Monthly newspaper and online publication targeting 18 to 35 year olds. The ultimate guide to the hottest parties, going out and having fun. Music, fashion, film, travel, festivals, technology, comedy, and parties! London, Barcelona, Miami and Ibiza.
Issue link: https://read.uberflip.com/i/903274
wanting to push the scene forward. There's not a lot of labels that have lasted 25 years and that's a testa- ment to RAM and Andy, they've had a vision for it and they've not rested. If you look at the back catalogue, the amount of massive tunes and chart success that a very under- ground record has had is a major achievement. We've been on the label for donkey's years now, I think my first release on the label was a track called 'Heaven & Hell' as Xample. It's been good, with the transition to Loadstar from Xample & Lomax with our first record, 'Link To The Past' arguably one of our biggest tracks. You played at the RAM 25 tour in a ridiculous back to back with Mind Vortex AND DC Breaks, who came up with this lethal combination? Well, it was really random. We got booked to play at Rampage in Bel- gium, and there was this idea to do this RAM showcase. That's where it first happened, and it gained a little bit of traction as a result of that. We got booked at another couple of festivals and now it's just carried on. It's not something that we're gonna do all the time but the key shows; Warehouse Project, Printworks. It's really great to be able to do it and it's really good fun. It's pretty intense when you've got that many people behind the decks but it's good fun because you're spurring each other on to play certain tunes and that. If you guys weren't in the music scene, what do you see yourselves doing? Both Nick and I had full-time jobs up until about 7 or 8 years ago. I was in banking and Nick was in IT stuff, so we would probably be doing that, to be honest! Thankfully music's been good to us. Banking and IT to one of the big- gest drum & bass acts! I would not wanna go back to that, but it's one of those things. When we started doing music it was quite difficult to get into because the internet wasn't as prevalent as it is now. It wasn't as easy to break through and get noticed, so for years we were slaving away on our evenings and weekends. It was hard but it got to the point luckily where something had to give and thankfully it was our jobs! Do you see the rise of the internet as a positive? Yeah definitely. Any way to get your music out and for more people to hear it has got to be a benefit. I know a lot of people moan about the way it's watered down music and the fact it's so disposable and things like that. But equally, a lot more people can access your music now and it gets you to places where you wouldn't normally go to. Have you been to any crazy places where you wouldn't have expect- ed to be? Yeah, we played at a festival called KaZantip in Ukraine which was ab- solutely crazy. We flew to Ukraine, had to get another flight and then drive for about four hours into the middle of nowhere for this crazy festival. It's mental, it's this hedo- nistic place where I would have never imagined going in a million years. Was that the craziest party you've played at? Yeah probably was, another quality one was EDC in Las Vegas. It's in Vegas for a start, which is mental in itself. It's a weird place, you sort of love to hate Vegas. That is a crazy festival just because of the amount of people there are there for an electronic music festival. The amount of people that go Glaston- bury go to EDC and it's just elec- tronic music so that's pretty special in itself. The amount of production that they put on the stages is quite a spectacle. So what would Loadstar do to change the world? Probably give free alcohol, my per- sonal preference would be every day but I don't think many people would get things done. Maybe Fri- day's at 3 pm, courtesy of Loadstar - get involved! What are Loadstar most in love with right now? I'm massively into house music, I'm really enjoying listening to that. It's not something I've been into for a long time. I went to Glaston- bury about 18 months ago and ended up listening to a lot of house music and got really inspired by it. Nick's the same, he's quite heavily influenced by house. When you're tied up in a genre for so long, it's quite easy to get blinkers and just be influenced and listen to that but we're always looking for influences outside of drum & bass. What ideas have changed your life? Not so much an idea, but having children has massively changed my life. I've got three kids and I guess it is an idea as it makes you think about things differently. It's life- changing for the right reasons. What's the worst trouble that you guys have got yourselves into? When we were on tour in Austra- lia we ended up getting thrown out of our hotel by the police. It wasn't really our fault, but it was us who ended up biting the bullet. We had a suite in this hotel that a promoter had booked for us. We had just travelled from England and played the show after travel- ling, so we were pretty knackered. The promoter invited all his mates back to the hotel suite for an after party. Nick and I actually went to bed while they were partying in the living room. I woke up to someone banging on my door shouting "get up, you've gotta get out" and all that. I thought it was people mess- ing about. Eventually opened the door and it was the police and they said we had to leave. It was like 5 or 6 in the morning after we'd trav- elled to Australia and then played a show. We left and got breakfast somewhere and went straight to the airport. It was a nightmare situation. DRUM & BASS " WHEN YOU'RE TIED UP IN A GENRE FOR SO LONG, IT'S QUITE EASY TO GET BLINKERS AND JUST BE INFLUENCED AND LISTEN TO THAT BUT WE'RE ALWAYS LOOKING FOR INFLUENCES OUTSIDE OF DRUM & BASS. " 43 2017 / ISSUE 104 follow @Loadstar