Interviews

Patti Labelle - Music Is My Way Of Life (Dave Lee Remix)

This to us is disco remix perfection. Naturally, the original material is 24-carat gold, yet Dave Lee's way of reworking the parts to create an arrangement that continues to keep stepping up and up (and up) into dancefloor euphoria is a totally masterful demonstration of the art of the remix.

Paul Cauthen – Cocaine Country Dancing

God bless the Marina Fountain rave pub of St Leonards! The good landlord there, a great friend, played this to us over The Big Speakers during a lock-in one night after we'd been playing there, and we lost our shit. Reason being: country got cool again. Cauthen confirmed that, and he was clearly also a new Outlaw Country king in the making (we're pleased to see him now being crowned, five years later). We play our own beefy FMB edit of this track out and it always goes down a treat.

Rudy Norman – Back To The Streets

Rudy! The sweetest guy. Our remix of this was an important release for us in two ways – being invited by the man himself to rework such a cult AOR track and also for leading to our first release with Ubiquity Records by starting what's become a really strong and fruitful relationship over recent years. The remix also found itself released around the time lockdown was easing so its chorus line felt really powerful to us then too.

The Chemical Brothers - Setting Sun

We grew up during the 90s and this kind of psychedelic rock-meets-rave hitting the mainstream no doubt influenced what we like to go out and dance to ourselves as well as helping to normalise in popular culture the kinds of productions we like to release. These guys are inspirational for the longevity of their career too, they continue to evolve but always sound like themselves.

Lonnie Mack – Mexico

We were invited by number one jam band Phish to provide the daytime and late night poolside entertainment at their 'Riviera Maya' weekender in Cancun earlier this year. Dropping this slow and sleazy, unshazamable blues-funk deep cut to finish an afternoon of midtempo FMB refritos turned a ton of heads and led to loads of follow-up track ID requests online too. It shows two things: one, always be prepared for the chance to play the exact right track at the right time even if you think that moment might never come; and two, you can play just about anything you want if you’ve earned the trust of your audience.

Black Sabbath - Planet Caravan (Balam Edit)

Sometimes we like to surprise one another by dropping tunes mid-set that the other might not know about. The first time this got an airing, by Jack, was one such occasion. It led to Ben aiming to imitate the production style but using a sample from Neil Young’s ‘Tonight’s The Night’ – a track that he’d loved for years and had noticed how suitable for a remix (both lyrically and musically) it would be. The result was quite different to the inspiration, but that’s the beauty of art hey.

Digital Zandoli

Original dance music! This is here to illustrate how inspiration can come from unexpected places. Though we have a relatively tight bandwidth to the sound of what we produce, our listening habits are very wide – we love good music in general and when we’re not DJing as FMB we draw from a much wider range of styles. One of these West Indies zouk tracks formed the basis of our track Keep On, though you wouldn’t really be able to pick that out from the finished product.

Orleans – Business As Usual

Jack: One of the first tracks we turned our hands to re-editing – irresistible guitar licks and swagger. If I remember rightly the trippy visuals, we used for this track involved a gargantuan rodeo bull in slow-motion kicking up dust while marauding rancheros. Part of a mixtape, the track and its video made me feel like we were really starting to realise our creative vision for the project.

Daft Punk – Aerodynamic

Ben: This has massive nostalgic value and an otherworldly quality to it. My brother and I would listen to Discovery in his car in our late teens. Like with the Chems above, I suppose it was the first ever dance music album I got into, although it felt more like robot rock with synths at the time. I love the aesthetic, the artwork, and the majesty of the baroque-esque synth guitar parts. It's flamboyant and excellent in a way only the French can pull off.

Claggers – Umber Rag

Another great example of killer tracks brought to us by our friends. They sure know what we like. Our top amigo Harry of None More Records joined us on tour in California last year, and though we still don’t forgive him for taking a week to play us this track out there, to be fair the moment he chose to stick it on late at night on a boat in Santa Barbara was just absolutely unforgettable. A treasured memory, chosen as an example of the great adventures that FMB has led to. More please!