DJ CARL COX
Coxy Coxy
This chant greets legendary crowd-pleaser Carl
Cox when he plays in clubs across the world. Now
he’s releasing an album called ‘At The End of
the Cliché’. Is this the beginning of a new Coxy
era?
“I love the music for a start. It’s the only
thing that really keeps me going. I love seeing
people enjoy the music that I play, obviously,
there’s a lot of talent out there. People come
and get inspired and then try to copy it and do
well by themselves. In the early days, there was
a lot of rock bands and people looked up to The
Beatles and stuff - playing air guitars and
wanting to be like them. Now with the DJ
situation, people want the decks and they want
to be like Carl Cox, Sasha, Paul Oakenfold,
Digweed…. I suppose we’ve become like the
hierarchy of our century but I don’t see it like
that. My interest has always been music and
records. I never professed to be a live musician
as such but at the end of the day, I took the
bull by the horns and said ‘Okay, this is my
fate’. The DJ – picking up on other people’s
music and playing it to the rest of the world at
the smallest clubs to the biggest parties you’ve
sever seen”.
Carl Cox is talking about how he came to be
where he is today as we sit and chat in the
Velvet Underground just before the doors are
opened for Ultimate BASE, his regular Thursday
night residency. Tonight will prove to be quite
special as Cox plays a full five hour set,
spinning everything from post-ambient to
trip-hop beats, jazz, funk, house and soul. The
first trickle of punters will soon turn into a
veritable flood until the whole club is
positively heaving. I’m asked over the course of
the evening why ‘Britain’s Biggest DJ’ should
choose to play such a small, intimate venue when
he could pack out privileged position to do as
he pleases and he wisely chose not to loose
touch with his grass roots as he attempts to
realise his ultimate ambitions.
“My parents were into R&B, funk and soul, Jim
Reeves, Duane Eddy…. A completely eclectic style
of music. Not that there was any one genre you
were supposed to listen to. As a start, I had a
good education. Whether a singer’s black, white,
green or blue, if you can feel their music and
they have something to say – you can really
appreciate that and that’s what I picked up on.
The same has always been true throughout my
career. I used to do weddings and birthday
parties and introduced 60s music and rock and
roll era as well as Madonna, Adam & The Ants and
that sort of stuff. I’d just gel it together
hopefully with some dance music thrown in for
good measure – some O Jays, some Pendergrass. I
become unique because I was always trying to
introduce dance music from a very early age
rather then profess to be just a rock and roll
DJ”.
Cox is at great pains to make the distinction
between his DJing and his music making. “I’m
someone who is able to create music because
(technological) progression has allowed us to do
that. I’m just expressing myself really. What I
have in my head and what I’m trying to release.
I could have made a really commercial,
successful record but in that sort of situation,
you’re living a lie to yourself and insulting
your intelligence. I know I can make music as
well as a musician. If I didn’t then I would
just make the hits and get the money and ‘Oh
yeah, here’s the next 2 Unlimited’. I have
something to say and hope that other people can
respect that what, at the moment, they clearly
do”.
“I’m trying to set a high standard of what
you’re supposed to listen to from a DJ point of
view. Its nice to have DJ mixes of this, that
and the other. You’re supposed to know how the
dance floor works but when you’re hot, you’re
hot, and when you’re not, you’re not. At the end
of the day, you have nothing to fall back on
when you fall out of favour with these people. I
have something to say with my own music. Here it
is. If you want that sound then you can have it
as a remix because I already have my initial
sound. Nothing like that comes in and I just
carry on with my own music. The worst thing
about remixing is if you have a lot of ideas,
you’re just giving them away to other artists
and they do really well with it”.
“People will see you as someone who has made
just that style of music while I’m someone who
has grown up with all sorts of different styles.
I’m able to make all sorts of styles so
therefore in a form of expression, there should
be no limits, no boundaries. People just take
you for what you are. You’re a person making
music no matter what it is. I just felt that as
I’m going along in my career as a DJ and
obviously taking another step forward and
producing the stuff, there’s no record label
that was required to make music from my end of
it – as a DJ – hence I started the record label
up myself because I’m the only one who can
understand how to sell Carl Cox. It’s not an
easy road because as soon as there’s something a
bit strange, a bit weird, it won’t get in the
Top 20 or whatever, they just say no – you don’t
get a second chance and therefore it pushes a
lot of people into making dance accessible
records”.
It was Cox’s disillusionment with other record
companies which lead him to found Worldwide
Ultimatum – changed from just plain Ultimatum
after it was discovered that the Stereo MCs had
a production company of the same name. “I had a
record deal in my early days with Perfecto
Records in 1991. I had three successful years
with them but I got burnt over how they treated
me as an artist. They just wanted to make a
certain sound but I wanted to say ‘I have this,
but I have that as well’. They didn’t want to
know about that, hence not being signed to
Perfecto Records anymore. So there was no point
rushing into another recording deal because it
would have been more of the same. I decided to
set up a smaller label called MMR (More Music
Records). I did quite a bit of licensing from
Germany and Holland and put out a few of my own
records – not like the ‘big splash Carl Cox – go
and buy it now’. I just like people to pick up
on the music at face value and that kind of
slowly built”.
However, Cox soon realised that his music would
get out to a wider audience if it had some money
behind it, which lead to him hooking up with
Edel Records. “I wasn’t about to turn my small
label into something like CBS because I would
have to give time and dedication to it which, at
the moment, I haven’t got. I needed a company
which could take at face value what I have as an
A&R person, as an artist and someone who
actually has something to say in respect to
setting up a label which has a certain type of
music coming out of it but also allows the
artists to express themselves/ I don’t care what
it is as long as I can feel what you’re saying
and that is the whole basis of Worldwide
Ultimatum Records”.
Worldwide Ultimatum’s first release was a
sampler featuring tracks from Judge Jules, Josh
Wink, Craig Walsh, Josh Abrahams and a couple of
tracks from Cox himself – the melancholic ‘Song
for Rachel’ and ‘Education’, a collaboration
with Eric Powell, Josh Abraham’s excellent ‘The
Satyricon’ quickly followed. Forthcoming are
albums from Cox and the newly signed Craig Walsh
and Sub Culture, as well as a second sampler.
“It’s very hard. I get a lot of demo tapes and
stuff, but I’m not feeling what Josh or Craig is
giving me or what I’m doing myself”.
Cox’s first offering himself from Worldwide
Ultimatum was the recent ‘Three Paintings and a
Drum’ EP, featuring lead track ‘Phoebus Apollo’.
“It’s a bit of a weird one really. These things
kind of collect together like pieces of a jigsaw
puzzle. When you normally do a track, you just
focus – you know who’s going to buy it and you
just make the track but it was very important
for me not to sell out between making something
which would definitely to into the charts, and
something which has emotion and feeling. The way
that '‘Phoebus Apollo' came out was completely
perfect for me in respect to coming back into
the mainstream again with this sort of record.
It also broke down all sorts of barriers where,
at the end of the day, you don’t have to make a
record that you know is going to go into the
charts – you can just make what you feel and
what you believe in and I’m sure it will come
through and people will appreciate it”.
Cox and all concerned were consequently
pleasantly surprised when ‘Three Paintings and a
Drum’ went into the Top 30. “I was so shocked
and so pleased by that. A lot of people around
me, especially the hierarchy – the record
company and the DJs – were just astounded by
that”.
‘Phoebus Apollo’ is aptly named after the Roman
God of music and the sun. “When I was making the
record, if I just stood back and listened to it,
it just gave me a feeling of warmth like the
aura of the sun. We looked it up in the
thesaurus to see what the aura of the sun was
and it ended up being Phoebus Apollo. It just
evolved from that. When we were recording it,
our minds were working towards something which
has substance. It’s quite cool. I could have
made a real ‘hands in the air’ handbag record
which has nothing to do with anything apart from
being commercial enough to be on Top of the Of
Pops. I knew that I could go past that with
something which has real meaning. I like to
think that I’m a bit of a genius in that respect
because most people would never have thought
about that song in that situation. Fair play to
Rachel. She heard it and said ‘What does it make
you feel? Why did you make that?’ I explained it
and we kind of worked together on it”.
Cox’s follow-up single, ‘Sader’s Dream’ which
was released at the end of April is, he says, “A
lot more house orientated and a little bit more
old school. I want people to know that there is
a sound that evolved before the sound that
you’ve got today. ‘Sader’ is a sample that I’ve
taken off a Crusaders groove. Again, there’s a
lot of feeling and energy. It does sound old
school but with a new school flavour. There’s a
lot of strings in there and it sounds quite
inspiring. So, I’ve done this track which throws
everything out of whack because it’s got nothing
to do with techno. It’s just a really good,
pumping house track with feeling. I’ve also done
a remix of it which brings the sound up-to-date
as well as a really minimalist underground
record called ‘Worldwide Ultimatum’ which is
basically my voice going through filters and
soundscapes. It’s really dark and different”.
Cox’s long awaited album, ‘At The End of the
Cliché’ will finally see the light of day at the
end of May. “In the early days, you needed
cliché to get where you wanted, but I’ve always
made my own path in life – so it’s like the end
of the cliché – just breaking things down in
that respect”.
“There’s a lot of down-tempo dub and guitar
stuff. There’s also a lot of expression. Every
record hasn’t got slamming acid, relentless
beats and stuff. You have to listen to it,
that’s all I can really say. I could have made
dancefloor - friendly music if I wanted, but I
just haven’t got the feel for that. That is a
very industry-friendly game to play and I’ve
never really been industry-friendly. My heart
doesn’t lie in that. I want to make hits for
radio and stuff. All the remixes that I’ve done
have always had inspiration in them – but it’s
cool because I have stood my ground for what I
truly believe in”.
Cox certainly won’t be slowing up in the near
future. Apart from Ultimate BASE, his monthly
residency at Cream’s ‘Full On’ and regular
stints around his home town of Brighton, he’ll
also be appearing once again at this year’s
Tribal Gathering. He certainly has fond memories
of last year’s landmark dance festival.
“I went on after Orbital and can’t really
express how I felt after what they did. People
really got into it. It wasn’t really classed as a
rave at the end of the day. It was just a really
big party. People from all over the country and
the world coming together and having a good
time. I thought that was really positive for the
whole scene and the industry as a whole, because
the authorities are always trying to break down
the raves and the gatherings but we’ve got
Underworld doing this and Leftfield doing that.
It was just brilliant. Glastonbury even more so
– it was just the best event I’ve ever done in
my life. A totally landmark party”.
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