Agent K: I started my career as a musician when I was nine years old and my mum put me on flute lessons. When I was fifteen or sixteen, I'd finished all my grades, and I stopped playing for a few years. Then I moved down to London in 1992 and I enrolled for a BTEC National diploma in performing arts. It was a two-year course. The first year I wanted to play keyboards; I saw this big, massive grand piano, and I thought that is me; I have to play keyboards. So for the first year I just played keyboards. Then when I heard Herbie Hancock's "Chameleon" from "Headhunters," that changed my life. That was one of the records that changed my life.
Then I met up with a guy called Jake Rickman. We had a little funk band called The Profiteers, a little seven-piece funk band. And then he met this guy called Ollie from a little crew called the Herbalisers. And then we set up a live band, a Herbaliser live band. We started to tour loads of places and people thought we were a pretty good band.
Emm: Do you do any session work as a musician?
Agent K: Yes, I used to do some. I used to do quite a bit, but there's nothing really happening now. I just do my own thing now. I've just been trying to sort out what I'm going to do with this whole music thing. I know I've got this talent, and I just have to use it properly and use it to my advantage. This is where it all starts, and I can take the world by the storm, but, I just have to sort out my business. That can be difficult, because the music business can be so cut-throat, and you have be ruthless to get ahead sometimes.
Emm: Do you play any other instruments?
Agent K: Flute, keyboards and drums, percussion. I can kind of sing but I don't want to sing. I can pitch notes, I've got a pleasant pitch so I can sing, but I just have to have my voice developed. So I will be working on that in time.
Emm: How did you meet up with the guys from Bugz in the Attic?
Agent K: While I was working with the Herbaliser crew, I met up with Orin and Daz and all them guys. They came down to the Herbaliser studio one day because they were doing a session next door with someone else. We introduced ourselves and starting talking about music and you know, I told them I play keys, and they invited me up to their studio up in Richmond. So we started making tunes there all day, all night, just all the time. And then we released the first tune, which was a Neon Phusion tune, I think. And then, that's how it all started. Then Orin introduced me to I.G., and then from that I just kind of met everyone else.
Emm: Orin? That's Orin Walters, who's Afronaught, right?
Agent K:That's Afronaught, yes.
Emm: And Daz or Darren is Daz-I-Kue, and with I.G. Culture and Seiji, you guys make up what we know as Bugz in the Attic.
Agent K:That's right.
Emm: I hear people talk about the Bugz in the Attic sound, the West London sound, and "broken beat". And I know that a lot of people sort of disdain the "broken beat" moniker. How do you feel about the "broken beat" label? And if you don't like it, how would you describe the music that Bugz in the Attic makes?
Agent K:Good music. It's very hard to put it in a category because there's so many different styles of music that influence our sound. Orin's from a house background. Seiji is drum and bass, and Cliff is from house and garage. And I'm just from a mix of soul and jazz. And then, Darren, he's from a soul and boogie background. When everyone fuses all that together it just comes out just incredible. That's probably why it's such a special thing because we use so many different styles of music.
