Tonight (15th February) sees one of Leeds’ finest jungle/drum & bass nights, Jungle Jam, celebrate its 8th birthday. Hosted at Mint Warehouse, ‘Kings of the Jungle’ is set to include performances from such jungle legends as Micky Finn, Ragga Twins and Remarc. Repping for former four-piece Bad Company is Maldini, original member and DJ/producer in his own right. Leeds Student’s Will Gadsby Peet caught up with him for a chat ahead of his set tonight.
LS: Mate I cannot tell you how cool it is to be interviewing you, I’m a massive fan of pretty much everything you’ve been involved in, Renegade Hardware and Bad Company are probably the two most influential things (in a good way) that have happened to drum and bass. ‘Snapfish’, ‘The Nine’, ‘Oceanic’ and ‘Planet Dust’ are just massive tunes.
Your MySpace page claims that you were born in a vat of skill underneath an awesome tree, on a full moon, on the one day of the year where nothing bad happened, is this true?
Yep, obviously… documented and factual… doh
LS: From Renegade Hardware to Bad Company, you’ve been at the forefront of the drum & bass scene as we know it pretty much since it began. With all the producers and DJs you’ve worked with over your career who would you say has been the most influential on your sound?
No U Turn Records were a huge influence on myself and D-Bridge when we made tracks as Future Forces Inc on Renegade Hardware. Also a lot of music played by Bailey and the Metalheadz crew when Blue Note was about in Hoxton Square.
Later on when we formed Bad Company I guess artists like Ed Rush and Optical were pretty influential, they had just started Virus and their output was insane. Also people like Moving Fusion and Konflict… Year 2000 had some incredible tracks… ‘Alien Girl’, ‘Messiah’, ‘The Beginning’
LS: What was it that attracted you to drum and bass in the first place as a genre of dance music?
I guess hearing tearing sub lines in a club for the first time, how can you not love that…
LS: Obviously you’re still repping the Bad Company name hard, have you got any side projects that we should be looking out for in 2013?
At the moment I’m in the process of finishing an EP for C4C and a remix for Dom n Roland.
LS: What would your dream line up (past or present) for a night be?
If we’re talking past, I always loved the lineups down at Blue Note, Metalheadz. Groove, Bailey and the rest of the crew… Present day… Calyx & Teebee, Optiv & BTK, Ed Rush & Optical, Mefjus, Neonlight, Marky, Bukem, Friction, Andy C
LS: When Bad Company first started out, there were four of you guys collaborating to produce some revolutionary tunes. How did you manage to keep a unity and cohesion to your sound with so many different creative inputs?
We rarely made tracks with all four of us; it was usually one of us with DJ Fresh so I guess the cohesion in the sound obviously came from number one, Fresh being involved in every track as the studio was at his house… And number two, everything was done on analogue equipment which meant the studio was made up of a lot of gear that we had personally collected… Nowadays things can sound a bit samey, sound-wise, perhaps because it’s all done in the box with everyone having access to the same plug-ins.
LS: My mate is a DJ and he says that dropping a big tune and seeing a crowd react is better than sex. Would you agree or should I find my friend a book on how to have better sex?
Hmm… Don’t get me wrong, it’s an amazing feeling playing to a reactive crowd, dropping a track you’ve been working on and getting pure, sincere feedback, but maybe you should find your friend a better book or better still perhaps a fuck buddy? Practice makes perfect
LS: What do you think of dubstep?
Some of it is pretty cool, not really my cup of tea but I’m not against it like a lot of some diehard drum and bass fans.
LS: What’s your favourite drum and bass song of all time? And what’s your favourite song that you’ve made?
That’s is such a difficult one, so many great tracks…’Future Unknown’ by Krust is one I love still to this day, disgusting track! Obviously ‘Messiah’ by Konflict… I could go on and on, there are just too many!
LS: The rise of drum and bass has been meteoric over the past twenty odd years, evolving from a genre of music heavily associated with a sweaty basement and a crowd of about twenty to a chart topping monster, filling out super clubs and festivals all over the world. What do you think of the mainstream success of acts like Chase & Status and former Bad Company member DJ Fresh? Do you ever get nostalgic for sweaty basements?
It’s an amazing accomplishment, music learnt and created initially in a bedroom taken out to mainstream level. I think it’s something to be quite proud of. Both Chase & Status and Fresh have made huge amounts of underground music so they definitely deserve all the success they’re getting with the overground stuff. I still get to play in sweaty basements so, nostalgic? Not at all… Hahaha
LS: What’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever seen/done whilst on tour?
I remember we were playing at some club and some dude passing out the second we dropped a new track (possibly ‘4 Days’?)… Couldn’t handle the bass… Hahah boom, out. Skydiving with Dieselboy was fun… The rest is unprintable, sorry
LS: Jungle Jam’s 8th Birthday celebration is rapidly approaching (15th of Feb) and it looks set to be a proper old school knees up, what can we expect from your ‘Classics Tearout Set’?
You can expect something special!! Basically all the classic Bad Company tracks from over the years. A trip down memory lane as it were, my way!
Hear Maldini perform as Bad Company TONIGHT (15th February) at Mint Warehouse for Jungle Jam’s 8th Birthday, alongside Micky Finn, Ragga Twins, Remarc, Serial Killaz, Hatcha and many more. Standard tickets are available for £14.
