Robi Insinna aka Headman and Manhead faced some of his toughest questions ever in our last personality clash with Erol Alkan. This issue Zurich based producer Robi sets the questions for output records boss, legend of the uk hip-hop scene, producer, remixer and top designer Trevor Jackson, who throughout his life has made, and continues to make, serious waves in enough areas to satisfy three careers. Now he finds enough time to give clash the rundown too.
H: Tell us a little bit about the early Underdog, The Brotherhood and Bite it! days and how it all turned into Output.
TJ: I started out making sounds after being inspired by the Usual Suspects, Grandmaster Flash, Double D and Steinski and Art of Noise etc. Until I got my hands on a Commodore 64 I was making pause button mix tapes in the style of the old school edit kings, The Latin Rascals, Omar Santana and Chep Nunez. I wasn’t so much into making music but making collages of sound and was studying Graphics at college and these techniques were just an aural extension of what I was doing visually.
The first track I ever properly made was a house track sampling the bass from Gwen Guthrie’s ‘Peanut Butter’. I loved early house music and was designing sleeves for most of the seminal records of the time like Todd Terry, Frankie Bones and Pal Joey. I continued to make instrumental hip-hop until I met The Brotherhood, a rap crew who were based in north-west London where I was living.
We began to make tracks together, and eventually I created the label Bite It! to release the first Brotherhood EP ‘Descendants of the Holocaust’. This record, a Jewish hip-hop perspective, began to get media attention. As the band progressed and with a string of well received singles under their belts the band reformed as a multicultural trio, who signed to Virgin Records. I also began to remix artists such as Massive Attack, U2, The House of Pain, Run DMC and many others under the Underdog moniker. This work stopped for 2 years while we created the ‘Elementals’ album which, when finally released, was hailed by many as ‘the best British hip-hop album ever made’.
All this attention began to cause friction between myself, who as creator of 100% of all the music and production was more than happy to shun the limelight, and the band whose egos after numerous interviews and TV appearances began to far outgrow their modest record sales. After being asked to leave the band, I happily went on to resurrect my remix career, whilst after throwing me out, The Brotherhood spent the next decade blaming me for their loss of career! This situation, the financial nightmare of running an independent UK label along with the death of my close friend and manager Marts Andrups forced me to rethink my career.
Hip-hop was becoming more and more restricted creatively and lyrically. I found very little of the integrity and intelligence I loved in the classic MCs like KRS1, Chuck D, De La Soul and Ultramagnetic MCs. Everything had turned to sex, money and violence and I really didn’t want to be part of that anymore. I then took a long time out and decided to create a new label, which would allow me to release music of any form.
Output was born and along with it the chance to design record sleeves for my own bands whose music I loved (unlike the manufactured dross I had ended up working on for the previous couple of years). I swiftly made Output my number one priority. I was working with unique and highly talented young artists like Fridge and Fourtet, who totally understood what I was trying to do, and finally had an outlet to express all my varied musical tastes.
H: Why do you think it took a while for people to notice Output? Before it was really underground and it was hard to get the records.
TJ: Output is now 9 years old and since the beginning I have been incredibly fortunate to have had the positive support of the media, due to my earlier work, something which is so integral to building the strong foundations of an independent label. Most of the early releases were only printed in very limited runs, mainly because we didn’t actually think we could sell any more! We also spent time producing expensive but innovative packaging, which created a great demand early on.
H: I’m based in Switzerland, over here and in Germany you are seen as a kind of style guru. Do you like being seen as that?
TJ: Essentially I want to surround myself with things that have a purpose, things that exist for a genuine reason, and as much as people might think otherwise, trends are really not important to me. What I respect most is things that have an integral sense of timelessness; I hate transient culture. I want to possess something for a lifetime, something that functions well and I want to look at forever. Younger people are now brought up with a really throwaway attitude, which I think is crass. Taste is totally subjective, I am not interested in anything because I am told I should or have to like it. People are too easily influenced by marketing nowadays and are scared of having a strong opinion and being an individual. These are the things that I grew up with. People today want to feel safe, feeling part of a gang, not standing out, that’s a crying shame.
H: What do you think of the rise of the Punk- Funk revival? Do you feel you are the pioneer of this style?
TJ: It’s flattering that I may have decided to revitalise a form of music and update it for a generation who didn’t know, or another that forgot. I did what I did because I had a genuine feeling that the music I loved was being ignored and needed to be re-formatted in another way so people could start to discover what fantastic music there was being made in the 80s. I always felt that era really lacked the deserved respect that the 60s and 70s always seemed to get. I didn’t work hard to create any type of movement or scene. I would really rather to be seen as a pioneer of a form of music that is totally innovative and original than something that I am honest enough to admit is just a contemporary update of something that has gone before.
H: Tell us about your design work. Are you doing loads at the moment? How do you see the connection between art, music and fashion? Who is your favourite artist, designer, or biggest inspiration in creating visuals?
TJ: As explained before I thrive on ideas, I try not to separate all these things, there is only good creativity and bad creativity to me. At the moment good is simple, strong, direct and authentic. I don’t have any one favourite, there are thousands of things I love, I find it so hard to concentrate sometimes when there is so much great shit around at the moment in all fields of creativity. Quite how I manage to work when I could spend every waking moment in the cinema, listening to music and reading books and magazines is a mystery.
H: How do you find the time to do all the different things: remixing, producing and art directing?
TJ: Not easily, I would much rather be doing one thing well than 10 things not so well. Working on the Soulwax artwork was the rare opportunity to pretty much drop everything else for a small while, and it really shows to me. It’s the first thing I think I have ever done that I am more than 75% happy with.
H: I’m sure a lot of people wanna know, what’s happening with your own productions? I heard some rumours that you have a lot of new material?
TJ: Well I currently have over 100 tracks that are sitting nervously in my hard-drive awaiting finishing touches. I love them all, so want to try to get 5 albums out in the next year (that’s not including Playgroup). Some of these things are so old now I really should hate them, but they still sound fresh to me. So I am trying to divide them into different projects and find a bit of time to decide on some vocalists between these long interviews, being an indie record mogul and and designing stuff for the label. One of them is called ‘Pink Lunch’, a track has appeared on a Gigolo compilation and also a Colette compilation. There’s the Post No Bills Project, which debuts on the next Kitsune compilation. An RnB album, a hip-hop album and a kind of mutant house thing, got lots to do. I think I need to get some people to help me finish them.
Oh and there’s our project Robbie; Don’t Forget The Drugs EP (a crack track, a smack track, an acid track and a weed track) from the two cleanest men in music. I think we should get an award or something?
H: Regarding the release of your remix album: what do you think of remixing? Do you enjoy it? Do you think it’s a good thing? What is the criteria for you to choose a song for remixing and to commit to it? Do you ever have the feeling you give away too many ideas that maybe could have been used for your own track?
TJ: I did over 80 remixes as the Underdog and nearly 25 as Playgroup, it can be fun. I am fortunate that I very rarely do these things for the cash and have the chance to do things for amazing artists. I would like to think I have never really done anything that doesn’t really have some honest relation the original somehow and I always try to get inside the head of the band and the type of music they like etc when I approach the mix.
I always want them to be happy but in 15 years of this job I have only ever had two direct compliments; one from Peshay for my ‘Miles At Home Remix’ and one from the RZA who loved a Gravediggaz mix and apparently wanted to re-vocal his part. I would only ever do a remix if I think I could do something as good or improve the original somehow. As for giving away ideas, I actually think it has taught me loads & inspired me to do the things. It is frustrating that for most of my mixes. I always recreate all the music and keep the original vocal, yet earn no publishing. It’s like I have written over 100 pieces of original music and not really got the income I deserve.
H: When is Mister Jackson gonna get a family and settle down?
TJ: When I can find a woman that can put up with me.
