat
Fateh Ali Khan
But
to work with Nusrat was like bloody hell man, you know
what I mean. He was the most famous Kewali singer, and
it was a real pleasurable experience, so I've always liked
that mix. Quite a lot of these records are hard to find.
They're not obvious records. A lot of people are not really
aware that we have actually done that, except for the
inner circle.
Les
Negresses Vertes
Yeah,
then there was Negresses Vertes, and I think we did a
really good job with that one as well. I think it was
done through Virgin but once again all these remixes were
done away. That was done at Peter Gabriel's studio, which
is a great place. The Karmacoma was done in Naples, you
know.
Karmacoma
Yeah,
because that was something we did with a guy called Rino
from Almamegretta. Who are a quite famous Neapolitan band
he was just a friend of [3-]D's, not a friend of D's but
of ours really we went to Naples to do a little ode to
D's roots he's from Naples and soaked up the whole atmosphere
of Naples and did that with Rino and he added the whole
Neapolitan Chorus to it as well, which was brilliant.
We stripped it all down, we did it with a guy called Ben
Young, we remixed it with him and everything basically
re-laid most of the track.
More
classic reggae
I
wanted to mix it up again, I just want to take it for
a bit of a roller coaster ride. Like I was saying if I
had more time I would have started with punk records and
ended with a couple of house records, something like that,
but you can't do much with 70 minutes. It's just a collection
of good classical dance records really.
Badmarsh
& Shri
Well,
Jammy´s was the guy who brought out the first electronic
reggae which was "Under Me Sleng Teng". Well
I've always liked Badmarsh & Shri, really, I know
them but I'm not friends, it's just sort of musical admiration
really. I loved the track and it's an unreleased version.
I don't know if you heard the one on the album but it's
totally different. That was just sent to me, somebody
just sent it to me and I was like bloody hell man they've
mixed this really wicked track which I've always loved
the Badmarsh & Shri but with an old… Jamaican rhythm
and I thought that was really clever, it works really
well, bootlegs and stuff.
Recent
bootlegs
Well,
to be honest there are a couple of bootlegs that are really
brilliant! My original concept for this album was to create
a bootleg mix album, cause that's what I collect. I love
collecting bootlegs. Yeah mash-ups and stuff like that,
with acappellas over famous or good rhythm tracks. I find
that quite quirky I really love that. The original concept
of this album was to do a bootleg thing, but when I talked
to !K7 they said it was a minefield, don't get into it.
Then I changed tact and thought, you know, I'll just put
on a timeless selection of records which I think are really
good and that you can listen to at any time but take you
on a slight roller coaster ride through different fields
of music that I like.
What
about DJ Kicks?
The
one thing about all this Kicks thing is really bass lines,
all of the tracks have wicked bass lines. And that's basically
what I'm about, a wicked bass line. Half the records I
know or actually hear, I don't know the names. I knew
the bass lines and I knew the melodies but I never knew
the actual lyrics. I was always drawn to the bass sound
and I've always been into reggae. Some of the lyrics to
some of the records I've liked are shit!
Too
Many DJ's?
I'm
totally into all that stuff because at the end of the
day all it is is just a collage of music. I don't find
anything bad about that or, I don't want them fucking
around with Massive Attack stuff mind. Quintessentially,
all I am is a DJ really, from the heart. I've always made
records from a DJ point of view. I'm not really into all
this technology. I'd rather work with an engineer who
was totally au fait with all this technical stuff, I can't
get bogged down in it. So I've always taken my influences
from a DJ aspect, If I make a record it's always going
to be from the thought of "I'll tell you what I really
like that drum sound in that track or I like this or I
like this about this record" and that's going be
the basis of how I start a record from an influence that
I know from something else. Then I lead on from there.
Maybe it can change along the way. If I'm going to start
doing a structure a record it will be inspired from another
record or a certain thing I like about it you know.
How
do you make records?
Ideas
and elements and stuff like that. Essentially that's how
we made our first record, the "Blue Lines" record,
that was completely from a DJ perspective. We're gonna
make a record of our favorite sounds and influences and
it was quite heavily sample based. It was quite imaginative
the way we did something with it. Whatever you do you've
got to have an imagination to take something and do something
with it. It can either be shit or the next step on, do
something good with it. I'm totally into just a sort of
recycling, whether it be clothes music or anything really.
Barrington
Levy
It's
just an old dance hall record that I remember. When I
used to hear that record I was like "wow". It
was the advent of dance hall, really, it's an early dance
hall record. Now I think the dancehall thing is great
but it's kind of lost it's way a little bit. It's had
such an influence on music, it´s such a brilliant
thing and it comes and goes. Reggae won't die as such,
people just think right there's a new audience to come
to know it. In Germany for instance a massive reggae scene
and Japan. There's a band in Germany called Seeed, they're
just like UB40, but they're the most authentic Jamaican
reggae band this side of the pond that I've heard and
they're German! They've got a few sort of German West
Indians involved as well. They are quintessentially German
band and, like fuck me man hear them playing, they're
amazing. And they've really got a massive Jamaican scene,
which is quite weird, really weird.
Foxy
Brown
Everything
here is all what I'm about, which is sort of reggae influenced
so the Foxy Brown thing; I just love the fact that she
cross pollinating the hip hop thing with the old "54-46
was my number" the Toots and The Maytals song. I
thought that was really clever. Old reggae is still being
used in contemporary hip-hop now, and to me that's what
we were doing years ago.
What
do you think of current US production, Timbaland etc.
?
I
love it man because most of those people are all from
the West Indian roots as well. There's a reggae influence
to what they do in their beats.
Leftfield?
I
just love Leftfield and the fact that they did that record
which was one of my favorite records they've ever done.
The thing about liking Leftfield is that when we went
to tour last. Last time we were on tour we had this system
right and I remember hearing this system that Leftfield
had. It was making people sick..."oh yeah! we better
get that system". We tracked it down and had it on
our last tour as well, absolutely amazing, it's the most
amazing PA you have ever heard. It reminded us of that
old school, blues, Jamaican bass lines that I used to
hear at these things.
Was
it more creative in the 90's?
Well,
I think to be honest, it was so saturated with raves and
at that time people were getting really bored. It was
all about going out and getting pilled up. And with us
when we first started, we were like let's make some anti-dance
music, something that you can sit and listen to rather
than sort of be, you know let's make something, not necessarily
for people who came home from raves and needed something
to listen to but it did kind of fill that void. There
was nothing else around, there wasn't any relaxing music
going on at the time, it was all quite hype and a bit
heavily drug induced. I think people got bored with that
and they wanted to make more experimental music.
Mos
Def
It
was on the soundtrack for Blade 2. We were asked to do
that and I remember having a little pop at it and not
doing a good job on it actually and I remember [3-]D picking
it up and sorting it out. This came about, and since then
he's done Brixton Academy and a couple of dates with us
and we're thinking about working with him for the next
album. He's actually coming back to live in Europe now
because he's getting asked to do quite a lot of stuff
here and he's becoming quite creative, and he sort of
likes the European vibe you know, he thinks it's a bit
more cultural. He's relocating to Europe and we'll be
seeing a lot more of him, and hopefully we'll be doing
some stuff with him.
New
York House music?
Yeah,
I love New York House. I love people like Tony Humphries
and Frankie Knuckles, Dave Morales. I admire all these
DJ's, there's a lot of DJ's I admire, I still love the
DJ culture. Bristol's a really weird place, you know we
always go for the most extreme sounds. You know, we either
like the grave march or we like really fast jungle or
trance, which is big, really big, you know the Nick Warrens
and the Paul Oakenfolds and Sasha and stuff like that.
I was a DJ like years ago and I used to play house music
before and I think my tastes were a bit more varied. We
used to play at all the raves, all the Universe raves
and stuff like that.
CD
or Vinyl?
I
don't even know how to use CD decks you know I'm a Luddite
when it comes to technical stuff. Turntables are great.
All someone's got to do to mess me up is chuck me a CD
to play and I'm like "How do I do this?"
Paul
Oakenfold
Yeah,
because I see Paul, he's played on a couple of Creams
after us, on tour we've done Creamfields and he's played
after us and you know I'm a little bit shocked sometimes,
he's a great DJ and he's got all that power, but sometimes
he doesn't play the best records. I think sometimes when
people start pandering to the crowd, that's when it all
goes wrong because you're supposed to edu--, well not,
I hate the word educate, you know sort of entertain people.
That's exactly why I like the whole thing.
Back
to bootlegs...
The
revamp of old acappellas on new rhythms keeps the whole
thing fresh you know. There's still a load of records,
and that's why when you hear all that 1980's stuff and
when I hear it now I'm like "Oh no, please not this
again." I've done it already with the Wild Bunch
and that stuff really, digging out those old records.
Were
you into ESG, Liquid Liquid?
I
loved ESG, loved em. Liquid, Liquid, all that stuff is
amazing. Good underground stuff you know what I mean?
Well the funny thing is what I keep forgetting, I'm 45.
I've been collecting records for thirty odd years or so.
So for me to look back, my old school, is 1970s &
1960s. If I were looking for records to sample maybe ten
years ago I would look for those type of records. So that
was my old school so you can't knock it because the young
kids who are like in their twenties their old school records
are records that they heard when they were little kids
and they are records I heard when I was a young man so
I can't really knock it, in a way, but everything has
its fashion and it's all sort of recyclable. You know
sometimes fashion and records go hand and hand. People
regurgitate things for a reason because there's a market
that wants it and hadn't had it before so they do the
laziest thing and just regurgitate it.
What
didn't make the album?
I
saw the guys the other day and I said to them "hey!
I can't get your fucking tune". It was a track from
the Chemical Brothers with Method Man and they wouldn't
let me have it. It was quite shocking really, because
I got the other thing from Def Jam which was Foxy Brown.
Do
you play out much?
You
know, I play all over the place. I get asked to play here
there and everywhere. Well I tell you what; I've actually
been to this club called Lux in Portugal. It really is
an amazing club, the way it's done, it's a family thing
they totally enjoy it, they love it, and its so welcoming.
It's fucking amazing you know. Fortunately I've done a
lot of good things you know; Massive Attack, the DJing
thing, it's all been brilliant really. DJing's my first
love really. The whole thing with DJing nowadays like
I say, with the Wild Bunch you can play anything. You
can be experimental, you can play reggae, you can play
punk, you can play hip-hop, you can play old soul records.
In a whole night we would play everything, you know what
I mean, a whole span of records from different time generations,
genres, everything. And it's a really weird thing that
DJ's now aren't really DJ's as such, their just guys that
mix. They just have one slot of records, like house DJ's,
I think it's all-great, but it's so boring, and they'll
play four hours of house. You know years ago as a DJ you
never played that. You sort of mix it up, and you know
there's a lot of music about, and it's a shame that DJ's
don't take on creative power, that they can do whatever
they want, and play records that they want. Because I'm
sure that a lot of DJ's if you actually took them out
of working hours and they were in their house playing
records to you, it wouldn't necessarily be what they play
to people. It's a shame that people don't really take
on that power, that they could actually do that and say,
"Now, I'm going to play a varied selection of music."
Interview:
Peter Kirk (08/2004)
Fotos: Rankin
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