Jeremy Glenn (aka Terror Snake) — one half of drum & bass DJ duo The Upbeats — refuses to be the wanker who says that D&B is the new rock and roll.
“I guess for dance music it kind of is, because [our music] has quite a lot of raw energy. Well, the stuff that has drawn us into it anyway, has kind of got that raw, rock feel about it. But I think rock and roll is still rock and roll. There's so much good rock out there that there doesn't need to be a new rock and roll.”
He will, however, admit that he can happily accept such a flattering comparison. “Actually, one of my favourite quotes ever was for our last album: one of our favourite producers Gridlock's way of describing us was that we were the Black Sabbath of drum & bass. We thought that was pretty fucking cool.”
Also cool is their fourth studio album, Primitive Technique, which was released last month. Glenn can describe it in a line — “an emotional roller coaster of raw bass power” — but, unlike their other albums, this one avoids following a theme.
“With Nobody's Out There, we wrote a story and all the music kind of suited the story. And Big Skeleton, we kind of had a vibe that we were matching. With this album, we just wanted to write; we just wrote music that we were really feeling, and we kind of put it together, instead of having a really strong outline of the kind of raw thing that we wanted to create, as we [have] found that that can be quite constrictive in the past.
“We like sounds [that are] quite primal or raw, so we thought that would be kind of a good starting point and a good basis for the album. And then everything kind of just grew from there. We had a pretty strong visual theme. We went and did a crazy photo shoot, we had costumes made by people that worked with Peter Jackson's studio. We went and we maybe got a little bit carried away. We like getting dressed up.”
Collaborating with Dutch electronica trio Noisia has propelled The Upbeats from their home of New Zealand onto the world stage in less than a year.
“Since we announced signing with Noisia, everything has changed for us, pretty much,” Glenn says. “Like, we've kind of consistently, for the last how many years, just been working and releasing music and just touring. And we were doing reasonably well as quite an underground act, but just within the last eight months it's just gone nuts, and I think that we've just been exposed to a completely different crowd of people through the fanbase of the Noisia guys.”
It's a fanbase that has now outnumbered local Australian and New Zealand fans. “We've seen a lot more outside New Zealand and Australia actually taking notice and seeing a huge shift. Like, we kind of keep track of the stats of where our music's being listened to, on Soundcloud. About a year ago, 80 percent of the stuff on our Soundcloud would have been listened to by people from New Zealand, whereas now all of the plays are coming from America and Europe. Like, New Zealand doesn't even feature in the top ten countries of where our listeners are coming from.”
Glenn and musical partner, Dylan Jones, have a hectic schedule ahead of them, with a current tour of New Zealand and Australia leading straight into a European jaunt, and a six-month stint in Noisia's Dutch hometown.
“We've been touring constantly all year. I've had maybe like two weekends off this year, I think,” laughs Glenn. “But that's awesome; I genuinely love performing.”
Glenn even promises to stay awake for the shows. “Years ago, before we were kind of doing this seriously, I once got quite drunk—I got physically challenged to drink a whole lot of tequila before I played—and I managed to fall asleep while performing.”
The Upbeats headline Earth Frequency February 14-17
