A Conversation with Ancient Astronauts’ Kabanjak & Dogu – HuffPost 3.14.11

Mike Ragogna: Before we get into Ancient Astronauts’ new album Into Bass And Time, let’s get into some of your history. Kabanjak, you’ve been influenced by the blues. So who were your favorite artists and songs that formed your musical taste?

Kabanjak: When I was about thirteen years old, I started digging the blues. Blind Lemon Jefferson, Bukka White, and the old Delta Blues recordings by Muddy Waters and Leadbelly were a great source of inspiration. The song “God Don’t Never Change” by Blind Willie Johnson still blows my mind. It shows you just need a guitar and a voice to make great music. I think the blues is the foundation for all kind of different musical genres.

MR: Dogu, you have a taste for ’90s hip-hop. Who were some of your favorite artists and songs?

Dogu: Hmm, there are so many. But here´s a little list:

Pete Rock & CL Smooth “They Reminisce Over You”
The Pharcyde “Oh S**t”
The Roots “Silent Treatment”
Eric B & Rakim “Don´t Sweat The Technique”
Public Enemy “Don´t Believe The Hype”
Hard 2 Obtain “LI Groove”
Silver Bullet “20 Seconds To Comply”
Souls Of Mischief “´93 Till Infinity”
Wu-Tang Clan “C.R.E.A.M.”
MC Lyte “When In Love”
Tha Alkaholiks “Daaam”
Master Ace “Music Man”
N.W.A “Express Yourself”
EPMD “Strictly Business”
Biz Markie “Just A Friend”
A Tribe Called Quest “Jazz (We´ve Got)”
Poor Righteous Teachers “Shakiyla”
The Fugees “Boof Baf”
Kool G Rap & DJ Polo “Streets Of New York”
KRS-1 “Sound Of Da Police”

MR: What’s the origin of Ancient Astronauts?

D: We know each other for more than 20 years because we come from the same hometown–Moers, Germany. We played tennis in the same club back in the day, and even our parents knew each other. But in those days, we where not really the closest friends, but we respected each other. When we got older, we started doing parties together in our hometown because we noticed that we both shared a big love for funk, jazz and African music, and modern electronics such as early big beat, drum & bass and trip-hop. We thought there was so much crap music played in all the clubs that we had to do something against it.. And then we exchanged our specific skills in hip-hop, reggae, and blues, and tried to form our own sound that is influenced by all these genres and just started producing. In 2001, Dogu started Switchstance Recordings to give our music and the music of our friend and collegue Protassov a platform.

MR: Do you believe in ancient astronauts?

K: We believe in possibilities. Who knows what is out there. But the whole ancient astronauts theory is very interesting and inspiring to us. We just love our band name and the myths behind it.

MR: How do you think they’d view our culture if they ever returned?

K: They´d probably think, “Nothing really changed.”

MR: (laughs) You’ve worked on other artists’ projects, which are among your favorites?

D: We had a lot of fun remixing our label mates Ocote Soul Sounds because their music is so rich and original. Very organic. It makes the most fun when you get a full band with great musicians that you can remix than only computer-generated music. Also, to remix, Vieux Farke Toure–the son of Ali Farka Toure from Mali–was such a great experience. His music is so far beyond modern electronic music, so we tried to give it our own kind of Hip Hop twist, but in respect to the original recording. We thought if there are B-Boys out in the desert, then they will feel this.

MR: How did your blend of hip-hop and electronica coalesce?

K: In the mid and late nineties, over here in Europe, we were heavily influenced by the UK scene when it came to club music, when hip-hop started becoming more gangsta or more commercial labels like Ninja Tune, Mo´Wax, Catskills or Wall Of Sound blew us away with their sound aesthetics. They gave a very musical approach to hip-hop and breakbeats. Also, the mid-’90 house music from France like Etienne de Crecy, La Funk Mob or Daft Punk brought us into serious electronics and DJ mixing. Both of us like more than one style of music, so we always combine different genres in our sets and productions. Hip-hop gave us the freedom to fuse different music from everywhere in the world through a fat, dope beat and electronica helps to make everything more tight and on point. Hip-hop is our inner soul when it comes to the production and the aesthetics of beats and rhythms, and modern electronica gives you a lot of tricks and flics to play around and give it your own touch.

MR: You have some cool pop culture samples. How did you choose them?

D: It´s got to be dope and fit into the mood of our song. Most of the time, we go through a stack of records, searching for those rare unheard sounds and pick what we like. But in the end, we try to make the sample our own by pitching, slicing, tweaking and editing it.

MR: How do you come up with the topics for your lyrics?

K: Actually this is not really coming from us. We concentrate on the music and the feel that we want to give our tracks. When we work with vocalists, then our tunes just get working titles but our lyricists always have the freedom to change the title. Sometimes, the title points into a direction that we think the lyrics could go, but in the end, the lyricist is the one who feels our music and writes his own lyrics. For example, on the new album, we have a song called “The Shining” with Azeem on vocals. We had that beat flying around in our studio for about a year and always wanted a serious MC to rhyme over it. We thought “The Shining” is a good title for the mood of the rhythm and harmonies, and we knew that Azeem understood what we meant with it. So, he totally adapted that topic and took it forward. But again, if he gave us lyrics with a totally different topic but killing it over that beat, then we would have been convinced because we really want our songs to be collaborations with the lyricists that we work with. We give the music a little inspiration, the lyricists give the message.

MR: Can you pinpoint what’s unique about Ancient Astronauts’ recordings over everyone else’s?

D: We would say what is really unique about our music is our sound aesthetic. The way we want our music to sound, that little dopeness that lives in our productions. We do not steal samples one-to-one, we make our own sounds by remodeling them and form our own new melodies out of these sound samples. Then, we combine them with our own composition, our own songwriting and arrangement. Kabanjak plays a lot of live instruments, but in Ancient Astronauts, we love to sample them and make them sound like samples from vinyl records. Our sound is very organic, warm and relaxed, but still has a lot of pressure and depth. Also, the influence from the whole field of electronica gives a certain shape to our music.
For the type of music that we do–let´s call it an electronic world music inspired by the hip-hop sound–we have our own German and European viewpoint. Our vision of the world and music is a very cultural one, that´s why we call ourselves Ancient Astronauts, in order to respect the old and create the new.

MR: Do you have any advice for new artists?

D: Be open for music from different cultures or places in the whole world. It is always good to listen to old recordings from different music genres to catch a feeling for the mix of instruments. If you love what you do, then go on with it but always stay realistic. Success needs time in this world, so don’t run after the money because then it will never come. As so often in this world, good contacts are very important, and a certain level of being able to manage your own career is essential. You have to invest a lot of time and energy in what you do and what you believe in. Don’t follow hypes, follow your heart.