House Music Circles: September

House Music Circles: September

28 September, 2009 | 5.31AM

• Written by: Mazi Namvar
• Filed under: Music News: house music circles, soul clap, wolf + lamb music

For this month’s installment of House Music Circles I decided to use an opportunity a few weeks back while DJing in Buffalo, NY, to interview one of my favorite new acts, Soul Clap.

They came to my attention earlier this year with their remix of Crazy Larry’s ‘Gargiulo’s Scarf’ on Fade Records.

Eli and Charlie, the two charming members of the group, were a pleasure to chat with. Our relaxed and laughter filled conversation covered a lot of topics including their initial meeting, their connection with the hotter than hot Wolf + Lamb Music imprint, their current European tour, their weekly club night in Boston and their love of exotic junk food.

Crazy Larry ‘Gargiulo’s Scarf’ (Soul Clap’s Nice’N’Ripe Rub)

How did you guys get started, how did you meet? Where did this whole Soul Clap idea come from?

Eli: Boring. That is the lamest question ever!

Charlie: That is a lame question, but you know what Mazi, we’ll field that lame question. Eli and I are both from Boston. Eli is from Cambridge and I’m from Brookline Massachusetts.

We met in high school through a mutual friend. We were both in ‘alternative’ high school programs. And they both had student government town meetings and such. So as a day trip they decided that we would go to Cambridge and see how they do their town meetings and they would come to Brookline to see how we do our town meetings and Eli and I were both rave trash at the time and recognized a mutual interest in vinyl collecting and raving…

E: ...and smoking crack and such… [laughs]

C: ...no, no crack smoking.

That’s good. A good lame answer to a lame question. So why Soul Clap?

Soul Clap is the feeling, the sensation, the natural reaction to a moment on the dancefloor when you are one with the music [starts clapping hands] and you’re Soul Clapping along with that...it’s more about a gospel kind of thing. I think you know, mixing religion with this kind of...wait wait [looking to Eli] no, you answer that part [laughs].

E: It’s about an uplifting feeling.

C: We’re not very religious people but I think we’re pretty spiritual.

Just taking it down to a mundane functional level do you guys have a special thing about claps?

E: Lately it has been all about the 80’s snare Bobbie Brown type smashed clap sounds. It’s gotta be a smashing sound. So it is a literal thing and a metaphorical thing too. I always loved swingy garage claps too.

You guys have been involved with Wolf + Lamb doing re-edits. How did that come about?

C: The edits have always been something that we’ve been interested in. It’s weird but the ‘Love Light’ Stevie Wonder edit we did, which is on the first Wolf + Lamb Black, kind of blew our name out into the world - and it had been finished for years!

We did that in the Summer of 2007. In Boston to survive as a working DJ you gotta be a master of all styles. We found that a really great way to make money in Boston was to DJ for retail clients: Macy’s for example. In Macy’s you can’t just play underground, and you don’t wanna just play pop, so these edits are the perfect fusion – taking something old and making something new and fresh.

E: We were playing a lot of Todd Terje and other artists like Mark East, The Revenge – these are big influences now.

Yup, I can clearly hear the tradition your music is fitting in.

C: Yeah and there’s DJ Khan, who’s one of the disco crate digging kings here in Boston - he kind of brought us up for the last few years. For a while now he’s been teaching us about disco, and edits as such a big part of disco music. He always does edits on all his mixes, so he kinda laced us with that.

Charlie and I were speaking before and he said Soul Clap used to have a specific sound when you started and now you’ve done an about face – you’ve changed it up. What was it and what is it now?

We’ve always produced from our influences, first and foremost. We’ve been DJing for 12 years and we’ve made it our mission to learn everything about every kind of music, so I think we’ve always produced from what has influenced us.

It’s not a total about face, it’s a maturing of our sound. Going from the house influence – New York House, UK Garage and UK House influence – moving towards older soul, funk and R&B Music and we’ve been doing a 90s party for three years so the 90s have always been a huge influence on us.

We’re finally starting to harness these ideas from the past; take them and create futuristic music.

So you’ve been refining, very cool. You have a tour coming up right?

C: Yes. It’s our big Euro tour! We’ve played in Europe before but never this many dates in such a short time. We’ll be playing in Berlin, and then we’re going to Dublin then to Portugal, then from Portugal to France, then to Croatia. Then Croatia back to Berlin and finally to the UK. I wanna go to Amsterdam! [laughs]

E: You can go to Airdrop.com or SoulClap.us for the exact tour dates.

What’s the next thing people should be looking for? What’s your next release?

E: There’s a new Airdrop EP out on September 14th. It’s vinyl only for awhile, then digital later. It’s called the ‘Definition EP’. It’s really important to us – four original tracks and our first real original EP.

It’s called ‘Definition’ because it’s four songs that define where we’re at right now. A1 is called ‘Grown-N-Sexy’ with a sample from the 80s. It’s very R&B, very filtery kinda sound like mid 90s house. ‘Crazy Lady’ is more on the deep house tip, kinda brings in a lot of our influences from deep house over the years.

‘Beauty Sleep’ was written with Paolo who runs Airdrop. He’s not a producer but he’s a huge music lover and has sent us amazing music over the years and taught us a lot. We were in the studio kinda messing around and came up with a sick track.

C: That track has a lot of original elements to it. It’s got a sample too but a lot of original synthesizers are flowing in there.

E: The B2, which actually looks like it could be the biggest thing off the record, is called ‘3 Wheel E-Motion’, which we wrote in a G Funk West Coast style. That one is just really different.

C: It’s sick - with a fat slap bass.

E: Yeah Charlie freaked out a dope solo on the keys. On that whole EP we’re using a lot of drums from the late 80s, early 90s. We’re not making music to sound like it’s from that time, but like I was saying to you before, it’s about the process and about keeping it in mind while we write. How you would think about it back in the day. Taking that perspective, breaking it into a million pieces and bringing it back together.

Right, I think what you’re doing is definitely modern music, just influenced from that era. One other thing I’m curious about - talking locally about Boston – what’s going on in your hometown? Is it helping you being from there? Is it a good thing or a hindrance?

C: No one’s ever really come up and been like “we’re representing Boston”. That’s the curse of Boston. Everybody moves somewhere else and blows up representing wherever they’ve moved to.

E: Well I mean Fred Giannelli - The Kooky Scientist, he kinda did. He definitely set out doing his own thing from the beginning. Boston is a great home base.

All the clubs close at 2am but we can afterparty with our friends when we want to. In general though we can be home from work at 2:30 or 3am every night and get some sleep and get music and work done the next day, and make sure we’re running our parties properly.

We do a weekly Wednesday night at a teeny little place called Phoenix Landing – it’s an Irish Pub that transforms into a club. The place has the best soundsystem in Boston. Pretty bumpin’ and because we’re doing a Wednesday near NY and there’s not really any other techno parties on that night in the US we can book a lot of cool international guests.

Who have you had come through?

C: Recently Cassie, Paco Osuna, Dixon, Heidi, Tiefschwarz.

E: Masomenos, Italo Boys. Pretty much anyone when they come on tour that we like.

C: Before us a dude named Shannon Shalaco, who lives in SF now, he had the night on Wednesday. It’s been going for over 12 years.

Who do you have coming up?

C: Till Von Sein, Bruno Pronsato, Dilo from Argentina.

E: Sascha Dive, Lee Burridge and Paco Osuna again.

C: You can get the whole line up at midweektechno.com.

E: ...and hopefully Mazi Namvar in the near future.

You mean Audio Soul Project?

C+ E: Yeah Audio Soul Project! [laughs]

Anything else going on that people should be hipped to?

E: There’s our upcoming Wolf + Lamb Black #3 ‘Wicked Game and Dreams’. That one we’re really excited about too.

C: We’ve also done a Michael Jackson tribute EP that came out, ‘Michael Went To Heaven’ / ‘Michael Went To Hell’, and then a track by No Regular Play. Oh yeah there’s also our podcast. Tons of dope mixes there.

E: Go to our website SoulClap.us. There’s tons of free stuff there and fan us on Facebook. And don’t forget Twitter. We’re all over the internet!

One last question: Buffalo Wings - yes or no?

E: Man I’ve had maybe 30 wings in the last two days here in Buffalo. It has been amazing - a real experience.

C: Now time to go to Chicago for some alligator sausage!

About Mazi Namvar aka Audio Soul Project

A prolific producer, remixer and DJ, Chicago resident Mazi Namvar’s name has appeared on over 200 records in the 15 years, under a number of pseudonyms including Audio Soul Project.

A DJ for 18 years, Mazi has played at clubs like Fabric in London, Crystal in Istanbul, Q in Zürich, Avalon in Los Angeles, Masai in Varna, Level in Bahrain, Red Light in Paris and Simoon in Tokyo.

He continually works on remixes, and his recent credits include Marc Romboy and Tyree Cooper’s ‘Lost’ on Josh Wink’s Ovum Recordings, Nick and Danny Chatelain’s ‘Sube Conmigo’ on NRK, AlexKid & Chloe’s ‘Afterblaster’ on Brique Rouge, Alexander Maier’s ‘Sahara Rain’ on Mood Music, Cates & dpL’s ‘Through the Weekend’ on OM Records, Chaim’s ‘C Factor’ on Missive Recordings, Sandrino & Adryan’s ‘Solar Wind’ on Fresh Meat and Nosmo v Kris B & Ben Brown’s ‘La Cocina’ which was licensed to Darren Emerson’s ‘Bogotá GU36’ DJ mix; the latest in the Global Underground series.

Currently most of his original music appears on Fresh Meat Records which he co-owns with partner Nathan Drew Larsen. Other recent productions have appeared on Systematic, Dessous Recordings, Circle Music and SAW Recordings. 

• (0) Comments
• (1873) Views
• Check out Soul Clap on Beatport