South London meets South Africa...
Let’s start with a true story. If you live in New Cross like I do, then getting the night bus back from North London or out East can be a bit of a hike. If you’re out in Plastic People, say, then you’ll probably need to journey across to London Bridge, before getting dropped off in Lewisham. It’s a trek, but it does take you past a private members club - by this time one of the few lights on the street, people spill out into the road while slick African pop pulsates inside. African culture is almost everywhere in South London, you just need to know where to look.
LV knew where to look. A three man production unit, their sets have been littered with African beats for some time. It helps when one member - Gervase Gordon - is actually born in the country, and has both the reason and the access to head back. Gradually forming ties with the South African scene, the trio allowed the sounds of Kwaito and House to fuse with their own style. Perennial crate-diggers, LV simply opened their ears to these new sounds in the same way as they had countless times before.
“In the past few years we’ve been listening to more and more of it” Si Williams explains. “I think it was when Gerv did his first mini DJ tour out there, which was probably about two and a half years ago. He got really heavily into all the music they were playing in taxis out there and he got a big deeper into the scene. So when he came back he just came back with loads and loads of tunes and there was just so much good stuff going on out there and that we couldn’t help but get into it”.
Famed for its spare, alien nature – some Kwaito tracks are little more than a simple loop and a kick drum – LV insist that they actually related to the scene almost immediately. “It worked well with music which was coming from this country as well in terms of mixing it together in DJ sets” continues the producer. “We didn’t know so much about the culture around it, we’d heard a bit from Jerv but we’d not really experienced it directly ourselves so it wasn’t really the driving force for us in terms of getting into it”.
“House music has always been – as far as I’m concerned – stripped things down to its barest elements. Or at least that’s the stuff that we like” Williams says. “Obviously you can kind of go maximal on your House. That’s generally not the stuff that we’re really that interested in. That’s the one of the things that I like about it but I can dislike it as well. If you get a tune where it’s just a loop and you don’t like that loop then it sucks, really. On the other hand if it’s a loop that you really love then it’s just brilliant, you know what I mean?”
LV and Okmalumkoolkat - Sebenza
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Gradually introducing more and more South African artists into their productions, LV have built up contacts with the likes of Okmalumkoolkat, Spoek Mathambo and Ruffest. As Will Horrocks explains, though, this doesn’t necessarily equate to an openness within the scene itself. “I don’t know whether it’s necessary to have a link to people but it just seems to be a situation where they like what we’re playing and we’ve liked what they’ve been doing. They can do something on top of what we’ve played them and we can sort of take it from there. I know that Spoek Mathambo – who’s on the album and who we’ve worked with before – was instrumental in introducing a few people to us” he says. “They heard the track, liked it, wanted to put something over it so they did. It was pretty straight forward for us to get involved with them, they didn’t feel there were any barriers but we didn’t feel it was any different”.
While Si Williams and Will Horrocks worked on beats in London, Gervase Gordon made frequent scouting trips to the townships. Billed - “only in the broadest, glibbest sense” (Horrocks) - as ‘South London Meets South Africa', the resulting sessions are a fusion of the two areas. LV would build basic rhythm tracks, send them to the vocalists and then completely re-work each track. “The way we tend to work is that we’ll come up with something, give to vocalists and then we’ll get an a capella or a vocal off them and we’ll totally change the beat underneath” says Horrocks. Si Williams agrees, stating: “We just generally tend to go with the idea that we just give them something to work with and then we’ll sort out the music later. It’s pretty rare for us to send a tune, have the vocal done over and then for that to be the tune which makes it into the general world”.
The process unwittingly begs for comparison between the two areas, with both South London and South African sharing a hunger for reggae – and bass frequencies in general. Dancehall remains an enormous scene in the townships, with hip hop also high up in the musical diet. LV insist, though, that the counterpoints are much more general, less refined. “I think it’s more to do with people liking to go out and listen to loud, soundsystem music. Particularly if it’s warm or if the sun’s out” laughs Horrocks. “People just want to have a good time. I don’t know if you can put that down to reggae or dub. I know that a lot of people across the world listen to that and we listen to that and I guess the guys, the vocalists probably listen to that, to a certain extent. I guess the common thread is more likely to be just music, rather than any particular form of music. I guess it is. It sounds like a cheesy thing. It’s not a universal language as such but it is a thing that people appreciate across the continents”.
Arguably kicking off the partnership between British bass culture and South African music with their famed mix for Blackdown, LV are not surprised by the subsequent surge of interest in Kwaito styles. “No I mean it doesn’t really surprise me” insists Si Williams. “I’m not as exposed as I could be to it. There are global trends. Beyonce went over to South Africa. There’s definitely a sense that there are exciting things happening in South Africa”.
“Also there seem to be links forming between the UK and South Africa” adds Will Horrocks. “People like Auntie Flo, for example, the guys from Pollinate. There’s a lot of connections being made between the UK underground scene and what’s happening in South Africa. It’s really cool actually, there’s a mutual appreciation going on there”.
Photo Credit: Jason Turner
- - -
LV's new album 'Sebenza' is set to be released on Hyperdub this August.
LV knew where to look. A three man production unit, their sets have been littered with African beats for some time. It helps when one member - Gervase Gordon - is actually born in the country, and has both the reason and the access to head back. Gradually forming ties with the South African scene, the trio allowed the sounds of Kwaito and House to fuse with their own style. Perennial crate-diggers, LV simply opened their ears to these new sounds in the same way as they had countless times before.
“In the past few years we’ve been listening to more and more of it” Si Williams explains. “I think it was when Gerv did his first mini DJ tour out there, which was probably about two and a half years ago. He got really heavily into all the music they were playing in taxis out there and he got a big deeper into the scene. So when he came back he just came back with loads and loads of tunes and there was just so much good stuff going on out there and that we couldn’t help but get into it”.
Famed for its spare, alien nature – some Kwaito tracks are little more than a simple loop and a kick drum – LV insist that they actually related to the scene almost immediately. “It worked well with music which was coming from this country as well in terms of mixing it together in DJ sets” continues the producer. “We didn’t know so much about the culture around it, we’d heard a bit from Jerv but we’d not really experienced it directly ourselves so it wasn’t really the driving force for us in terms of getting into it”.
“House music has always been – as far as I’m concerned – stripped things down to its barest elements. Or at least that’s the stuff that we like” Williams says. “Obviously you can kind of go maximal on your House. That’s generally not the stuff that we’re really that interested in. That’s the one of the things that I like about it but I can dislike it as well. If you get a tune where it’s just a loop and you don’t like that loop then it sucks, really. On the other hand if it’s a loop that you really love then it’s just brilliant, you know what I mean?”
LV and Okmalumkoolkat - Sebenza
- - -
Gradually introducing more and more South African artists into their productions, LV have built up contacts with the likes of Okmalumkoolkat, Spoek Mathambo and Ruffest. As Will Horrocks explains, though, this doesn’t necessarily equate to an openness within the scene itself. “I don’t know whether it’s necessary to have a link to people but it just seems to be a situation where they like what we’re playing and we’ve liked what they’ve been doing. They can do something on top of what we’ve played them and we can sort of take it from there. I know that Spoek Mathambo – who’s on the album and who we’ve worked with before – was instrumental in introducing a few people to us” he says. “They heard the track, liked it, wanted to put something over it so they did. It was pretty straight forward for us to get involved with them, they didn’t feel there were any barriers but we didn’t feel it was any different”.
While Si Williams and Will Horrocks worked on beats in London, Gervase Gordon made frequent scouting trips to the townships. Billed - “only in the broadest, glibbest sense” (Horrocks) - as ‘South London Meets South Africa', the resulting sessions are a fusion of the two areas. LV would build basic rhythm tracks, send them to the vocalists and then completely re-work each track. “The way we tend to work is that we’ll come up with something, give to vocalists and then we’ll get an a capella or a vocal off them and we’ll totally change the beat underneath” says Horrocks. Si Williams agrees, stating: “We just generally tend to go with the idea that we just give them something to work with and then we’ll sort out the music later. It’s pretty rare for us to send a tune, have the vocal done over and then for that to be the tune which makes it into the general world”.
The process unwittingly begs for comparison between the two areas, with both South London and South African sharing a hunger for reggae – and bass frequencies in general. Dancehall remains an enormous scene in the townships, with hip hop also high up in the musical diet. LV insist, though, that the counterpoints are much more general, less refined. “I think it’s more to do with people liking to go out and listen to loud, soundsystem music. Particularly if it’s warm or if the sun’s out” laughs Horrocks. “People just want to have a good time. I don’t know if you can put that down to reggae or dub. I know that a lot of people across the world listen to that and we listen to that and I guess the guys, the vocalists probably listen to that, to a certain extent. I guess the common thread is more likely to be just music, rather than any particular form of music. I guess it is. It sounds like a cheesy thing. It’s not a universal language as such but it is a thing that people appreciate across the continents”.
Arguably kicking off the partnership between British bass culture and South African music with their famed mix for Blackdown, LV are not surprised by the subsequent surge of interest in Kwaito styles. “No I mean it doesn’t really surprise me” insists Si Williams. “I’m not as exposed as I could be to it. There are global trends. Beyonce went over to South Africa. There’s definitely a sense that there are exciting things happening in South Africa”.
“Also there seem to be links forming between the UK and South Africa” adds Will Horrocks. “People like Auntie Flo, for example, the guys from Pollinate. There’s a lot of connections being made between the UK underground scene and what’s happening in South Africa. It’s really cool actually, there’s a mutual appreciation going on there”.
Photo Credit: Jason Turner
- - -
LV's new album 'Sebenza' is set to be released on Hyperdub this August.
