“BEEEEEEEERRPPPPZZZZHHHH oh shitting fuck I’m sorry!”
My first ever phone interview hadn’t started well. Having been called promptly by Chase & Status’ press management, I had promptly proceeded to make a complete tit of myself, despite my very best laid plans.
“David? Yeah, you’ll be talking to Saul.” Saul ‘Chase’ Milton, he meant. I had looked it up on Wikipedia, as I was a professional (in the very loosest sense of the word). Still…
“Paul?” I said dumbly. There is apparently no-one called Paul in Chase & Status, which might have covered my booby.
“No. Saul.” An awkward pause. “I’m putting you through now.” Recovering, I quickly put my phone on loudspeaker and pressed the big idiot-proof record button my computer. Only the mic was still on, so just as Saul came on the line an earsplitting shriek of feedback burst forth enthusiastically.
“BEEEEEEEERRPPPPZZZZHHHH oh shitting fuck I’m sorry!”
So for a brief moment me and a world-famous producer were united in one brief moment of extreme mutual embarrassment. It was glorious.
Chase & Status are, of course, the drum’n’bass/dubstep producing duo famous for hits ‘Eastern Jam’ and ‘End Credits’ (a collaboration with dapper rapper Plan B that featured on the soundtrack for Harry Brown). They’re one of a range of crossover acts like Magnetic Man and Pendulum that have pushed underground club music blinking if not into the light of day, then at least into the muted greasy spotlights of the Gallery basement. They broke the surface with debut album More Than A Lot in 2008, but are really set to make waves with their new record No More Idols. I caught up with Saul just as he was applying the finishing touches to the album, and he seemed confident that it was going to tick all the right boxes.
“The new album picks up from where we left off, but with bigger songs and bigger songwriting,” he begins, in a voice that’s a study in either authentic urban gruffness or affected nonchalance, and I’m much too nervous to tell which. “It’s got some really exciting beats in there. It’s a really UK album and we’re just showing you where we’re at right now.”
What exactly a ‘UK album’ is he doesn’t clarify, and when I float the idea that dubstep as a genre just isn’t suited to the album format I’m shot down ruthlessly, so I don’t pursue it. Regardless, UK dubstep has quite drastically moved on since More Than A Lot, and the fact that Saul’s implicitly admitting that the new album is essentially an amplification of the previous record’s sound is maybe a bit worrying. I ask him whether he feels that Chase & Status have progressed musically over the past few years.
“I dunno, I think it’s a more mature album. There’s no point in trying to recreate More Than A Lot, it’s great for what it was and as it is,” he says, safely covering two of three possible perfect tenses. “Equally, there’s no point trying to write ‘Eastern Jam 2’.” However, for all this commitment to remaining current, Saul is firm when I ask whether Chase & Status have been influenced by some of the more leftfield dubstep artists of late, such as Mount Kimbie or James Blake.
“No, not at all.” But he softens the blow. “It’s not a question of whether I respect them more than, say, Magnetic Man. I love what Magnetic Man do, and I love what underground people do as well. I love it all mate. I’m not one of these people who wants to pick a side.” This diplomatic streak gradually begins to reveal itself in ever brighter colours as the interview goes on, especially when we begin to talk about ‘the scene’ and ‘purists’.
Underground forums on the net are notoriously ruthless when it comes to their favourite artists selling out. No More Idols features an impressive roster of collaborations with hot UK chart talent – Dizzee Rascal, Plan B, Tinie Tempah, White Lies, Sub Focus and Cee Lo Green all feature. Chase & Status can hardly be surprised when they’re accused of selling out, but do they feel the need to defend themselves from the forum fanboys?
“Yeah, yeah,” Saul starts eagerly, then checks himself, suddenly becoming artificially casual about the whole thing, but unable to keep his enthusiasm breaking through. “Uh, well, I personally wouldn’t bother getting into the debate at all. But, um, yeah obviously… the thing is… when I was young, I just loved drum’n’bass, jungle, that was it! Hated everybody else. But then I realised that that was mad, and you should just like everything you like. Being a purist is just stupid.” Again he stops in his track and pulls a 180, perhaps aware that he could be alienating a substantial demographic. “I mean, purists are great in one sense, because they’re the core of the underground. I just think it’s narrow-minded when you can’t cope with people evolving and changing and doing bigger things. All the artists you mentioned have been doing stuff in the underground for years, they’ve shaped that scene and now they’re moving on top to do bigger things as well. It’s great. I don’t think anyone needs to justify anything to anyone.”
So Chase & Status’ migration to America to work on Rihanna’s Rated R is completely in character for a duo who are keen to let the winds of the market blow them to wherever they’re wanted. It doesn’t hurt that the experience with our favourite Rude Girl gave them a taste of the high life.
“We were with her every day all day. We went out for drinks and were working on beats together, it was awesome. She was amazing, we got on really well with her. It’s not as corporate as it’s made out. Stargate and Drake were in the studio as well. Jay-Z came in and we all went out to dinner. It was a real nice vibe.” The relationship with Jay-Z then went on to blossom into a US management deal with Jigga’s Roc Nation. “It was a real nice vibe. Right now we’re just concentrating on getting the Chase & Status record done, so everything else needs to be put on hold, but I’d definitely like to work with other people again.”
Saul is keen to distance himself from commercialism, however, and it’s perhaps this residual affection for the alternative that led him to the grotty sound of the Dizzee collab ‘Heavy’, which was an apparently deliberate move away from the Rascal’s recent forays into the pop market, bringing him back to “the deepest grime of his Boy in Da Corner days. And he’s absolutely better like that, he’s ferocious on the track.” Saul seems to view ‘Heavy’ as a bit of a middle finger to the ‘betrayed’ purist community. “I’m sure half of the people would have thought that we were bringing him into the studio to come up with what purists would call a pop tune, but we didn’t. We just wanted to do something unbelievably raw.”
Saul, articulate, impassioned and ever so slightly defensive, is clearly loving where his talent has landed him and fellow DJ Will ‘Status’ Kennard, but while he’s apparently keen to stress that he owes the underground dance community nada, it becomes clear over the interview how keenly he feels that particular debt. Perhaps his most surprising opinion, however, and especially given Chase & Status’ massive success, is that writing music for the charts is the first step on the road to artistic suicide. “You never write for the charts, man, you write for yourself. That’s why we make music. If you write music specifically for the chart, you’re finished.” Well amen to that.