Make no mistake: this record is a complete fluke. So says its creator Toddla T. And he should know, right?
Growing up raving in his native Sheffield, acid house was everywhere for T; the soundtrack to his formative years and even to this day reminding him of quality music, good times and hedonism. “I have always loved 303 records” he says. “I thought they were genius partly because of their minimalism, and when I was in the studio with Roses Gabor making a record I thought ‘fuck it I want to make a tune like this!’”
The end result is On Acid – three tracks of bubbling 303’s and acid-leaning house music that is without doubt the ‘housiest’ thing the notoriously eclectic artist has ever produced. Ironically, this is exactly the opposite of what T had intended. “The funny thing is, as house music got really popular last year and a lot of people started jumping on the bandwagon by starting to play and produce house music I decided I was going to make a point of not doing that” he admits. “I didn’t want to seem like I was getting on the bandwagon and trying to not seem irrelevant. So the thing is with this record it was a complete fluke.”
"I was stupidly thinking I’m not going to make house because everyone else is – which was nonsense of course – and after a few studio sessions I was like ‘fucking hell, I’ve actually done exactly what I set out not to do!’”
A happy accident indeed, for On Acid is a unique and remarkable addition to Defected Records’ musical canon. Accompanied by a suitably raw and frenetic music video (“We went to this place in Kingston, Jamaica where we filmed this guy skanking it in front of a wall... it was incredible!”) ‘Acid’ punches hard and fast with a squelching 303, occasional chanted vocal and very little else to district you from its single-minded energy.
Much of ‘Phoney’s charm is in its simplicity: a simple top line loop peppered with a sublime Shola Ama vocal. “I just had the loop of the top line and the acid thing going and kept looping and looping it before thinking ‘fucking hell there’s a bit of a thing coming together here!’" Rounding off the EP is the record that was the catalyst to T’s acid explosion, ‘Pandora’s Box’. “I thought the song was really good because it was minimal and reminded me of home and of the records I grew up raving to. I was personally happy that I managed to achieve something that I looked up to for so long!”
On Acid is out May 5 on Defected Records
