Our bi-monthly residents are back, this time extending a warm welcome to Border Community chief James Holden for an extensive 4-hour set. Having just released his new long player ‘The Inheritors’ to all round critical acclamation the D.R. hosts have timed James’ arrival more than a little perfectly and the all-night session seems a fitting way to let him flex his freshly worked out musical muscles.
Deadly Rhythm took 5 minutes to chat to James about his latest album, Label A & R, ‘Trance’ and live sets…
Your new album ‘The Inheritors’ has just dropped and it’s picking up some very positive feedback. Do you feel like it’s been a long journey to follow up your debut, in many other genres it feels like there’s pressure to come back quickly, but it seems like you’ve been able to take your time or is that a misconception?
It has been a long journey yeah, but looking back I probably wouldn’t change anything: I learned a lot in the intervening years. We’ve always strongly believed that you shouldn’t release records for the sake of it – take the time, make something that’s as good as it can be and in some way genuinely new otherwise don’t insult your fans (and the sanctity of music itself) by releasing something half-arsed. The music industry (broadly) disagrees with us on this.
Most people will probably be aware that your first releases were filed under ‘Trance’ and it’s something you’ve referred to as being ‘naïve’, but do you think the emotion and textures associated with the genre have stayed with you in some way?
Yeah totally – the execution was naive but what I was aiming for in 1999 is almost the same as what I aim for now: I’ve always loved mantric, repetitive but ever-changing music – from when I used to hammer out 3 chords for half an hour on the piano when I was a kid up to the present day.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZItq6bQiorU
You launched Border Community in 2003, what was the incentive for launching a label back then? Did you see it as a vehicle for change or something that would almost usher in a new era for you?
I just didn’t want to work with the rest of the music industry! I’d had a few bad experiences, knew I knew better than all the A&R dinks I’d met so far, and really wanted to help my friends avoid that sort of thing.
(This superlative review from RA of James’s debut release on his own imprint is exactly ten years old and one which set the benchmark very high for all future releases)
We’ve read about how the label consumed a lot of your time in the period following ‘The Idiots Are Winning’, do you ever feel that the strains of running a label might have drained you artistically?
Not really artistically – in fact my friends on BC have always been inspirational. Just time-wise, and emotionally it began to get a bit draining. Doing my LP has let us step back and see how we should approach it from now onwards though, so that’s a good thing.
You’ll be playing Deadly Rhythm at the Sub Club this Friday for a full four hours. Do you often get the opportunity to play the entire night, Obviously it gives you more musical freedom, what can we expect in the early hours?
I’ve always enjoyed playing the early sets – slower, trippier etc. But making the effort to do a load of all-night sets at the (few) clubs around Europe I thought it could work in has been great. I can feel it changing me permanently as a dj, which is funny. Most of the music I really love is more early-hours than peak-time anyway, so you can expect to see me smiling a lot – whilst playing cosmic/kraut/pagan/synthwave/etc!
With ‘The Inheritors’ now finally out and a busy DJ schedule over the coming months, where do you think the next stage of the journey will take you, Have you considered producing a live show or anything along those lines?
I hadn’t thought about a live show seriously – half because I’ve worked so hard on being as good a dj as i can be, and half because I made the record on a bunch of unwieldy unreliable untransportable analogue equipment. But then Thom Yorke asked if I wanted to support Atoms For Peace in the states this autumn and I realised I was being stupid. I’m working on it at the moment: synths and drums wall of psych-noise. Tom Page from Rocketnumbernine is going to play drums – we worked together on the live show I did as part of the Barbican’s ‘Consciousness’ lecture and just get on really well musically – so I’m really excited to see where we can take it.
Check out this recording from Sonar Sao Paulo, things go wild from 30 mins onwards…
https://soundcloud.com/medellinstyle/jamesholdenlivesonar
£10 advanced tickets for Friday are on sale here.
words by Alex Caslano