Just out, a beguiling release from Banzulu, ‘Nobody Move/Gal Dem’ & once inside it will stick. Fans of Silent Dust, Fracture, Kimyan Law and the none60 podcasts must quite simply: get to know.
Banzulu hi, first off can you cite some big music influences/crushes?
Caleb: I’m all over the place in terms of what has influenced me over the years. With Banzulu, we’re heavily influenced by Chicago footwork, and since we are involved in that community, we’ve been absorbing the sound and putting our own twist on it.
The none60 release is an example of that. The footwork sound has changed my life a lot though; there hasn’t been a sound that so totally transformed my approach to music and DJing since I first got into hip hop in my teens, so it’s been the primary influence on my approach to making tunes for Banzulu.
Over the years though, I’ve been really motivated by the Grime sound, Jungle – especially the Ragga influenced stuff – lots of the early Dubstep sound but my roots as a DJ are in hip hop and reggae, so to actually answer the question, which is tough: RZA, The Bug, Super Cat, Bjork, TEKLIFE!
Abe: Mala, Commodo, Gantz, Burial, and Michael “5000” Watts have all greatly impacted how I approach listening to and making music. I was very much into dubstep before learning about footwork music so my roots production-wise lie heavily there.
Tell us of life pre Banzulu?
Abe: Before Banzulu we were primarily making beats at 140 with our respective projects that were, in a sense, very serious type of beats and wanted an outlet to make fun bootlegs and remixes of tracks we enjoyed.
Originally the plan was to make bootlegs at 160 of tracks that were unique to Florida that we were surrounded by in earlier years. Remixes of Grind Mode, Ball Greezy, Sam Sneak and so on. It progressively evolved to making heavy originals thanks to the creative prowess of Caleb.
Caleb: I’m a Florida boy by birth; got into making beats and Djing at about 17. Since I was always broke, my first attempts at beats were actually made on a dual cassette deck… if you’re old enough, you’ll know what I mean!. Most of the DJing I did for years was as the backing DJ for hip hop crews. Lived on the West Coast for a bit and did that kind of thing before moving back to FL, getting more involved in Dubstep/Garage/D&B and getting serious about beat making.
Linked up with Abe and the homie Elliot Mess a few years ago and started throwing shows under the SUB:CULTURE name; we don’t really throw parties anymore, but we’ve been putting out a lot of amazing footwork guest mixes lately, which you can find here. One thing led to another and Abe and I decided to form Banzulu at the end of 2013. Our first track to be released was a compilation called Jack to Juke from Phyla Digital. Track is called ‘PlentyDro’.
The release for none60 has amazing art, who did that?
Silent Dust from none60 really hooked it up. It’s an artist that they connected with who’s clearly extremely talented… called Woefoep.
Where and in what clubs can we find you?
You can catch us at Depth Charge in Orlando in November!
What tune is in your head right now?
Abe: A$AP Rocky ‘Multiply’. I love the tribute to Pimp C and the minimal, terrorizing, dark feel throughout the track.
httpv://youtu.be/5v6JUzxWoGw
And shouts?
The homies at Juke Bounce Werk, the bro Deejay Earl, Iyer and Phyla Digital, the Depth Charge cats in Orlando, of course Silent Dust and none60, Polish Juke, Mark Starr, Eric Hicks, Violet Systems and really all the amazing DJs who have done mixes for SUB:CULTURE, plus the whole Lowrise community!