Right, I'm off for two weeks holidays. This year has been very productive so far, but it has also been very hectic and the past three months have dragged on a bit. Time for a break in Thailand to recharge my batteries and spend loads of quality time with my family. I leave you in the capabale hands of Scion aka Rene Lowe and DJ Pete. This interview was conducted back in 2003 when they had just released their 'Arrange and Process Basic Channel Tracks'. I had the pleasure of seeing them perform this show twice in Dublin at the time and both gigs were amazing. Anyway, happy reading, see you all on the other side...
Dance music’s most revered figures are as famous for what they haven’t done as for what they’ve achieved. Derrick May made a wise career move when he decided to stop making and releasing music - not even he could have bettered ‘Icon’ - Goldie’s love of the silver screen is as well documented as his back catalogue and Junior Vasquez was renowned for never playing outside of his New York residency, where, the audience is patently less discerning.
Add to this list of illustrious characters German producer Maurizio and his Basic Channel and Chain Reaction labels. The creator of a particularly distinctive brand of techno that took its inspiration from the dub sound systems of Jamaica rather than the usual practice of bowing down to the sci-fi obsessed Detroit oligarchy, the rumours about the mysterious Maurizio are as strong as the legacy left in the wake of his scuffled dub shuffle. Is he a man, two men, a woman or a German prince? Is he a fat, bald git? Does he record his work upside down in a submarine?
We will probably never know whether these insinuations – not helped by Maurizio famously playing live from behind a curtain at London techno Mecca Lost during the mid nineties, are true or not, but we do know that he will never, ever, even under pain of death do an interview.
This is a great shame, because Maurizio and Basic Channel’s back catalogue are about to come under scrutiny again with the release of a new compilation on Tresor, ‘Scion Arrange And Process Basic Channel Tracks.’ Luckily, Chain Reaction mainstays Scion, who have pieced together both labels’ hissing electronic highlights into one alluringly hypnotic mix, have consented to speak about the project.
Scion aka Pete Kuschnereit and Rene Lowe also double up as Substance and Vainqueur respectively and met in 1991 when they started working at the Basic Channel affiliated Hardwax record store in Berlin.
“My impression about Basic Channel is that, in the beginning they just wanted to let the music speak for itself,” explains Rene. “When they wanted to stay anonymous it became like a self-perpetuating thing and they had nothing really to do with it. The mystique about Maurizio and Basic Channel just kept going and the weirdest stories came about. No one knows who started them, but that’s how the legend started.”
Apart from their day job in Hardwax, Rene and Pete showed an interest in following in the footsteps of he (or she) who shall remain anonymous, and spent the early to the mid nineties familiarising themselves with their equipment.
By 1995, Basic Channel had deemed Scion’s work was good enough to warrant setting up a new imprint to release their material and thus Chain Reaction was born. “We just gave them the tracks and they released them,” Rene says in a matter of fact way, but, having released their first EP, also called ‘Scion’, duty, quite literally called.
“After we made this we had to do national service,” Rene explains. “Unfortunately, as soon as Pete was finished I had to do it, so there wasn’t really time for us to work together for quite a while. In fact, this CD is the first serious studio project we’ve done in the last few years.”
Having served their country, the duo returned to Hardwax and Chain Reaction, pooling their studio resources to release more EPs. A succession of releases followed, but they are adamant that recording in the shadow of Basic Channel did not intimidate or put them under pressure.
“Not really, because we were also heavily influenced by Chicago and Detroit,” Rene says, admitting nonetheless that “we learnt how to produce there and learnt from the Basic Channel sound. “If anything, the job at Hardwax helped us more than Basic Channel,” Pete says, finally getting the chance to speak up. “In the early 90s, this is where everyone from Berlin hung out, as well as all the first wave of DJs who were coming over from America. We met them all and got to know a wide range of producers who were and continue to be really important,” he concludes.
Similarly, Scion seem unfazed by the Basic Channel legacy, but when I ask them about the effect the act had on the contemporary electronic music landscape, they are quick to praise Maurizio’s work.
“They made a link, made it clear that there’s a connection between the techno of today and music that was made years ago in Jamaica and even old funk music,” Rene, clearly the talkative member of the act, replies. “I remember in the early 90s people in the techno scene said this was something new that had never happened before, there was this idea that the Basic Channel music came out of nothing, but that’s not true,” he continues. “They showed where this music came from and they had a huge influence on techno producers. At the same time,” he adds “it’s a wave that started many years ago: they transferred the kind of sound and the Jamaican methods of recording into a modern environment. It’s important to really know your history, to be aware that music from 20 or 30 years ago has a lot in common with the music of nowadays. If techno is all you know, how will you progress?”
The release of ‘Arrange And Process’ should remind and hopefully introduce people to the magic behind the Basic Channel legend. Classics like ‘Phylyps Trak 2’, BC’s version of Carl Craig’s ‘The Climax’ and Cyrus’ ‘Inversion’ hiss, squelch and hum smoothly together, segued by Scion using a new software package simply called Live. Given that Basic Channel aren’t really known for their business acumen, it seems a strange move for them to release what is, to all intensive purposes a mix CD.
“There were a number of factors that led to the release of this CD,” Pete explains. “It wasn’t a big plan, but Dimitri, who owns Tresor, was always interested in presenting a project that brought together all the old BC records. At the same time, he had asked us to do a regular mix CD for the label, but then we met the boss of Ableton, the company responsible for creating this new software, Live. We didn’t want to do a regular mix and none of these records had been released on a CD before, so that’s how it happened. It’s a nice reminder of Basic Channel as well as a good collection.”
Of course, the other main reason why the arrival of ‘Arrange And Process’ is timely is because Basic Channel’s work is more relevant than ever. Evident in the click/glitch German house, apparent in the dubby West Coast house sound, traceable in the nocturnal rhythms of tech-house and still an integral part of club techno, the raw, electronic dub of Maurizio’s label is never far away.
“It’s just personal taste, but the stuff that takes inspiration from Basic Channel, especially the German music, isn’t that interesting, it’s too clean and clinical: I like it raw and rough ,” Pete observes. “At the same time, the Chain Reaction and Basic Channel spirit survives, and the audience for electronic music has changed a lot over the last five years. Nowadays, there are more people getting into it and this music is reaching a totally different and bigger audience.”
Currently gigging around the world together with vocalist Tikiman - from Basic Channel sister roots label Rhythm & Sound - the duo believes that the addition of a vocalist to their set up has attracted more sizeable audience than their previous ‘two blokes behind a mixing desk’ arrangement.
“We did some live shows back in the initials stages of Chain Reaction, but in 1998 we actually started to do it seriously and what we do now with Tikiman is like a proper show,” Rene believes, adding, “there’s a guy on stage performing and entertaining, showing people the roots side of the music as well as the techno elements. It’s a very good package for everyone and it also means that we see a far wider range people coming to our concerts than years nowadays than before.”
Having notched up more than thirty gigs in the last year with the roots singer and, with more shows planned to promote the album, there’s another, typically Basic Channel reason why Scion enjoy performing live with Tikiman. “It’s good for us because the crowd isn’t paying us attention anymore and we can focus on the music,” Rene laughs. Some things never change.
