INTERVIEW — Getting In Sync With Philippa [MI4L.com]

It’s great to talk to you. How are you doing today?

Hey there, great thanks. Today the advance single for the new Freerange collab ep with Jimpster has dropped. It’s so nice when people finally get to hear music that’s been a year, if not 2 years in the making. And this EP is particularly special as it’s a collaboration between myself and Freerange label head Jimpster, as well as being the 300th release on Freerange – it’s an incredible feat (to get to 300).

So yeah, feeling particularly stoked right now. Not just for myself.

What kind of artists, DJs, genres were you into growing up?

Are we talking little kid or teenager? Ha! I’m gonna go young with this answer, as I’ve been thinking about it a bit recently.

I grew up in a household where classical music dominated. My mother is a music teacher and conducted church choirs as well as playing organ sometimes. I sang in (excellent) choirs, played the piano, and heard a lot of Beethoven, Bach, Debussy and so on. Life was all about music when I was a kid, and I feel very blessed for having had that upbringing.

Is there an album that sticks in your mind from being a kid?

As a teenager I discovered indie music and became very obsessed with it. I listened to a lot of different bands: Bauhaus, the Stone Roses, Slowdive, Pixies, Sonic Youth… but my favourite was probably The Cure. I always loved the deep waters of emotionally oriented music.

So an album? Probably Disintegration by The Cure. 2nd option would be The Stone Roses eponymously named album.

Tell us a bit about the place you were born and what was it like growing up there?

I grew up in Nelson – that’s where we moved to when I was around 12 years old. It’s at the top of the south Island with a population of 50,000 and  is surrounded by ocean, mountains, lakes, and the utterly gorgeous Abel Tasman national park (hit google images, it’ll blow yr mind). I miss it a lot.

My school friends and I thought we were badass by wagging school, going up the river and smoking weed – but actually it was a pretty calm, peaceful and safe place to grow up.

Talk a little about your history as a DJ back in New Zealand? Where did you play, what kind of vibe were you playing?

I started DJing in the late 90s after discovering house music and falling deeply in love with it. I was very much into British deep house, the likes of Crazy P and early Paper Recordings output; also, French house – Motorbass, early Daft Punk – plus Guidance recordings in Chicago, Larry Heard, and then later on the full scope of Chicago house.

What grabbed me right away was its attitude. House aimed to promote strength, unity, acceptance, community support, warmth – which were essentially messages of hope from the African American and Hispanic communities who birthed the music. It was revelatory – it blew my mind. Black music came along and rolled like a steam train and through my imagination. I consequently discovered hip hop in a big way, and from there soul, jazz, disco and so on – but as a fan only. As a DJ I played house.

And I did that a lot – in NZ I played 2-5 times a week for 15 years before moving to Europe. I guess I was lucky in that I came up in an era where there were many clubs and not so many DJs. DJing was expensive ($25 NZ a record, anyone?), and not particularly easy (Technics 1200s) – the bar for commitment was a lot higher in those days. So I played A LOT, and was brought up through a scene that was very connected – you HAD to go to the record store to buy records, so you saw your mates and comrades weekly. You got to hang out with the more established DJs of the scene and meet the visiting internationals. We were coached – no two ways about it. There was leadership and training, and I was essentially trained to be a good DJ. I’m very cognisant of that these days, and really grateful to the heroes of the local scene back in NZ who supported me. It was an incredible time.

I could go on. I miss the community vibes of those days.

You worked in a record shop. Tell us a little about the shop, what kind of stuff were you repping?

I did. I worked for around three years in BPM records (1998 – 2001) – which was probably Auckland’s best record store for house, techno and drum n bass. I remember it being intense – I’d go in on weekends on zero sleep, almost directly from the club to the store. On that note, I’m not sure I was the friendliest record store attendant in that era :/

What was the main driver for you leaving for Berlin?

Just the fact that NZ is so far away from everything – we’re pretty isolated down there. For example, to get home, door to door, takes 35 +/- hours of non-stop travel from my place in Berlin. Apart from Antartica, I’m not sure there could be any place further away.

NZ is very cool in many ways, and always had a decent electronic music community intent on doing great things, but there’s no getting away from the fact that the centre for electronic music internationally is basically Europe (incl UK). Or the US. Depending on what you’re looking for.

How long did it take you to settle? Do you call Berlin home now?

I feel like I’ve talked about this quite a lot, but yeah… it was pretty bad. I experienced intense culture shock and homesickness. I can be quite introverted and neurotic anyway, but the shock of being ripped out of a long established career, networks and friendships brought about a fairly long and protracted period of low grade but sustained depression. Part of the problem was that it’s nigh impossible to just nip home for a weekend when it costs so much and takes so long to travel there. I was in Berlin for 3 years before I was able to get home and visit family and much missed friends.

Anyway it came right, over time, as most things do. I ran a lot, which helped, and threw myself into learning a new craft – music production. Music saved my ass, as it always does.

Now 11 years in, I’m happy in Berlin – more than ever right now. And yes, Berlin is home.

Were you living in Berlin when you put out your first record? What was your first release?

I was. In 2019 I put out four eps with the help of decent PR which brought me to the ears of Slothboogie and Freerange, and those labels consequently started releasing my music.

The first ep I released was called Pronoia – on a self-releasing project called At Peace.

You are a music tech teacher in Berlin…

Honestly, teaching is the jigsaw puzzle that makes it all work. I sometimes think I gain more from teaching than my students –  the official learners in that situation – in that it’s just a very rewarding thing to do. I am a tutor on the BA Hons Electronic Music Production programme at Catalyst Berlin – which is an institute of arts and technology. The school has about 800 international students and we offer BA Hons and MA programmes in film, visual effects and animation, screenwriting, screen acting, sound and music for visual media, creative audio production and electronic music production. It’s probably more academic than you are thinking, and I would say in general the school operates at quite a high level. I’ve been there since moving to Berlin 11 years ago and I adore it for many reasons.

Does your day job help with your work as a producer & DJ and in what ways.

Yeah of course. Firstly, I’m spending a significant part of my professional life thinking about, discussing and teaching music and related subjects. Then there are the students themselves who are overall pretty amazing and inspirational. Perhaps not so obviously is just the simple fact that teaching means there is a large part of my life focused on other people.  Being an artist can lead to over self-absorption – teaching is an antidote.

Who are the artists that inspire you right now?

So many! It’s pretty varied in terms of genre.

I’m currently a little bit in love with Otis Redding – the Staxx Records documentary is brilliant btw, if you’re interested in US southern soul of the 50s and onwards. In that style, I’ve been eating Motown and Northern Soul playlists for breakfast for a couple of years now. Streaming playlists are problematic though aren’t they, in that you often don’t quite register who it is you’re listening to.

Apart from that, I listened quite a lot this summer to Arc de Soleil – Swedish guitarist, similar to Khruangbin. His music is simultaneously relaxing and elevating – always a good combo. Plus another Swedish band called Beach Vacation – which is melodic indie music, to my mind reminiscent of UK 90s bands Slowdive and Cocteau Twins, but more uptempo..

I’ve recently been through another DJ Cam stage – immaculately produced, slightly spooky French instrumental hip hop and electronica.

And then just a lot of jazz – on the daily. Bebop and hard bop mostly (40s and 50s). I’m not sure I’ll ever move on from it. Jazz keeps me company.

Talk to us about the new EP and your collaboration with Jimpster? What parts did you both play in the production?

Honestly this collab has been one of the most mind blowing things to happen in the last year. I’m really grateful for the entire project from beginning to end.

It’s convoluted how it all came together – but I’ll give you the short version. Essentially, I wrote the original sketches and had recorded some instrumentation and the vocalists – and from there Jamie took the tracks and brought them to life with a bit of toing and froing between us over a period of several months. Jamie rewrote some basslines and enriched the instrumentation.

What did you learn from working on this project with Jimpster?

Ah, so much. It’s not every day one gets to collaborate with an artist with so much depth and history. What’s been personally significant for me, is hearing these musical ideas come to life in the hands of someone who’s been producing for the better part of 30 years. I learnt a lot in terms of instrumentation and arrangement – the multitude of layers and punctuation points that were added to the tracks without them ever starting to feel overly full or cluttered. Obviously Jamie’s production style is utterly gorgeous, so yeah, it’s been incredible to get to work with him like this.

What are you most proud of with this release? What was the most challenging part of bringing it together?

I think we share some common ground in terms of aesthetics and themes we’re exploring with our music – and this has resulted in a fairly even hybrid of both of our styles. I always loved Jimpster’s album Amore, and used to listen to it a lot back in Auckland in a certain era – certainly I was referencing that emotional space when for example Dreaming was coming together as an idea.

What drives you to create music?

Literally I was talking about this with Fred Everything (see below) this week – I really basically want to write music that moves people – that brings one back to a place where it’s a good thing to feel the feelings, where magic exists, where ultimately everything is going to be ok – better than ok.

What can we hope to see next from you Philippa?

Happily, I’m in the final stages of mixing an EP to come out on Fred Everything’s label Lazy Days, set for release early November. So with that in mind, I’m off to the studio.

Thanks for having me Music Is 4 Lovers! xx

-Philippa