East Is South

The dichotomy here is that in a lot of countries most people don’t go to clubs, but they do gather to listen to music -- music is a gathering principle. In other parts of the world, women will get together to sing their songs, men and women will gather to celebrate a birth, a wedding, a departure, but in the West it seems you have to go to a club to have the gathering element. You have to go somewhere to dance -- it doesn‘t happen right in your courtyard; there’s no one playing live right outside your doorstep. Here we buy the music, and we go somewhere to listen to the music. Hopefully, going to listen to music is an act of celebration.

A lot of the music you sample is religious or spiritual music. Do you really think it can be transplanted into a Western setting with its spiritual dimension intact?

It‘s always easy to be holy in a holy environment. But what happens when you’re not in one? I have no problem playing anything spiritual anywhere. My feeling is that it‘s done in total respect, and at the same time, we have to live with the good and bad -- we can’t just say that it‘s all good, and that the bad doesn’t exist. There‘s nothing bad about bringing something spiritual into a club where you might have people looking for sex or taking drugs or whatever. We’re all creatures of the sacred and profane, so when I play those samples I‘m trying to bring something good wherever I go.

What can we expect to hear from you at Vynyl on June 30?

It always depends on the dance floor and the vibe, and I never know till I get there. So I adjust to the conditions. As far as tempo, I like to play low beats per minute. I can play low tempo for hours. Some people call it chill music. I can also play fast tempo, but again it’s according to the crowd, because as much as you need good players, you need good listeners as well.