EXCLUSIVE MIX: The Green Man... Vibes From Cologne

Words: Damian B

The Green Man: what’s the connection between this beardy, ancient icon and… Cologne? Random Central, right? Maybe not, considering the contentious history of that early 90s Shut Up & Dance clusterbomb of Ravin I’m Ravin and its aftereffects. Cologne is closer than Memphis, right? Dig deeper into that SUAD moment and you’ll find another tune which easily sounds as hench now as it did back in those rowdy forest raves of 1592.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5a3X7aQzdvI

So, with that genteel string sample reverberating, Damian B slipped on his green tights and caught up with music maestro TGM from his Cologne HQ as he lays down some bass & breaks-fuelled Sound Power… And gives us an exclusive mix in the process.

Was the whole SUAD sound a big influence sir?

Yes, you bet! I love those. I named myself after The Green Man track. Shut Up & Dance were a big influence, as was Peter Bouncer on his Junglist or Congo Natty Works. I also loved Rebel MC’s Cockney Rhythm. These were great inspirations and great people to meet too.

Is the D&B/jungle scene big in Cologne?

There’s a lot of electronic music around. Sadly not so much jungle.

There’s a lot of different streams in this album. It’s 25 tracks long!

I like combining all sorts of things, such as jazz, dub and classical with electronics and heavy basses. This is my second album and it took me quite a long time to realise it. I wanted to make it special and realise some ideas that came into my mind over time, which basically is always the case with my Basswerk releases. My first album was released by Combination Records though, they also released some techno and material Seba, but they don’t exist anymore.

The production is fantastic, what details can you give me on that front?

Thank you! I love going into details of sound and to me it is a lot about bass. I have a lot of hardware and for the first time I had some excellent mastering help too CD wise by Stuart, Beau and Simon. Wanna know how it looks like? Check:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ft6mRQ0IfDg&feature=c4-overview-vl&list=PLF3EB371C656AB917

Tell me about some of the collabs on the album…

Recently I had some collabs over the net like in Shy Conversations with Sam KDC and Mindless with Decon. The singing of most tunes was taken care of by a friend, junglist DJ Freeze, who helped me to connect to some reggae singers.

Where can lucky folk hear this stuff played out? I want to be there!

I have my own well established event called Basswerk Sessions at Gebäude 9 in Cologne here, but we are only doing it on special occasions. It is a very special venue and I am a bit spoiled as wherever I go it can’t be much better. You can check the vibe in this video I made…

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=areKBEPL5jQ

People like Klute or Aquasky had their first abroad gigs with us in the 90s. Or at least that’s what they told us! Recently we had Calibre, Dub Phizix, BSE, Spectrasoul, Enei, Intalex, Doc Scott. I played in many countries, but not yet in England. We’ll see.

You must have some stories putting this album together considering how many tracks! Can you give us a few? I love Somehow You Know When It’s Right.

That’s a special one and at first this was supposed to be the name of the album: it’s in relation to getting married a year and a half ago. Yes, I love this feeling of sensing to do the right thing and I was thinking of making it a concept for videos too as many little examples can be found in daily life… Just as long as you are willing to see them. It’s about listening to your inner voice and refusing to do some things people want from you.

Amen.

Stay True, Keep On Movin and Love Change Or Leave it are tracks that I really like to play out. I love the deep bass of that last track. And its name, too. The first two, however, spread the vibe I want in the clubs very well with a dry and bassy sound.

I heard that a certain tune came about from music software but not in the usual sense…

Yes. Passage to India was an idea I had when teaching a Pro Tools class. I went to a gym after the class and had it in my mind, but when I came back I realised I had forgotten it: it was left on the school’s computer. So I came back to grab it, but a colleague had already erased it. I was devastated and tried buying some data saving programs, they all didn’t work, but while they were searching for lost files I was able to reconstruct the idea again.

It probably came out better this way!

And of course there are more stories, Apocalypse, Chainsmoker and We Destroy The World were tracks I did after evil things like Fuksuhima happened or when you feel like important truths or facts are hidden under so many lies and meaningless stories, so they can’t be seen any more.

Why the title of the album: Sound Power?

Well, this is another story when I was recording Peter (Bouncer). I made a sketch I wanted him to sing on and DJ Freeze talked to him about it earlier. We only had very little time and he was flying in. Then there was a heavy snowstorm. We played him the stuff in the car and he was into it. He worked out an idea and when he performed, we all had shivers of joy because it was such a great one take performance. I mentioned this to him saying how much power I felt in and received from his singing, and he said “we call it word Sound Power’. Later on, I somehow felt that it would help to learn how to do the graphics, cause I didn’t really feel able to tell a graphic designer in advance precisely what to do. And then I got the idea of using this picture and the name came into my mind.

This is so personal with you isn’t it? Just how far-reaching it all is…

Music has saved me a lot of times when I was feeling not so good and I am happy that I have patience and joy to make music and now tools and skills to realise my ideas. But back then I was especially inspired by some people doing really good instrumental music with new sounds, like Wally Badarou, Yello and Air, later on Shut Up & Dance, Doc Scott, Matrix, Intalex or dBridge. So the Sound Power name also matched well with that picture I shot and I also liked this kind of rather simple, more dub-based aesthetics. ‘Dub’ as in the genre. In the end, it all seemed to fit. And of course the album is more meant as something hopefully rather timeless, of course the power of sound is.

So to sum up, what keeps it all ticking along? The longevity of this genre is unrivalled and it’s a fascinating subject.

I simply love it. It has given me a lot in the last 20 years, so it will always be a big part of me. In my youth I didn’t meet many people where I felt like they think similar or have similar interests, but then in the 90s I met a lot of D&B people I felt very comfortable hanging out with, like Klute or the Aquasky boys. A lot of D&B musicians and junglists don’t do it for the money; they simply gotta do it cause it is so great and they love it and have a chance to do it. A lot of jungle music simply made me smile, but it also allowed me to express or let out or cope with darker feelings. I met many great people where I felt that they really have a lot to give as musicians.

EXCLUSIVE MIX: The Green Man… Vibes From Cologne

1 The Green Man – Poona

2 Fracture – Bad Habit (Om Unit Remix)

2 The Green Man, Freeze & Ras Abraham – Junglist Soldier

4 Skeptical – Blue Eyes VIP

5 The Green Man – Stay True

6 Foreign Beggars – Mob Justice (Enei Remix)

7 The Green Man – Somehow You Know

8 Calibre – Cully

9 The Green Man & Decon – Mindless

10 The Green Man & Peter Bouncer – Word Sound Power

11 The Green Man – Passage To India

12 DRS + Dub Phizix – Play With Fire

13 The Green Man – Love Change Or Leave It