Here is a great interview with Charlie May. This guy is almost singularly responsible for shaping my sound today. Spooky, D.O.P, Dub House Disco, the whole Guerilla Records sound. He has had major influence on modern progressive house. Oh, and he produced a few little gems with Sasha back in the day as well.
“There’s also the second type that just wants to go on stage, turn one knob in front of the crowd, put their arms up in the air, and say ‘look at me, I just rolled off all the bass for two bars’, and pretend they’re Jesus.”
Registered: Jul 2005
Location: City, Country format (ex. Paris, France)
Great interview, sounds like there would have been a bit of censoring though. I loved the 'make it more purple' comment, thanks for posting.
Jul-12-2009 08:15
xphonix
tranceaddict
Registered: May 2009
Location: united kingdom
thanks, great read!
Jul-12-2009 09:58
Zak McKracken
Trance
Registered: Jun 2003
Location:
i especialy like the part where he sayd he doesnt botter to PR himself with websites and myspace and twitter and shit, its just soooo boring. I so agree.
Jul-12-2009 11:07
DJ RANN
Supreme tranceaddict
Registered: May 2001
Location: Hollywood....
Thanks for posting this. Been into Mr. May for a along time (one of the geeks that actually read those dusty cover notes).
There is a bit of bullshit in this though. If I read it right, he says he teamed up with sasha for expander. I know for a fact that he had been working with sasha for at least several years before that, and to a very large degree was responsible for the sound that sasha cultivated in remixes in the mid to late 90's.
Also, this interview is clearly written to "introduce" him to a new generation of EDM fans, and feel that it's not accurate for that very reason. I remember a similar PR push along the same lines about 6-7 years ago in the UK magazines when the spooky thing was accelerating. It's fells a bit like a rehash.
Yes, it's difficult to explain dance music culture of the late 80's and early 90's in 500 words or less, it's been subtly guilded to suit his profile and PR spin, which if funny considering that he doesn't believe in that sort of thing....
....There's a lot of "playing it cool" and playing to a specific audience's soft spots in this interview.
On a more general note, I find it interesting that a lot of composers and sound designers I know have such hard ons for dubstep - as expressive and experimental as it is, I think they forget the reason those underground movements such as acid house become so popular...(the fact you could really dance to them).
Having said all that and actually I don't mean to discredit him (really the journalism) Charlie may is a genius and think it's only right that he get more recognition for his contribution to music and the EDM scene.
One thing I find quite amusing is the very specific digs at certain producers and DJ's. There's loads of them in there....
Thanks for sharing eric
