Woolfy Interview: SXSW 2010

Simon James is just your typical English-born, Los Angeles-bred son of a Scottish glam rocker- turned-manager-to-the-stars/pub owner, house DJ and musician. So, not really typical at all. Performing under the name Woolfy (which he gave himself because of his abundantly hairy legs) he has been making house beats and music since 1991. In 1999, a chance meeting with another musician and producer Dan Hastie at James' pub, The Scotland Yard, started a fruitful collaboration known as Projections, and lead to other recordings as Woolfy vs. Projections. For the last decade, Woolfy has been releasing records and playing killer parties, and before heading to SXSW, he chatted with Spinner about not taking himself too seriously, playing his own instruments and the muse that is Karen O.

How did you start in music?

Well, my whole life, I've been making music, since I was 9, but I began producing in 1998, and yeah, I've been putting out records ever since. I put out my first record in 2000, under a project called Projections, and they were on a Chicago label (Guidance Recordings) ... from there, we went on to the Permanent Vacation and DFA and Rong Records. I'd been in the house music scene for a long time, since '91, so we started to do some beats and in the mid-90s there was a big wave of chill-out, not trip-hop, but basically the chill stuff that was happening with Thievery Corporation and all that. And we were actually producing those kinds of beats, because we were somewhere in between hip-hop and disco back then. If you check the first album, there was a lot of disco. Between the two, we were just making vibe-y chill-out stuff and all of a sudden I met with my partner Dan Hastie, and he had a couple beats too, and everything just kind of worked out you know?

What are your musical influences?

Karen O. Karen O is my hero right now. I want to meet her. Do you know Karen O? Oh God, I love her. That's my sole inspiration right now. That and my daughter. My daughter is definitely the one, but if I want to write a good nasty song, I think of Karen O. So yeah, that's the thing. My sister ... she like hangs out with the same group of friends as my sister, so I'm really trying to make something happen there, randomly, so I don't get all nervous. She's a tough woman to approach. But yeah, one of these days, I'm going to write a song, she's going to love it and leave Spike Jonze, and it's going to be Woolfy and f***ing Karen.
What did you think of the 'Where the Wild Things Are' soundtrack?

Honestly mate, it has not left my car in seven months. I'm not even kidding. We listened to it today, it's my daughter's favorite album too, and she's only two, but you know how there's a lot of screaming on the record? So she's all about it, I'm all about it. I'm surprised that soundtrack didn't win a Grammy actually, or even be up in the running, because lyrically it's amazing, to tie in the storylines of the book and everything, it's just amazing. I just thought with her and Spike Jonze, she might have (gotten) a nod.

Describe your sound in your own words.

There's definitely two sides. One is definitely dirty party music, I guess. It's kind of like letting yourself go and rock and rolling out, lots of drinking and having fun and all that. There's another side, and that's what we keep for the Permanent Vacation label in Germany, and that's much more like song-written stuff and kind of more Beatles ... I would actually say it's more Wings. The new album has a lot more Wings influence on it, and it's more chill-out and emotional, whereas the straight Woolfy stuff is like ... go for it and make a silly song and don't worry too much about it. Not taking yourself too seriously. A lot of it is unserious music, unless you take partying seriously, which I do, so I can be serious about it.

How has the death of sampling changed your music?

Well, it's definitely changed my music, but we've always used real instruments on all of our production, and it's all analog, all analog keyboards and synths and everything like that. So yeah, it sucks that I can't get Curtis Mayfield to sing on my track anymore just by lifting him, so yeah, it's a new challenge, but it's kind of the direction we were going in anyway. Because sampling is great, but it also becomes limited and makes you repeat things, which was great for a certain type and era of music and will probably come back around at some point.

What can people expect from a Woolfy show?

Unfortunately, we're not doing a live show ... it's going to be a DJ set now, because my guys are in quite a few bands that are also playing down there, and a lot of stuff got shifted around and some of them have bigger gigs with Ozomatli and stuff. So basically, we got kicked to the curb on our one big show. But as far as the DJ, pretty much a debaucherous good time. Is that even a word? I don't even know if that's a word. All the people who are going to be on that night, it's going to be a DFA night, so everyone is into having a good time and not taking yourself too seriously.



Carl Atiya Swanson is a contributor from Seed.com. Learn how you can contribute here.