Interview: Will Saul talks Simple, secrets, and the scene

There are his two record labels, Simple and Aus Music, outlets that collectively have provided homes for Matthew Jonson, Jimpster, I:Cube, SCB, Ramadanman, Appleblim, John Tejada, dOP, Dixon, Midland and Lee Curtiss, to name but a handful. On top of those you’ve got the relentless international club bookings, and stunning production oeuvre.

Indeed the man in question, Will Saul, is a busy guy - but makes simultaneously spinning such potentially challenging plates seem relatively easy. Since his first major break - via Muzik magazine’s Bedroom Bedlam mixtape competition - he has added string after string to this intimidating bow, with his reputation as astute A&R, technical DJ, and studio wizard now more than well established.

With all this in mind, and his forthcoming date at Manchester’s Kraak Gallery, we decided it was time to call his London HQ for a quick chat. We ended up speaking for some time about successful multi-tasking, why Simple Records recently restarted, that long-awaited full-length album and the state of modern dance music. He also mentions a club with a toilet in the DJ booth, so read on if you want to know more about any of those issues.

Hi Will, how are you today?
I’m OK, I’m just at home at the moment though and really should be in the office but I’ve got a three month old baby that has been up all night.

Oh, how is fatherhood treating you then?
It’s treating me very well thanks, it’s amazing, but a bit tiring at times…

We can imagine. Other than parenting what else has been going on recently then?
Well it’s been quite a busy time really. In the last few years I’ve been working on an album which should be out later this year. Gig-wise I had a great show recently at Panorama Bar, playing with Scuba back-to-back for six hours, which was a lot of fun. And I’ve just spent the last few days collaborating on a track with Glimpse. So yeah, it’s been busy for a while, I took off some time in November for the baby’s arrival too.

This album then, it has been a while coming. Is it finally finished?
Yeah, it is. Unfortunately I can’t really tell you much about it though as it’s coming out under a completely different name. But it has taken a couple of years to do and there are a lot of vocals in there. I can’t really tell you much about the vocalists either I’m afraid, for the same reasons.

Because it’s more of an ambitious, song-based project I’m actually looking at getting it signed to a bigger label to let it have more of a chance. I’ll probably leak who’s behind it once it has been picked up but at the moment it’s got to be a bit hush hush.

OK, so without giving anything away, at all, it’s still electronically focused?
Yes, it is, absolutely. But it touches on a wide variety of styles- from dub to pop, disco, and kind of Detroit techno-electro stuff, and all in a way so there’s nothing, even instrumentals, that’s over five minutes. Most are three and a half to four, everything keeps changing, the hooks are constantly evolving- i.e. they’re non-linear - and I’ve written it as a full complete album. A whole piece, not individual singles.

Sounds interesting. Obviously you’re re-starting Simple again too, what’s going on there then?
I mean Simple is nearly ten years old now, and obviously it was retired after fifty releases last year, but it’s re-launching because I’ve just found a load of artists who have re-invigorated my faith in house music a little bit. So that begins in March with an artist called October, with remixes from Legowelt. Then there’s another EP lined up from a new act called Dusky, and another new act called Six Finger.

On top of that there’s an EP in the pipeline from Sei A, who is obviously a lot more established. So that will be four EPs out before summer, so yeah I’m really excited about Simple again actually. There’s some really exciting, fresh house music at the moment that isn’t, you know, like the Aus sounding stuff, going further into bass music. I want Simple to be more purist.

And what do you think of the way the Aus Music sound has developed?
It’s kind of happened by accident to be honest. It started out as a home for Lee Jones and my partner in the label, Fink, who also records under Sideshow. So it was always meant as a kind of leftfield outlet- Fink is very much dub influenced, and Lee is sort of melancholic, cinematic house music.
That was the beginning.

Then because it was a bit different I started getting sent stuff from the likes of Ramadanman and Appleblim when the dubstep thing started to get a bit more experimental. Aus seemed like the best place for them, as I wasn’t going to put that stuff out on Simple. As a result of that early uptake of those guys we’ve obviously had a lot of involvement with that sound. Midland, SCB, obviously Joy Orbison was a big one for us too.

So it kind of grew like that really. I didn’t wake up one day and think ‘right, I’m going to market and make some bass-led house music. It’s just one of those things that happened in such a way. And because we were there in that early stage it has grown into a bit of a focal point for that scene.

In terms of focal points, your biography references national magazine DJ competitions, and taping the Top 40. Are we missing these kind of unifying outlets now there are so many sources of music, and music press?
Yeah, I think that’s spot on really. Just the sheer volume of references out there is all encompassing. There’s just so much out there. And I think that’s why electronic music is so varied right now. But I can’t say that’s a bad thing because I love that about it to be honest. Kids these days have such an amazing amount of things to go on. They can learn about old techno, and hear every seminal Detroit record in about 24 hours research online, and then they can go and learn about post punk or whatever. As such they have all these different sounds, then these are put together and that’s where all this post-dubstep or whatever you want to call it sound comes from.

You don’t have to trek to record stores, record Top 40s or anything like that anymore. As a result the genres are melting into one. People can afford to explore more than one style of music, rather than before when you’d spend all your pocket money on three house records. I don’t know if that answers the question really. It has definitely happened though, and in some ways it’s a good thing.

But then… no, actually I think it’s a good thing, now I’m talking about it like this. It’s sad that people won’t have that same record shop experience and
stuff like that, though if you can listen to the entire Planet E back catalogue at the touch of a button, well I like that.

So is the scene healthy right now then?
Musically I think the answer has to be yes really. On the flip side though such open access means people take things for free, which is changing the landscape of how people get paid. Record labels find it very hard to exist now, proper ones, with the revenue streams available at the moment, because people are choosing not to pay for music.

From that perspective it’s a different kettle of fish, and I don’t have the answer. If I did I’d probably be pretty rich right now because the bottom line is major labels don’t have the answer either, otherwise piracy wouldn’t be so rife. It really has to come from higher, right down from government level if we’re going to control piracy, though I’m not sure that’s really the answer either.

You’ll be up in Manchester to play Kraak Gallery next week, when was the last time you were in town?
It’s been quite a long time actually, in fact a very long time. It’s funny, DJing, you tend to play somewhere a lot then you don’t go there for ages. It has been years though, but I’ve always had a great time there; I played Sankeys maybe in 2009, they were all great gigs anyway.

Anywhere else stood out of late?
Well, obviously the Panorama Bar gig was particularly good. Also the label showcase at Fabric in November was great too. Ego, in Hamburg, is one of the best places I’ve ever played- that’s a really small place owned by Solomun, a super club really.

I also played a lot in Italy last year, The Tunnel in Milan was an awesome place. Oh, and Tokyo, this club that’s now called Eleven was amazing, and it wasn’t the highlight but they had this huge DJ booth, which was miles away from the toilet, and I was thinking how on Earth am I going to get to the toilet- I was on for four hours. Then I got told there was a little cubicle in the booth, which was pretty memorable.

Words: Martin Guttridge-Hewitt

Will Saul plays at Construct at Manchester's Kraak Gallery on March 16th. Tickets are available through Skiddle below.

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