Brookes Brothers Interview

Although Phil and Dan Brookes, a.k.a. the Brookes Brothers, have come a long way from their hometown, you can still feel their London roots in the core of what they do. Strongly influenced by Soul and Reggae, these guys produce a sound that is completely original to other Drum & Bass teams. With worldwide festivals under their belt and support from the likes of DJ Fresh and Radio 1’s Zane Lowe, we spoke to the Brothers about the current music scene and their strong connections in the industry that have catapulted them into the spotlight.

Hello there Phil and Dan Brookes, all the way from out here in Melbourne. I have to say that as a London-born fan, it’s exciting to see how far you have spread your sound. What have been your other favourite places to play and where do you want to go next?
Thanks! It’s always a buzz to see our music travel so far and wide! We’ve played in some amazing places. Some of our faves – aside from Melbourne of course – have been Tokyo, Thailand and Puerto Rico. It’s hard to choose.

So, while we’re talking of favourite things, what about festivals? What have been your favourites to attend and what ones have you played at/ enjoyed? Are there any that you’re keen to be a cheeky headliner for?
We’ve played the main stage at Exit Festival in Serbia twice now supporting the Prodigy and Jamiroquai, which have both been amazing. Also Pukkelpop & Tomorrowland in Belgium were both incredible. We aren’t too concerned about headlining but it’d be great to play Glastonbury one year; that one has never happened for us!

Okay, having talked about away ventures – what about home ones? How long were you residents at Fabric for, and do you feel your sound has changed at all since then? Is it a place you want to return to or are you so over it?
We were residents there for around three years as Breakbeat Kaos used to hold a residency there. We still play there a few times a year either at FabricLive events or for Hype at True Playaz and we always love it there. It’s where we grew up. Our sound is constantly developing in little ways, although we do like to stick to our core values and not really stray from that – uplifting, energetic music basically. I think moving onto our second album, we have started using a lot more organic instrumentation instead of synths and samples and we’re writing with a lot more vocalists these days.

Besides Fabric, you seriously have been affiliated with some huge names and labels. BreakBeat Kaos is a giant dotted line to be signing; did you hunt them down or did they hunt you down?
Around 2006 DJ Fresh set up a temporary Aol Instant Messenger address for people to send their tracks through as he was looking to sign new artists. He posted it on a forum and we got straight on it. I just remember the entire scene at the time frantically sending their beats to this address in the hope of getting lucky. We didn’t expect to hear anything back and were shocked when he got back to us wanting to sign us up. A month later our first release on BBK, “Hard Knocks/Mistakes”, came out.

Oh! While we’re talking names – who else would you like to collaborate with right now, if you had the chance? Go on, it’s Celine Dion isn’t it?
Yeah, her or Barbara Streisand! Seriously though who wouldn’t collab with Celine??!! Jokes aside we’d love to collab with a guy from the UK called Bobby Tank. Think we’re gonna do it over the next few months. He’s got a wicked sound.

While we’re talking collaborations, I’d love to know how life with Subfocus ended up happening – that’s huge, and another big fat (phat) name you’ve contributed towards in the music world.
Well, we were friends at school with Nick Subfocus when we were eight and we were making music together at uni so that’s how that one came about!

And besides that drum and bass field in which you’ve participated, excelled and influenced, what other music fields spark your curiosity? I notice a soulful tone in some of your old stuff, and wondered what other genres tickle your fancy. Sneaky bit of Britney Spears hidden in that CD rack?
We love a bit of everything, from musicals to Mozart. We’re not your typical Drum & Bass heads in that we’ve got really eclectic tastes, but we tend to stick in the Soul, Jazz and Funk side of things. Much of what we listen to now is bands from the early 80s such as Earth Wind & Fire, Dazz Band and The Whispers. But we listen to loads and loads of different stuff.

I’ve also spotted a fair dabble in the Dubstep scene on your part. A lot of people interchangeably associate Dubstep and Drum & Bass; it gets frustrating I find, because there is a completely different culture surrounding these genres. Considering the Reggae/Dub feel of “In Your Eyes”, what do you think about this interchangeable approach to terminology?
We just make music! We’re not too involved in the culture of each particular scene, if you like. Obviously we’ve worked primarily in Drum & Bass, but we don’t have any allegiances to any specific scene. In Your Eyes was a good opportunity for us to explore a Reggae sound at a good BPM. Our mum is Jamaican so Reggae is always a sound we wanted to mess around with as it was around the house a lot while we were growing up. Everyone listens to whatever they want to listen to and that’s the way it should be. There are similarities between Drum & Bass and Dubstep as they both come from the UK underground, but I think most people can tell the difference.

And as pioneers in the Drum & Bass world, how do you feel about Dubstep now that the sound and understanding of it has altered massively?
We aren’t massively keen on the laser-based stuff or the stuff that just has a load of bass sounds from Massive thrown together, but there’s still a load of good tunes at 140BPM out there. There are also a lot of stale elements being repeatedly hammered to death which is a little boring, but that happens in every genre, certainly Drum & Bass. We just tend to do our thing and let others get on with theirs.

Talking of musical genres, Australia has introduced me to the scene of Glitch Hop – have you heard of it/ how do you feel about it?
We really like guys like KOAN Sound, Opuiuo and Flume. It’s a creative scene for sure. It’s not dance music really to us but great to listen to in the car or at home. It’s still growing in the UK so we’ll see where it goes but it’s great seeing it grow from strength to strength over in Australia and NZ.

I’m guessing that your personal answers could differ massively there; surely you guys don’t agree about everything. In fact, is there ever a time you both staunchly disagree with each other over musicality? Who wins when idea arguments and so forth arise?
We tend to agree on most things music, but when we don’t we settle it nice and simply with a Special Cup on Mario Kart.

So in terms of this whole conflict/working together thing – had you agreed about the fundamentals from the start? For instance, were you both on the same hype regarding how to get your name out there? How did you start entering the scene?
Yeah we’ve always agreed about the fundamentals musically. In terms of getting our name out there, we never even hatched a plan for that or thought about it like that, it just happened and we consider ourselves very lucky. This was well before artist pages on Facebook and long before Twitter was around, so we didn’t really think like that back then! It was just about making wicked tunes and enjoying ourselves – and it still is.

And had your entry to the music world not been such a ridiculous success, what would have been your fall-back plans? Any amusing career choices you were keen to turn to as an alternative (butcher, baker, candle-stick maker)?
I think we’d both be bonafide bums!! Honestly though, I think music was the only thing we were ever gonna do. We feel very lucky to be able to do this for a living and with our jobs comes a responsibility not to put out generic boring music!

I would ask a cheeky witty question too, about something like… animals. Oh my word, what animal would you most love to have on stage with you? I think a unicorn would be pretty cool – you don’t have to tell us yours… though, come on: humour a crazy London listener?
Something quiet and not-too-stinky so we could enjoy the music! Maybe a parrot on each of our shoulders – he could learn to copy all the bass sounds and then we could resample him back in the studio. Now you’re giving me ideas [Laughs].

Thanks so much for your time and animal-input, guys. Take care and see you in Melbourne, or London, or goodness knows where!
Thank you! See y’all soon.

Words by Lillie Almond