Luke Solomon

Luke Solomon has been flying the flag for house music (of the bumping jacking variety) for as long as I can remember. With his band the Freaks, alongside Stella Attar, Justin Harris and Johnny Rock they bought underground house to the masses with their massive single; The Creeps. Classic Recordings, and its sister imprint Music For Freaks, set up with long term friend and collaborator Derrick Carter, were THE benchmark labels for house that was just as much London as it was Chicago. Unfortunately Classic closed its doors in 2006, succumbing to the financial pressures that plagued the whole industry.

Now Classic are back with a whole load of back catalogue remixes, some exciting new projects, and that’s just for starters.

So Luke, what have you been up to? Are you still DJ’ing a lot? Yeah! Every weekend still. I do try and be a bit more selective about what I do and when I do it, and how long I go away for because of family commitments. I also have lot of studio commitments.

Is that stuff with Freaks? Yeah a lot of stuff with Freaks, it’s taking up quite a major part of my life at the moment, just because we are trying to get a record deal and we’ve got a whole load of new stuff we’ve just written. We have just finished our last [writing] session so we are in demo mode at the moment, trying to get a decent A&R man on board and a label behind us. Taking it into a new era I guess.

How are you finding that? A lot has changed since Freaks were last around. Erm, it’s a tricky one really. From a writing side of things we have gone through a lot of incarnations as well as writing a new album when the label was being wound down; all of those financial issues affected our creativity quite a lot of course. Then there was the whole dance music not being very popular, battles with that, what can we do, where can we go. Then with Creeps becoming a top ten record, it kind of bought us some time to go back to the drawing board a bit, rediscover out roots again be a bit quirky and electronic, and a bit mad! This time we have tried to write songs with a proper top line, and a take a more pop approach to our lyrics and music and our arrangements; so it’s almost like a new lease of life for Stella and myself. We are quite excited with what we have come up with. Whether anyone is going to get it is, well… that’s another story.

Well, I think there are enough Freaks fans out there. Haha, I hope so! I think more to the point is that there is an A&R man out there that will get it, otherwise I guess we are just going to end up doing it ourselves, which seems to be a common thing for a lot of artists nowadays anyway.

I think so. There seems to be less money in the pot to go round. Exactly - It’s a hard time for everyone.
I was just reading Morgan Geist’s interview on Resident Advisor and he seems very miserable about the state of things. Haha, well maybe Morgan does take things a bit too personally, but you know when you are doing your own thing, which is exactly what Morgan does, it’s hard, it’s a battle. You want to be heard and for people to love your music, but if you are not being heard or ‘got’ because the people selling your music don’t know how to sell it, then it’s a real a struggle and I really feel for people like that.

It’s definitely a difficult time, but something has got to change. Well, they have, but to be honest I think they are already. One of the things we are looking at is the whole branding aspect. A lot of companies like Absolut or Bacardi are getting behind bands and musicians a lot more than the actual record companies and in a lot of respects there might be something to be said for that. I think the days of the major record label are really numbered. When you are a brand and you are not relying on an artist to make your money, you can support that artist.

It kind of makes it all about the music again, even though on the face of it, that doesn’t make sense [Working with a brand and not a record label]. Definitely. I think there are some good options there and it’s a bit all or nothing, so we are just going to see how it goes. We are just going to throw a lot of things up in the air and see what happens!

So is the new [Freaks] stuff going to be on Music For Freaks, or is it going to be on Classic? No, we are just waiting to see what happens – Domino are interested in possibly signing us. Whether that’s a long shot or not, I don’t know. If we had those guys behind us, that would be amazing.

So tell me a little bit more about how Classic Recordings came back to life? I know the musical landscape moved against you… [Classic succumbed to financial pressures and closed its doors in 2006] Well, I think it was a number of things. Erm the financial side of things took its toll on all of us. There were a lot of friends and family involved with label, and I think we all just needed to step away from, it in order to retain friendships, and forget for a while about how bills were going to get paid and all of that shit. I just wanted to be an artist, not a businessman, and that is what I had turned into…

No one gets into music for that! No, no, no…! Originally it was just for fun, and free drinks, and yeah it changed quite dramatically, and I think we had all just had enough. So we all just stepped back and did our own thing for a while. It took us quite a long time to clear up the fall-out and the mess from it all. Then it took me a bit of time to find where I was at creatively, and what I wanted to do and being happy in the studio. Actually being a proper producer and things like that. I dunno, things have gone full circle again, house music is in vogue again, which is not why we did it [re-launched Classis Recordings], but I think there is a whole generation of kids that grew up with Classic, and discovering there is a lot of respect for the label, that’s quite flattering. It is almost adapting to that and giving this whole new generation a platform to put out their music, or their take on the catalogue. That’s kind of where Derrick and me are at with it. We wanted to show err, we are still down with the kids hahahahha!!!

Was it that you were discovering new artists, or were you talking about starting the label again anyway? Yeah, I mean I am excited by a lot of the music that is around right now. If I were to start a new label from scratch there would be a lot of producers who I would approach for music. For a while people got a distracted by making fashionable music and listening too much to what journalists told them, instead of just thinking; I just want to make music I like. You know people like Matthew Johnson, Guillaume And The Coutu Dumonts, Henrick Schwarz, are for me at the pinnacle of this new generation. Just hearing what they are doing and coming into their own is quite exciting. Seth Troxler as well, people like that. Coupled with the fact the digital side of the industry has really kicked off now and found its ground. We have noticed that there has been a real surge in sales. That means we can invest a little bit more money back in to the label, whether that’s new music or whatever…

I really like the Rob Mello remix. Yeah, the Fabrice Lig remix? Yeah, I like what Fabrice is doing at the moment.

There is definitely a house revival on. Some of the more interesting stuff I am hearing right now is on a definite house tip. Exactly, and production is changing; it’s much easier for a producer to have a shit hot studio on their house, and sonically make things sound great which is really interesting.

So is Classic re-launching digitally only? We are going to do some kind of collectors samplers, where we put or favourites on to vinyl and spread that across a few records and make it a bit more collectable and possibly coloured or something, were it is a just a case of breaking even. We maybe want to take a bit artier.

That sounds a good idea; add some more value to the vinyl. Yeah, you know I still buy a lot of vinyl, but to be honest, with a lot of modern music, unless it is an album I really want, I generally download my music and buy it from Beatport or Stompy or wherever. I have also digitized my whole collection…

Whoah…. Yeah, it feels like a bit of a step backwards, and there are still some die-hards out there, lugging vinyl around, with an aching back, but you know I can’t afford it anymore. It’s just not possible to travel every weekend with all that vinyl and make it financially viable. It’s too difficult.

So where do you see Classic fitting in? Is it just going to be supporting new artists, or a platform for other stuff? Well there are a couple of things coming up that me and Derrick, one way or another, have managed to secure. It’s gonna be a surprise, there are a couple of quite unusual things we are obviously doing remixes of, and highlighting. There are some things we are really excited about. There is actually a Freaks record coming out, which is a Robert Owens collaboration that we did a couple of years ago. We have had some remixes done and it’s quite close to us that record. We wanted to get it out and let the kids know we haven’t sold out! We are still, in our hearts, flying the flag!

So I know you have a hectic DJ schedule, are you still going out and hearing new music? Well, it’s difficult having a kid, and I maybe wouldn’t go out now just to hear certain DJ, but I do keep my ear very close to the ground. If I am playing at AKA or The End, I make a real effort to go and hear the other DJs, so I know what is going on around me for sure.

Producer wise, Kink, I have been following him quite closely, and BOE the label he is releasing on are doing some really interesting stuff. Matthew Herbert is doing some really good stuff, Guillaume and The Coutu Dumonts, again. Crosstown [Rebels] are doing some good stuff again. Radioslave as well. Some of Layo and Bushwhacker’s new stuff. A lot of these guys have had a new lease of life and that’s really cool for me; the way it should be.

I am just about to start producing Radioslave’s new single actually.

Really? I am really into what he is doing. We are actually spending next week in the studio. Matt is coming over here and we are going to do something with a full vocal, a very Yello influenced record, almost like a Radioslave signature tune. I have just finished producing Damian Lazarus new album as well…

What’s that sound like? Aah, its pretty out there! I actually love it. For me, it’s something I have really enjoyed being part of; I think it’s a real pivotal point for me. It’s something I am really proud to part of, but its very avant-garde!

So not particularly dancefloor focused? Nah, well, there are a couple of bits on there, I means it’s quite dark, but I just like the fact he is experimenting a lot. His whole take on electronic music. I think people are either going to love it, or hate it!

Well, there is nothing worse than indifference! No exactly. I am more inclined though to become more of a proper producer, instead of just being a bedroom producer! I have actually got a decent studio now, and I am going to go and sit with some pretty well known pop producers and be ‘tea boy’ for a while and learn from the ground up again. So that’s my long term aspiration.

One last question…..what is the symbol on Classic label? Is that a dog? (Lots of laughing) It’s an elephant!

It is?! Hahaha, no! It’s actually Wind, the winged statue of victory, taken from behind. The goddess of wind!

Classic Recordings first new release, Fabrice Lig’s remix of Critical by Rob Mello is out now….

Interview by Gareth Owen