John Digweed: A structured approach

John Digweed: A structured approach

29 July, 2010 | 6.40AM

• Written by: Beatportal
• Filed under: Music News: bedrock, structures

When is a DJ mix not just a DJ mix? Probably when it’s something like John Digweed’s ‘Structures’. Like all of his mixes, it’s a showcase of the Bedrock sound, a portrait of his tastes as a DJ, and even a state-of-the-art address describing his vision of today’s underground house and techno.

‘Structures’ also might be the most monumental release of Digweed’s career to date. Not only does the package include two full album-length mixes, along with full-length versions of all 33 tracks used in them; the majority of the tracks are themselves previously unreleased and exclusive to ‘Structures’, or new versions of material included on last year’s ‘Bedrock 11’. (The Beatport release of the album also includes six additional tracks not included on the mix.)

There’s also a third mix, recorded live at Bedrock’s WMC party at Vagabond Miami last March; in fact, it’s Digweed’s first ever commercially released live session.

Rounding out the package, the Uruguayan director Pablo Casacuberta filmed Digweed’s 2009 tour of South America, turning the footage into an intimate portrait of the artist as he’s rarely (if ever) been seen. (Purchasers of ‘Structures’ on Beatport get a 50-minute edit of the documentary by downloading Bedrock’s special interactive sleeve; go here to get it, or check this tutorial for more information on how to use it.)

We caught up with the workaholic producer in a rare moment of downtime to find out how ‘Structures’ came together. Read on for the full interview.

Are you getting ready for gigs this weekend?

I played Wednesday, and then I play Saturday and Sunday, so I have a Friday night at home.

You were in Tunisia, right? How was that?

It was hot. [laughs] It was so hot, just roasting. I think it was about 29 or 30 at night and about 40 during the day! But it was good, I think it was the third time I’ve been there.

What are crowds like there?

A mixture of tourists and locals, as well, and they’re into it.

Let’s talk about ‘Structures’. How did you select the tracks for the mix?

Some of the tracks stem from the ‘Bedrock 11’ album, which came out in October, which we remixed—like the Marc Marzenit, the Mutant Clan tracks, Christian Smith’s ‘Flyertalk’. They had already seen the light of day on the album last year, I just wanted to give them a bit of a reworking. Then it was just contacting some producers who I think are making great music, asking them if they wanted to get involved, make a track, do a remix for one of the tracks off the album, stuff like that.

It took about six or seven months of putting it together to come up with the final tracklisting. Then there’s the live mix, which didn’t really take any preparation at all, as it was kind of an afterthought, after I’d already played the gig. It wasn’t planned to be on an album or anything, it just happened that it worked out that way, so that was quite a simple thing. And obviously the documentary was shot last year, and it was looking for a home, and I think this was the ideal package. The combination of the two CDs, the live album, and the DVD, plus the visual aspect—Malone’s designs from the Bedrock artwork, the shots from the club night, shots from the documentary—it makes it one of the strongest packages we’ve put out as a label.

How did you decide how you wanted to structure the mixes?

I like to start a bit mellower and build up. It doesn’t really make sense to start with the biggest record and end mellow; you want to encourage people in with the mix, you want to catch their attention and then gradually draw them in more and more, so by the time the energy does pick up, they haven’t realized that you’ve sucked them in. Whereas if you start off crash, bang, wallop, it’s very hard to maintain that, and people get tired if it’s all go-for-broke from the very start. I’m definitely looking for those records that are going to make the start of the CD. We had Luis Junior’s track, which was perfect, following into John Daly’s remix of ‘Babylon’, a really nice deep house vibe. And on CD2, Nick Warren’s ‘In Search of Silver’ has just got a beautiful beginning, a lovely sort of ambient.

When people hear the first track, you want to catch their attention and make them interested, so it’s very important to find those records that will do the job.

Is it an agonizing process to figure out what fits where? Ewan Pearson talked about how he spent months trying to figure out the proper components and the proper order for his last mix CD.

It takes a while. I mean, I’ve been doing these albums for many years, but it doesn’t get any easier. Also, I’m working with a very limited amount of tracks. I’m not just going to record labels and saying, “I really like this record, it fits in perfectly between these two.” I’m actually creating the mix out of stuff that’s either on the label or that I’m signing. So there has to be an element of, right, we’re missing a track with this kind of vibe, let’s scrape around and find what’s going to fit in there. And then contacting a certain person and saying, “Have you got anything you’re making, what tracks are coming up?” It’s a bit of luck as well. The label gets sent so much music, you could be in that situation where you’re scratching your head, thinking, I’m stuck trying to get from this section to that section, and that very day, someone will send you a track and say, “I’ve just finished this, what do you think of it?” And you listen to it and think, this is the track I’ve been waiting for!

So it’s all those things—a lot of work, a lot of care and attention, but I like to think of myself as a perfectionist. I don’t let anything go out that I’m not happy with. When I put these albums together it’s really important that someone’s not going to listen to it just once, I want them to listen to it over and over again and enjoy it. I want them to really like the album and the music that’s on there, not only as a mix, but as individual tracks in their own right. It’s very important, when these tracks are signed, that they’re good records that stand on their own, without being on this compilation.

Do you feel like there’s more pressure to create lasting mix albums now when there are so many podcasts and mixes available for free online?

Obviously, I’m in the spotlight, so people are going to pay attention when I put something out, and it had better be good. You know, the higher up the ladder, the more people will have a pop at you. So I think it’s really important that you deliver something worthwhile and very good. I’ve maintained my position in the scene by always being very disciplined and making sure that what I deliver is 110%, and that the people are going to enjoy it. I don’t just throw’em together and hope people like it. As I said, it took six or seven months of planning this thing and putting it together and trying different mixes out, trying different tracks out, and piecing the digital puzzle together to make something that’s going to stand the test of time.

I was struck by the tonal and harmonic cohesion. The first 15 or 25 minutes, I think it’s three tracks, are just seamless. Did you specifically ask for things in certain keys?

No, it’s just the way it worked out. Obviously it’s very lucky when those records you want to choose for the start work well together, but I think if they didn’t work well together, you’d be listening to a different mix now. You can’t bang a square peg into a round hole. There’s no point in just lumping something in there just because you think, well, I really want this at the start of the mix, but it doesn’t work with anything else. It needs to work, and it needs to sound nice. You don’t want it to be out there, and people think, ooh, it stands out like a sore thumb! You want to do something that people want to listen to again and again, so it’s important that the mix have a smooth feel.

You have to take care and pay attention to the detail in these albums. People are so much more finely attuned now to how these albums should sound, that you can’t put something out that’s substandard.

Were there any tracks you wanted to use, but couldn’t find room for?

No, I pretty much got everything on there that I wanted to. I think there’s enough on there. [Laughs] You could keep adding more and more, but the thing would never get released.

You created the mix in Ableton, which is obviously quite different than mixing live in a club. Do you find it difficult to translate the energy of a spontaneous set to something that you’re doing in your studio on your computer?

Not really, because I’ve been DJing for so long, I know how I want it to sound. When I’m listening back, if it doesn’t sound like I want it to, I know I need to make some changes. It’s a question of knowing what you want and knowing how to get that.

I’ve got to say, without Ableton, putting these mix comps together—with all the traveling and my schedule—would be so much harder. It’s unbelievable the amount of work I can get done while I’m traveling now, whereas before, you had to rely on coming back, working in the studio, trying the tracks out with vinyl and CDs. Having Ableton allows you to free up that time when you’d be sitting in a hotel room watching BBC World or something. Now, you can actually work on the album and be very productive. I’m really happy to have that kind of flexibility with my time now.

What format are you playing in clubs?

I’m on the [Pioneer] CDJ-2000, which I absolutely love. I think they’ve really nailed it with the new units that have come out. The movement on it is really spot-on, the display is crystal clear, and the search feature to find the tracks—I really love it. I was always kind of unsure how it was going to work, just playing off SD cards, but it’s fantastic. It saves a lot of time burning CDs and writing all the information on them. I can just be working on stuff, put it on an SD card, and I’m ready to go. It’s a great invention.

That’s the worst thing about CDRs—burning tracks and keeping track of them, and trying to decipher what you’ve written on them…

Well, I can’t read my handwriting, so I’ve got this visual aspect where I look at something and realize what it is, but then you always put it back somewhere else in the wallet, and you can’t find it when you want it!

How did you decide to include the Vagabond set? That’s your first official, commercially released live set, right?

That’s correct. I’m actually involved in the Vagabond; I’m one of the partners there. I’ve always wanted to do a live mix, and we recorded the night, and it was such a fantastic night, the energy in the room. I was looking back and thought, I wonder if we could use some of this? I started getting some of the tracks cleared. It wasn’t until we decided to include the documentary, and they said, well, you’re using a DVD, you’ve got four and a half gigs, so you’ve got more space to put stuff on it. If you’ve got any other material you want to put on there, you might as well utilize the DVD. So that’s what made me go, oh, let’s put a live mix out. There are several mixes I was debating, but it made sense to use the Vagabond mix because it was a Bedrock night, it was a great night, and I’m involved in it, as well, so you don’t have any problems with contacting clubs and them getting a bit precious about certain things. It all tied in nicely, really.

You had to shorten it for licensing issues, though.

Yeah, there was a major [label track], and then there were a couple of other labels that had tracks on there that I wrote to for a release, and they were like, it’s not coming out yet, you can’t use it. It’s a real shame, because it would have been longer than it was. But I certainly understand the labels—well, the major labels I didn’t understand, because the record’s been released, they obviously want to recoup some money on it, but they just wanted to stick to a 1990s contract mentality. It was just unworkable, really, the deal that they wanted. It was so much money, and that was just for one territory. I thought, I can’t do this for a worldwide release, it just doesn’t make any sense. It’s a shame, because it would have been nice to have the track on there, but people haven’t heard it on there, so they don’t miss it.

How did the documentary come about, and what was it like being the focus of a project like that?

One of my manger’s friends put me in touch with Pablo [Casacuberta], from Uruguay. He said look, there’s this director who’s really interested in working with you on a documentary when you come down to do a South American tour. We spoke via email, and he sent me some ideas of his vision and what he wanted to do, and I thought it was the chance to do something a little bit different. He wanted to use the visual aspect to get across the documentary, rather than me just sitting in the green room, talking. He set up loads of different locations around Uruguay and also in Buenos Aires and Brazil.

I’ve got to say, I’d come off one tour, and by the time I got there I was absolutely shattered. We started at 6:30 the next morning, and it was like a 13-, 14-hour shoot, and then sleep and another 14-hour day, so I think by the end of day two, I was practically on my knees. I thought, what am I going to come across like? When they were filming, I’m lying on the floor and there are these robots walking past me, or they’re getting me to hold things in certain ways, and I was thinking, this guy’s getting me to do some funny stuff, I’m not sure how comfortable I feel with it. But then watching it back and seeing what he did, I was really happy with the end result, because he’d actually thought about what he wanted to do. He wanted to create something a little bit more visual with the documentary attached to it, with my dialogue. He really thought about how he wanted to get the message across. It’s nice for me to have something that documents my career from the start, almost through to where I am now, with a really nice visual aspect.

What are Bedrock’s plans for the rest of the year?

I’m going to be touring this album for the rest of the summer and beyond. Then, the 2nd of October I’ll be celebrating 12 years of Bedrock at the O2 Academy Brixton, in London. That’s going to be a huge event, we’ve got a big guest joining me that we can’t announce until next month. All in all, it’s nice to do something big to celebrate the label this year, because I think we’ve had a fantastic year. And also, I think we’re trying to give people good value for their money, and give something back to the crowd as well.

What’s your impression of clubbing in England, and London particularly, right now? I know you’d been doing some things at Matter, and now that’s gone under. Are you optimistic about the nightlife prospects?

There’s been quite a lot of clubs that have closed due to the lease being up, and being sold off to property developers, or lack of attendance and stuff like that. It’s a shame that there have been quite a few disappeared from the landscape. I think something will rise up; people will get inspired and start something new. Obviously Fabric, which is the key club in London and probably the UK, might have had some problems, but they’re back on track now, which is fantastic news. I think it’s definitely harder out there at the moment for the promoters, but if you look at clubs like Fabric, they’ve got their noses to the grindstone and they’re working hard to put on really good quality nights. And smaller nights are starting up, and I think we’ll see them build their fan base and grow into bigger nights. It’s tough, but we’ve been through periods like this before, and I’m sure there’ll be periods again. But then you go to Manchester, and it’s rocking! They’ve got the Warehouse Project about to start in a few months time, and they’ll probably sell out every date. Sankeys is doing amazingly, so it’s not all doom and gloom.

We’ll end on that positive note! Thanks for talking to us today, and have a great tour.

Thanks so much, have a great weekend.

‘Structures’

John Digweed’s Summer 2010 Top 10

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