We have a rather special mix for you by all round top bloke KEVIN GRIFFITHS recorded live at Switch last month. A snap shot of everything that is good about house/techno at the moment we are loving it
so get on the download. We also managed to ask the man himself a few questions about his music, his label and him. Check it out:
DJ/Producer/Label Boss/Promoter - Its fair to say you are juggling a lot of plates rather well but where does your true love lie, which plate gets you up in the morning and why?
I’m probably most passionate about the label as I’ve worked really hard on it over the last 3 years. As well as the music I get a lot out of satisfaction from building the brand and label identity. Having said
that I firmly have the production bug and get a real buzz from creating music, even though the process can be fairly stressful creating an end result that I’m happy with.
Describe Tsuba's/your sound in three words?
Sexy underground house
Its fair to say Tsuba is on fire at the moment with Peace Divisions latest and last (?) storming up the RA and Beatport charts and Return of Samurai killing it – What's the secret to the success?
There’s an awful lot of music out there each week, especially with the advent of the digital only label, so the aim is to release music on Tsuba that stands out from the pack. I also try to not strictly stick
to one genre which is really important – I love deep house as much as tech house & techno, so I want to be able to release both which gives a bit of diversity.
You have a number of great artists on the roster at Tsuba but who should we watch out for?
Okain is someone I have no doubt is going to be really big. He makes really club friendly hook laden tracks and has his own distinct sound. Its nice to part of that having supported him from really early on
after he sent a demo in. There’s also Ethyl & Huxley who have also just released on Cecille. Like Okain, they have really strong melodies, but are more house orientated with a deeper sound. Nima Gorji is
another one who’s doing an EP an the moment. I play an embarrassing amount of his stuff when I DJ so its great to have him on the label! Now Peace Division have split Justin Drake has just delivered a
wicked EP as a solo artist – he’s super talented and I’m sure there’s lots more to come. Bearweasel have just finished a new release as well of raw acid house trax that are made for underground clubs.
Then there’s a single from Federico Molinari and a new Moodymanc EP so lots of exciting things.
What's next for Tsuba? What's your plans for the label?
Generally to maintain the quality of releases. I’m the third most charted UK label on RA so it would be nice to improve on that. Another aim is to do more label nights to spread the word .Tsuba will be
hosting Room 3 at Fabric in November which is exciting and should be able to confirm a label party in Berlin shortly.
You have had a number of successful releases yourself, was the label started as a platform for you tunes? What's coming up for you as a producer?
I didn’t start the label with the intention of doing my own stuff, but after about 10 releases it seemed like a sensible thing to do. I always said I wouldn’t do it, but I tried Ableton and really enjoyed it so
got the bug pretty quickly. Also to progress as a DJ you really need to put your balls on the line and release some music.
My next Tsuba release is in October – 3 new tracks and a remix from Langenberg. Then I have a new EP on Four:Twenty around the same time that has one original from me (+ simon baker mix) and two
tracks I’ve done with Okain.
Steve Bug has just put my last single ‘cantona kung fu’ on his new mix cd out in October which is nice!
Club night wise you run Issst and just hosted it in a rather special venue, fill us in?
Issst is pretty occasional now with 1 or 2 parties a year. We try to find unusual venues to make the parties even more of a special event. We did one a few weeks ago at a private members club at the top
of centre point in London with tiefschwarz. The views are totally mind blowing with literally every land mark in London in sight. I did the sunrise set 4-6am which was special.
There are a lot of people out there making records wanting to break through, what's your advice to them, bombard A&R's or sit back and wait to be spotted?
It’s a tough one as I’ve kind of stopped listening to demos. The label is well established now and I have a really talented pool of people to release music with so there’s very little space for brand new
artists. The other reason is the amount I’m being sent which is about 10 a day. I have other things to do as well as Tsuba so the reality is I don’t have the time to listen, otherwise I’d have no time to run
the label properly! My advice would be to try and meet the A&R personally at a gig or whatever – I’ll always listen to stuff having met someone.
Recently we've seen house come back in a big way plus tribal rhythms and vocal snippets are everywhere – what's next do you think and what would you like to hear more of from DJs/Producers?
Yeah house is back, but now people are dissing it already! So I guess if you’re a label solely releasing that sound it could get tough. Its quite easy now with loops etc to make a track so its good to have an
element of musicality. To contradict that though, if it’s a killer loop with jumping bassline that works in a club context - for DJs those tracks are really important. As a DJ I know I always like to be
armed with those tracks. With my Tsuba hat on, it goes back to the importance of variety and not being stuck with one sound. I would get bored just releasing those beat orientated/DJ tracks.
Desert island disks – What three tunes would you pick regardless of genre?
Tosca ‘J.A.C’ (K7) - Album
16B ‘It Doesn’t Have To End’ (Eye Q)
Tiny Trendies ‘The Sky Is Not Crying’ (Nuphonic)
What do you do to chill out, get away from it all when you have time?
My favourite is chilling out with my wife and daughter on a Sunday after a gig. Nice food & red wine and I’m a happy chap.
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