The Groove Thief traveled to Bordeaux, France, to represent NiceUp at the 2015 Reggae Sun Ska Festival.
This interview comes from backstage during the festival.
TGT: So, I was wondering, what was the recording process like with Monkey Marc?
SOOM T: Monkey Marc had some riddims, the basis of the beats… I just listened to those riddims, dubbed them and rubbed them.
TGT: But you took it to another galaxy… it’s not reggae, it’s not hip hop, it really has a future, almost alien sound. How did you guys bring that together?
SOOM T: It was an accident. Monkey Marc was in the city, and he never had a place to stay. So my friend actually brought him to my flat and said ‘Soom this guy needs a place to stay,’ and he stood there with his laptop, [with] like half the beats – and that’s the way it went on. It was pure accident. [We weren’t] gonna release an album or whatever. That took four years to finish.
TGT: That means you spent four years on the vocals? Or you did the vocals and he spent four years…
SOOM T: Eh, he spent four years. But it did go back and forth, and I was always not happy with it – I wanted this turned up, that turned up. Then it took me – and my label put it out, Renegade Masters – took me about a year to get all the artwork and blah, blah, blah.
TGT: Ah – ok! So, any chance of you two doing a tour together?
SOOM T: At some point, at the moment, I’ve got to do an album that I’ve just recorded and finished, with Wagram with Tom Fire. So I need to tour that with a live band first, but a couple years… I’m gonna let Bullets Over Babylon really absorb… it’s a really underground thing – I want people to discover it, and then about three/four years, when people have truly discovered it, we will tour it.
TGT: Alright, alright! What projects are you working on now then?
SOOM T: I just finished [that] album with Tom Fire, and that’s taking a lot of time, and I’m working on other albums as well. My album with Wagram is coming out in November.
TGT: So two albums out in one year?
SOOM T: Yeah!
TGT: I reviewed your album with Monkey Marc [for NiceUp], and it was really, like a unique style… it wasn’t really like his previous stuff, and it wasn’t really you’re your previous stuff – which is so unusual for collaborations, right? Usually, it’s the producer’s style with a new vocalist, but it really seemed like something fresh. And, what’s it been like working with him, FLeCK and other more drum-n-bass/heavy producers?
SOOM T: It’s brilliant. What a joy. Monkey Marc and me, we’ll have a bond forever now as a result of that album. I’m gonna keep experimenting though, I’m doing a jazz/hiphop album as well.
TGT: Cool cool! Well thank you very much!
The Groove Thief
.the future of dub is the present.
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