by RUPERT BOTTENBERG

The resurgence in recent years of deep funk - the tough, raw, original sound from the late '60s and early '70s - can be traced back largely to a Scots cat named Keb Darge. A veteran of the U.K.'s northern soul scene - those speed-fuelled, all-night soul shakedowns that rocked Britain in the '70s and laid down the blueprint for rave - Darge is schooled in the obsessive pursuit of the rarest slabs of old-school funk. After years of shaking his head and clucking his tongue as the funk scene devolved into a mess of bad white-boy 'fros and butterfly collars, vacuous disco and overly precious rare-groove sounds, Darge took the bull by the horns. In '96, he and Snowboy started their Deep Funk soirée in London and, around the same time, Darge began compiling CD series for the BBE label like Funk Spectrum, Soul Spectrum and the famous Legendary Deep Funk. The world's been catching up to him, though, with a new wave of live bands doing true funk sounds (check out Darge's Funk for the 21st Century anthology, on the Do Right! label of Toronto's John Kong), and Kenny Dope of Masters at Work starting the KD label with Darge. Energetic and rather outspoken (when you're a former Scottish martial arts champ who bears an eerie resemblance to Ben Kingsley in Sexy Beast, you can get away with it), Darge didn't hesitate to share some deep thoughts with the Mirror.

Mirror: Let's talk about the new wave of live, vintage-style funk bands, which is so refreshing after years of funk being represented, live at least, by dreadlocked collegiate wankmasters and bellbottomed wedding bands -

Keb Darge: (giggles gleefully) You've got it sussed, don't you!

M: I'm talking about Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings, Lee Fields, Sugarman 3, Breakstra and of course the New Mastersounds, who you produced. They're all such a great addition to the deep funk scene.

KD: Oh, aye, it's not just that, but to the whole music scene. I mean, I was going, in the '70s, and seeing your Bobby Browns, your Curtis Mayfields, your Motown - your Junior Walkers and Archie Bells - the whole fucking lot. However, the best live show, the one that moved me most, was Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings. Not because it was new and it hadn't been seen before, not even because we'd missed it for so long, but because it was so fucking good! It was one of the best live shows, with young Binky playing his guitar behind his back with his hands stuck together and Sharon's character oozing out. The music was perfect! And I've seen them all! I might be seeing it through clouded memory, but Sharon Jones was the best live fucking soul act I've ever seen, and I have seen a lot.

M: There's also Imaginary Visions and the New Mastersounds, two acts in this genre that saw you move from the DJ booth to the producer's chair. How was that experience for you?

KD: I thought I'd split my head open on the studio ceiling - that's true, actually! Imaginary Visions was just me and Nick Van Gelder, just the two of us did that. It was okay, but it wasn't just right. When I got the New Mastersounds and got into the studio with them - it was a real shitty little old studio with a low ceiling, hence I split my head open on it - just listening back to the tape after they'd recorded "It's Alright Now," first time, I was like, "Fucking hell, did we just do that?" It's one of the best old funk records I'd ever heard, and we just did it? Jesus, bang! It was great and, I hate to say this, it was so fucking easy! Because they're such great musicians, I'd say, "Could you make it a bit more doomp-boomp-boomp," just do it with my mouth, what I wanted them to do. I was very excited, especially when I first turned up at a club with the record in my hand, played it and watched the response. I thought, "Way-hey! There's a big future here!"

Dangerous dancing

M: You've got a reputation for hitting the dancefloor at the parties you spin at.

KD: If someone else is DJing, I'll have a wee dance before I go and DJ. John Kong keeps telling me, "Go on, dance, dance!" He wants people to see me dance. I said, "Fuck this, John, I gotta be here! Wait 'til someone else comes on!"

M: I understand you were once a competitive dancer in that northern soul tradition -

KD: Oh, I wasn't competitive, I was just so good that I kept winning!

M: You're a former Scottish champion at tae kwon do, though. Did that contribute to your dancing skills?

KD: Oh, absolutely. In the northern soul scene, everyone was into kung fu, karate or tae kwon do, so you're stretching all week, doing tricks with your legs. Then come the weekend, you're thinking, "Hmmm, maybe I could do a hooking kick in mid-air, spin 'round, land in the splits, flip up again and flip my legs over my head." It was like breakdancing, but we didn't call it that. You could invent tricks because you were so flexible.

M: I want to move to the subject of collecting, although in your case it's not collecting as a hobby, it's a matter of gathering professional work materials. In fact, you have to turn over your collection now and then to keep yourself in stock.

KD: If I was rich fucker, I'd probably be a collector as well, but I have to make a choice, be a collector or a DJ, because I don't have enough money to be both. So I'll find a record, break it, and someone will reissue it. Then I'm in the position that, if I want to keep it, I will, and if I want to sell the damn thing and play the reissue, then I have money to discover someone else - or make someone else, nowadays. You know, my set is about 40 per cent new tunes, now.

Straight to the source

M: As far as the old stuff goes, you have a reputation for going to the source - checking the producer's name on an old side, digging through the phone book and chasing them down, asking them about records they haven't even thought about in 20 or 30 years.

KD: Oh, aye, that's the way to get the bloody records, you know. Then you get to meet them and they surprise you. They bring out things - "Oh, yes, I've got these master tapes that were never put out, and did you know this record?" No, I didn't - can I have that one as well, please? Then they say, "Oh, did you meet my friend whoever? He did some stuff as well," and you get a phone number that leads you on to someone else. So yeah, yeah, it's the best way to get good tunes these days.

M: But meeting these guys, there must be some interesting stories - they were there the first time around.

KD: One thing I find is, nowadays, we know a lot more about the whole picture of the funk scene than they did at the time. If they were making a record in North Carolina, they knew about James Brown and maybe a few others, but they didn't know what was happening in Texas or California. It was their area, their state that they knew. Then there are the stories about some records that were just played once in some bar and handed out to help promote the band. It's interesting from the collector's side, but it's sad for the people producing stuff - what a shame, Jesus Christ! If that had happened to the New Mastersounds, I'd be in tears! I feel sorry for a lot of the poor fuckers.

M: But there is a silver lining, like with that "Funky Chick" tune by the Majestics.

KD: Yeah, that was tremendous. It got on a compilation and some advertising geek at Kentucky Fried Chicken thought, "Ooh, perfect for us." So they did all the licensing properly and wind up getting a good, big cheque for this tune they put out years ago and didn't get anything for when they did. So there were a few tears shed by those boys. Then there's Michael Orr, he phoned me up out of the blue - his "Spread Love" is on Legendary Deep Funk II. He made that album with all the money he had, with a hand-drawn cover and all that. He said it had sold fuck all, nobody was interested at the time - they all wanted tacky disco. Then he hears from a friend, 30 years later, that I'd put it on a compilation and was playing it in Europe. He says, "I don't want any money, I just want to say thank you, sir, thank you for having faith in my music. I thought I was the only one who had faith in my music, but you have faith in my music too and I wanna thank you for that!"

With John Kong, Andy Williams and Scott C at the Goods at la Sala Rossa on Saturday, march 29, 10:30pm, $12

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