Evil Nine 'Manchester is one of our favourite places to play'

Image: Evil Nine

Brighton born and bred twosome, Tom Beaufoy and Pat Pardy a.k.a Evil Nine, have been making genre bending music since their alliance in 1998. The pair established themselves as breakbeat connoisseurs, they pushed musical boundaries and secured a critically acclaimed album You Can Be Special Too back in 2004.

The innovators have recently been snapped up by Stanton Warriors' Punks label and have a string of mega releases lined up for the rest of the year. 

Evil Nine are on top form and are set to unleash their signature soulful, rough sounds on crowds around the world, including Manchester's Sound Control next weekend. We caught up with Tom ahead of the gig. 

Hi Tom, thanks for taking the time to speak to us. You're playing at Lowdown's 5th Birthday in Manchester this weekend. Are you looking forward to it? 

We're really excited about this one! Manchester is one of our favorite places to play and we got a bit of a history here so no doubt we'll see some familiar faces! Got a feeling it will be BIG.

What's the reception like up North compared to back home down South? 

People up North like to get involved haha, there's no standing on the sidelines just them getting properly stuck in! Not sure what the real differences are between North and South except perhaps the crowd up north is a touch messier and the girls don't wear coats!

You're playing alongside Krafty Kuts, are you fans? 

We're from the same place actually. Brighton is our shared home. I've known Martin for such a long time since he ran a record shop back in the day, HVR (Happy Vibes Recordings) rinsing out the happy hardcore. He's a good lad and although we do kinda different things, we're fans, man's got skills on the decks for sure. 

You've recently had a release on Stanton Warriors' label Punks (listen below). How did that come about? 

Me and Dom were hanging out drinking a coffee in sunny Brighton at the end of summer and we were talking breakbeats and how there's some dope tracks being produced again, of course no ones calling it breaks, its "bass" these days. I was telling him that me and Pat were back into the beats too so he said that we should drop them an EP, four tracks so its more showcase on the new tip.

We havnt been affiliated with a label for a while so its nice to be back in a family type vibe. I reckon this year could be big for Punks, its a super strong roster with everyone making forward-thinking club music, managing I think to inject some new freshness into breakbeat.

How does it work when you are both in the studio, do you take on separate roles?  

Not as such, generally we both take it in turns in the hot seat at the computer but we do pretty much the same kinda thing which is: fuck about until it sounds ok. When the other person is not at the mouse they sit behind and pipe up with mildly encouraging statements like "I quite like that" and mildly disparaging statements like "hmmm, not so keen on that". 

Any other releases lined up that you could tell us about? 

A remix coming out next month on OWSLA , a possible mix album and other EPs on Punks and maybe a cheeky booty praps.

What's the rest of 2015 looking like for you two? 

Quite nice thank you. 

Hypothetical question, if you could go B2B with any artist from past or present, who would join you and why? And would you team up with them or pick someone different for each of you? 

Well there's loads of artists we'd love to collaborate with but if we're talking B2B then I guess its got to be a DJ. Growing up I was massively influenced by Weatherall and Laurent Garnier, both next level selectors. So playing with one of them would do the trick , B2B with someone quality generally makes you raise your game, hopefully that would be the case ha.

If you want to see the duo in action, head here for tickets. 

Tickets are no longer available for this event