The Judge still won't budge

Photo: Judge Jules

The true art of DJing lies in managing to imbue your personality in the records you select, irrespective of the sound you represent or the skills you bring to the table. Mr Scruff's playful persona runs amok in the eclecticism of his offerings, Loco Dice's rolling rhythms encapsulate his swaggering hip-hop background and the bubbly immediacy of Annie Mac is guaranteed when she speaks and plays music. 

One man who has never failed to do anything but embody his manner with his music has been Judge Jules, whose larger than life attitude has always been a consistent accompaniment to his unrelenting big room sound. For over a decade he was the custodian of the harder end of the spectrum of dance music on Radio One, a bosh counterpart to Pete Tong’s snapshot of mainstream clubland, and it was all allayed with that trademark voice and ebullient sensibility.

That sound evolved and changed frequently over the years, with funk fuelled hard house in the nineties mutating towards rolling techno, industrial trance and speaker shredding electro as the new century dawned. But all along that trademark appearance, crowd pleasing aplomb and hedonistic allure remained constant, a totem for those who like their electronic music harder and faster.

In 2015, a full thirty years since his early days at Kiss FM during its pirate heyday, Jules is still representative of that echelon of clubland that shows no signs of disappearing any time soon, with his Global Warm Up radio show syndicated across the globe (hear the latest edition above).

His aptly named 'Judge Won't Budge' tour sees him jet across the UK this Spring, as well as a date at the Tidy Weekender on March 27th. Ahead of it all we caught up him to see where a genuine icon of clubland stands in 2015.

You've just launched your ‘Judge Won’t Budge Tour’. Where are you taking the concept and how does this reflect where you are musically in 2015?

Well, it’s nice to package things together, and as someone who by nature has evolved musically, in 2015 I suppose my sets are very much a combination of my own mashups and productions.  

The only way to differentiate yourself as a DJ in the modern era, when people, by fair means and foul, can get hold of tracks so quickly is to deliver something that you’re fairly confident is different – that’s difficult to achieve unless you’re producing your own music.  

That’s where we’re at in 2015, and the Judge Won’t Budge Tour is the showcase.

You’ll also be hitting the Tidy Weekender at the end of March. Is the Tidy Weekender somewhere you've enjoyed playing before? And how active are you planning on being on the festival circuit as a whole this summer?

The Tidy Weekender is something that I have done on a number of occasions, dotted over the years; I’ve got huge respect for the Tidy Boys because they are, more than almost any DJs I’ve encountered over my career, prepared to take chances, be different and let it all hang out.  

They’ll drop Shirley Bassey in the middle of a set or the theme to a children’s TV show, but the backdrop is interesting and quirky dance music. I’ve always had a connection with them as friends and a great respect for them as DJs. 

Having DJed since the late eighties, what have been some of the major changes in the field? And how has the raving climate changed in that time?

I suppose that most significant change in dance music would have to be the internet because it’s easy to forget that the internet hasn’t always been here. Throughout the nineties whilst I first started DJing, dance music felt like a bit of a private member’s club – you either listened to the radio, which largely played mainstream music, or you went to clubs, where they played tracks that you simply couldn’t encounter any other way.  

Now of course, the internet is all about DJs having Soundcloud pages where you’re exposed to exactly what they do. It’s become more difficult to differentiate yourself. I think that the trick now is to apply a ‘less is more’ mentality and not expose everything you do on your social media pages, so that your live sets still have a bit of intrigue about them.

During your time as Radio One’s dance music authority, what records did you particularly enjoy breaking?

There were so many records I enjoyed breaking. I think that’s because I was the only DJ playing a certain area of music - the trancier side of things. I don’t exactly bask in reflective glory over breaking records, but over the years I’ve had a great number of producers expressing gratitude about the support I gave their records and the platform I provided for their careers.  

But when you’re on a station like Radio One, which is unique in the world really, that’s the least you can do. I’m not trying to evade the question and give you any one particular track, because it happened all the time and it’s such an important function of being on the radio.  

My Global Warm Up show (the radio show I've hosted for over 10 years) is still played on over 80 stations across the world and that’s what I continue to do – break new music (listen to the latest edition above).

You’ve had a successful run with Paul Van Dyk’s Vandit imprint over the past few years, have you any more records in the pipeline that we can look forward to, either with Vandit or elsewhere?

I’ve probably been releasing about three tracks a year but I’m trying to up the ante to four or five.  I’ve got a new single called ‘Turn Out The Lights’ – we’ve not finalised which label it’ll be coming out on just yet but it’s a really interesting track.  

I’ve always tried to make tracks that sit between genres rather than necessarily being hamstrung and frightened to step out from the genre boundaries that, sadly, so many producers seem hindered by.  So ‘Turn Out The Lights – that’s my next offering, keep an ear out for it.

Will you be returning to the White Isle later this year for Judgement Fridays? Does Ibiza still have the same magic it did when you first started playing there?

Ibiza will be happening this summer for me. Ibiza as a whole is now slightly different to ‘back in the day’ in that it’s more corporate and VIP-orientated but there’s still plenty of magic on the island. As a destination it’s totally unique and it’s perhaps a victim of its own success. 

The VIP tables and the slightly less ‘earthy’ nature of Ibiza are a by-product of its fantastic popularity.  I mean, there are probably five times as many flights from the UK to Ibiza as there were when I first started playing there, which suggest there are at least five times as many people heading there during July and August.

Where else are you looking forward to playing this year?

The Judge Won’t Budge Tour is taking me right though to the start of summer. These dates are part of the re-brand and as the tour is a kind of mission statement regarding my intentions for 2015, there is no one date that I’m looking forward to over the others, the whole tour is something I’m very excited about.

Finally, a hypothetical question - You've been asked to throw your ultimate rave. You can have the bill on any DJ in history, alive or dead. Who would join you?

An absolutely legendary DJ called Larry Levan (now sadly departed) who was the resident DJ at the Paradise Garage in the eighties. Old dance music heads have a lot of respect for Larry, and as a young DJ on Kiss FM in the early nineties I interviewed him just before he passed away. It’s one of his last interviews available. 

See theJudge Won't Budge Tour dates and Jules' other UK shows here. Get your Tidy Weekender tickets below.

Tickets are no longer available for this event