We Spoke To Scratch Perverts About Vinyl And Explosions

Scratch Perverts are some of the most accomplished DJ duos in the world. They have 4 DMC championship titles between them and have been performing regularly around the world for more than 10 years. In recent years they’ve moved away from turn-tablism to focus on gigging and producing their own music. Next year will see them release a LP of new material.

There are headlining “The Town” event at the Old Library in Birmingham’s Custard Factory. I don’t know why a Custard Factory would ever need a library but it sounds pretty fun. I called up Joel AKA Prime Cuts to ask him what he was up to and what he has in store for Birmingham.

Noisey: Hey Joel!So, what are you guys up to in the studio?

Just writing really and also arranging for the next black gold release. We’ve got an EP by Cuts coming out. He’s the guy that I run the label with. I’m just doing the last bits and bobs before it goes to be mastered tomorrow.

Cool, when’s it coming out?

I’m hoping before the end of the year. I know that December and January are fairly grim times to be putting music out but what the hell. I’m hoping we can get it out before Christmas. We do a really super limited vinyl edition of everything we put out. There’ll be 300 of this one. It’ll be hand numbered and embossed and all that malarkey, it’ll be a really nice hand-screen printed package. They do look a bit special and it’s nice to get a bit hands on with this stuff.

What do you think about the state of final these days, there’s fewer and fewer releases and you see things like record store day that try to preserve it, do you think it’s important?

Well my own personal view, as someone who still buys records, the stuff I’m after I can still get on wax. There’s a lot of people doing the limited vinyl run thing and it’s good to build that kind of fever amongst people about the record. I’m still one of those people that, if I really love a piece of music, I want to own a physical copy of it.

So when you perform do you play vinyl?

I can’t, I’m literally not allowed. 90% of the clubs I play in, good luck with trying to play vinyl in them. There are some people doing vinyl only sets but that’s generally in a different environment from where we play. So when I play out I use time-coded vinyl.

Is it the venue owners that say no?

We’re not told ‘no.’ We’re usually playing within a line up of other people, they’ll usually be playing some sort of digital format and if the sound engineer isn’t used to someone on wax then it’s stuff. We had a period of two years were we had so many problems I just had to make the switch.

You made your name from turntablism. Is it not sad to move away from it?

Yeah I mean I’m very proud of it as well. I won four world titles and I’m very proud of what we achieved. It’s the reason we’re still gigging today but it’s something that’s in the past for me now.

Is there any reason why you’ve moved away from it?

I think we haven’t really given a reason why we’ve moved away from it and I really see next year and what we’re about to do as a key changing point in how people perceive Scratch Perverts. We’ve been around for so long that we can get away with what we’re about to.

So what are you about to do?

We’re releasing music but it’s not going to be an album of scratching and rapping. We haven’t been in that mindset for so long.

What kind of stuff can we expect?

It’s difficult to put it into a genre. I think a lot of stuff is dictated by tempo and this is around the 120 - 130 bmp mark. It’s very difficult to describe one’s music but it’s just drawn on all the things that excite us. A few of the tracks we’ve been playing out so if you’ve come to see us in the past few months you’ll have heard a few in the set.

So you’re playing the Custard Factory in Birmingham tonight, are you excited?

I always look forward to gigging. I’m not sure what to expect about tonight. I think we’re the only kinda DJ outfit. They’ve got beat-boxing, angle-grinding, welding, hammering nails into wood. So yeah, we could be upstaged by some mechanics! It’s a fantastic venue, the Custard Factory.

So as we said the gig tonight is going to be accompanied by various circus acts, if you were to run away to the circus what would you be?

We’d be Siamese bearded ladies.

I’m not sure if you can be a bearded lady if you’re a man, isn’t that just a man with a beard, in a dress.

Haha yeah we’d be two aging DJs with beards.

So you were in DJ Hero and DJ Hero 2, what’s it like to be recreated in a computer game?

Yeah, initially I was very skeptical but we went to meet the guys and they showed us the game and we got quite excited about it. So we just went away and built sets as though we were doing it for the competition arena. So I think ours stand out as being quite different and we’re meant to be the hardest level, which we loved.

So if you’re the hardest level does that mean you’re the best DJs in it?

Of course!

Haha, thanks Joel. Watch out for explosions!

The Town is at the Custard Factory in Birmingham for only 2 more days, for tickets and latest line up information check

www.tothetown.co.uk

www.facebook.com/josecuervotequila