Last year something sat on my end-of-year list that I’d never have expected to a year before. Having admittedly never really listened to Scroobius Pip other than having heard a few guest verses and the odd single; I’d been following him on Twitter pretty much since I signed up to it, sharing his love of language and enjoying his quips (I’d recommend giving him a follow @ScroobiusPipYo). I’m not trying to put down his previous work, as I know that it’s great, however the beats didn’t really click with me for whatever reason. With the new punk/hardcore infused direction of Distraction Pieces I found myself feeling the excitement of when I first started listening to P.O.S (and the rest of Doomtree), Sage Francis and others along a similar vein.
As well as having greatly enjoyed his record, I had the pleasure of catching his live show, which also pleasantly surprised me. Complete with an outstanding support slot by B. Dolan, the overall night was the best live show I saw all year, and I made it out to a lot of shows! It was there where I caught up with Pip for an interview; one that came completely out of the blue and I was completely unprepared for (after having received an email from his publicist asking if I could meet up with him in 30 minutes time).
After listening to the lyrics of one of the standout tracks from the album, ‘Death Of The Journalist’ a few dozen times by this point I was petrified, and would have completely understood had Pip taken offence at how unprepared I was, given the gauntlet he’d laid down for bloggers and writers already. However upon meeting him, this certainly wasn’t the case, the humble spoken word poet, rapper and hardcore enthusiast sat down with me to discuss journalism, releasing the new album independently, his relationship with Sage Francis’ Strange Famous label and his live show.
I must also apologise again to Mr. Pip, for being a terrible journalist and taking literally months to get this transcribed and posted; at least I didn’t rush!
Considering the circumstances, of me being completely unprepared, I wanted to discuss your track, ‘Death Of The Journalist’ as opposed to trying to sweep it under the rug. What has the response to that been?
Yeah I mean I have had some people angry about it, because it’s having a go at journalism. But it’s not really just having ago- in a way it’s throwing the gauntlet down, and mainly it was looking into it for me. I didn’t come to a conclusion, but I found it a fascinating subject because a lot of the news we get now is from blogs and stuff; and a lot of the bloggers probably aren’t aware that you can get a degree in journalism, and that used to be how you’d become a journalist, you’d get a degree. You wouldn’t just go, “Oh I’ve started writing now.” There’s ways and means, there’s rules of source checking and fact checking, and things like that, which people just writing a blog just haven’t gone through; which is fine, because they wouldn’t. But because of the way we are as a public, we’ll instantly go to the more shocking stories, and not check the facts. So it’s a weird one.
Scroobius Pip – Death Of The Journalist
There’s a bit of irony there too, because I feel like I’ve seen stuff promoting this record on blogs and stuff, a lot more than I have for your previous records…
Yeah it’s been really weird. And that’s been partly because of the way I’ve done it. I’ve done it on my own label; (and) normally when you’re releasing a record, you need to give the album to the monthly magazines at least two months before the release, and things like that. But I didn’t want to do any of that, so we did focus on the more immediate press; it was that thing of, “I want the record to be finished, and then as soon as we can get it made up and out there, get it out!” Rather than have it finished, and sit on it for three months then go, “Here it is!” I wanted it to be, “As soon as we’ve got stuff ready, lets do videos, lets get it out there.” Rather than trying to chase these long lead press things: because again everything’s so instant now. The idea was that as soon as you can hear any of the songs anywhere, they’re available on Itunes, or the album is out. So it’s that immediate thing.
So after exploring the whole blogging and music journalism thing, and then challenging them, you’ve ended up doing better out of it?
Its one of them that’s kind of nice; it was throwing the gauntlet down to a lot of bloggers and thankfully if you’re kind of a good blogger then they’ll take that and say, “Right, well I’m going to write this and research you well and review it unbiased.” I mean NME did the same, and fair play to them, when me and Dan (Le Sac) released ‘Thou Shalt.’ Because in there we had, “Thou shall not read NME,” and that kind of throwing down the gauntlet, that they could turn around and say, “Fuck that!” but they made it their single of the week and reviewed it regardless.
Yeah, I have to say it had me questioning myself a lot too!
That’s the thing. (And) it was the bit about press releases that, every band you talk to, it’s kind of a joke in the industry that you’ll start getting your previews through and they’re all describing you in the same way because you’ve sent out a press release and they’ve literally taken all the wording from that and put it there. And again, I’d be fine with that if they said, “We’ve just received this press release.” and then just printed the press release; that’s cool. But it’s that thing of, it’s under the cover of journalism or writing, when it’s just, “You’ve not done anything man!” And it’s all important because it gets you press and gets you out there, but still it’s like, “Put some effort in.” I don’t think I’d be able to do that, and that’s the reason that my blog on my website is hardly ever updated, because I would want to put effort into it; if I don’t have the time I’m not just going to copy and paste some bullshit and then go, “There you go!”
Do you think some of it could just be subconscious though?
Yeah it could be. It’s that weird thing that me and Dan have seen, and I have with this, that you get to a level or a size as a band, where certain areas have to cover you. So our first record, ninety-percent of the reviews were amazing because no one knew who we were, so it was only people who’d hunted us out and went, “Right, I need to write about that.” Whereas you get to the point where they have to cover you and on the preview things, it’s that kind of thing, they’re naturally just going to copy a bit from the press release because they’re not actually passionate, or don’t know about (you). They’re not saying, “They’ve been doing this for a while…” You can tell the blogs where they’re into what you do, because they’ll have a bit more freedom with it and they’ll know what you are. Me and Dan in particular have always been a weird act to try and put into a genre, so I can understand why a lot of bloggers will just pick bits from what we’ve told them to put rather than trying to figure it out themselves I guess.
And you released this album in the US also, on Sage Francis’ Strange Famous Records. How did that come about?
Well Angles, mine and Dan’s first album came out on Strange Famous as well. So that came about originally- it’s all just stories of luck; Sage (Francis) had posted a comment on our MySpace page. At that point, ‘Thou Shalt’ had just came out and there was loads of hype, we were talking to a lot of major labels in the UK and indies and we had a few in America that were making some noise; but it all felt like it was just talk. So we held out for a bit and it got to a point where I said to Dan, “I’m just going to MySpace Sage Francis, and say, we don’t want tonnes of money off you or anything, we just want to put the record out and have it available.” And yeah, he was into it, and liked it, so we re-released it.
And when I was working on this record I contacted Sage almost instantly because I knew I was releasing it on my own label, so it was a new thing for me and I kind of spoke to him in a way of, “Even if you don’t release it I wouldn’t mind picking your brains a little bit.” because he’s been running his own label for a long time. But he was keen to release it, and keen to jump on a track. Because originally when I was writing it and structuring it he wasn’t on it at all, and then when I sent over a few demos and he was like, “I’ve started writing something for that track.” (So I thought) “Great, that’s music to my ears.” Because I’ve been a fan of Sage since he first started making it over to the UK.
And how did P.O.S ended up on that record (‘Let Em Come’) too?
When me and Dan toured Angles in America he came along to one of our shows, because we were touring with B. Dolan and they’re mates. I didn’t really know much about him, but B lent me his CD and I got into it, started chatting to him, and he came over to the UK and toured with King Blues and I met up with him then because they’re mates of mine as well, and I met up with him at SXSW and things like that and we always spoke about (collaborating.) I’d said to him “If you ever want to get more exposure over in the UK or whatever, I’m a fan!” Because Never Better was the hip-hop album of that year I think; it was amazing. So I was keen to work with him, but then it went back and forth for ages and ages… We’d finished the record and I didn’t have the P.O.S verse, Sage had jumped on that track in the gap where P.O.S was going to be, and it was that awkward thing of, “I don’t want to tell P.O.S he’s not on it now, because I want everyone on it.” And then P.O.S delivered his verse literally at the last minute, so I took out a verse of my own; I’d had two verses on that track originally. But they’re two of my favourite emcees and they both smashed it, so there was no way of doing the album version with one and a bonus version with the other or something like that, all three of us on there just sat so nicely, so I had to go with it.
And there ended up being a Strange Famous remix too, with Cecil Otter (of Doomtree) and the Metermaids…
Yeah, Sage arranged that. It was a complete rethinking of it, it was a lot more chilled and in that Strange Famous style in a way; it was cool.
Scroobius Pip (feat. Sage Francis, Cecil Otter & The Metermaids) – Let Em Come (SFR Redux)
Why did you choose to do a solo record this time around, and how did making it differ from the stuff you’ve done with Dan?
The reason I wanted to do a solo record was, I mean I’d done a solo record before I started working with Dan, and me and Dan have been touring and writing for like four years and have done two records, (but) the first music that I was into, and passionate about was punk and hardcore. And that’s not something that Dan’s into at all, so that’s never really come across that much in our music, obviously I mention Crass and Minor Threat now every and again, (but) I wanted to get (that across). I used to be in little punk bands and that, and while me and Dan were working together I had a side band, which was kind of a hardcore thing; we just met up and practiced but never released anything. And I started to write some stuff that was so specific to that sound, and I wouldn’t turn around to Dan and say, “Our next record has got to sound like this.” Because it’s a duo, he’s the important part on the production side, and he smashes that. So I decided I just wanted to have a go of putting it together myself.
Originally it was going to just be me and my mate Worgie; who produced a few bits on it to play in the live band. But bizarrely Liam Howlett from the Prodigy turned it into a collaboration thing, because he emailed me and asked if I needed any beats, and I said, “Yeah, I’d love you to make a beat for me.” He never came through with it, because he’s a busy guy, but he gave me that thought of, “Right, I could work with a lot of different producers and if I give them all a specific sound, I won’t just be getting a Prodigy beat or with Steve Mason a Beta Band beat or whatever. We’ll get them all to tailor it to a certain sound that I’m after and see what comes out.” And it went really well, working with Danny Lohner and Travis Barker, Steve Mason and just all sorts of other people was just amazing.
And how has the response to the record been?
It’s been really overwhelming, particularly because I was releasing it on my own label, I was keeping the budgets really tight, and I wasn’t looking to push it that much. But it got to number 7 in the Itunes chart on the week of release, which was ahead of like, Example, and loads of big stuff, and I didn’t expect any of that. So the reactions have been great. It was that thing on the lead up that I was very aware, or I expected, or prepared, for the fact that a lot of Le Sac vs Pip fans wouldn’t like it, because it’s different: it’s still got the same vibe, but it’s more aggressive and harder and guitars, it’s not the dancy (style of Le Sac vs. Pip). And it’s interesting with the live shows, because you realise that all the beats are a quite slow, hip-hop tempo, although they’re harder and thrashier. Whereas, when you come and see me and Dan its all go mental and then chill for the more deep, dark ones. But with this a lot of it’s just a head bop type thing, but it seems to be working, so yeah it’s great!
And how is the live show structured for the solo stuff? Do you have a live band?
I’ve got a live drummer and Worgie on guitar who is running a load of stuff through the laptop, because on the record I still wanted to have that hip-hop feel so there are certain bits which are samples and things dropped in, so we wanted to get all of that across still. We didn’t want to just bring a DJ because that’s cheesy now, so many people have a DJ when they don’t need one, all they’re doing is playing a backing track and they have to stand their pretending. I’ve got a few mates who are great DJ’s who would have been completely up for it, but I would have been wasting their time and not doing them justice, because they’re really talented and all they’d have been doing is pressing play and then taking their headphones every off now and then when they’re not doing anything. So we’ve got a lot of stuff running through the laptop, some of the guitar effects that Worgie does are going through the laptop and tweaking and things like that, but it works!
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