Need some Summer Selection 2014 BBQ launch recovery vibes? Look no further… Hybrid Minds and Tempza have delivered!
Firstly… Apologies to everyone who attended yet another awesome Summer Selection launch party yesterday at Ministry Of Sound. We KNOW running our Summer Selection BBQs on a Sunday can cause major hangover schoolnight stressington. But here’s something we guarantee will sooth your soul… An exclusive mix from Hybrid Minds and Tempza!
Heading a b2b session of monolithic proportions with Bcee and LSB, Hybrid Minds smashed it yesterday, as did every other DJ who participated in our annual al fresco bash. We caught up with Josh before he hit the decks to chat summer tunes, summer shows and forthcoming productions!
Read on for full details and the link to grab Hybrid Minds and Tempza’s mix!
Props on the mix! Did you make it with the summer in mind, or is it more of a wicked representation of Hybrid Minds?
I aimed for summer vibes but it veered the deeper I got. I guess it’s a mixture of both…
Anything with Calibre’s Even If has a summer flavour for us…
Exactly!
The summer and D&B are very fitting bedfellows. Why do you think that is?
Definitely. I don’t want to sound too cheesy but it’s the soundtrack to the summer isn’t it? I think the deeper stuff is a bit more winter but liquid is especially good for the summer. Chill out, have a BBQ and put on some D&B. Or a nice little head-bob on the beach.
Or a dance on the beach! From a producer’s perspective, how tricky is the balance of creating something that’s good to chill to and great to dance to?
It’s very tricky! It has to be minimal and musical. What we’ve found as DJs is that mixing in heavier stuff gives it that extra dynamic that keep people dancing. And in the studio we always try to aim for something for people to have a good time to… Whether you’re chilling or dancing it’s all about creating smiles. We’d like to make some heavier stuff at one point, but haven’t got round to it yet!
Sounds like it’s on the cards, though!
It always has been to a degree. It depends how we feel in the studio. We always talk about but never get round to it!
I spoke to Technimatic recently and they said they always set out to make something dark but half way through say ‘oh a nice bit of trumpet would go well here’ or ‘let’s just add some big strings’ and the darkness quickly fades…
It’s exactly the same with us! We find it very hard not to reach for the pianos.
Pianos, for me, are one of the essential ingredients to a summer D&B tune. What other ingredients should a summer D&B tune have?
It needs to have nice light breaks, it has to be musical and should have an uplifting lead. Oh, and not too heavy. Basically Calibre!
Ha! Yes! What’s your favourite summer D&B tune that isn’t written by Calibre?
Off the top of my head I’d have to say Crooklyn by Alix Perez. Love that track.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lls2H5vnGJM
Us too! Now then, we’ve got Mountains on our Summer Selection 2014 album. Quite a biggie. One of your biggest?
We’re very proud of it for sure. We think it’s one of our best made tracks that we’ve released so far. But we’re struggling to top the success of Lost to be honest! It was the first track where we found our trademark. We were very surprised at how well it did. We prefer other tracks we’ve made, like Mountains, but Lost just went down ridiculously well!
Mountains is all about the big strings and delicate vocal… Ideal for summers. Was it written during the summer?
We’re definitely inspired by the seasons… If it’s sunny outside then we’ll arrive at the studio with a bit of a positive and uplifting mindstate and write something that fits that. We tend to write more sombre, reflective ballady tracks in the colder months. The thing is with Mountains is the whole album was written throughout the whole year. We kept going back to tunes and reworking them so it probably started in spring and ended the following spring. It’s been influenced by all the seasons!
So what’s been your favourite summer show?
The biggest summer show we’ve done was a few years ago at Urban Artforms. That was a crazy crazy crowd! And, hate to sound like I’m licking arse, but the vibes at last year’s Drum&BassArena BBQ were unbelievable! Everyone there knows their stuff so you can dig really deep and pull out some really cool classics and know that people will understand it and enjoy it. It’s such a buzz to play to crowds like that.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCVM8wNIU3w
What’s the ratio of those shows compared to shows when you’re expected to play more of your biggest hits?
It’s hard to gauge, really. Places like Bristol and Brighton and London guarantee crowds who know their stuff but other places, maybe a bit further afield, don’t quite appreciate it as much when you drop classics from the likes of Logistics, Calibre or Alix Perez. I’d say 80 per cent of the time we get crowds who love it… We test the water and see how it goes down!
Any forthcoming summer shows you’re looking forward to?
Yeah I’m really looking forward to the Spearhead night at Plan B this Friday. There’ll be plenty of vibes there for sure. And on the same night Matt will be playing at the Audio River festival in Poland which sounds mental.
Hold up… Last time we featured you guys Matt was off on an international flex. Does he bully you for the jet-set shows?
Haha, no! We take turns on the international shows. It’s pot luck. Trust me, I wouldn’t allow him to hog those shows.
Good! Let’s talk productions… I see you’ve been in the studio with Bcee and Rocky Nti…
Yes we have. We’re very happy with the vibe of that. We’ve been working on a track with Riya, too, which we’re really excited about putting out. It will be on an EP we’re making for Spearhead which is work in progress. We’re also really excited about the remix album that’s coming out.
Yes. That’s huge! So many wicked names on it… How much of a role did you play curating those remixes?
It was about 50/50 between us and Bcee. We picked some friends then Bcee suggested more. It developed really nicely. We started with the idea of a remix EP but we got so many great responses that it turned into an entire remix album. It’s a really cool project.
How do you feel when a remix of your productions lands in your inbox?
We’re always really excited to hear someone else’s interpretation of our work. It’s really interesting to see what people have done. Especially the heavier people; it’s great hearing how they’ve switched up something that’s calm and soothing into an absolute banger. We also love it because we get awesome new versions of our tracks to play in our sets!
Any remixes you’re especially feeling?
We love them all, everyone has gone beyond expectations, but the one that made us go ‘what the fuck?!?’ was Neonlight’s remix. They have smashed it. It’s so mental and heavy it’s a struggle to fit into our sets… We go from a crowd of people nodding heads and having a good time to a riot of people who look like that want to tear buildings down! Proper madness.
DOWNLOAD YOUR EXCLUSIVE HYBRID MINDS MIX NOW!
Mountains is one of many amazing summer-singed D&B tracks on Drum&BassArena Summer Selection 2014. Out now, you can cop it on… iTunes, Amazon, Drum&BassArena Store