RS: When the two of you guys work in the studio, are you using
Logic on a Mac, or what's your computer setup like?
Jim Sullivan: Funnily enough we use a PC, and we've been using a
version of Cubase which is good, though it has got cobwebs on it. It's
a really old version of Cubase, but we got so used to using that that
we didn't want change. But we've just gone to the new Cubase 4 now, on
a PC. And we run Midi on an Atari ST <laughing>.
RS: Are you all on the computer or do you use any outboard gear?
Eddie Craig: We use both. We're both musicians and both keyboard
players and we both come from the very old school and we won't be
getting rid of our outboard gear very quickly. The thing is, the more
outboard you use, it colors the sound differently, whereas if it all
just comes from the computer, it can sometimes sound a bit stale. If
we're doing music for films, which we have done in the past, we
definitely use the outboard a lot more and that's both keyboards and
effects processors.
RS: What movies have you worked on?
Eddie Craig: We've done music for adverts and small films for
colleges in the area, and we've done our own films as well, because we
do video and CGI.
RS: Do you do your music videos as well, like that Bomb the Secret video?
Eddie Craig: We did do that video, yes. We edited, recorded and wrote
the treatment, did the design and the computer graphics on that.
Jim Sullivan: Yes, we hooked up with a friend of ours that works in a
studio in London, and luckily he managed to get us some downtime. He
was operating the cameras, and got us some really good inroads into
keeping the budget down for us. It was very handy.
RS: Where did that comic book idea come from?
Eddie Craig: There was some old TV programs in the 80s with the comic
book strips and we liked that type of imagery. It's just something
we'd been thinking about for a while. Then Jim came up with the
process of being able to actually do it. It's one thing, having the
idea and actually working out how to do it was a secondary thing. Jim
spent many a late night working on it, with square eyes in front of
computer screen, working on the technique. It seemed to work quite
well for us.
RS: How did you get your hands on the Bucketheads, to redo that track?
Eddie Craig: That was a long process actually. It took over a year to
get permission. First of all, we spoke to the band Chicago, who the
Bucketheads got the sample from. Then our lawyers got in touch with
Kenny Dope, and everyone was really up for it. Kenny gave us his full
support on the track and really made things easy for us. We were
very, very lucky to have the chance to work with such great samples
and we were looked after and treated really well. And the rest is
history.
RS: So that's a little bit of your history. When the two of you
guys work in the studio together, do you have different roles you
play, or do you fight over the keyboard? What's your collaboration
process like?
Jim Sullivan: Ed is very much a DJ, as well as a formidable producer
himself, and has come from a very strong musical background, from
being in bands. So I bring the musical element, and Ed always brings
the urban element, whether the scratching or just urban ideas. We've
found that when we go away and write tunes individually they never
come out with quite the pizzazz that we get when we write them
together. So Ed brings the urban element, I bring the musical element,
and we've found that it works very well together.
Eddie Craig: We've been very blessed that we get on so well. I mean,
we've written hundreds and thousands of tracks over the years, and
we've never had one argument in that whole time. So we do get on like
brothers. We're very blessed for that.
RS: Very cool. When you DJ out, do you DJ the same music you produce?
Eddie Craig: Yes. Jim's also a wicked DJ, but he tends not to play
out. He prefers to look after the VIP room. But generally, we play to
the crowd. If it's a house club, we'll play a house mix. If it's more
of a garage club or baseline club, we'll play that style. We do like
to interact the music. If it's a garage club we will play house
tracks, and if it's a baseline club we'll play house or electro tracks
in our set. We try and keep it open-minded, and don't pigeonhole too
much.
RS: When you're spinning live, are you playing vinyl, CD, laptop?
Jim Sullivan: Vinyl and CDs mainly. We can operate the computers, but
we're generally quite old school. Vinyl preferably, but a lot of
clubs we're going to now don't even have vinyl decks. So we have had
to make a transition to CDs. The CD players are so good now, there are
very much like operating a deck, and a lot tighter sometimes, and you
don't get the warped records. But it's generally vinyl and CD.
