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Hudson Mohawke Interview
RnB/Hip Hop | Wednesday 7th December 2011 | Osh
Without beating around the bush, Hudson Mohawke is one of the hottest producers on the planet right now. A tweet from hip-hop producer Just Blaze reveals the respect he is gaining: “I am listening to new @moanhawke and almost just got moved to tears. Wow. These are the chords I hear in dreams that I forget when I wake.” We caught up with the man himself to hear it from the horse’s mouth...
“I got a cassette tape of old happy hardcore and jungle albums. One of them totally sparked my imagination and I became really, really interested in that type of music when I was about 10 or 11....”
So, Hudson Mohawke, how’s it going? How’s your summer been?
Um, pretty good so far, doing festivals and stuff, and working on music. Just moved house which is nice and yeah, it’s fun.
Are you quite new to festivals?
My first year where I did quite a few festivals was, like, 2009, so... Yeah, it’s been really good this year, been to some really good festivals.
Have you played at a particular festival and been feeling quite connected?
I had one a couple of weeks ago: it was a new festival in Amsterdam called Pitch Festival. Basically, they have their big, massive festival called ‘Lowlands’, their Glastonbury... They did that last year and that was one of my best gigs last year. This year they launched this smaller sort of boutique festival in this old gas factory in Amsterdam. So that was a couple of weeks ago and that was really, really amazing. I had the closing slot of the festival; it was probably one of my favourite gigs of the year, I think.
Wicked. So how did you get into music?
Yeah. Basically my dad used to be a radio host in Glasgow in the ‘80s; he had a radio show and he had records in the house and stuff, and I guess that kinda rubbed off on me. I used to just collect chart CDs and NOW albums when I was really young. I got a dubbed cassette tape of like an old happy hardcore and jungle festival thing that I used to get different box sets of. One of them totally sparked my imagination and I became really, really interested in that type of music when I was about 10 or 11. I started buying all these, like, happy hardcore records and stuff. A lot of the guys that make that music came from hip-hop beforehand; there are a lot of, like, sped-up breakbeats, and a lot of scratching and stuff like that, and that caught my attention. From that, into being really interested in the sort of hip-hop side of things, and turntablists...
So then you ended up taking part in the DMCs?
I started that when I was 13, I think, or 14. Then I was a finalist when I was 15 and when I was 16, and then sort of rejected it because I got a bit bored of the concept that it was just about competition, you know? At that point all I wanted to do was spend every waking hour just hunched over a set of turntables. I’m glad I did it at a young age and that I didn't get into it at an older age where I could’ve got wrapped up in the whole thing, but I was able to sort of move on from that.
Yeah, I think DJ Craze is kind of stuck in it...
I mean, I really like DJ Craze. I think he is amazing, but, yeah, he’s still in that and he’s tried to escape it by making some really bad sort of electro-clash kind of stuff which doesn't really seem like any natural move. It’s just there for the sake of it, but I really rate and respect him as a DJ and he is an amazing turntablist.
Did you have one turntablist that you always wanted to see?
I was a big, big fan of Mr Thing, the Scratch Perverts and, um, Woody, a sort of Manchester-y guy... Who else? Obviously people like A-track; I’m still a bit fan of A-track. I think he’s managed to make a much more natural move from what he’s done rather than like jumping ship, so I’m still a big fan of A-track. Even though sometimes, musically, I’m not a big fan, I’m a fan of how he has done things and the way he has built his career. Obviously people like Qbert... I used to go and see him. I can’t believe that things like that actually happen. Outside of the competitive sense, like a thousand people would go to a club and just watch him scratch for, like, two hours non-stop as a club night! Or even like a concert, almost.
So, your first couple of releases were released on the LuckyMe label...
Yeah. Basically, the very first thing I think I ever had released was like, me and this guy Don, who runs LuckyMe, had like a little hip-hop group. He was the MC and I was the producer called Surface Empire, and someone approached us who was at college doing a project where part of their project was to release to release a CD and start a label and stuff. So we were, like, the guinea pigs for his course, and that was 2004 I think. That was the first sort of semi-proper release, even though it wasn't even a proper release. I did Heralds Of Change records with Mike Slott. The very first vinyl release was the start of 2006; that was the very first piece vinyl release I ever did, which was on an irish label called ‘All City’. We did three or four other Heralds Of Change records; then he moved away to New York, so...
And then you made the move to Warp Records. How did you get involved with Warp?
Basically, I had just been posting loads of stuff up online, putting loads of stuff on Myspace and that kind of thing. There was a guy who works at the Warp office who’s from Glasgow as well and was part of the Rub-A-Dub records in Glasgow.
Was that the one that had a blog?
Maybe, yeah. It was just a really good record shop in Glasgow; at one point there were seven or eight different labels running out of this one record shop and that’s where Jackmaster worked, and still works, in distribution. So I sent an mp3 to a couple of people; I was just putting the feelers out. I didn't have any hopes, in my wildest dreams, of doing anything with a label like Warp so it was a total surprise to me. It gave me a bit of a panic for a while because it was too good of an opportunity for me to turn down. There was no way I could've been like, ‘I’m not doing it.’ At the same time, I had no clue of how I would approach it; it just sort of felt like, ‘If I’m going to do this, if I’m going to have to stand alongside this roster of amazing artists, then I have to completely rethink everything that I do musically and completely regenerate myself’, you know. So I was panicking about that for a long time. I signed a contract towards the end of 2007 and nothing came out until early 2009 because I was just like, ‘Fuck, I don’t know if I can do this!’. I had eventually come to this sort of thinking that, you know everybody who was on the label was approached to be on the label for the idea of them doing their own thing and them being themselves, not because they, I mean I’m sure none of them set out to be like right, Im gonna now make a classic record or something like that just, thats the way it evolves, that’s the best i can do here is just to approach in my own way and see what happens basically.
Do you yourself have any artists that you listen to over and over again?
In terms of Warp stuff or?
Yeah.
Um, Boards of Canada, obviously stuff like Squarepusher, I really like Autechre... I really, really like Jimi Tenor, even though he did one album. It was a couple of years ago. I think he’s a Swedish or Norwegian kind of guitar, afro, funk, jazz, weird guy... He does concerts where he comes out on a horse and stuff like that! [Laughs] Um, I’m trying to think of who else is on the label. I used to really like Beans, like the anti-pop and stuff. Prefuse 73, I really love Prefuse. There’s fucking so many artists I like.
Okay. So back on to your release, the Satin Panthers EP. Is this a precursor to your second album?
Basically, I wanted to experiment by going down slightly more of a dance floor route because I wouldn’t like to do that in an album, and I don’t really feel it particularly suits an album for it all to be dance-oriented. I thought, because it is still something that I am interested in, that I would like for this EP to stand as my kind of foray in to that side of things. Not that its an out-and-out dance record or anything like that but, compared to my other releases, it is slightly more dance floor-oriented. For the next record, it’s not finished yet, but it’s more listener-oriented. That sounds really shit but, like, it’s not like a club record or something like that.
You’re quite an active tweeter and you have a bit of comedy in your tweets. Have you got any people who tweet who just crack you up?
Um. let me think... My manager, actually, is probably the funniest person. I have loads of his tweets saved on my phone.
Is that John?
No, his name is Simon White. He also manages Bloc Party, Cassius and Phoenix. Him and Diplo’s manager Kevin: he’s a really good tweeter as well!
[Tweets:
‘Thinking of dressing more like a magician, thoughts?’
‘Attacked by a plague of flying ants on my way to first time meeting P Diddy, no big deal.’
‘I always just end up favouriting all his tweets.’
‘Dont care about that new band you mentioned or that email with the woman being bummed by a wolf just leave me alone.’
‘I know want to go Ghost hunting, I just want to get a bunch of brothers together to go searching for ghosts, whos down?’]
If you had to be stranded on a desert island with someone, who would it be?
Larry David, um...
Why?
Just because I think he would be a complete bastard to have around, but he’d probably be hilarious! Um, fuck. I can’t think of that many people that I’d want to have around. Um, Quincy Jones or Prince, somebody like that. Who else? Maybe Armando Iannucci...
Who?
Armando Iannucci, a comedian guy. I don’t know why I picked him randomly but he wrote all of Alan Partridge, had his own show on Channel 4 and he’s, like, a writer in all the good comedy shows.
If you were invisible for the day, what would you do?
Probably something that I can’t say [laughs].
I interviewed Jack Beats and they said they would hang around women’s changing rooms!
Probably that!
You might see Jack Beats there!
Yeah, some sort of changing rooms! Go freak people out like driving cars while you are invisible or something. I’d just go and scare people.
Have you got an album or an artist that you have been most inspired by and you feel has rubbed off on your music?
Probably. I mean, lots of little rave and hardcore stuff I just have permanently lodged in my brain at all times just because of hammering it, listening to it at a young age. Also Boards of Canada, Music Has the Right to Children... Mahavishnu Orchestra, something like that... Kinda progressive-rock, jazz-fusion stuff. Their album Apocalypse I bought randomly on vinyl in 2004; that instantly became, like, my favourite record for ages. I haven't listened it for while; I just downloaded it again the other day because my vinyls are up at my mum’s house in Glasgow. So I’ve been blasting that out for the last few days. It’s such an amazing album; it just goes from, like, 16 minute-long tracks of big massive drum solos, and then into an opera part, and then into some fucking other bizarre solo. Bizarre stuff all thrown together, and all really amazing musicians, all releasing stuff all in their own right, all signed as solo artists and then all coming together to make this massive super group of just amazing-ness.
Thank you Hudson Mohawke.
Cheers.
Hudson Mohwake’s Satin Panthers EP is out now. Keep up with the news at www.myspace.com/hudsonmo, soundcloud.com/hudsonhowake, and on twitter (@moanhawke)
