Love this mix from Stu! Working in some classics with modern mind bending gear he sends some major good vibrations with this set. Electro, funk, disco, boogie and soul are all coolly thrown into the melting pot. Stu runs the record label and collective Cosmic Boogie that started about three years ago as a home for like minded DJs, backed by legend and friend Greg Wilson. Watch out for edits by Stu, Greg and other luminaries like Ashley Beedle on Cosmic Boogie hitting your local vinyl store soon … in the meantime check out his great mix, interview and the tracklisting is below.
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STU ROBINSON (COSMIC BOOGIE) INTERVIEW
hey Stu, thanks for the mix! Please tell where you are from and about the Cosmic Boogie collective?
Hey no problem – thanks for having it. The mix is something I put together which is a bit more uptempo and upfront perhaps than I usually play, showing more what a club or festival set might be like. As for the Cosmic Boogie Collective – Cosmic Boogie is based in Liverpool and I am originally from just outside the city limits. A few years ago when we all got together with the idea, there were three of us (and Greg), but now the others have moved on to other things. So really Cosmic Boogie is just me with Greg’s input and Dicky Trisco also helps out with the running of the imprint. I still get lots of people involved as and when I can, and Gav, one of the original collective, supplied a mix a few weeks back – so we’re still very much all on the same vibe. I’m open to letting people into Cosmic Boogie though – so I keep the idea of it being a collective again at some point…
How did you meet Greg?
About 3 or 4 years ago I had read ‘Love Saves the Day’ by Tim Lawrence, and the book changed how I thought about modern dance music. It changed pretty much everything in fact. I was already leaning heavily towards this era of music, but never had the picture been painted so clearly. I started to scour the web, books and anything else finding every bit of information I could on the origins of dance music – and quite by accident I came across Greg’s website (electrofunkroots), and fell in love with the best of 83 mix. After reading everything I could (all the articles and tracklists), i got in touch with Greg – he lived not too far away from me and we met up a few weeks later. I owe alot to the advice and input from Greg – he has pointed me in the right direction many times, giving advice on mixes, edits, the direction of the site (and also some general life help from time to time). Cosmic Boogie is an outlet for Greg to host all his mixes from the years gone by and we get so much interest to the site because of that, and in turn Greg has a good reference point for things he wants to put online – so really, I suppose its a two way thing now. The name Cosmic Boogie was also originally something Greg had coined a long time back – so, without Greg – this would not exist. We’re good friends now – and I have as much time and respect for him as anyone in my life (apart from the football – but lets not go into that…)
What kind of music is the collective into?
Groove based music I suppose. I dont really know much about when one genre ends and another one begins. I suppose if i had to think about it off the cuff I would say Disco, Funk, Boogie, Soul, Jazz Funk, Rare Groove…and so on…however, there are so many tracks that fit into all those genres, I can never really tell what’s what. Not being a part of the original rare groove scene, for example, I dont know if a track is rare groove or disco, or probably even jazz funk. What I would say is that I pretty much like anything that is good, but I probably lean more to a black American funk sound than a European or Italo based sound. I was a drum and bass DJ for about 10 years as well so I love breakbeats, bass and percussion – in fact, I’d say that percussion and bass are the most important things in a track for me. Have a listen to any of the mixes on the site and you would get a good idea of the overall sound I am into, although it moves around a lot. There are some genres i dont fully understand – trance, haircut electro and i’m probably also not the biggest house music fan on the earth either. However, I try not to close myself off to anything. I asked Theo Parrish last year if there was any genre of music he doesn’t get something from and he said every scene, every genre, every vibe has something you can pick up and learn from – so who am I to argue.
You’ve just released the first record on the new Cosmic Boogie label. Are they your edits and have you got more lined up?
Yeah I got together with Dicky Trisco thanks to sending him some tracks, and we decided to go with it, setup a label, and the first release (with both edits by me) came out in May. Its been a great working relationship so far, and the second release will be two Ashley Beedle edits (thats coming out in August), then the third again by me. The fourth will be Greg Wilson on one side, and Ian Dewhurst on the other side (Ian is the person who put all the mastercuts CD’s together in the early 90′s) and I perdsonally am really excited about that. As you can see with the people involved, with the Cosmic Boogie edits we’re trying to get a particular sound – the exploration of ‘cosmic’ but without it involving the whole Baldelli vibe. I don’t have anything against that, I just want a different side of space disco, something that maybe isn’t over saturated at the moment. Moving further into next year I am hopeful that some of the other material I edit will be coming out on some other more upfront labels like Disco Deviance and so on. I have a few other bits on soundcloud (www.soundcloud.com/cosmicboogie) that are getting good props – including a talking heads edit I did that people are free to download. That seems to be getting alot of interest thanks to support from Greg and a few others in the scene. So really, all good…and of course quite exciting.
You also promote a party in called Archive in Liverpool, please tell us a bit more about it?
Archive is, alas, no more. It was great while it lasted, but I am no longer involved in it. It was financially crippling to try and put on big nights in a city that is dominated by a few clubs – and perhaps doesn’t quite have a base strong enough to support this kind of night. We tried our best, we had some great parties (Theo Parrish, Greg, Optimo, Danny Wang, Fultion, Trusme…etc) but it just got too tricky to work on, too draining, and tempers frayed a little towards the end. There are other nights starting to crop up in Liverpool – including one with Kelvin Andrews called Altiplano – I went along to that last month and it was great – the next one has Balearic Mike from Manchester playing, and I am really hopeful that they can get off the ground – Liverpool needs something like this. I am trying to work out starting a Cosmic Boogie night, but i’m waiting for a venue to come free – and it might take some time.
I read that you recently played at Cream in Liverpool, how did that go off?
Yeah it was cool to be asked to do that – in all fairness, I played the opening hour so it wasn’t super busy – although I doubt many people have ever played an hour of disco in Cream before, so really I am very grateful for it. The night was Sasha and Digweed in the main room, and then all the smaller nights in Liverpool in the famous Annex. The sound-system was incredible, I had a fridge full of cold beer, and my own sound engineer. That was nice – I thought the people in Cream were actually really good – they could have been all “who the fuck are you” – but far the opposite – they made me (and the other dj’s who had never played there) feel very welcome. I’d love to play again some day, but I doubt that Cream is somewhere that an audience truly into the sound I am into would frequent. Stranger things have happened though…
How did you get into djing and making music?
Thats a simple one – I love it. I fell in love with the rave scene when i was a young kid – growing up in the north west of the UK you had lots of great clubs, and members of my family had all been into the northern soul scene so i think it ran through my blood. When I found dance music, I found something I connected with – and although a lot of my friends who I started going out with all those years ago have moved on – I never could. I just live and breathe everything about music, so naturally dj’ing was the next step, and the next step from that is editing and producing music. I can play the keyboard a little bit and so there is a musical streak running through me. I think music is the most important thing you can have in your life, and I tell my two little girls that all the time. They both love music too – and I hope they find a connection and get the same pleasure I have.
What are you current top 5 tunes?
Thats a tough one, so these might not be my top 5 that I am playing out at the moment – but the top 5 I am listening to and loving the most (in no order).
Listen to the Music (Allenby Chilton Edit) – Candi Statton
Strawberry Letter 23 – The Brothers Johnson
Simple Things (Work It OUt) (Todd Terje remix) – Shit Robot
Dont Tell Me Tell Her – Oddysey
Everything is Ok (Ashley Beedle Edit) – Al Green
What do you think will make the world a better place?
The only thing that comes to mind right now from such a profound question, is the capitulation of Manchester United.
Would you like to give a shout out to anyone?
Yes absolutely – big gay shout outs to Greg, Dicky Trisco, Mark Webster, Gav, Neil, Paul Outlar, Adam Wilson and hairy chum Roscoe on the music side, and from the generally letting me be everything I need to be in my life, a shout to my three girls, Vikki, Ellie and Amber.
Nice one!
Tracklisting:
Gaz Nevada / I.C. Love Affair – ZYX Records
The Emperor Machine / Kananana – DC Recordings
Tensnake / Holding Back My Love – Running Back
Candi Statton / Listen… (Fat Camp Edit) – PPF
Do It / Out In The Sticks – Disco Deviance
The Popular Peoples Front / Cellophane Lover – PPF
Brooklyn Express / Change Position 88 – Unidisc
Dorothys Fortress / Milo’s Revenge – Destroy All Planets
DT Edit / Make Em Move – CDR
Feels Good (You Got The Love) (Cosmic Boogie goes to New Brighton Edit) – Disco Deviance
International Music Machine / Run Away
MikeBurns / Galaktattakk – Disco Devil
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