Dj, producer, curator and digger extraordinaire. Quantic is
one of the biggest players in current progressive Latin music and he’s not even
Latino. Born in the English countryside he made a pretty decent career for the
first half of last decade producing soulful downtempo electronica until around
2007 he got suddenly converted into Latinhood. That song, “Mi Swing Es
Tropical,” he did in Puerto Rico with Nickodemus and Candela Allstars was a
huge breakthrough and pretty much marked the beginning of a whole new phase in
his development as an artist, getting immersed in Latin music to the point that
he even relocated to Colombia.
Celebrating the recent release of a Best Of Quantic
compilation (out on Tru Thoughts), Will Holland, better known as Quantic, visited San Francisco, CA
and there I had the chance to have a little chat backstage right before his
show.
- So, how did you first get into Latin music?
- It happened in Puerto Rico. Nickodemus invited me to go there and record with the Candela
Allstars. That was the first time I got in
touch with (Latin music). I had already a lot of music because I buy records,
lots of music. But that was the first time I came in touch with actual
musicians and it was cool. It was interesting. But for me its all about
records. I’ve always got introduced through digging.
- And digging took you to Colombia, where you ended up
staying.
- Yeah. I was really into Ray Pérez y sus Dementes, these records from Venezuela, and also Afredito
Linares, from Perú... and all these
records, that kind of scene, revolved around Cali. You hear people shouting out
in those records about Cali, because Cali was such a spot to go and play in the
‘70s, it was like this big mecca for salsa. And my friend Beto (Soundway Records’
Roberto Gyemant) assured me that there were going to be heavy records and of
course they were. It was interesting. It was another world. Coming from a
background of looking for funk records, reggae and stuff, it was like a whole
new universe, musically, to discover. Sometimes I don’t like the word 'digging' because it implies a certain nostalgia, maybe a separation between the present
and the past. I feel that when they look for records, some people, even friends
of mine would buy records of some artist, but if that same artist was playing
in the street they wouldn’t go and talk to them.
- Maybe not in that sense, but there’s definitely a
nostalgic side to your music because you always approach it from a ‘60s and
‘70s aesthetic. That type of sound.
- Oh yeah, definitely. You gotta understand that at
that period everything was at its best. It's like with cars, you had a period
when the Jaguar and all these cars were the best they could be, you know, they
were beautiful, they were hand-designed. And that’s what happened to music too.
You had Fender, people making all these amazing instruments, and you had all
these young people and out of that came all these styles and I think it was
really at the top as far the recording industry could be.
- There was definitely a creative pinnacle happening at
that time.
- Yes, totally. But I don’t wanna be nostalgic in the sense
that “oh, no today...” Because that’s the other thing, you gotta imagine that
today there’s just as many people. They just don’t have that opportunity
because in the ‘70s there seemed to be more of an opening for people to get
into that industry. While now I see so many talented people that don’t get
accepted as a singer-songwirter, whatever, because if they’re not singing like Marc
Anthony they’re not gonna get noticed, you
know what I mean? Unless you can prove that you have the potential to sell
thousands.
- There has been recently a huge shift in interest among
diggers and producers toward old Latin music. It wasn’t just you. Do you think it
was because they simply ran out of funk and soul break-beats to sample? All
those crates have been dug so much that they reached a point where they needed to
look somewhere else?
- I think it basically came to an end and it was also about
like, moving forward. There has to be evolution, it can’t just be the same old
thing. And also funk and soul really commercialized with Amy Winehouse, Sharon Jones, whatever. It became a big thing and a lot of people just got bored of
it, “ok, let’s try something else.” For me, personally, you look for breaks so
much that you start thinking “what’s a break?” Is it only when it goes like
boom-bap? Is that a break? Or could a break be Congolese music? It’s more about
rhythm, finding more rhythms, rather than just American funk.
- How about the recent boom of global interest in
Colombia? It’s like suddenly, in the last couple of years, the whole world, but
particularly Europe and the US, discovered how amazing Colombian music is,
after ignoring it for a long time.
- Yeah, I don’t know why that is. I don’t think that they
ignored it. From the ‘70s, ‘80s and even into the ‘90s most of Colombian music
was really hard to access abroad, except the crossovers like Carlos Vives and the small world music circles. Because that’s
another thing, the world music scene never did Latin American music any favors,
making it softer and more like para planchar, you know. I think
one key thing has been the internet. That’s been amazing for Colombian acts to
be able to get out and get the music heard.
- But how about the interest of European record labels in
releasing all these reissues of old Colombian music. You’ve been personally
involved in curating many of those compilations. And there’s an undeniable
specific interest in Colombia, which ten years ago, it wasn't happening, they were maybe focused in
Brazil.
- Yes, that’s true. I think that was certainly happening in
the UK, this whole big thing for Brazil. Still goes on. Don’t know. Don’t know
why it happened. It seemed like the world became ready maybe. Maybe they
weren’t ready for it before. Maybe it’s a hearing thing. I had Colombian
records maybe seven or eight years ago that I just didn’t understand back then.
It didn’t interest me. And now I hear the same thing today, and with a
different understanding I can really like it. The human hear- it’s just
psychological, you are hearing the same thing but your interpretation changes.
- How do you feel about the whole ñu-cumbia movement?
- I think it’s cool. Like in anything that explodes so
quickly there’s a lot of shit and there’s a lot of good stuff as well. There’re
a lot of people sampling Andrés Landero,
Los Gaiteros. And that’s great.
But there’s a whole lot of musicians in Colombia that can still play that
style. Colombian folkloric music hasn’t changed, generally speaking it’s pretty
much the same thing that it was a hundred years ago, you know, gaitas, cumbias.
Also, a lot of the times when I hear the new mash-up things, if the original
was so good, why did you need to do that? Why did you need to put a beat to
that old record to kind of somehow make it acceptable to the gringos? Why is
that? That doesn’t need to happen, people should learn to accept it how it is.
- Do you think there’s a difference between the Colombian
music Europeans are interested in, and the Colombian music that Colombians
are interested in?
- I think that’s an interesting point, it definitely
happens. There’s kind of a wide gap. Let’s face it, just like the British
abroad and the Argentineans abroad, there’s people that will only be interested
in the famous Argentinean hits that remind them of back home, they’re not
interested in something that’s very leftfield. There’s certainly a nostalgia in
Colombians and Latinos abroad in general and they wanna hear salsa, they don’t
wanna hear these obscure things. It’s the same. Look man, I go to Colombia to
buy records and I’m looking for cumbias and rare Fruko records and the salesman is saying to me “look you
know this English rock record from the ‘70s?” because they have a big
appreciation for British rock from the ‘70s, some that even I never heard
about.
- Did it shock you at first, when you got to Colombia, to
find out that the average youth down there was more interested in the music
coming from Europe and the US rather than cumbia and their own roots?
- Colombians are the first to admit that they value more
something that’s coming from the outside in. And when somebody from abroad
comes in and plays their music then it puts value on it, there’s this foreign
interest in it. It’s a weird phenomenon. It’s definitely a post-colonial
phenomenon. You could write a thesis on that.
- I’m of the idea that it was that initial interest of foreigners
in cumbia what ignited the whole ñu-cumbia movement coming out of Mexico and
Argentina.
- The danger with cumbia is that we have this kind of buzz
word, cumbia, cumbia... But there’s a lot of shit that isn’t necessary cumbia.
There’s a lot of stuff, like the Argentinean stuff, a lot of it is great, but a
lot of just isn’t cumbia. It’s reggae, or dubstep, whatever.
- As long as it has a güiro loop, anything is considered
cumbia.
- Exactly. And I think also we have to remember the
importance of the African drum patterns. It’s like a language that speaks to
those people, and the Costeños in Colombia, they hear that. It’s a pattern that
speaks to them. So when they hear cumbia from like Argentina it’s just like
they’re mystified. I play that shit to like Aníbal Velázquez and the heavyweight guys from the coast and they
are confused. Because the feel is so different.
- But that’s also because cumbia evolved in different
directions and assimilated to each country’s local culture in different ways.
- Totally. And that’s beautiful too. That’s lovely. It’s not
a bad thing.
- Somebody on my blog left a comment saying that you and
Frente Cumbiero were going to work on a project together, recoding at the
Discos Fuentes studios in Medellín. I read that and I almost came in my pants.
- Yes, (laughs) we’ve got founding from the British council
and it’s still in pre-production what we’re gonna do, but we’re renting Fuentes
for like two, three weeks. I’ve been there a lot, it’s cool, they rebuilt the
studio in the ‘80s so it’s a little bit different to what it was, but it’s
still the same basic concept.
- And I imagine you’re gonna invite some musicians from
that era who are still around. Right?
- Yes. Michi Sarmiento.
Afredito Linares, Aníbal
Velázquez, Pedro Beltrán. The heavyweights. Trying to. Let’s see.
- Are you planning to release this through Tru Thoughts
or Soundway?
- Might be for Soundway. We’ve got to see. We’ve got to get
it done first. It’s always a gamble when you record. You never know how is it
going to work out. Should be good.
- So, you live in Cali, and you’re definitely familiar
with the song “Las Caleñas son como las flores,” right? That song pretty much
says that women in Cali don’t put out easily, they like to play hard to get.
And that’s a pretty well spread preconception about Colombian women in general.
Did you experience that yourself or being a foreigner gave you a special pass?
- (Laughs) No comment. No comment. I don’t know if they’re hard to get. I
don’t know about that, but they’re certainly beautiful.
- Living in Colombia, do you miss anything from back
home? I assume you don’t miss the food.
- Well, you know what? I do. Because that’s a big myth about
England. If you go to London, yes, the food is terrible, but I’m from the
country and the food is really nice. I have a little cache of English mustard
and tea-bags and kind of things that I restock periodically.
- Can you get fish and chips there?
- No. I do my own though.
- I don’t know if you’ve seen it. There’s a Vice TV documentary about how young men in northern Colombia get sexually initiated
with female donkeys (because, once again, women play too hard to get). And I always wondered why are there so many cumbia songs
about donkeys. Do you think there’s a correlation there?
- I haven’t had a personal insight on that. But I’m sure it
goes on man. I was watching the news once and it’s a terribly story about these
robbers, ladrones, who robbed a Circus
in la costa, in a little town and
they stole the sound-system and various other things from the circus and while
they were there they took the donkey from the circus and they raped her. And I
was thinking, I was watching the news and I was like, “OK, that’s really bad,
I’m sorry for the donkey, but fuck, man, how did they know that the donkey was
ripe?”
- Because they’re experts! They’ve been fucking donkeys
since they were kids.
- I don’t know. I think that’s kind of myth.
- How about the connection between cumbia and donkey fucking?
- I’ve been doing a good job recording with costeños and I have never asked them. And I should maybe not
make comment.
- Right, I don’t wanna ruin your reputation, you need to
be able to go back and record that album with Frente Cumbiero.
- And they’re gonna say, “hey, what did you say? That we all
fuck donkeys?” No. No.
