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Same name, same
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by SCOTT C Since 1996, core Ninja Tune outfit the Herbaliser has been touring the world as a live band, bringing their eclectic mix of hip hop, funk, soul, jazz and electronic music to fans everywhere. This year, founders Jake Wherry and Ollie Teeba split with their longtime label to embrace the winds of change blowing at K7 Records, where they’ve released their latest and fittingly titled record, Same As It Never Was. The Mirror spoke to Teeba over the phone from London. Mirror: After being on Ninja for so long, what were your reasons for leaving for K7? Was it an amicable departure? Ollie Teeba: K7 was enthusiastic about making things happen in America, and Ninja Tune had successfully broken the Canadian market, but that’s really the tip of the iceberg as far as North America is concerned. The break was totally positive. We’re still very good friends with Ninja Tune and there’s no animosity at all. It was just time for a change. We’re showing another side of what we can do, that’s all. As far as our organization and our attitude towards promoting ourselves, that’s changed with the arrival of a new manager and a new agent. Where me and Jake used to take most of the production lead, we now have Ralph and Andy, two of the guys from the horn section who are now sort of a second unit for production. It works really well too. There’s always someone working on something somewhere, like a well-oiled machine. M: You mentioned that you had to scale things down a bit for North America, so what are you working with in terms of a live show right now? OT: What we did in Europe was bring our own front of house guy for the mix, and even a lighting guy, which is a new thing for us. We’ve always left it up to the house engineer to do their thing. Our tour manager is going to be doing the lights on the Canadian and U.S. tour (laughs), so you do what you have to. I’m sure he knows what he’s doing. We also had our own monitor guy who speaks the same language as we do, meaning he understands how we like things to be on stage. We’re still bringing the same amount of musicians that we’d bring out to Europe, and we’re still bringing [singer] Jessica Darling. It’s gonna be great. Lighting guy, monitor guy, or not. M: After so long together as a band, and all the musical variations of the Herbaliser, how do you feel about this increasingly popular return to vintage funk and soul? OT: You’ve got a whole bunch of people who’ve been around for ages, like the Dap-kings, Breakestra and Poets of Rhythm, and these guys have been doing this whole retro funk-soul thing really well for a really long time. The attention to detail, about how a recording is made, is brilliant. They’re achieving what acid jazz was unable to achieve, mastering the science of recording along with song styles. It’s because of how huge Amy Winehouse got with Mark Ronson that these guys are finally getting the attention they deserve, but the truth is, they’ve been around for ages. WITH GRAND ANALOG AT LE NATIONAL |
