Grit, dirt, backstreets Manchester soul is hardcoded into D&B and Mark XTC has tapped right into this with the No Promises ep featuring the likes of Fox, DRS, Davos and a certain Marshall Jefferson. Considering the jungle that mid-2016 ITSELF has turned out to be, it will hit a nerve, especially when that video is taken into account, with hitherto subliminal concepts dragged into daylght by the crew at dLo. We’ll touch on that…
Mark hello, how’s things what are you up to?
Morning! Just come back from Glastonbury, it was my first time there, played a few different stages, playing different genres of music, which was cool.
Take us into ‘No Promises’ itself and the inspiration: this seems like it was inspired by something specific, so when did it come alive as it were?
The original track came alive about a year ago, I was just messing around at 88bmp and thought ‘I like this’, then added some oldskool jungle drums so the track began to take shape. I knew after having a 32 bar loop I had to have Del on it.
The video is thought provoking… should hit anyone with a heart, what’s thoughts on the concept of this?
The concept was put together by Adam and Del really… we had a meeting about it and decided to let them push on with it; I didn’t need to be in the video, it was mainly about the vocals.
What in general inspires you to get cooking creatively?
I’ve always made music, mainly for other people or remixes of some sort but decided to do a project with some of different genres I like myself, from Hip Hop to house to Jungle to drum and bass. These are all my inspirations and luckily Adam and NB Audio were up for it.
Fox appears in ‘Stormz’… take us behind?
What can you say about Mr Fox, he’s a star, his vocal delivery is always on point if he’s on stage or in the studio he comes correct.
For ‘Stormz’ I wanted something a bit more dancefloor-friendly as the other tracks are not as dancefloor-orientated, so a Fox vocal with a Reece bass drop worked for ‘Stormz’.
What else can we expect on the No Promises ep… I love the bubbling, infectious vibe running through it, it’s electric.
I really enjoyed working with Davos, if you hum something he will play it on the piano, he’s a bloody wizard.
And Marshall Jefferson?
Working with Marshall Jefferson was – and still is – a dream come true!
What an absolute legend, ‘Acid House’ is one of the tunes I like to listen back to, it makes me smile every time Marshall says “Acid House”.
What tune is in your head?
Right now I have Asmo ‘Jam The Dance’ in my head: think one day I’m going to create something like that, a big piano riff into a breakbeat and bass drop
Any shouts?
Massive Large Huge shouts to everybody on the EP, Fox, Marshall, Davos and of course Mr DRS… shout to Adam and all at NBA, Amigos Tonn and Sappo, Wilf and all the Northbase boys, Stu Allan and all the oldskool crew, L Double and all the Kool fm crew.
DRS pic by Chelone Wolf