Ten years ago two very passionate DJs and longtime friends – UK’s Giles Smith and James Priestley – wanted to throw a party. They called it Secretsundaze. A decade later the pair have hosted House music’s finest, from Chez Damier to Ame, Cassy, Tevo Howard and Osunlade and their Sunday afternoon soiree is still going strong.
The 10th anniversary of the party marks an exciting turning point for the team. Along with a summer schedule packed with daytime celebrations from London to New York, the milestone also marks the expansion of the Secretsundaze brand including the revival of their label (now three EPs in) and the growth of their booking branch, The Secret Agency, currently home to Detroit’s Keith Worthy as well as fresher faces such as San Soda and Ethyl & Flori.
And of course, you can’t have a celebration without a compilation – Smith and Priestley have put together the aptly titled, 10 Years of Secretsundaze, featuring an exclusive mix by each. The two disc set is essentially a Secretsundaze party in a nutshell – an eclectic, energetic and emotive journey that spans the wide, and multi-colored spectrum of House, blending in a range of joints, new and old, timeless and underrated.
Ahead of their gig here in New York, we caught up with Secretsundaze’s co-founder, Giles Smith. A dynamic and amiable character, Smith is a veteran of UK’s post-Acid House generation. He got his big break at a young age, earning a residency at the renowned Faith party run by the legendary Junior Boys Own crew. Smith’s insatiable thirst for music is the secret to his success. To say he’s a vinyl enthusiast is an understatement. In this interview, Smith chatted our ears off about wacky Japanese record dealers, schooled us in UK House music history and gave us a peek into his record bag…
halcyon: Hi Giles, how are you doing today?
Giles Smith: Hello! Well my friend and I were out until five in the morning so it’s a slow start to the day.
h: It’s all good. I’ve been there! So, it seems like you have a lot going on these days – celebrating 10 years of Secretsundaze, re-launching the label with two EPs on the shelves already, and now you have the 10 Year Anniversary Secretsundaze compilation dropping this week. Let’s talk about the compilation – it’s great. I’ve already listened to both mixes a couple of times.
GS: We’ve got a vinyl sampler coming out as well from each of our mixes. We’ve got a Marcus Intalex track, “Taking Over Me” from 2000, which is a track we both play out a lot. When it came out I think that a lot of House and Techno people missed out on it because Marcus Intalex is actually more of a Drum n’ Bass producer. He’s from Hospital Records, which is quite a cool UK Drum n’ Bass label. That was a little 10’’ that came out. It’s a real gem. In both of our respective mixes, James and I have a strong focus on highlighting undiscovered or underrated records that a lot of people don’t know that stand the test of time. They sound amazing now. We don’t try and get as many exclusive tracks as we can. That’s not really our philosophy at all.
h: Nice, I like your ethos. The versatility shows in the mixes. I’m always curious, how does one approach making a hyped up mix like that – do you have a concept behind it, a certain vibe or style you wanted to convey?
GS: Not really. You are only limited to eighty minutes, which is quite limiting to be honest. I read an interview today with Dixon about the mix format and how he’s kind of frustrated by it and it’s 80 minute length. It’s hard to get in a lot in that time.
h: Right, but that can be the fun part, too.
GS: Yes, trying to compress what you play in three or four hours is part of the fun at the same time. It’s hard to compress that style into that. You have to jump from second gear to fourth gear and you can’t touch on certain moments. But this compilation is supposed to be a representation of my DJing, and the music I like. Some people like to be more conceptual and try deconstructing tracks on Ableton, but I just want to make it nice – a nice beginning, a nice middle and a nice end really, you know?
h: Agreed. I’m sure you get asked this a lot, but how did you and James meet?
GS: We went to school in Cambridge. He came into the school a lot later than me, and he was in the year below. We went to quite an academic, strict school in Cambridge, and anyone who was a little bit different or artsy stuck out quite easily. So, usually you only hang out with people that were in your year group – that was more the norm. But you know, I think people gravitated towards each other if they were part of that “way out” group. So James and I knew we were both into music and stuff. We didn’t necessarily like the same type of music at the time but we started to go out to raves together.
h: Cool. What did you guys study at university?
GS: This was school I’m talking about.
h: Oh.
GS: This was when we were like 13 or 14.
h: Wow that’s a long relationship! But now I am curious to know now, what did you study at university? Were you always heading towards a musical path?
GS: No, not at all actually. I studied social sciences – socio-political- economic related social sciences. Music was really a passion for me, not anything that I consciously wanted to study.
h: So what kind of daytime jobs did you guys have before your careers as DJs took off?
GS: Not that much really! Well, James did actually work in record distribution for quite awhile. And I worked in a PR company. But I got sacked because I was rude to a journalist.
h: Oh really? What did you say?
GS: I was very rude. I was pretty good at my job but I’m not an ass kisser, and someone was really rude to me and I just wasn’t prepared to roll over, you know?
h: Yes.
GS: So that was the end of that. I did that for about 6 months. And pretty much I started DJing quite quickly, it happened to me quite quickly. I had quite a big break with the old school Junior Boys Own crew.
h: That’s right, you were one of their youngest residents at their legendary party, Faith. Can you tell me more about that experience?
GS: At the time, I kind of knew that Junior Boys Own was a major UK House label. This was before I moved to London. They were a lot more active six or seven years ago than they are now. They would do about four events a year, and they were quite special because it wasn’t monthly, or weekly. It was like after Christmas Day. They would sometimes throw the party in Brighton, near the beach. But it was always the “special occasion” thing that struck me about the Faith parties. And they had a slightly older crowd because that’s where they came from and that was always really fun for me. I think they liked me getting involved because I was really young compared to them! And it was a different vibe too. There was always an emphasis on having fun, but also, they were serious about their music. They used to bring a lot of cool US artists over, like Doc Martin and Dubtribe Soundsystem as well. So it was really special for me to play at those parties, because I knew the heritage of Faith. The Faith parties were really a reincarnation of the Boys Own parties from the late ’80s, Acid House era. It was all the same kind of people, like Terry Farley and Andrew Weatherall and Steve Maze too, who used to write. I don’t know if you know, but the “Boys Own” was a fanzine as well, it was a magazine, did you know that?
h: No, I didn’t.
GS: You didn’t? Well it was called “Junior Boys Own.” It was actually a magazine, a fanzine. It was a legendary early ’80s and early ’90s free magazine. It was about Acid House culture and football, and how those things collided when ecstasy came along; how the football hooligans were becoming more mellow, taking ease and going out, discovering music, and getting loved up. That was the kind of culture in a nutshell. Junior Boys Own was passionate about music and everything – fashion, football. So what I guess I’m trying to say is that the whole Boys Own crew has a lot of heritage. I was very proud too, at a fairly young age and early on in my DJ career that I became an unofficial resident really. There were five of them [in the crew], all like 40 years old, and I was just in my early 20s.
h: Speaking of magazines, didn’t you used to write for one too?
GS: Yes, DJ Mag. I really like writing, actually. I was actually at an after party, and [was talking to] Lesley Wright, who was quite a well known editor for DJ Mag for a few years. She’s quite a character. I was talking a load of rubbish about music, as usual, and I thought she was taking the piss because she said come and write some reviews for DJ Mag, but I thought she was joking because I was talking so much rubbish, at least I thought I was, anyway. So I was like ‘yah, sure.’ So I did a couple reviews, she really liked them, so I just started doing that. It was something I just kind of fell into. I just did a handful of reviews every issue. It didn’t take me more than a few hours of my time.
h: I review a lot of music too. In your opinion, what are the elements that go into what you’d consider a “good” music review?
GS: I don’t know, really. Honesty is always good. You can’t really be objective when you’re reviewing something because it’s your opinion. But if you are reviewing stuff you don’t like, I don’t think you should be doing stuff you don’t like at all! Honesty, insight… that you actually have some knowledge about the music – it’s heritage and where it stands in the scheme of things, some background and knowledge. But yeah, honesty is the main thing.
h: Being honest is key.
GS: It’s also nice to try and express yourself in different ways and not use all the same well-trodden clichés, you know? I would spend ages working out different ways of saying things.
h: I agree. I hear you are a very serious, avid record collector, and you’ll go through almost every bin in the shop?
GS: Yeah, for sure, absolutely. That, to me is what DJing should be about, really – trying to discover things that you don’t know, and other people don’t know and try to find ways to make your sets different, and stand out. I really do enjoy that process of getting my hands dirty and getting on my knees, which I quite often do in any weird position. That feeling of searching – it never really leaves you. It’s like an insatiable appetite, you know?
h: Story of my life. I love getting my fingers dusty.
GS: Every time I go to a different city, the first thing I think about is going to the record store.
h: What’s the most interesting record shop you’ve come across then?
GS: I’ve been to a guy in Japan, in his living room. He’s a private record dealer. Japan is such a crazy culture. [For example], when people are really into something in Japan, they don’t usually pursue things halfheartedly. Whatever it is you are into – records, soundsystems, etc., you go to any length to be obsessive and be expert in whatever it is they are into. They have some amazing record stores, amazing standard stores but there are also a lot of private, wacky dealers. If you know people who know people you can make appointments to go around to people’s houses. The houses pretty much double up as record stores. My first [visit] to Japan I went around to this guy’s house/store. It was by appointment only. It was pretty amazing, spending 4 or 5 hours digging there.
h: I’ve heard of private record dealers before. What kind of music did this guy have?
GS: Really a lot of obscure Disco stuff. There was a lot of House, Disco-House, but all very obscure. Some of the shops in Japan seem to have more of a back catalog of Chicago House and US music than you have when you come to the States. It’s quite bizarre.
h: I feel like there’s a certain lifestyle and mindset of a vinyl purist that transcends beyond the collecting itself. What would you say that is?
GS: I guess all the things I’ve talked about really – that kind of obsession with finding new stuff. I guess it’s part having that obsessive nature and having a real love of collecting things, having the physical object, touching the actual record, and seeing the artwork. Also, I’m a really social person, and I really like meeting people and exchanging ideas. You obviously can buy a record online, but then you won’t [have that experience] when you go into a shop where you can interact with people. That’s a really positive thing. All these people who sit online downloading stuff on the computer, it’s quite a solitary, isolating thing. It doesn’t really appeal to me. It’s a state of mind, in that respect. I don’t like the idea of me spending ages on my own, behind a laptop, listening to music, so yeah, I don’t know. Its something that’s in you, and that’s the way I am.
h: Are you at home right now?
GS: Yes.
h: Are you near your records?
GS: Well I just moved houses, so most of them are actually in boxes.
h: Well, I was going to ask, if you are near your records, could you pull out a couple and tell me something about them, perhaps a story?
GS: Oh wow, okay. Hang on a second, I’m going to go to my record bag – it’s still [packed] from the weekend. Do you want me to talk about any record, whether it’s new or old?
h: Exactly.
GS: Okay! I’ve got, in my hand, the new Dionne track on Smallville. Are you familiar with this record?
h: Yes.
GS: Its called Back on the Planet. I think Smallville is, really, for me, one of the best labels in the last few years. Its the essence of proper “deep music” as opposed to a lot of this other stuff that gets billed as “deep music’ these days. Smallville music is always very classy and timeless, it doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel. But what it does, it does extremely well and this is a prime example of that. To me, this Dionne is a very Mr. Fingers-esque with 808s, 909s, a lot of drums and a lot of atmosphere. That’s the key. There’s a kind of feeling one gets from listening to these deep records. There’s a kind of warmth in the atmosphere. So yeah, that’s a nice record and I really look forward to every time I see a Smallville release because I kind of know what I’m getting. I’m always very happy to see one on the shelf!
h: I love all those Hamburg-based labels – Smallville, Laid and Dial. They are all great.
GS: Yeah, I got their very first releases. When I was doing reviews, I would get all these promos and I reviewed all their very first records, so I get on well with those guys. What else…Okay this is really cool, it’s a new record on Ocha Records by Ezel, and it’s called “In My Lifetime.” There are two remixes on here, and they are both really good. The one I’m playing is the Yoruba Soul Dub, which is obviously Osunlade. It’s very nice, very soulful, but has a slightly futuristic side. It’s not that kind of old school retro and it’s got some sounds mixed up with some new, and also has a really sweet vocal.
h: Sounds lovely.
GS: Okay I’ve got another one. I’m a huge fan of stuff Chris Brann used to do. He’s a US producer. He used to be on Peacefrog and he has an alter ego, The Ananda Project and also the…sorry…my mind’s gone blank. My head’s up my ass today. Ah, he’s also part of the Wamdue Project. I really liked the stuff they were doing in the mid ‘90s to ’97. They produced a couple of albums on Peacefrog, which is definitely a favorite label of mine. I’ve got a copy of “Moments,” which is an album they did on Peacefrong. I’ve been playing 2 or 3 from that, so that’s in my bag.
h: I’d love to dig through your bag.
GS: (laughs) Let’s see what else. This is basically Joe Claussel, he’s got this little label called Sacred Rhythm Music, and he’s released this track, which is called “Mampo,” which is, I think, something to do with him. I think he pretty much wrote it, really. It has a lot of African influences, which is in a lot of stuff Claussel does. But it’s a very authentic African influenced House track, which is very dramatic. It’s got a huge, long introduction with a lot of percussion before you actually hit the bassline. It’s very epic and it’s about 13 minutes long. It’s quite hard to play, actually, and I have to say I haven’t still played it out yet! But I’m hoping I can find the moment to play it. It’s a pretty amazing record.
h: I recently wrote a feature on Ron Trent’s Prescription Classics Recordings and the fact that they are now making a lot of their music available in digital format. Prescription Classics was always a vinyl-only label, as you may know, but they decided to start digitalizing their music in order to keep the music and the imprint alive and pertinent in this digital day and age. Thoughts?
GS: Yeah, it’s a difficult one, isn’t it? There are different ways to look at it. What is really for me is that, seeing the fact that there’s quite this big deep House revival, they want to earn some money, which is fine – it’s their prerogative to do that. It’s actually Ron Trent who is putting them all out again. But I guess it is somewhat frustrating for people who have dug for those tracks, and tried to make their sets different. Some spend a lot of money on those records. I know I’ve spent at least 70 or 80 pounds on one record. But I also think it’s nice, for a new generation of people who don’t know that music – they can [now] access it, and download it. But I guess, it also kind of takes away a little bit if you’ve put a lot of effort into finding that music on vinyl. Then quickly given suddenly available, I can understand how it can frustrate people, and it slightly frustrates me. There’s always other stuff you can find. I don’t have a massive problem with it, but I find it slightly a bit annoying when you‘ve got one of your gems and….
h: It’s suddenly available online for the world to download.
GS: Exactly. It’s suddenly everywhere, and people are buying it because they think deep house is “cool” and they would have never got it if it wasn’t for this kind of hype, you know?
h: You have mentioned, earlier on in this interview, that you’ve noticed this deep House revival.
GS: Yeah, I don’t want to say too much about it, but deep House is like the new minimal, or whatever. I don’t really care, to be honest, I don’t’ care at all. I’ll always like this music. It’s not really going to change for me. What’s really “cool” is something different in two years time, you know?
h: Agreed. Deep House will always be my first love. You know, I find it interesting that the UK is such a vibrant and creative spot for Deep House and Disco, especially since those styles really originated in US. For someone who grew up in UK, and watched the progression of the scene, why would you say the UK has grown into such a hot spot for this sound?
GS: Well, generally, there are so many different people, from record shops to artists who have influenced the scene. But the UK has always been a place where people have always been open to new ideas and new things, and if you look at the early House days in the late ’80s and early ’90s there were many many DJs, such as Juan Atkins (Model 500), Tony Humphries, Larry Levan, who, when he did his first world DJing tour, came to the UK. I think the UK is always open to these new things and embracing new things, so although the music emanated from America – the Disco and House – I think many of those artists have actually felt more welcome in the UK than in the States. I would be as bold to say it’s more advanced. Many of those artists I’ve heard in interviews – and some have told me – say how they weren’t getting gigs in the States, so you know, they came to Europe and particularly the UK on a regular basis because their music was really welcome. They actually had a living, you know?
h: Absolutely.
GS: That’s the main thing, really. It’s quite a big question that you asked.
h: Well it’s a good answer, and a type of answer I was looking for. Speaking of the UK, and its underground House music scene – the sudden death of Kenny Hawkes was shocking to many. Did you know him?
GS: Yeah, I did know him. He played at Secretsundaze before, actually, in the first year. I remember him. It was quite funny – we invited him to play at Secretsundaze, and I remember him standing behind the bar, looking at the party, and going “oh fuck, this party is really full on, I’m not ready for this.” I think he thought it was a kind of little mellow kind of Sunday party, and he came to the party and it was really firing. I remember him. He was kind of joking but slightly nervous because he didn’t know what to expect. But he was a nice character. Good, fun guy with quite a giant sense of humor. I’d bump into him quite regularly around town, and at record stores. And obviously, UK’s underground house music scene owes a huge amount to Hawkes, for sure. Hawkes and Luke Solomon ran the Space night on a Wednesday at Bar Rumba, which was something like Back to Basics. That was before clubs like Fabric was even opened, or even a seed of an idea. Back to Basics in Leeds was a particularly special club for me. That and Space on a Wednesday at Bar Rumba with Hawkes and Solomon were the clubs who pushed US guys like Gemini, Mark Farina, Chez Damier – all those people. They were really pushing this music, this kind of underground music, which wasn’t cheesy. [Hawkes] was a little bit of a bastion of that, and he was doing a radio show on Girls FM, which was a really well known pirate radio station in London. Yeah, it’s a big loss for sure.
h: May he rest in peace.
GS: Yeah, exactly.
h: Well, looks like our time is up. Thank you for this thorough and interesting conversation. As a House music head, this has been a very intriguing interview.
GS: Well thanks, hope you can make sense of my long-winded rambling.
h: I’ll do my best. See you on the boat!
Don’t miss the boat when Blk|market Membership and Global Frequencies present the 10 years of Secretsundaze cruise this Sunday, July 17th, 2001.
10 Years of Secret Sundaze CD compilation and other Secretsundaze vinyl releases are available at halcyon the shop.
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