DJ Bone
Think of Detroit techno and DJ Bone might not be high on your list of luminaries. As part of the city’s second wave of producers, Bone's presence in the UK has been largely limited to persistent DJing visits, through which he has fostering a hardcore following to his many excellent productions.
His rare appearances in our music press have always been of interest though, most notably a difference of opinion in a guest reviewers article with Cristian Vogel around five years ago that at the time seemed to pit the mindset of the burgeoning school of UK experimentalism against Detroit’s dancefloor-dependent standpoint, something he’s all too willing to set straight; "I have the upmost respect for those guys. The Brighton scene was one of the first in Britain to embrace me." On the release of his second compilation of Detroit-based/inspired music, Subject: Detroit Volume 2, Bone again touched down, managing to blow away the Leicester Square liggerati at Home and do some straight talking in the process.
Detroit, above all else, is a city of contradiction. Its many decaying buildings are now immortalised through the work of photographers like Camilo Verara; the Detroit urban-truth that ‘wherever you see a vacant lot, a home once stood’ is being rebuked as they become offices and malls; the Hamtranck district’s streets are lined with chairs – a surreal marking of territory in a parking-challenged area whilst homelessness propagates elsewhere; the beauty of the adequate Tiger Stadium is rejected for the multi-purpose schlock of the ‘CoPa’ complex to host the city’s sport. And musically, after years of continual movement outwards, the city’s sounds are ignored on the Motown airwaves whilst a Detroit record can smash the UK Top 30 due to a lyric that could have been penned by David Lynch.
"There is no diversity in radio anymore", states Bone. "I got into this listening to Mojo (legendary Detroit radio jock). He wasn’t responsible for me listening to techno, but he was responsible for showing the possibilities of DJing. He’d play almost anything as long as it had some kind of soul – Stevie Wonder, Al Green, Juan Atkins, Public Enemy, Prince – it was amazing. He’d let the records play and he was a great, regular radio DJ. We hadn’t heard anything like this before. His music was just different, there was something about it. I heard Alexander Robotnik, Art of Noise, Depeche Mode, Kraftwerk all through Mojo."
As a kid, the early sparks of electronic music and especially those fused in his own city, were irresistible to the young Eric Dulan. "I was starting to sneak into the back of the Music Institute. There was no alcohol or drugs being sold . It wasn’t a bad environment for a young teenager, But imagine, imagine getting in there and hearing this thing. Imagine hearing Strings of Life and Nude Photo before the rest of the world, not even realising that the rest of the world would even want to hear it. It was Detroit music, made by Detroit people, played to Detroit people. It was amazing. It wasn’t weird at the time, it was normal for me to hear Technicolor on the radio, it’s weird looking back. Then the mix shows started. You had Derrick May in the afternoon doing a Mayday mix and Jeff Mills at night and eventually Claude Young. Jeff was playing Run DMC and Prince, early Chicago, all manner of shit. It amazes me now and I’m shocked because radio-wise, they couldn't care less in Detroit. I don’t know what yu’d have to do to get a black radio station in Detroit to play some techno. But I’m working on it."
It seems it will be a fair task though. The recent tale of old-school soul DJ Linda Lexy, who dared to play local electronic music on her show and was immediately fired, is telling of the predicament. Bone cites evidence to the contrary; "They had the Electronic Music Festival here and were expecting 200,000 and got 1.5 million. If they can’t understand how strong this music is after that I don’t know what it’ll take. The fact that Sony, one of the major labels, went after a UR track – what does that prove to you? I don’t think they know how to harness the music and then make money out of it. Black radio stations aren’t black-owned. They may be black run, but they’re programmed from California. A playlist is sent to the whole network and that’s it."
Radio stations aside, what is the current state of Detroit’s producers? "There’s a lot of Detroit guys who are looking to be the poster-children of techno", he explains. "Detroit is a city of segregation, either all black all white, all gay, all straight. White people live here, Mexican people live there, African people in a certain area. It’s decisive for that reason but there’s also a ‘wannabe’ aspect. Some people want to be famous. There are some amazing people in Detroit and some of them are frustrated. ‘Why does that guy get on the cover of the magazine? Why’s he on the radio?’ – I’m like ‘don’t worry about it – do your thing. The people that do kick and scream only end up shortening their careers. They push so hard they get the cover or the radio spot. The person then sits back or wakes up one morning and realises that they don’t have the talent to be deserving of a cover. They were too worried about being on that cover than working out what to do when they got there."
Bone fits into a triumvirate of Detroit producers – alongside Rolando and James Pennington – who regularly push their music on this side of the pond. It’s also normally the case that wherever Detroit DJs play, Bone has been there first, kickstarting the early Voyager nights at the Complex in Islington amongst others. His label, Subject, champions new producers with the artists appearing uncredited to add emphasis to the music. With an overriding onus on integrity, it’s surprising that he’s managed to avoid cynicism; "It doesn’t bug me anymore. The bottom line is no matter how much money the majors have, they don’t have the soul, the spirit, to produce good music. They have to dress it up – special sleeves, jewel cases, posters everywhere, ads in magazines. I can’t imagine an ad in a magazine for a promo 12" when techno first started. Especially now, the shelf life of a single is so short – they have the money to advertise everything. The cool thing about underground labels is that as long as they have good music and good representation – as in a DJ playing it – they’ll be fine. Most independent labels don’t look to sell tonnes of copies, they do it because they love it. They want to make sure they can continue to do it – that goes for Detroit for the most part. Look at all those old songs that have sold hundreds of thousands without any packaging. Adonis’ No Way Back has sold tonnes, there’s no fancy packaging but the funk is there." Bone’s route into producing followed a common path. The music that he had grown-up with, that had so influenced him, was being overlooked. The prevalent Swedish techno scene had begun to dominate and it seemed the only way of continuing the legacy was to try and do it himself.
"The minimal thing was getting out of hand, all that Swedish stuff. Right before that started coming out, that’s the way Detroit was going, they got that style from Detroit anyway. Alan Oldham’s been doing techno like that his whole career. It’s just a take on it and I wanted soul." The ensuing creative period allows him to take time and plan releases to suit himself. "I’m at the point where I have enough good songs to last. When the time is right they go out – if I want to hang on, I’ll hang on. I’m not making a record to put out on a fad. If so, you have to get everything out before the next fad comes along. I just wanted to stockpile a bunch of stuff and it won’t matter when it goes out. I’m not copying anyone, I’m not afraid to take time. That’s why those guys were releasing two 12s a month. Those people know that at any given moment Jeff Mills could stop making that music and they wouldn’t have money. They were afraid. All they were doing was copying Jeff or copying Rob Hood and they knew. The Swedish thinking was and still is ‘if we make it harder and louder and crisper and make it sound CD quality, then people will like it’. I mean I’ve never heard records so crisp in my life, they were better than the digital recordings they mastered off and the needle was shaking in the groove. No matter how loud you make it, how you EQ it, if it don’t have the funk it ’ain’t going to work. That mentality, that end of the spectrum, is not what I consider techno. I’ve been to places and played four UR records back to back and been told ‘that’s not techno’." And the Bone solution? Change. "What I’m looking for is for all of the people who know they are being imitated to raise the bar. That’s where we progress. Just say, ‘this is what I’m doing -‘bam’- try and copy that! The only people that I think constantly do it and do it well is UR. They can be making hard electro and then the next one you get Turning Point. No one could predict what they were about to embark upon. And F-Comm. They throw people a curveball. They have this slow, melodic side now. Nice stuff man and they broke it on their compilations really well. Right now, Kenny Dixon Jr is doing it – that’s the best in soul music right there."
So after another visit to the UK, is Bone still encouraged by our club culture? "It’s a tour of duty – divide and conquer. I thought half the floor would clear immediately because people aren’t used to it, they don’t feel comfortable. But I had lots of interest and I got asked back immediately. And the music on that mix CD will still stand up in six years time." Let’s hope it not only stands, but screams from the airwaves and bursts from the pages. In DJ Bone, the term ‘exponent’ fits perfectly and our future sound has someone expert and enlightened to fight its corner for present attention. The world would listen if given the chance.
Detroit, above all else, is a city of contradiction. Its many decaying buildings are now immortalised through the work of photographers like Camilo Verara; the Detroit urban-truth that ‘wherever you see a vacant lot, a home once stood’ is being rebuked as they become offices and malls; the Hamtranck district’s streets are lined with chairs – a surreal marking of territory in a parking-challenged area whilst homelessness propagates elsewhere; the beauty of the adequate Tiger Stadium is rejected for the multi-purpose schlock of the ‘CoPa’ complex to host the city’s sport. And musically, after years of continual movement outwards, the city’s sounds are ignored on the Motown airwaves whilst a Detroit record can smash the UK Top 30 due to a lyric that could have been penned by David Lynch.
"There is no diversity in radio anymore", states Bone. "I got into this listening to Mojo (legendary Detroit radio jock). He wasn’t responsible for me listening to techno, but he was responsible for showing the possibilities of DJing. He’d play almost anything as long as it had some kind of soul – Stevie Wonder, Al Green, Juan Atkins, Public Enemy, Prince – it was amazing. He’d let the records play and he was a great, regular radio DJ. We hadn’t heard anything like this before. His music was just different, there was something about it. I heard Alexander Robotnik, Art of Noise, Depeche Mode, Kraftwerk all through Mojo."
As a kid, the early sparks of electronic music and especially those fused in his own city, were irresistible to the young Eric Dulan. "I was starting to sneak into the back of the Music Institute. There was no alcohol or drugs being sold . It wasn’t a bad environment for a young teenager, But imagine, imagine getting in there and hearing this thing. Imagine hearing Strings of Life and Nude Photo before the rest of the world, not even realising that the rest of the world would even want to hear it. It was Detroit music, made by Detroit people, played to Detroit people. It was amazing. It wasn’t weird at the time, it was normal for me to hear Technicolor on the radio, it’s weird looking back. Then the mix shows started. You had Derrick May in the afternoon doing a Mayday mix and Jeff Mills at night and eventually Claude Young. Jeff was playing Run DMC and Prince, early Chicago, all manner of shit. It amazes me now and I’m shocked because radio-wise, they couldn't care less in Detroit. I don’t know what yu’d have to do to get a black radio station in Detroit to play some techno. But I’m working on it."
It seems it will be a fair task though. The recent tale of old-school soul DJ Linda Lexy, who dared to play local electronic music on her show and was immediately fired, is telling of the predicament. Bone cites evidence to the contrary; "They had the Electronic Music Festival here and were expecting 200,000 and got 1.5 million. If they can’t understand how strong this music is after that I don’t know what it’ll take. The fact that Sony, one of the major labels, went after a UR track – what does that prove to you? I don’t think they know how to harness the music and then make money out of it. Black radio stations aren’t black-owned. They may be black run, but they’re programmed from California. A playlist is sent to the whole network and that’s it."
Radio stations aside, what is the current state of Detroit’s producers? "There’s a lot of Detroit guys who are looking to be the poster-children of techno", he explains. "Detroit is a city of segregation, either all black all white, all gay, all straight. White people live here, Mexican people live there, African people in a certain area. It’s decisive for that reason but there’s also a ‘wannabe’ aspect. Some people want to be famous. There are some amazing people in Detroit and some of them are frustrated. ‘Why does that guy get on the cover of the magazine? Why’s he on the radio?’ – I’m like ‘don’t worry about it – do your thing. The people that do kick and scream only end up shortening their careers. They push so hard they get the cover or the radio spot. The person then sits back or wakes up one morning and realises that they don’t have the talent to be deserving of a cover. They were too worried about being on that cover than working out what to do when they got there."
Bone fits into a triumvirate of Detroit producers – alongside Rolando and James Pennington – who regularly push their music on this side of the pond. It’s also normally the case that wherever Detroit DJs play, Bone has been there first, kickstarting the early Voyager nights at the Complex in Islington amongst others. His label, Subject, champions new producers with the artists appearing uncredited to add emphasis to the music. With an overriding onus on integrity, it’s surprising that he’s managed to avoid cynicism; "It doesn’t bug me anymore. The bottom line is no matter how much money the majors have, they don’t have the soul, the spirit, to produce good music. They have to dress it up – special sleeves, jewel cases, posters everywhere, ads in magazines. I can’t imagine an ad in a magazine for a promo 12" when techno first started. Especially now, the shelf life of a single is so short – they have the money to advertise everything. The cool thing about underground labels is that as long as they have good music and good representation – as in a DJ playing it – they’ll be fine. Most independent labels don’t look to sell tonnes of copies, they do it because they love it. They want to make sure they can continue to do it – that goes for Detroit for the most part. Look at all those old songs that have sold hundreds of thousands without any packaging. Adonis’ No Way Back has sold tonnes, there’s no fancy packaging but the funk is there." Bone’s route into producing followed a common path. The music that he had grown-up with, that had so influenced him, was being overlooked. The prevalent Swedish techno scene had begun to dominate and it seemed the only way of continuing the legacy was to try and do it himself.
"The minimal thing was getting out of hand, all that Swedish stuff. Right before that started coming out, that’s the way Detroit was going, they got that style from Detroit anyway. Alan Oldham’s been doing techno like that his whole career. It’s just a take on it and I wanted soul." The ensuing creative period allows him to take time and plan releases to suit himself. "I’m at the point where I have enough good songs to last. When the time is right they go out – if I want to hang on, I’ll hang on. I’m not making a record to put out on a fad. If so, you have to get everything out before the next fad comes along. I just wanted to stockpile a bunch of stuff and it won’t matter when it goes out. I’m not copying anyone, I’m not afraid to take time. That’s why those guys were releasing two 12s a month. Those people know that at any given moment Jeff Mills could stop making that music and they wouldn’t have money. They were afraid. All they were doing was copying Jeff or copying Rob Hood and they knew. The Swedish thinking was and still is ‘if we make it harder and louder and crisper and make it sound CD quality, then people will like it’. I mean I’ve never heard records so crisp in my life, they were better than the digital recordings they mastered off and the needle was shaking in the groove. No matter how loud you make it, how you EQ it, if it don’t have the funk it ’ain’t going to work. That mentality, that end of the spectrum, is not what I consider techno. I’ve been to places and played four UR records back to back and been told ‘that’s not techno’." And the Bone solution? Change. "What I’m looking for is for all of the people who know they are being imitated to raise the bar. That’s where we progress. Just say, ‘this is what I’m doing -‘bam’- try and copy that! The only people that I think constantly do it and do it well is UR. They can be making hard electro and then the next one you get Turning Point. No one could predict what they were about to embark upon. And F-Comm. They throw people a curveball. They have this slow, melodic side now. Nice stuff man and they broke it on their compilations really well. Right now, Kenny Dixon Jr is doing it – that’s the best in soul music right there."
So after another visit to the UK, is Bone still encouraged by our club culture? "It’s a tour of duty – divide and conquer. I thought half the floor would clear immediately because people aren’t used to it, they don’t feel comfortable. But I had lots of interest and I got asked back immediately. And the music on that mix CD will still stand up in six years time." Let’s hope it not only stands, but screams from the airwaves and bursts from the pages. In DJ Bone, the term ‘exponent’ fits perfectly and our future sound has someone expert and enlightened to fight its corner for present attention. The world would listen if given the chance.
