LUCAS ABELA
The man who put the NOISE in NSW! (sound projector magazine london 1998)

If you were paying attention last issue - and I know some of you were - you may have gleaned and glommed a brief introduction to the world of Lucas Abela, in our brief review of his solo CD Peeled Hearts Paste, and two CD releases on his independent Dual Plover label which he runs out of Sydney Australia. (Some others on this label are also reviewed this issue, so look for 'em!) Lucas touched down in London on 2 June 1999, where your Sound Projector team caught him playing a lively five-minute set at Backspace, an odd little 'bring your own' venue on Clink Street near London Bridge. Here, Lucas inserted an odd-looking instrument into his mouth and generated a series of highly bizarre, non-musical bursts of electric noise - looking not unlike some sort of twisted dental student practising on himself. We then escorted him - Abela walking barefoot, wearing some incredible flared trousers - to a nearby inn where we could sit outside and converse, thereby garnering some interesting facts and opinions re the fringes of the late 20th-century music underground scene as Abela sees it from his angle. No quarter given nor asked! Notes: The 'Bridge' he refers to is a large steel curved frame, on which are mounted motors and discs spinning at high speeds. The 'Glove' is a handpiece fitted with four long styluses which enable him to sample records in a unique way...we saw neither of these, however, being treated only to what he calls the 'mouth-work'.

Sound Projector team = EP (Ed Pinsent) and WA (War Arrow) LA = Lucas Abela.

EP; We've just seen Lucas Abela, playing at this venue called Backspace, which is like a cybernet cafe...weird...what on earth were you doing? It looked absolutely horrible and painful! You were sticking something in your mouth and you had like a utility belt of effects pedals around your waist.

LA; I stick like a turkey skewer connected to a phonographic cartridge from a turntable in my mouth, and play that. It's a kitchen utensil designed for sewing up really big turkeys! I use it instead of a stylus. Apparently it has caused some damage to my mouth...everyone says it's bruised. I used to get damaged on the inside of my mouth...the inside of my cheek is torn apart every time I play a show and I have to leave a couple of shows before it repairs before I can play again without intense pain. It isn't so bad today, but apparently I'm bruised. Don't know why! I usually get lost in the moment...I can't say I did just then. The volume was a problem for me and I usually get into a stream of consciousness level when I'm playing and forget everything around me and just play and enjoy that a lot. But tonight...the volume was so low. I didn't get into that level of playing I would usually get into. It wasn't a PA, more like a Hi-Fi stereo system. Wasn't the finest show I ever did. But everyone seemed to enjoy it and said good things.

EP; Well, there's several sides to it. There's you performing - and there's the volume. Maybe the volume let you down, but it was still spirited, energetic - the movements were there. Is the loud volume important to you?

LA; Well, you play and feel as an improvisor. You're not playing a set piece of music. You don't know which string to use, you don't know what you're doing. The volume and presence in the room makes it a better show in the end, it's harder to play with a low volume. I could hear people talking while I was playing, and I've never had that before! Never in my life had a hushed conversation when I'm playing. And that really signifies a low-level fuckin' sound. (He becomes a tad disjected) That show was crap, as far as I'm concerned! It was hard to get people to put me on, at a decent venue, with a decent PA. No-one's interested. I've been in touch with Dylan from Prick Decay, and he organised five shows for me in the UK and it ended up turning into two shows, when I got here. I was really pissed off about that. He got me Glasgow and he got me Leeds (the Termite Club). Everything else I had to arrange myself. There was a last-minute Newcastle show, and this show was last-minute. Newcastle was a rock gig, supporting some rock band doing their album launch. I don't even know how I got onto that! But a gig's a gig, and I'll play anywhere...anytime!

EP; That's a good philosophy. And it looks like you travel light.

LA; Yes, it all fits in a backpack. I used to play the 'Bridge' and all the big machinery and stuff, but when I went to tour Japan in 97, I couldn't take it along with me. So that's when I developed the skewer-in-the-mouth show, because it's light, and it travels well, I can get around on a self-financed tour. No-one's paying you millions of dollars to drag a huge cargo of equipment. You can get through Customs because you haven't got lots of things.

WA; (Amused) I can just imagine trying to get through Customs with a turkey skewer...'what's this for???!'

LA; In San Francisco, they thought my turkey skewers - or my humming bars, as I call them - were instruments to break into cars! So they held me in Customs, put me in this back room, and had the San Francisco Police Department come and inspect all this equipment. They drilled me for a couple of hours about what I was doing. I ended up having to show them what I do - they were really confused, but they ended up letting me go. I call it a humming bar because I play the vibration of my lips against the bar - hence, humming bar. (Imitates sound of this).

EP; Are you more of a performance artist, than an improviser, would you say?

LA; No - entertainer. I don't like to put any luggage on it!

WA; What about your other names - I've got a compilation and I guess you're on there in some capacity, is it DJ Smallcock?

LA; I play as DJ Smallcock, Justice Yeldham and the Dynamic ribbon Device, Peeled Hearts Paste...I play in a band called Testicle Candy, a band called Bul-Go-Gi, a band called Black and Budget Minded...the Band from Bloody Elle. Lots of different projects I play in back at home, but I usually tour as Peeled Hearts Paste. I'm thinking of dropping that and keeping my solo name as DJ Smallcock. I thought of Peeled Hearts Paste in '92, and I'm kind of over the name really! DJ Smallcock has always been pre-recorded material, but considering I'm playing a large stylus in my mouth - which is turntablism in a way - I'm thinking of keeping just one name.

EP; It's pretty extreme turntablism...playing your own body.

LA; I started off doing radio shows and doing just really violent turntablism. And I kept breaking everything, so I started modifying the turntables to be more sturdy, using pins and rings and razor blades, then knives and all sorts of things until eventually it became the turkey skewer and the motorised turntables...instead of turntables I would use spinning motors.

EP; Were you actually playing records, or just spinning metal discs?

LA; I had circular saws and vegetable cutters, and I've had actual records, and grinding stones, and Tibetan Humming bowls, all spinning at high speeds, and playing them. I've kind of gone off that! I really like the mouth work, I think it has a lot more dynamic and changeable sounds. The actual pieces I can create by just using the humming bar in the mouth I find a lot more interesting, and performative. It's very visual, the 'Bridge' and other stuff I used to play was visual as well. I think the sounds lacked...there were a certain amount of sounds I could make, and that was it. But when I get into the mouth work, the range of sounds is much more exquisite and more enjoyable for me to play, and it's light as I said before. Put it in a backpack and go anywhere.

EP; So there are other people who have done sound from body-art...very kind of cerebral. There's Stelarc, the Australian...

LA; Yeah, Stelarc's an Aussie guy. He had that funny arm-thing he did. That was more on a performance art level, aurally it wasn't all that interesting. It didn't have the dynamic - an enjoyable dynamic - that's why I call myself an entertainer rather than a performance artist. Because performance artists are boring, and entertainers are fun to watch and they do an enjoyable show.

EP; Stelarc - it's not only boring, but it's also kind of depressing isn't it? He's saying something very depressing about human beings.

LA; Yeah! It's not so much fun. I don't get into all that hate-monger kind of stuff. I'm into giving a fun show that entertains people, just something people will enjoy. So much noise music is based on just relentless crap and making people feel uncomfortable. I like a fun dynamic that people can enjoy, and I don't think many people come in on that angle. The audience helps. I'm a shy performer!

EP; When I got your CDs out of the blue, [followed soon by a CD from Phlegm] I kind of assumed there was a whole scene of free noise going on in Australia...is that true?

LA; Free noise, no...there's a scene of experimental musicians, but free noise, there's very little free noise. A few people. But I think it's all relative - small populations in Australia and all that. It's quite healthy, but as far as noise music goes there's me and a couple of other individuals. Phlegm rock hard! They don't exist any more. There's a new band called Menstruation Sisters, comprising two members of Phlegm. They're like my favourite band in the whole world at the moment. They're fuckin fantastic - you should see them. But they're not free noise - they're rock. Not your everyday rock or anything like that. They're fuckin out there, but still not free noise in any respect.

EP; Are you going out on a limb, doing what you're doing in your home country?

LA; Yeah, there's no-one really interested in what I'm doing. The gigs are very small. It depends on the gig. I play a lot of raves these days, and collaborate with Techno DJs...I get large crowds there and they really love what I'm doing. But it's got beats behind it! If I got up there and played without the Techno DJ with me, I'm not sure what they'd think. Noise and Techno go really well together. You have that underlying noise, and then you've got the beats on top of it. Everyone's dancing, going wild and there's really freaky sounds. People are getting really bored with Techno, cause it's fucking ten years on or even longer. Whacking noise in there with it just brings up the interest. Really crazy. The gigs I enjoy most at the moment are my Techno gigs, cause, as I said I like to be an entertainer and when you're in that environment you get huge crowds, everyone gets into it and they dance like motherfuckers. You go to fuckin' noise shows, experimental noise shows, and everyone sits down, they clap politely, you really feel like shooting them, you know! When you play at a Techno gig everyone's fuckin dancing to your music. You're making an extreme noise - or textured, dynamic noise like I like to make - they're dancing, I really love that and it makes me feel good playing to a crowd like that, rather than pretentious fucking noise fans or experimental music patrons that...I don't really know what they're into it for. I don't understand them really. I don't get those people...they're just nerd music collector motherfuckers and they shit me to a large extent! I'm probably biting the hand that feeds me, running an experimental music label and all! (Laughs) Well, fuck you!

WA; I think it's always the way. You (Ed) have done comics in the past, and I've done comics in the past, and you can end up hating your own audience.

EP; Well you're right about experimental music. I mean I go to some of these experimental music things, I probably have been a nerd myself in that sense! But the audience are too polite, they don't always appear to enjoy it, and there's a real staid collector mentality behind it. I agree that, if you can get out there and entertain people with it...

LA; It's a very elitist mentality, as well. I was talking to Nomex tonight, and he knew some guy in Holland that had built a 'bridge' similar to mine. We were talking about the fact that experimental musicians are very precious about their ideas, if they build an instrument and someone does the same thing, they get really really shitty! But I actually enjoy that, because imagine if the guy that invented the guitar was the only person that ever played the guitar! Nothing would ever come out of it, because every individual has something new to bring to an instrument, and if you have that attitude, like 'this instrument's mine, I've invented it, no-one else can fuckin play it-' - it's just fucking stupid, because every person that takes that instrument up is going to attack it in a very different context and come out with completely different things. I've heard of people doing similar things to my 'glove' that I invented, with the styluses on each finger - the same with the 'Bridge', and it makes me happy to think people are doing similar things, and playing similar instruments. They're all going to come out differently in the end, because you've got a mind and individuality behind that. The instrument doesn't make the sound, it's the person behind the instrument that makes the sound, and that's what 's good in the end. If you're gonna be so precious, I don't know...fuck off!

EP;You're not out there demanding a copyright from these people, then!

LA; Not at all! I'd be glad to be ripped off, to see what other people do with my ideas, Then again I wouldn't even claim them as my ideas. There's a lot of synchronicity in ideas, and I'm sure other people, at the same time I've come up with things, have come up with things...the Kombi album I put out [Music to Drive-By], I recorded that in '94. And then I heard about these people in Rogue's Gallery in Japan, who drive around Osaka and make car music. And they sound really wild! When I go to Osaka next I'm gonna get in that car and have them do a show for me - but I wasn't like 'Oh, they fucking made car music, the bastards, they ripped off my idea!', I didn't think that all! When I read an interview with them, they came up with this exact same idea about the exact same time I did, of making music with their car. But they came up with a completely different angle, they contact-mike their engine and all different parts of their car, and they have two audience passengers in the back, and they drive around and do their thing. While my Kombi album is like a complete accident where the car stereo was malfunctioning and made really weird sounds and I just decided to record it. So - similar ideas, but completely different approaches. And I haven't heard the Rogue's Gallery stuff yet, but I can imagine it being completely different to A Kombi, and I respect that -Ê because car music fucking rocks!

WA; There was that Spanish bloke who did it with a motorbike as well.

EP; Yes, erm...Jordi Vallis. It's his motorbike engine. Again, totally different as you say. I think, particularly in experimental music, people are very possessive of their ideas...because it's like that's all they've got! Instead of being a healthy scene where people are sharing ideas, it's become like a lot of little islands...you've got to hang onto what you've got and protect it at all costs, against all comers, and this I find very very sad.

LA; I get compared to Masonna a lot, because my sets are very short - and I wear a belt! Besides that - the music's completely fucking different! I'm nothing like Masonna, besides the short set and the belt! So what are people comparing me to Masonna for, for fuck's sake? It's a joke...a real joke. Most people have got a small mind. They can't see behind the conceptual idea and the actual aural endings of the music, they don't actually listen.

EP; And it's a music journalism thing too, because it's far easier to read about an idea in the music press than it is to go out and find out for yourself what it sounds like. WAÊ I think it's something to do with the fear of appearing stupid. People are afraid of just enjoying something on a very straightforward level. It has to have all this stuff attached...

LA; It's too fucking intellectual for my liking.

EP; How long have you been doing your work?

LA; I started out when I was doing radio shows in 1992-93, just doing turntables over the air and ended up...the guys from Phlegm heard my show one day and invited me to do it live in a venue in September 1994. And I've been doing it live since then, and developing it since then. This is in Sydney.

EP; And the A Kombi thing has been quite well documented...you were living out of the back of your van at the time. Were you a surfer?

LA; Yeh, I was living out the back of my van. I don't know if it's been well documented! I man, one interview in Bananafish doesn't make quite well documented! I was a surfer, when I used to live in the Gold Coast, but I kinda gave that up when I got beaten up by skegs one day!

EP; Skegs? That sounds nasty- what are skegs?

LA; That's kind of a slang term for a surfer. I started surfing when I moved to the Gold Coast, when I was 12, and did that for a few years until I was about 14, and then started getting really interested in experimental music and stopped surfing. At the time you think it's uncool, and you start wearing black and all that kinda shit you do when you're 14! It was Goth thing...it was the 80s, the late 80s. I started getting into strange music, not really Goth but more like Teenage Jesus and The Jerks, and Foetus, and the Slums - which is Goth in a way but more kind of experimental Goth. That led on into my interests of today. But that's where music started for me.

EP; It sounds like from the start you were taking it out to people, doing broadcasts, live shows...I mean you're not a bedroom guy.

LA; No, I don't play in my bedroom very often. I like to play in front of people. I enjoy it front of people and I don't record at home very often. I bought myself a DAT player and I hardly ever use the fucking thing! Most of my albums - there are a few studio tracks, but four or five live tracks and most of it's live. I wanna get into doing studio a bit more. I'm doing a BBC session next week, which I'm hoping will go well. That's for Mixing It (on Radio 3). One of the presenters came to Australia just after I released A Kombi and went into a dance music store and asked for something weird! The guy behind the counter knew me and sold him A Kombi. Then he came back a year later looking to do a documentary on Sydney musicians and I was over in Japan doing a tour. I got back during the last few days when he was still in Sydney doing interviews, and I heard that they wanted to talk to me so I contacted them and did the interview and stuff, and they said 'come and do a session'.

EP; It's not many people who come to London for the first time and do a BBC session!

LA; Yeah! I'm quite stoked about that! A lot of people say bad things about Mixing It, but if they're willing to take a risk on a completely unknown artist like myself, give me a session and then broadcast it - they're fucking right by me! I don't know what the programme's like because I've never listened to it, but you keep hearing...'Oh those guys are fucking toffee-nosed assholes!' I don't think so...no-one else has given me a go like that, and that doesn't sound toffee-nosed to me. Sounds like they've got open minds and they're willing to take chances...I don't give a shit what people say, it's good. I'm really fucking happy about that!

EP; Well it's the English disease...I've just exhibited it myself...the context is everything to us.

LA; Well, that exists everywhere. In Australia we call it the 'tall poppies syndrome'. If you're successful in Australia, everyone will write you off or say bad things about you. It's more like a jealousy thing - I don't really get it. If you do good things, everyone's more willing to knock it and say bad things...it's weird, people don't like success for some reason. I like success, I like successful people, they're doing what they wanna do and doing it well, there's nothing wrong with that! Why knock them down, why treat them like shit? It's hard to get anywhere, and then when you get there people do that to you...it's stupid.

EP; The bedroom thing...I feel that about a lot of New Zealand music. The guy from Opprobrium said to me that most New Zealand bands hardly ever play live, they make lots of cassette recordings at home...there aren't even that many venues, I think...

LA; There's a big spotlight on New Zealand bands. All those same bands who play in their bedrooms and don't play any gigs in New Zealand, they can go to America and other places, and they've got a large following. A lot of people are interested in New Zealand music...a lot of the music's really good, but I don't understand the mentality of scenes. Like there's the New Zealand scene, the Japan scene, and all the focus is on one place rather than on individuals. Individuals everywhere are doing great things. But it seems that if you're in a certain place - like a noiseician in Japan, or if you're doing drone music in New Zealand, you get a lot further than people doing drone music in Australia or drone music in South Africa, or drone music in fuckin Taiwan, or noise music in Taiwan. It's a location thing. People focus too much on locations and places rather than the actual music coming out of anywhere in the world. A more mainstream example would be the Seattle scene. There were some good bands coming out of Seattle, but every single band that was in Seattle got this huge fucking press - just for fucking living there! It's just a very slack attitude. I respect a lot of New Zealand musicians, I know a few of them and they're good friends of mine. I was in America [in a record shop] and they've got New Zealand sections, and Japanese sections, and you can't find an Australian CD anywhere!

EP; Have you been to America?

LA; Yeah, I toured America in 1997-98. I did shows in San Francisco, LA, New York...Providence, Boston. It was good. Toured with a band called Deerhoof, which fucking rock the earth! They're fucking great! They're got a really good pop sensibility, crossed with kind of a No Wave aesthetic. I just love pop, I love hooks. This band has hooks, but at the same time it's really dirty! And that goes together, picture perfect postcard for me. Love that band...Deerhoof!

EP; What is the appeal of noise? Why do we like it?

LA; I'm not really sure...I prefer a real dynamic noise which chops and changes and goes all over the place, and I like the journey in sound that it gives you. It's not always the same, it goes up and it goes down and it goes all over the place. Then again, there's a lot of noise which I personally don't like, which is just relentless, and loud, and goes on...and they do their shows for an hour. I'm sure some people actually like that but on a personal level I don't get into relentless noise, I like dynamic noise. I just like sonics, you feel the volume go through your body, it comes in and comes out again. When it's relentless, it's just there all the time and then it stops. But with dynamic noise, it's kind of a journey through sound...I guess...and that's what I enjoy about listening to noise.

EP; You're not confrontational then, not trying to repel them and say 'deal with it because it's so loud'.

LA; No, I wanna engage the audience. I want them to love me! I don't want to repel the audience or make their ears bleed, or be really loud and all that kind of shit. I want them to see an engaging performance that they enjoy from start to finish and go through all different levels of sound and stuff.

EP; That's really refreshing, because sometimes you read about this noise stuff and you hear it, and you think it might almost be like a dead end. The last place anyone could possibly go if you're interested in music. The only way it can go is to get louder and more intense and more confrontational.

LA; Well, I think the loud and confrontational thing has been done. It's over...I mean it's a fatalistic attitude to say something's over, but from the CDs I've heard I don't really think you can go much further with the relentless really loud approach to noise music, you know. I think you have to take it in different levels. The way I try and do it is to create something more performative, and visual, and enjoyable to watch. Because, table-noise - you know - FUCK! A bunch of assholes behind a desk with a bunch of pedals! Twiddling knobs and sliders for an hour - is not much to watch! I don't mind listening to some of it on CD, because some of it interests me. Some table-noise musicians are really dynamic and they have a sound and aural appreciation that I love, but watching them really bores the shit out of me! I like it when noise people get rid of the table and they have some kind of performance aspect that they work with, it becomes a lot more interesting and you can watch it and enjoy it on a lot more different levels. It is a show! You're in front of people and you've gotta remember that. If you're doing shows it's not all about the music, there's other aspects you have to consider. Because, why would you be playing in front of people in the first place? You may as well just sit there, record something at home and play the fucking DAT! Why do they set up all that equipment?

EP; What about your record label, Dual Plover? How long has that been going?

LA; It started out when I put out A Kombi, in 1996. I recorded it in '94 and I was trying to shop it to labels to put it out. I went to all the Australian experimental labels, like Extreme and Dorrabo. Which are completely fucked, Extreme are fucked! I'll put this on the record...they're gonna hate me for this, but I don't really care cause they put out a lot of stuff from overseas, and I don't think they look into the local scene whatsoever. Which is what pisses me off about them...some of the stuff they put out is good, and I can't complain, but when they don't look locally it really shits me. They're the only two Australian labels with any profile whatsoever - and the Australian content [of their catalogue] is so small. It shits me, because there is a lot of really good Australian music they could be putting out. Which I don't get. So after shopping with them, and no-one was interested, I thought I'm gonna have to do this myself. So I put out the CD...sent out promos...got a really good response. People like Merzbow were writing back to me, saying 'this is fucking great, you're doing something really new and interesting'. And then there was Bananafish writing to me saying 'let's do an interview', and I'd never done anything before. I was stoked! I don't get it. The people in Australia weren't willing to give me a go - and I do it myself and send it overseas and other people give me a go. I love them for that. I really wish Australians would like what is actually happening in Australia, because the Australian music scene would be a lot healthier internationally if that was the case. Just like New Zealand is! Cause I think it's a lot healthier over there, people support each other and that's why it's at the strength it is now. It's not like there's more people doing experimental music in New Zealand - it's just that they've got some kind of appreciation of what they do, and they don't look to overseas, and they have their own way of doing things. Whereas Australia always looks to overseas - well not on the whole, but the people who are just doing their own thing are just ignored. There's no communication between cities as well, because the cities are so far apart. There's so little communication between experimental - I hate the word experimental, but I keep using it anyway! - between Melbourne and Sydney, nobody knows what anybody's doing there...or between Sydney and Brisbane, the whole fuckin country, everyone's doing stuff but it's all very backyard and hard to bridge that gap. Then you've got Perth in WA which is the most isolated city in the world! It's closer to Asia than it is to Sydney. Perth apparently has some good stuff going as well. I'm gonna be doing an experimental festival in Tasmania when I get home. Well, that's why I started the label Dual Plover, because there was a lot of good music happening in Sydney and the only labels happening were the ones in Melbourne, there were no labels in Sydney. So I thought there's something good going on here. I'm gonna cotton onto it and I'm gonna take it as my own - and help everybody out in Sydney at the same time. It's not all just noise. I put out pop music, like Alternahunk and Funky Terrorist. I love pop music and I've got a very soft spot for that, so I put out them. Alternahunk are some of the greatest girls you ever met! Love those girls to death! I wish I could do more and release more, but there's only a certain amount of money I've got. I started the label on the fuckin dole - not eating much, just to put out the first CD! It was expensive at first, but I started a consolidation point for CD manufacture in Sydney. I set up a deal with a local manufacturer on a bulk level, then I do everyone else's CDs through me. Like I did the Phlegm CDs, the Hiss CDs, the Sigma label. I do CDs in America and New Zealand and Belgium, because I've got this bulk rate and they're giving me CDs really fucking cheaply. I do it for independents only, I don't do it for any labels. If they want to release music independently, they come to me for a really cheap rate - I mean like 95 cents a disc, Australian. Which is about 30p or 40p! When I put out A Kombi it cost me a lot of money and I thought I can't do this, it's too much, I'm on the dole, it's really hard. So I justÊ rang up the CD manufacturer and acted like a professional businessman, and said 'I'm starting up a brokerage, I'm going to have all this business for you. What kind of rates will you give me?' And they gave me a rate, and I started telling everybody I could get CDs done at this price, and I've been doing heaps of CDs for everyone since. And it's really helped Sydney music to a large degree - I don't know if the repercussions have really fully been felt yet, but the Phlegm CDs, the MS CDs and the Sportsbra CDs are starting to get reviews overseas and they're starting to tour...I pressed the Sigma editions through my consolidation point, and they're about to tour Europe. So it's really good helping out Australian music.

WA; Just out of curiosity, did you ever like Severed Heads at all? Because it's the only Australian group I really know, and I was just amazed that they never did better than they did.

LA; I must admit they were a bit before my time. When I was getting into experimental music, they started doing all that disco early-Industrial level, compared to early records I've heard since, where they do all the cut-up tape musique concrete type stuff they were doing in the early days, which I liked a lot better. I enjoyed what they did earlier. Australia has a really good history - SPK, The Birthday Party, and Foetus I guess - though they made most of their records since he left the country.Ê We still like to call Foetus our own! J G Thirlwell would probably refuse to say he's Australian these days! I read somewhere he doesn't even wanna re-enter the country at any point. I love his work.

EP; Are you playing anywhere else in Europe this trip?

LA; I've been to Rotterdam, did a music festival organised by Jon Rose. I got to play with Otomo Yoshihide. He's a great guy, and we're gonna do an album together when I hit Japan on the way back home. At this festival he really liked what I was doing. He said I'm the most extreme turntablist in the world! I first met him years ago in 1993 - I did an interview with him when I was still doing radio in Sydney. I got onto his Ground-Zero compilation - he did Consume Red, and on the third one in the series the general public got to remix the album. And I did my DJ Smallcock remix of that, which ended up being the first track on it. It's really kind of a funny story, cause I was in Osaka and just read about this Ground-Zero remix album, on the last day submissions could be in. So I thought Fuck, I wanna do that! Otomo was playing that night - I went down to Timebomb records, bought the album, dragged it back home, attached the CD to one of my motors, destroyed it with my humming bars, made this complete load of noise remixing the record analogue-ly, by using the surface of the CD rather than the actual sounds on the CD - straight onto DAT - got it videoed and photographed at the same time - went out and got the photographs developed - took the video and put it all into a box, went to Otomo's gig that night and handed it to him. And then a couple of months later I get an email saying 'Congratulations! You got on the album!' - when I speak to Otomo he says 'You're my favourite track, the best track!' out of all of 200 submissions, and he said he got really bored listening to them, but mine excited him, just the completely different approach I took to remixing the album. He loved it! All the conditions were that you had to use the CD as source material. I think I kept within those guidelines. The whole thing was broken in half by the time I'd finished, so I never actually listened to the CD! I'm kind of curious to hear it!