Searching for clarity with Eddie Leader

Image: Eddie Leader

Eddie Leader has been at the forefront of all things house for many years. Over the last ten years his Hudd Traxx imprint has come up with over 50 releases from the likes of Rick Wade, Chris Carrier, Matthew Herbert, DJ Sneak, Hector Moralez and Rio Padice. And every single one of them was released on vinyl - Eddie wouldn’t have it any other way.

As he looks forward to his label’s ten year bash at The Whiskey Jar on November 14th, he spoke to us about tinnitus: an issue that he has become increasingly vocal about in recent times, even making it as far as the couch on BBC Breakfast News.

Thanks to the efforts of Eddie and others, Action On Hearing Loss is funding research into tinnitus. Helped by this funding, there are currently two anti-tinnitus drugs at the clinical trial stage. More generally, the organisation has pledged to cure all hearing loss in the next ten years.

It appears to be an ambitious pledge but the signs from the research are positive. Never the less, they strongly recommend that all clubbers wear ear plugs, and they point out that for as little as fifteen pounds, people can buy customisable ear plugs that are good enough to protect their ears without it affecting their listening experience.

Tinnitus… you’re becoming quite the spokesperson!

It’s the third interview about it this year.

How did you get into this position?

I suffer from tinnitus myself and ended up doing a sponsored silence for the charity, Action On Hearing Loss. I raised a bit of awareness and money. And then through that, their publicity team got in touch with me and said ‘could you do an interview for the BBC?’, and that’s how it happened. I’m definitely happy to get involved everywhere I can to raise awareness.  

It was 48 hours of silence, right?

Yep. Being quiet is a lot harder than you’d think. I mean I talk quite a lot, and people speak to you and your automatic response is to talk back.

It’s quite difficult doing that but it’s quite interesting to get some kind of insight into what it must be like for people who haven’t got any hearing. It was quite an interesting experience. A friend of mine did a week’s silence for Action On Hearing Loss. Not sure I could have done that.

What did you do to amuse yourself?

Oh it was painful. I thought I’d just stay in but I had to go out. I actually went out to see a band on Saturday night, and guess what, the music was actually too loud! So I actually messed up and said “the music’s too loud”.

Hahaha, how ironic it was that! So what’s your story with tinnitus then?

I got my tinnitus after going to a night in Edinburgh about five or six years ago. I’ve always been aware of it actually because I started DJing at a really young age and my mother would tell me to watch my ears.

| actually got some custom-made earplugs when I was early twenties, and then sometimes I’d wear them out but then I wouldn’t wear them when I was DJing. 

I was stupid because I knew about the risks, and yet I still got it. But when I did get it, I got on top of it and I managed to prevent it from getting any worse.

What did you do?

I got lucky and went to see an audiologist and obviously there’s no cure but she gave me this thing called Sound Oasis. It’s basically like a wave machine that has various noises of rain forests, the ocean tide coming in and out. 

When I hear my tinnitus it would be at night, when it’s quiet, or if you’re stressed. But because I’ve actually got that Sound Oasis, I put it on all the time and it’s quite relaxing, so I almost forget I’ve got it sometimes because the level of that is louder than the tinnitus. 

As you say, there’s no cure, so prevention is what it’s all about. What do you think should be done to prevent more cases like yours?

Maybe there should be some sort of level restriction brought in. As a DJ it’s not really something I guess people want to hear you say. But at the end of the day, most clubs don’t give out ear plugs.

It’s just every man and woman for themselves really. The venues are happy to sell people booze and take money on the door, but they don’t want to be responsible for their hearing.

I think some sort of legal precedent would make venues take it more seriously. There are European laws about it. I’m sure these European laws are getting broken every night of the week, all over the country, and yet it would seem no one has been brought to book about it. Who really polices this?

I just don’t think there is anyone. I think you’re right. When clubs have to turn the music down it’s a council thing for noise disturbance - nothing to do with people’s ears. 

It’s tough to find a solution, because right now you could recommend that every clubber wears earplugs, but in reality, that’s not going to happen. Do you think it’s fair comment to say that the public hold a little responsibility, but that it should really be the people who are making money out of the public that stand up and make the effort to look after them?

Yes, absolutely. When you think back to being a kid yourself as a teenager when you first go out clubbing, you’re definitely not thinking about your ears. You’re thinking about going out, having a good time, having a drink and listening to some good music. It’s the last thing on your mind.

I definitely agree that clubs and maybe even the big DJs have some sort of responsibility to get the message across to kids. The thing is about some of these superstar, elitist DJs - they’ve got such an influence on people that they didn’t used to have. 

And obviously you’ve got social media, so that’s probably one thing that could work, but it’s just, how do people get them to do that, and do they actually care? But all we seem to hear online between big DJs is rants and feuds between them, I mean really, who gives a shit about that?

Or they’re telling us they’re stuck in an airport!

Yeah. I actually think a lot of DJs are too worried about their own image, their own publicity and their own gigs, as opposed to doing things that can help other people. The more I think about it, the more I think they’ve got a big responsibility.

The other thing that I was thinking about is how much do clubs really want to get involved with it? Are they scared if they put the message about ‘protect your hearing’? i.e. will as many people turn up to clubs? It does potentially mean they could lose some money.

It’s one of those things that some people are aware of and some people aren’t, but you don’t really think about it until it’s too late. There probably should be more information readily available to clubbers as well, but the industry should be doing more.

For more information on tinnitus you can head to the Action On Hearing Loss website.

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