MP3 : Steinki - Nothing to Fear Mix,
Excerpt 3
MF : Village Voice described you as "..just a perpetually disillusioned optimist who still assumes that the sounds and images rippling through the American consciousness are, forget copyright, every American's birthright--that we're all free to interpret and manipulate them as we choose..." Do you feel that all music is open to sampling ?
SS: Oh hell yeah, it's open - whether or not it's legal is another thing entirely. And i think it should be, because this is how society evolves. Stuff changes, stuff happens, people get a hold of it...
MF : I think that Rock & Roll wouldn't have happened if the original bluesmen had barred the Stones from using their riffs...
SS: But it would be nice if they got paid. The Stones were particularly nasty in that they took the original artist's names off the compositions, and put their own names on. That's not fair - that's straight-up cheating. And maybe they weren't responsible for it, and maybe it was their book-keeper, or their manager, but I feel that's a little different. Sampling is music moving forward, this is culture moving forward, and I think this is how it works.
MF : Culture feeds off it's antecedent...
SS: ...Yeah it's not only feeding off what came before, but there's also now the technology that's never existed before - there's a much more level playing field. Some 15 year old kid with a computer in his bedroom can turn out some amazing stuff and probably will, and make us all turn around and go - why didn't I think of that ? And what he shouldn't be able to - because he's using something that already exists ? It's similar now to the intellectual properties of the pharmeceutical companies. If one of them came up with the cure for AIDS - they're not going to give it out. heaven forfend that they should ever give it away to sick people. If some 15 year old biology minded kid came up with the cure, maybe he could post it on the web and evryone gets a cure for AIDS. For nothing. Intellectual property has its real drawbacks, y'know. I mean I want every bluesman to get paid, but I don't care about a pharmaceutical company.
MF : What do you think of the mash-ups that have gone crazy in the last year or so ?
SS: Oh well, the bastard pop, or the mash-up stuff, yeah that's pretty interesting. I mean, it has a certain limited appeal to me, because once you've got the joke - once you've heard the verse and the chorus - alright, what's for dinner. But some of them are really clever and really entertaing - I think everyone should have a crack at it man. A lot of good people are going to get started doing this and they're going to grow up into doing other things, so I have nothing against it.
MF : Can I ask you about "It's Up To You" ?
SS: It's up to you was right after the first gulf war. That's a lot older than a lot of people think. I regret to say that it still sounds fairly current. I didn't jump at doing anything about this war - and the time was different now than it was then, a lot of people have done a lot of things, so I didn't feel quite the same amount of pressure and responsibility. I mean, who am I to feel responsibility, but it has come over time that I want to deal with the themes of war and rogue governments in a slightly more abstract way. I'm putting together stuff so that I can, and using legally cleared stuff so that I can get it out there.
MF : Is it a responsibility of an artist to be politically active ?
SS: Well, it is, but man it's hard to say. On the one hand, you have all the historical precedents for governments making war, for people protesting, for social change to come about through struggle, but on the other hand you have, well, this is 2005, and things are a differnt now. We are one of the largest, most powerful countries in the world, and a gang of lying thieves has kidnapped the government. And they also have in place an enormous propaganda machine that... I don't think I could even describe to you properly how pervasive it is here.So many people here, their attitudes are so shaped by the poular media, and the popular media is in the hands of the republicans. It's like living with pod people.The state of public discourse here is about the level of third grade. It's hard to believe how awful it is. More than half the people in the United States do not believe in the theory of evolution - it's happened in survey after survey.
MF : What can you do about it ?
SS: My first impulse is to move away. If Canada would have me, my wife and I would be there in a heartbeat ! I don't give a shit that it's freezing nine months of the year, I'd rather be cold, but with sane people, than in temperate climates with a bunch of yahoos. Keep in mind man - people here..the standard of living has dropped so oprecipitously, that most families work - the husband and wife both have full time jobs. In cases like that, who the hell has time to spend on national politics. If you're responsible,maybe you catch an hour or two of TV, and the TV is written by the republicans. Most people think they're watching the world news - when in real life, it's the republican agenda.
MF : Last question - what are you listening to ?
SS: Ah man, a whole bunch of stuff...Cuban Jam Sessions vol 2, features a bass player called Cachao, recorded in 1955. Absolutely colossal. What else, The Books, you know them ? Really interesting, couple of string instrument musicans who use samples..Ming & FS, favourites of mine, and ooh...Lafayette Afrorock Band, a wonderful compilation put together by Strut, before they went under. I was so angry that's too bad, they put out some great stuff... some classical, I don't even know the names of it, I just throw it in the player, and a lot of old jazz...the best known would be a band called the McKinney's Cotton Pickers, some compilations as well, Jazz The World Forgot - just fucking wonderful, i don't know why i have such a taste for music from the 20's or 30's, I just love that stuff...
Big thanks to Steve for the time, Next Up...hero of the hammond, Reuben Wilson