A LOving ode to the b-sides of ELECTRONIC RELEASES from the 90’s & 00’s.
Newcastle DJ Phil Sure (known to his family as Phil Shaw) delivers a beautiful journey full of electronic cuts from the likes of Underworld, DJ Shadow, Death In Vegas, Tosca and more.
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Could you tell us a bit about your journey into electronic music and DJing, and how your love for downbeat and leftfield music came about? It started at a fairly young age. My parents had quite a large collection of music I used to sift through. Around my early ‘rebellious teen years’ after going through a punk and metal phase, my cousin introduced me to Prodigy’s Music for the Jilted Generation and it spiralled from there. I bought my first set of turntables as soon as I moved out of home and saved up the cash. I would go out to by records every Friday afternoon, raiding the breaks and house section. My love for downbeat and leftfield came from around that time too; mostly from the B-sides of albums I was listening to.
How did you decide to approach your mix? Any special moments or tracks in there for you? I have recently put out a couple of downbeat mixes with slight variants in sound and wanted to base another mix upon one of my all time favourite ‘drift away’ tunes -Underworld’s Best Mamgu Ever, which I thought would seem very fitting for a Lazydaze mix. I’ve spent a lot of time listening to music in my headphones or in a quiet place to relax in preparation for this mix. This is one that really draws you in and immediately flicks off the switch in your mind with a warm, calm feeling that lets you drift off. I chose to base the mix around that feeling and it grew into a blend of old and new B-sides; all individually amazing pieces that are quite underrated and deserve a lot more attention.
Which artists inspire you in the ambient/downbeat/electronica realm? I’d say Four Tet, Massive Attack, early DJ Shadow and UNKLE / James Lavelle, and Timo Maas, just to name a few. All of these artists were extremely versatile in their sounds and usually only had a handful of downbeat style tunes, but were all really captivating.
What’s your time favourite ambient/downbeat/electronica/experimental track, LP or mix compilation? One of my go-to albums in this sound would have to be UNKLE’s Edit Music For A Film; a two-part mix based on a bunch of movie clips with a lot of unpredictability which flow from dark and mysterious to light and theatrical. Definitely worth a good listen in the headphones or on a long drive.
Tell us a bit about the scene in Newcastle. The good, the bad, the unique? The music scene in Newcastle is somewhat small compared to Sydney, but it’s quite a cool community of like-minded individuals that are unique in the way that we are very laidback, but also very passionate and driven to keep building something significant again. The bad is that the venues are few and far between, as we are the originators of the lockout laws (sorry, Sydney.) This has made it hard to sustain a consistent scene in the city. On the positive side, it has pushed focus and creativity into finding new and interesting ways and places to put on events.
Where can we find you playing these days? Do you get to play many downbeat/listening gigs? At the odd gig in Sydney or Newcastle, ColourSound, and my own collaborated event, The Social. I’m also involved in a Newcastle based collective Mind Sub; we are putting on a three-day forest gathering at the end of June where I will be sharing some downbeat delights during a Sunday recovery session. I will most likely be bringing The Social back in the warmer months in Newcastle to spread more of the downbeat sound.
