MC Skibadee, a name everyone in the land of drum & bass is familiar with. He’s been at the top of his game for the past 25 years and picked up countless awards for it but are you familiar with anything outside of drums and bass? Jamie S23 talks exclusively to Skiba about 100’s of unreleased tracks, chart topping videos and potential future link ups.
Did you wake up one morning and think “I’m done with drum & bass, let’s try something new”?
“Nah not at all, the reason I started switching things up and trying new styles was soon after the passing of Stevie Hyper D. It really affected me, not only because he was a close friend of mine but because after all of his work in the rave scene all that was left was memories and tape packs.
I didn’t want to go out in the same light so thought I should take inspiration from Stevie’s life and make more of my career than just being a jungle MC going to clubs week in week out.
‘Times Two Records’ launched in 1998, it was a hip-hop influenced outfit using beats produced by Ed Solo. We used the same double time flows from jungle but over a half time beat.
MC Det & MC Skibadee ‘Slowmo’
MC Det & MC Skibadee ‘New Style Avengers’
The same label also released ‘Flava’ 4 Raver’ in 2003 which also featured MC Shabba D and MC Fearless.
If you had the chance, what MC from the scene would you pick to work with on a tune?
“The late Stevie Hyper D, I never got chance to write anything with him when he was alive and he was someone I really looked up to. He was the biggest MC in drum & bass!
You know what, I’ve got a tune on a hard drive somewhere where I’m singing his lyrics “All I wanna do is have some fun” which makes up part of the chorus then the verses are some proper Skiba lyrics. I just really enjoy making tunes for myself and this was certainly one that I loved making.
The thing is, I don’t look to jungle or drum & bass MCs for inspiration usually. I love reggae, bashment, hip-hop and soul. Sometimes I just switch up lyrics from these genres into a drum & bass style to get inspiration.”
Commercially, who would you want to link up with?
“You see boys like Rudimental carrying the drum & bass styles well in the charts, I would work with them but saying that, I would work with anyone that would allow me to properly fly the flag for the scene commercially. It’s one thing being well known in the underground rave scene but to properly represent you have to cover the full spectrum.
Lily Allen and Shy FX have been making some serious links this year, now that would be a big tune – all 3 of us on one record.
I want to hear people in their 30’s and 40’s say “that’s Skiba on the radio, I used to rave to him back when I was going out every weekend”.
What was the story behind ‘2 Fast 2 Ferocious’?
“I made that mix tape in 2003 with Durrty Doogz, we pressed up about 200 CDs and gave them away for free around London. I wanted people to see and hear a different side of my ability, if you listen to it now you will see it’s not just another drum & bass mix. This is a collection of UK hip hop with plenty of other musical influences.”
Considering the amount of tunes you have that are still unreleased do you have a favourite?
“I’ve got an album’s worth of tunes produced by crissy criss, a load more with MC youngman, it’s hard to remember them all and some are sitting on broken hard drives that I don’t think will ever see the light of day although I’m going to link up with Dave Ross as I believe he’s probably got a lot of these stored somewhere!
I do remember a tune I made with L Natural called ‘What Is This’ – that’s one I definately need to share when I can find it.
A tune I put together with The Wideboys about 4 years ago is coming out on their next studio album in November so keep an ear out for that one.”
Is there any of your released tunes that you look back and think “I wish that had stayed unreleased”?
“Not really man, like I said, I make tunes because I enjoy being creative.
I guess some might say the track I did with Bluestone which sampled Mungo Jerry’s ‘In The Summertime’ but I just wanted to have some fun with it. Yeah it’s cheesy but it’s got a decent melody so it’s all good with me.”
For all the latest on Skibadee you really need to check out his Facebook page which he keeps updated regularly with some wicked content.
Hold up, wait..
We were given a proper history lesson on the latest instalment of D&BTV, with The Prototypes taking us on a journey through jungle and drum & bass with Odyssey featuring Skibadee, Eksman and Demolition Man performing live. Fabio schooled us with a history of Creative Source set and we were treated to a rare birth of hardcore jungle set from the one and only Blame. Infectious vibes in the studio from start to finish. This is how it went down…