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1.Where are you from?
TC1: I'm from a town called Huddersfield originally but now live just outside of Leeds city in the North of UK (not far from Manchester also).
Jack@Spectrasoul: Brighton, UK
2.How did you get into drum & bass?
TC1:I got into a lot of early rave / dance music in 90/91 at the age of 12, stuff by n-joi, early prodigy, eon, altern 8, top buzz etc.
Jack@Spectrasoul: :I was brought up in a musical family. As I grew up I was introduced to music software and started to develop my ideas. This eventually led me down the DJ route and I started buying bundles of tunes every week.
3.Where was your first DJ appearance?
TC1: On Pirate radio at the age of 14 then in a nightlcub in Huddersfield university called the black hole at the age of 15.
Jack@Spectrasoul:my first gig as SpectraSoul was at Drumfunk in Bournemouth, UK in July last year. Turned up, club was busy and we were pretty nervous to be honest. The set went down really well, got to test a few of our early beats on a big system, and actually realised that we could work behind the turntables as a duo.
4.When was your golden era of drum & bass?
TC1: Would have to say 96 to 98, the music just started to move up a notch production wise and all the early dom, optical, matrix, boymerang and early dillinja masterpieces started to explode on the scene. The way the stuff sounded in the clubs at this time (in particular these guys productions) was just jaw dropping.
Jack@Spectrasoul: I think we're going through a golden era for Drum & Bass right now. The scene is thriving on an international level, so many good producers/DJ's making fresh exciting music, and recently it really opened up for the next generation to come through.
5.Which are your musical inspirations?
TC1: Its really tough to say, I could say fabio, grooverider, ltj bukem etc for me wanting to get involved in the whole thing in the first place but then i think a lot of our early material had a real early funk / disco / house vibe to it so you could say the likes of moodymann, masters at work, roy davis jnr etc.
Jack@Spectrasoul: There is so much music that influences us daily. We take inspiration from anything with a soulful and jazzy feel to it. Every one of our tracks represents a different mood or expression. With our music being mainly sample based, there is a clear and direct relationship between the music we listen to socially and the music we make in the studio.
6.How do you describe your own sound / the sound that you produce?
TC1:energetic!
Jack@Spectrasoul: That's a tough one! At the moment, we are working on a wide range of tunes. We can make a deep rolling tune that appeals to the dance floor, or we can make a more instrumental and vocal based tune. It really is dependant on our mood, influences, and the samples that we have collected.
7. Which track have you written that you are most happy with? Why?
TC1: I would probably have to say its one of the vocal ones - a track we did with a vocalist called kiyomi from tokyo entitled "what i see", it seemed to turn out exactly how we picured it in our heads. It wasn't one of our biggest tunes as it was quite a deep melodic track it just turned out exactly how we wanted it to, saying that though we are working on one with MC Conrad (LTJ Bukem's mc) which is shaping up really nice so who knows!
Jack@Spectrasoul: Has to be 'Cherry Smoke'. It was part of the first batch of tunes we made together, seem to remember all the elements fitting together seamlessly and everything just worked. That vocal still gives me a little shiver when I hear it.
8. What can people expect from your sets?
TC1: A good, across the board set of music and i hope people will think i mix well also - i still practice 5 or 6 hours a week even though i have been dj'ing for so many years so I do try my best.
Jack@Spectrasoul: We really can be un-predictable. Sometimes we will play strictly liquid and more musical tunes, sometimes we can play a set of rollers, but normally it is a mix of both. Again, I think we can adapt dependant on when we are playing. For example, if we are warming up, then we will play lighter; and if we are playing after Friction, for example, we can step up and play a harder set.
9. What does your top 10 at the moment look like?
TC1:
1. Survival & Sabre - Omega - ?
2. Zero Tolerance & Logistics - Frigid Dub - Integral
3. Stress Level, Ant TC1 & Julen - The Great Sacrifice - ?
4. Chris.SU & Ant TC1 - The Vendetta - Commercial Suicide
5. Survival - Orion - Creative Source
6. System - Near Miss - Digital Soundboy
7. Lomax - Come & see - Critical
8. Klute - Halloween - Commercial Suicide
9. Stress Level, Ant TC1 & Chris.SU - Final Cut - Commercial Suicide
10.Tactile - Caravan (Ant TC1 rmx 2) – Dispatch Jack@Spectrasoul: 1/ SpectraSoul - Cascade (Dub)
2/ Icicle & Nympho - Franky Mountain (Dub)
3/ D-bridge & Calibre - Untitled (Exit Dub?)
4/ Zero Tolerance - Goes Around (Shogun Audio Dub)
5/ SpectraSoul - Fluorescent (Dub)
6/ Commix - Solvent (Shogun Audio Dub)
7/ Icicle & Jubei - Keep Up (Dub)
8/ SpectraSoul - How Strange (Dub)
9/ Alix Perez - Stray (Dub)
10/ Alix Perez - Crooklyn (Soul:R) 10. Which was your best gig/show in 2007?
TC1: Tough choice! I can't decide but it has to be between Mute @ Hive in Zurich (Switzerland), or Progressions sessions @ Fabric, London (UK).
Jack@Spectrasoul: Probably our set at the first Shogun Audio event @ The End, London back in February. Playing at one of the most prestigious clubs in the country, on one of the best sound systems in the world was quite an honour. And not forgetting our last gig at the Hive Club in Zurich for Chris & the mute.ch crew. Always a pleasure to play there.
11. On which projects are you working on right now / what's coming next?
TC1: Quite a few but will be having a break from producing whilst in Asia. We have 2 tracks in the works with Atlantic Connection (one of them featuring MC Conrad), I have one I am working on with Survival, myself and Stress Level are working on a remix of 'Palomar' for Lomax and have just finished a track with a close friend of ours who is producing under the name Julen, which co-incidentally it looks like I will be playing for the first time on Hong Kong! I think our next release is in April / May on Klute's Commercial Suicide label "The Vendetta / Final Cut" (with Chris.SU). I have a steady flow of stuff coming out on Dispatch also from the likes of Survival, Zero Tolerance and steo and well as a collab from Break and Survival.
Jack@Spectrasoul: Right now we are still working hard in the studio, trying to define and experiment with our sound. We've got a couple of collaborations to tweak that we started with Icicle, and have just finished a new batch of tunes that we can hopefully find homes for.
Release wise, look out for our 'Waterfront EP' dropping on Nu:Directions in early 08, along with 12's on DSM, Westbay and SGN:LTD. In other projects, we've also linked up sponsorship with 'Aerosoul' clothing company (http://www.aerosoul.com), so keep an eye out for fresh threads there. 12. Which DJs would you book to play if you had control of a radio station for a day?
TC1:Great question! I could go on all day with this....
Karizma, Ame, Flight, Masters at work, Klute, DBridge, Kevin Reynolds, Derrick May, Jazzanova, Giles Peterson and Alan Partridge! Jack@Spectrasoul: We'd give the listeners a nice eclectic mix of upfront music across all genres:
Marc Mac
John Peel (RIP)
Calibre
Skream
With Annie Mac doing the Breakfast show
13. How did you like the D&B vibe over here in Hong Kong?
Tc1:Good! Great people and really friendly, I've been looking forward to coming back.
Interview by Magnetic Soul
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