Anyone raised on a diet of acid house throughout the 90s will have feasted on the deliciously fresh beats of K Klass at some time or another in the course of their clubbing career. With a back-catalogue of high-calibre dance staples including hits ‘Rhythm is a Mystery’ and ‘Let Me Show You’, their credentials have been established and developed over two decades in the industry, earning them both commercial success and underground respectability.
We caught up with K Klass’ Paul Roberts to discuss the influence of the Hacienda, their new single on Nocturnal Groove, and how ‘proper’ house music is in full swing once again…
K Klass was famously first formed after a meeting at the Hacienda…tell us what it felt like to be part of that scene…
It felt really exciting at the time to be part of the scene...the scene was fresh and you felt like you were part of something special. It was almost like it was a big secret between the 1200 people in there every Friday that you didn't want to share with anyone else.
In your opinion, are there any clubs open now that capture the same party spirit as the Hacienda clearly did?
A lot of the big festivals and foreign venues capture the essence of the party scene perfectly, but for us you will never match the levels of energy and passion showed by both the crowd and DJ's at the Hacienda in its late 80s heyday.
Your first release on Deconstruction 20 years ago reached number 3 in the UK chart…do you think we’ll ever see house tracks hitting those kind of heights in the mainstream again?
Yes, absolutely...over 20 years it’s swings and roundabouts; sometimes tracks come through the clubs and become massive commercial success, and this seems to be in a cycle that comes and goes We feel this will continue even with the way music is digitally consumed these days.
K Klass
Tell us a bit about the new single…
Our new single 'Capture Me' has been an idea that we have been working on for about a year and a half, on and off and has changed considerably since its original concept. It started life as an instrumental and then we added our vocalist Bobbi. Then the backing track changed behind the vocals and it became something altogether different! We are really excited about this track and also working with Nocturnal Groove who are putting out some great releases right now.
It seems that in the last year a lot of house production has tried to emulate the ‘classic’ house sounds of 10 to 20 years ago…is that something you’ve noticed?
There is definitely a swing back to ‘proper’ house music, with lots of producers using samples and riffs from old tracks. We are all in favour of people re-using parts and ideas from great old tracks and we definitely don’t feel this is being too retrospective, as house music has traditionally always borrowed and recycled from the past.
Are there any new projects on the horizon…a new album perhaps?
Yes…very much so, yes and even though we don't have an album as yet planned, we know we will have enough tracks by the end of the year to do so. 2011 is going to be a big year for K Klass and we are enjoying making music now more than ever before.
If you could pick out a single career highlight, what would it be?
It’s pretty much impossible to choose just one. The biggest career highlights are probably seeing the response Rhythm Is A Mystery got when played at the height of the night in the Hacienda and then seeing it reach No.3 in the national Top 40. Being nominated for a Grammy in 2002 in the remix category was also another highpoint. Clubs and live performance-wise there are far too many to mention...impossible to even make a top 10...we have been doing this a long time!
If you could retrace your steps, is there anything that you’d do different – professionally – knowing what you do now?
Looking back there are things we could have done differently but we never regret anything we have done as at the time it seemed right and to regret would be negative.
Ideally, what does the future hold for K Klass?
We want to keep on making music that we like and believe in. We feel in a really good place musically at the moment. We also want to spread our wings DJ-wise and take our sound to a more international market this year.
Anything else you’d like to tell us about…?
Look out for loads more new K Klass material and we are also launching a new monthly podcast which details can be found on Twitter @kklassuk and on facebook.com/officialkklass along with regular news and even the occasional free mix givaway to our friends and followers.
Capture Me (Part 1) is out 26th January on Nocturnal Grooves - click to listen & pre-order
