Session Transcript:
IG Culture
Red Bull Music Academy, Toronto 2007

The video stream for this lecture can be watched here.

IG Culture has been a leading figure in the UK’s underground since 1990, when Dodge City Productions’ 'accidental' deal with Island Records catapulted him into the spotlight. Here he talks about his roots in hip hop and the London warehouse scene and how it led to that contract and the mistakes his “ghetto-isms” led him to make. These days, though, he’s better known for his jazz-influenced dance music and he talks about some of the fusion greats who have influenced his later career.

Content team member Torsten Schmidt: »Thanks, thank you, thank you very much. The time and the hour might be unusual, but thanks for his great effort, Mr IG Culture up there on the couch, give him a warm welcome. And I’m not really sure - since we sang already and we might sing quite a few times again tonight when our boys are playing - but he’s still our birthday boy at this time. Is there any birthday ritual in any country, outside of just singing and giving presents, that we should know about?«

IG Culture: »They’ve got to take you out and buy all the drinks basically, that’s what we do in London.«

Torsten Schmidt: »OK, that’s what we’re going to do later (inaudible noise from audience). It might be a little bit too deep for us, I’m not sure we can manage that. Would that include soap and socks or just fists? (inaudible noise from audience) Don’t you think that’s rather harsh?«

Participant: »No.«

RBMA: »So next year we’ll be ready, know what I mean?«

Torsten Schmidt: »So Mark [Pritchard], do you really want to be the man in Detroit or get a little pressie from all your friends here. He’s going to go for the soft one. Theo, save at least one punch for later. Can we have another song maybe? OK, no song. Cake, cake, cake. (Mark Pritchard unwraps birthday present) It will tell you the time, but it’s more like studio time and it will tell your story throughout the day, so you’ll always know where everyone else’s is. You just think of any one of these guys, one of the faces you see here just now, and all the time one of them will be looking at you, no matter what the time of day. Strings, can we have strings?«

RBMA: »Happy birthday, Mark. Before we get into anything else I think we should play another tune. You all got a drink? It’s that time of night. Mr IG Culture.«

(music: Son Of Scientist – Keep It Burning)

RBMA: »What do you call that?«

IG Culture: »London bruk boogie.«

RBMA: »Thanks so much for getting on the plane. IG’s just been here for an hour, just touched down an hour ago. Thanks for making the effort.«

IG Culture: »Thanks for having me. I actually found out about it Sunday and they said: “Can you make it Monday?“ I said: “It’s too early, too soon.” So they got me on on Tuesday. So I haven’t got anything prepared, this is just off the cuff, we’re going to do it raw.«

RBMA: »Do you want to introduce yourself, name and where you from, for those who don’t know?«

IG Culture: »My name’s IG. I’m from London, I’ve been involved in many movements in the past 15 years: hip hop, soul, funk, rare groove, the broken beat movement. I’ve been involved in soundsystems as a youth. I’m also involved in New Sector Movements, Son Of Scientist, Likwid Biskit, Quango, I’m a part of the Co-Op club and the Co-Op label. The list goes on, that’s some of the few thigns I do.«

RBMA: »And where abouts are you from originally?«

IG Culture: »I’m from West London, Acton, pretty much grew up in Acton. Now I reside in Ladbroke Grove.«

RBMA: »Musically speaking, you just listed so many pseudonyms people might be familiar with, but what was the first thing that got you interested and why?«

IG Culture: »The first thing that got me started was writing lyrics, and that was through reggae, listening to the DJs from Jamaica, I was into the soundsystem thing, got involved in soundsystems. That’s basically where I got the name IG Culture. The youths I grew up with called me IG, now I’m a big old man they still call me IG Culture.«

RBMA: »It’s fair to say a lot of contemporary music from London in the last 25 years is influenced by soundsystem culture. Can you tell us when you got involved in soundsystems and how it shaped your musical journey?«

IG Culture: »Living in London is basically like this: so much music comes into London, it’s like a testing ground for so many sounds worldwide and we absorbed all of it. As well as being into soundsystems, I was also into electro and soul music and even pop music at the time. We listened to all of it. As a youth I used to go Hammersmith Palais and dance to a DJ called Steve Walsh and Tim Westwood, who used to play soul music at the time. So even Tim Westwood’s roots stem back to soul and reggae, though you wouldn’t know it now. It was Tim Westwood who brought through a London MC named General Levy. It doesn’t seem like it now, but he has got some roots.«

RBMA: »Talk to me about the early days of the British hip hop scene, because obviously that had a big influence on you, Dodge City.«

IG Culture: »There were good things, there was Gunshot, IQP, which ended up being Roots Manuva, I think that’s correct. We had so many groups. Americans probably don’t know it, but it was on a par with what they were doing. If you weigh it up, cheesy rap for cheesy rap, it was the same. It’s just that America had the backing and it’s history now, it just went sky high. I guess, we kept it more real (laughter / applause).«

RBMA: »So tell me about Dodge City.«

IG Culture: »Dodge City happened by accident. I was doing parties with a guy, at the time we had a thing called the warehouse party. We’d go to a warehouse, kick off the door, jack some electricity from somewhere. And he used to rap some verses that he knew from records and I used to do the same. We’d take the piss out of each other. I hadn’t seen him for a while and we met up again. He was doing a studio course and I’d just bought a W30, which was a really old sampler, which had about ten seconds sampling time. We decided to get together and see what we could come up with and within six months we had a record deal with Island Records. So it really happened by accident. I wasn’t going to be in a group with him, I just meant to do some beats for him. It just happened really quick, next thing you know we’re doing shit.«

RBMA: »What period was this?«

IG Culture: »This was 1990.«

RBMA: »Have you got anything on your computer you want to play from that?«

IG Culture: »No, no (laughter).«

RBMA: »Come on, I know you have.«

IG Culture: »No, I haven’t actually (looks through computer).«

RBMA: »How was the experience of being thrown into the major record label thing at that age at that time?«

IG Culture: »I was a ghetto youth at that time. I didn’t have any experience, came into it with all my ghetto-isms, was a little naïve, done things in a very naïve way, made a lot of mistakes, fell out with a lot of people, and learnt a lot. It was that learning curve at that period that’s taken me here. A lot of groups from the time – and in London at the time there were so many black groups signed on major labels – when you check the groups and follow their careers, none of them has lasted. It’s tough to keep going, reinventing yourself and feeding the public. It was a tough lesson to learn. After Dodge City got dropped I had to decide what I wanted to do. Do I want to carry on the way I’m going or do I want to be serious about it? The Dodge City situation wasn’t really about us doing great music, in hindsight it was mainly about learning.«

RBMA: »And then in 2003 your New Sector Movements got signed to Virgin. That was coming full circle back to the majors again, you could apply that experience.«

IG Culture: »Well, I was ready. Between Dodge City parting company from Island to getting signed to Virgin, that was eight years. I spent the whole time in the studio basically reinventing myself. I was originally a rapper, an MC, and by the time I got signed to Virgin I was a producer. OK, I’m going to have kick some arse as a producer now.«

(...)

RBMA: »And you were doing remixes all the way through.«

IG Culture: »I was doing remixes from Dodge City right through to the start of New Sector Movements. I was remixing Gang Starr, The Luniz, Heavy D, Digital Underground, that kind of thing.«

RBMA: »How did you end up with New Sector Movements and what is it?«

IG Culture: »The positive that thing I got out of saying, “I don’t give a shit about what’s going on out there, I’m just going to do my thing,” was that I got into music. I really got into buying, going to record fairs, checking out stuff I never heard before. Got into fusion, jazz, even more reggae, even more soul, even more hip hop, and I started paying attention to artists. I started paying attention to what they were actually playing, so I ended up buying a Rhodes, some Arps, a Hammond, Wurlitzer, I bought the lot. I bought an SP-1200, I just got all the tools to be a producer.«

RBMA: »When we have discussions it always comes back to jazz and reggae. Are there any artists from those periods you still like to play now?«

IG Culture: »This is just totally random, I’m drawing tunes from my iTunes. This tune blew me away when I first heard it, I found it at a record fair. The true heads in this room should know what this is. Don’t think anyone knows it yet.«

(music: The Heath Brothers - Smilin’ Billy Suite)

»That’s the Heath Brothers.«

RBMA: »Any particular artists – I know there are so many – any artists we should run down that are major major influences, turning points?«

IG Culture: »Yeah, one of the main influences for fusion is George Duke. There’s a few albums, Feel, I Love The Blues, She Heard Me Cry, then there’s another one, I can’t remember the name of it, I think it’s the first album on MPS. But yeah, George Duke is a big influence (looks through computer).«

RBMA: »Anyone else?«

IG Culture: »Herbie Hancock. I’m into Norman Connors, Horace Tapscott, the list goes on, Chick Corea. I could just reel off names and their albums deep. That’s the good thing about those artists, they didn’t just do one or two albums and fizzle, they’re 20, 30 albums deep. They’re not temporary.«

RBMA: »What’s this a loose cover of?«

IG Culture: »This is a group I’m involved with called Likwid Biskit, which is me and a character called Kaidi Tatham, and this is a tune called Herbs And Spice and it’s basically, yeah, licking a shot to Herbie Hancock.«

(music: Likwid Biskit - Herbs And Spice / applause)

»Thanks.«

RBMA: »You’ve got another one lined up there that you wanted to play.«

IG Culture: »Yeah, I was talking about George Duke earlier, and I did a cover of a tune he did called That’s What She Said. I tried to do a ‘bruk’ version of it.«

(music: Likwid Biskit - That’s What She Said)

»Yeah, this is off someone’s mixtape.«

(music continues)

RBMA: »Is that one coming out?«

IG Culture: »That’s been out. That was about ‘94, ‘95, I think.«

RBMA: »All drums programmed, yeah?«

IG Culture: »Yeah.«

RBMA: »You mentioned that pretty much everything you do, the drums are programmed.«

IG Culture: »Yeah. I’ve actually had drum lessons, so I’ve got an idea of jazz or something. But yeah, if you can say it, you can play it.«

RBMA: »You mentioned Kaidi playing on that piece. You’ve had the good fortune to work with some amazing musicians. Why don’t you tell us about some of them?«

IG Culture: »I worked with Kaidi Tatham on that. He’s not widely known, but he’s a genius, I think. I also do a project with a cat named Pino Palladino, who I’ve been working with lately on some stuff and he’s dangerous. Sometimes you’ll just sit watching him. Yeah, I’ve been working with Pino. On another project there’s a cat named Eric Appapoulay, another cat out of London who’s equally as deadly. There’s a lot of unknown cats who can really throw it down. So that’s three names; Pino Palladino, Kaida Tatham and Eric Appapoulay.

RBMA: »Is Eric on the album?«

IG Culture: »Yeah.«

RBMA: »Shall we play that?«

IG Culture: »Benji’s getting into his DJ mode.«

RBMA: »I think we should bring it up to the New Sector Movements era, then we can take it into the broken thing. Do you want to talk to us about the first New Sector Movements album? What was the idea behind that whole collective?«

IG Culture: »New Sector Movements started with me and a singer Bembe Segue and it later developed into Eska Mtungwazi, Kaida Tatham, Chix With Stix, Julie Dexter. These are all people from London. Virgin said: “You’re getting a lot of press at the moment, so we’ll take anything, any project.” The A&R man was going to the boss with a lot of stuff but they weren’t really feeling it until we were in The Face magazine; that’s when the boss said: “OK, let’s do an album.” They didn’t actually understand what I was doing, but they said: “Just do an album, don’t worry about doing anything commercial, just do what you feel.” So that’s eactly what I did. I mixed New Sector Movements up with Likwid Biskit, just some left-off-centre madness. I called the album Download This and it came out in 2001, according to Benji.«

RBMA: »I think. What’s this tune?«

IG Culture: »This tune’s off an EP, which was released at the same time on Virgin. We got totally arty about it, we got Doze Green to do the artwork; we just wanted to do a great piece of work with great artwork, throw it out there and see what happens. This is off the No Tricks EP and this is called Para.«

(music: New Sector Movements - Para)

»The last lyric of that bit was supposed to be “I’m fucking paranoid,” but I said: “No, Eric, let’s tone it down a little.” But that’s just London slang, ‘para’ means you’re paranoid.«

RBMA: »I think it’s fair to say the focus, the central element, is always the rhythmic focus.«

IG Culture: »Well, yeah. This thing called broken beat…«

RBMA: »That’s where I’m going. Who came up with that?«

IG Culture: »I was doing this stuff. Phil Asher, who’s Phil Asher from Restless Soul for those who don’t know, and Orin Walters, who’s also known as Afronaught from Bugz In The Attic, another London group, they started to call this kind of groove “that broken stuff”. And there’s a paper called Echoes who asked me what this stuff was called, and I said it’s going to be called broken beat. Next minute in another magazine it said: “Phil Asher and IG Culture: the inventors of broken beat.” So that’s how the term came about. Further down the line other people disassociated themselves from it. It just became a thing to do like house, just do a broken groove, which has now become a standard pattern now. But at the time broken was anything you wanted it to be. It wasn’t meant to be (makes broken beat with his mouth). So that’s basically the story of broken.«

RBMA: »A lot of people going to your club are now expecting to hear exactly that beat. How do you feel about that term and has it boxed you in?«

IG Culture: »We probably created a monster, because when we started the Co-Op club there would be only be a few people in there. People were like: “What are they playing?”, and just staring at us.«

RBMA: »When did it start?«

IG Culture: »Co-Op started early 2000, so we’re in our seventh year now. Nowadays, you play anything else and people won’t dance. They come expecting to hear broken beat and it’s developed in such a short period of time it’s pigeon-holed itself. It got to the point where it was only being influenced by itself.«

RBMA: »How do you get around that?«

IG Culture: »By going back to the beginning and saying: “Fuck it, let’s make some music again.” Because it’s not about just being standard so a DJ can have 16 bars to mix in a record. It’s partly about that, but it’s also about keeping music out there to give people ideas, keep them inspired.«

RBMA: »Those first two years when it was at Velvet Rooms was some of the most inspiring times musically. But what was your vision for taking it into the future with the DJs you set it up with? And who did you set the club up with?«

IG Culture: »I set it up with Dego from 4Hero and a guy named Demus from a band called Two Banks Of Four. I knew Demus from the '90s – he was the producer behind Young Disciples - and he came ‘round my flat and played me 4Hero. We sat down and we were talking, and he was interested in what I was doing and this new sound. I said we’d do something, so one of the things I did was I got him an advance to do the Numbers album, which I released on Main Squeeze, the label I was running at the time. And we also talked about setting up a club because at the time all these records are appearing: you’ve got Dego with his 2000 Black thing, Bugz In The Attic with Neon Phusion, me with New Sector Movements and Likwid Biskit, Domu, Seiji, G-Force, a lot of these cats were starting to do this music, but there was nowhere you could go to hear it. So we decided to set up a club, and when we began there was just a few people in there, us and the tumbleweed. But it kind of just grew and went from strength to strength. We got a couple of awards out of it - though that’s not the important thing - but yeah, it really grew.«

RBMA: »What was the musical ethos as a club?«

IG Culture: »At the time Dego was involved and he wanted nothing earlier than, like, ’95 or something. We wanted to play all our music, but we wanted to play everything we thought that was good; we didn’t want to play just one thing. On the flyer we put broken beat and future jazz, whatever that is. So at the early Co-Op you could expect to hear all kinds of stuff. You wouldn’t know what to expect because it was all fresh at the time.«

(...)

RBMA: »And where is the club now?«

IG Culture: »It’s at a place called Plastic People in London, certain mans know (laughs).«

RBMA: »And how have you seen the crowd change over the years?«

IG Culture: »This is real, right? When it started it was just us; then the crowd was trendy and white; then it was trendy white and Japanese with some sprinklings of black; then it was more blacks; then it was black, white and Japanese; now it’s black with some whites and a sprinkling of Japanese (laughs). No, it’s just a mix, everyone comes to the club and mixes with each other, which is a good thing.«

RBMA: »Talk to me about that ‘heads thing’, because I know that does your head in – the heads that comes down and wants to hear certain tunes, certain types of tunes, and wants to put you in your box.«

IG Culture: »Well, last Co-Op, Sunday, there’s a crew called the Laser Crew, the infamous Laser Crew. I call them that because they always came and fired the lasers. Back in the day, I used to shout “laser” and they’d fire their lasers off; it was crazy in there. One of the guys is called Cartel and he’s got this thing he spins round that sends messages in laser light. So he’d go: “Peven Everett, Peven Everett.” And I just ignored him, and said: “This is for the Peven Everett.” There’s a lot of heads in there. There’s a term, they call it ‘man beat’. Man beat is tunes only men listen to in the dance (laughter). But actually, the girls do like it, the women do like the man beat.«

RBMA: »What’s man beat?«

IG Culture: »Man beat is…(Benji looks into his computer) yeah, play man beat (laughter).«

(music: unknown)

»Man beat (applause). At a certain point in the club you can play four or five of those and they do this dance (bounces upper body from side to side). Serious, you know what I mean? (inaudible talk between two) Benji is going to play some big broken beat tunes that have been played in the Co-Op over the years. Bugz In The Attic are probably the best known because of their broken beat remixes for everyone at one period. Bugz In The Attic have definitely brought the sound worldwide.«

(music: Bugz In The Attic - Future Rage / applause)

.IG Culture: »That’s a big Bugz In The Attic tune.«

RBMA: »It’s great when you can create an environment so inspiring that people are making tunes especially for the club, with that dancefloor in mind. But how do you take it beyond that and make it bigger than that, transcending the boundaries of a club in London and taking it around the world, making it into something larger?«

IG Culture: »The Bugz have definitely been flying the flag for that sound. They’ve been DJing everywhere, last year, the year before. They’ve really been flying the flag of the broken beat thing. I feel that broken beat was just an accident, I was never really trying to make a genre called broken beat, I was just trying to make some music. When I got signed to Virgin I was in the process of making a hip hop album, I had to stop doing that to do this. Seven years later I resumed what I was doing before, but it took me down a whole different path.«

(...)

RBMA: »You’re a man with a serious record collection, ridiculous record collection. What kind of stuff was influencing you at that time, things that went into the melting pot?«

IG Culture: »Clearly, you know what I was listening to at the time? I was influenced by Dilla (applause), he was just a massive influence. And before Dilla, Pete Rock, I learned everything about hip hop from Pete Rock, basically. It took me ages to just work out how he did those filtered basslines. I didn’t know he was filtering out the tune just to leave a rumble – when I realised, I was: “Yeah, right.” So, Pete Rock, Dilla, Tribe Called Quest.«

RBMA: »Talking of filtering out, what are your weapons of choice in the studio?«

IG Culture: »At that time I was using S5000, Logic 4.7, MPC, SP-1200. They were my main things, and around that time I was using a Hammond organ, Rhodes, Wurlitzer and all kinds of old drummachines, like Sequential Circuits and even an old Hammond Bontempi box. There’s a lot of other things I used. On one track on the first New Sector Movements album I used RMI electrapianos, like Fela used to use.«

RBMA: »Generally using Logic as the main sequencer for all this stuff?«

IG Culture: »Now I’m using Logic 5.«

RBMA: »Logic 5?«

IG Culture: »Yeah, that’s all I’m using.«

RBMA: »They just installed Logic 8 outside.«

IG Culture: »Seen. They upgrade so often, but we never really get deep into what we have. I think I want to stick with 5 for the time being. My mate Venom says he’s going to install 8 on my system, but I like 5, it’s taken me a year to get my head 'round it.«

(...)

RBMA: »Has your music changed as it’s gone completely digital? Have you had other people telling you your stuff sounds different now?«

IG Culture: »I’m getting more work since I’ve gone digital (laughs) – I’m here, aren’t I? But I’m still being real with it, I’m still doing my thing and I’m still, as far as I’m concerned, not compromising. I’ve got this far by not compromising, so why change now?«

RBMA: »So musically, you’re starting everything inside the box and you’re mixing inside the box too? You’re not going through any boards?«

IG Culture: »Well, I mix through ProTools, I do all my mixing through ProTools. There will be some projects I will mix on a board. I’ll use a Neve Desk, but I still find a way to make it sound warm through Pro Tools.«

RBMA: »Any tips for us?«

IG Culture: »Don’t use reverbs.«

RBMA: »So everything’s still dry when you’re using digital, as if it was in analogue. You’re not tempted by all those space designer plug-in’s and stuff?«

IG Culture: »No. OK, I might use a little slap here and there, slap reverb, just to give an illusion of space, but I pretty much want to my stuff to hit hard but dry. For instance – this is just my personal opinion – I hate when a vocal is slicked up and prettied up and the meat of the vocal is hidden behind reverbs. I want to hear the real artist. That’s why when I worked with people like Eska Mtungwazi and Les Nubians, I did it bone dry, not a reverb in sight.«

RBMA: »Have you got anything new from the new IG era, a dubplate to play us, something brand new?«

IG Culture: »I’m doing a project for a brand new label in Japan. Their name is Freedom School. They approached me to do a concept album, they wanted me to do a piece that’s 20 minutes long that goes through all the eras of spiritual black music. Lets say, how you would hear some jazz on a label like Strata East - I don’t know if you know the label, but it was very conceptual, it wasn’t too concerned with hooks and stuff. OK, there were hooks, but it was more about just the feeling than the chorus. So I’ve just done another mad excursion. This project I’ve called Zen Baddism. That was one of the other things they wanted; they wanted it to be very black (laughter). (imitates Japanese accent) ”The Japanese-oh, very black-oh.“ So I went very black, this is a piece featuring Pino Palladino on bass. (starts track then quickly stops it) In fact I won’t play that one, I’ll go further in. The next section of this is influenced by bebop and Sun Ra, then it goes into one of my all-time classics, Girl You Need A Change Of Mind by Eddie Kendricks.«

(music: Zen Baddism – unknown / applause)

»The vocalist featured on that is a cat named Bilal Salaam from DC, so he’s a name to look out for.«

RBMA: »When’s that coming out?«

IG Culture: »It was supposed to have been this year, but I took my time with it so I think it will be early next year.«

RBMA: »So IG Culture, the end of 2007, what have you got coming up?«

IG Culture: »Next month I’m off to the motherland. I’m off to Senegal and Uganda to continue a project I started to commemorate the abolition of slavery. It was a project started by the British Council, they invited visual and musical artists from all over Africa, brought them all together, put me in the Roundhouse in North London. We’d never met each other before and we had to create a show. After a nightmare two weeks we had a show in place and we’re taking it to Africa. So that’s one of the things coming up.«

RBMA: »Is it going to be online or in a video?«

IG Culture: »No, the information is online. We’ll see.«

RBMA: »Album-wise, project-wise, label-wise?«

IG Culture: »The Zen Baddism project is imminent and I’m doing an album for a label in Chicago, Deeper Soul, and I’m doing an album under my Quango moniker as well. I went to Chicago for five weeks and recorded the album, working with a lot of musicians there like Tortoise and Corey Wilkes and a lot of jazz musicians. That’s the tale of my travels.«

RBMA: »What does IG stand for?«

IG Culture: »'Instant Graphics'.«

RBMA: »Where does that come from?«

IG Culture: »There was a young MC I was working with called Kid Co, who sadly passed away, and he used to call me Instant Graphics. So I kept it in memory of Kid Co.«

(...)

RBMA: »How long are you going to be in town for?«

IG Culture: »I’m leaving on Saturday.«

RBMA: »So you’re up for being around, being in the studio, answering any questions people have.«

IG Culture: »Yeah, sure.«

RBMA: »IG will be around for a bit which is good news, so please say thank you very much to IG Culture.«

IG Culture: »Yeah, thanks for having me. It happened just like that, but it was good. Thanks.«

(music: unknown)

»That came out in 2001, according to Benji.«