Introducing ourself: Our iCrates-editor Barbee comes from playing with sweet dolls to fight the meanest situation that could happen to a DJ and vinyl collector… plus he throws in some well defined perspectives on nowadays and yesterdays music. So get to know a part of us!
Music & Art – Pop & Underground
„I am so underground, nobody knows my name!“
This combination of music & art and pop & underground is visualised on the poster Barbee created to show his view on the history of pop music: „I did the poster for the DJs and music lovers to give them inspiration. So they can see the complete music history focused on electronic music at a glance. This is like a music network and it’s based on the underground map of berlin. At the first station of each line you always have the pioneer or icon of a style.“
This interest in history is laying down its traces in Barbee’s work as a DJ and producer. With his Münster-based partner DeeP. he is running the DeeP.Barbee-project that just released the „Germaya“-EP on german label Tricorn Music. The seven tracks come with loads of guests and a variety of beats from Dubstep and Ghetto Tech to House, coated with dry Elektro counterpointed by cosy ear candy sounds. One beat is derived from the sound of the soles of the german champion in tap dancing: „Its a combination of putting all the styles together and finding something new, and staying original, being something individual.“ The sweet House song „Love Loving Day“ reminiscing Blaze’s „Lovelee Dae“ bears Cumbia, a weird Drum n Bass-track comes with a happy homely street organ – more or less crazy Mash-Ups as the title „Germaya“ itself: „Germaya because in Germany maybe there are some ancient Elektro-Mumus around and we try to dig them and spread the spirit in our music. Mumus are some ancient tribes from the past. It’s also a project from KLF, they also sing about this spiritual part of our work.“
Not that they would burn a million dollar, but maybe this ancient spirit helps Deep.Barbee to endure their mission of combining of pop and underground. Love and hate, abandoned to both. This is outlined in „Underground Mentality“ with the sarcastic lyrics: „I am so underground, nobody knows my name!“ Barbee is indeed quite fed up by music scenes and some people in it mistaking underground and coolness: „I think there are so many people that have this attitude to be really against the stream, to go against it, and always be the nerd, and want to be alone, leave me alone, I am totally different than anyone else, I am my own subculture. The people start fighting against each other and are competing and don’t realise however where the music comes from, in the end you want to have a good time, and not the straight-i-just-listen-to-Hard-Tek-Drum-´n´Bass things-bla, bla, bla. That´s why HipHop is dead. Fuck HipHop.“ Nevertheless, having been deeply involved in the german Dubstep-scene over the past years, Barbee is still trying to keep it „underground“ and enjoys the freedom of being a small artist.
The Mixing Archive Of The Vinyl-Eater
„When you have good records and use the right samples, you can do something really new. I try to mix Minimal Techno with Dubstep, oldschool Breakbeat and so on. My aim is to break barriers and have a complete unique style packed with the cream of the top that you would dance to all night long and never listen to somewhere else again.“
Pop and underground, music and art, old and new – Barbee likes mixing. To maintain his joy in vinyl-mixing, Barbee is running a really well sorted collection of 5000 records. The past twenty years he has been collecting different styles, and his archive system is depending on them: „I am a mix addict, a mix maniac. I produced a case with 120 Mixes including cover artwork and playlists, just for fun of creating something to hold in my hands. I like to do mixes, so I need good sets, and to have good sets I need to collect records, and to sort them out, and to know them. If I really want to know them, I have to listen to them.“ So Barbee spends a lot of time creating his archive. The records are labeled with gloomy stickers and sorted by micro-styles. The categories are all varieties of Drum n Bass, House, NuBreaks and so on, described as „liquid“, „more techy“ or „mellow“.
This being DJ-tools, but Barbee also collects records for higher reasons: „Because of the art works, because a specific record stands for something original. I try to dig records that are outstanding with the feeling of good production and good mastering, that I am sure I could play the records also in 10 years from now and not just for a trend or something. And many records are lost. Thats also a fact that I am interested in since quite a few years, old cutting edge Disco and Boogie Records. You have the mission to find them and bring them together with the new upfront shit and show the people something different, and forward this message from the past to new people.“
As a DJ, Barbee is using his vinyl extensively. And over the years he also learned how to treat it well! First of all, he spends that cents on a plastic cover when he buys a new record. Second he sometimes washes his records with water, and dries them with some microfibre cloth intended for glass cleaning. Yes, our man loves his vinyl: „I eat vinyl for breakfast!“
The DJ Lovebook
A Romantic DJ!
And our man gets loved: by hot Brazilian ladies, thoroughly described in his „DJ Lovebook“. After passing his exame as a media designer, skateboarder Barbee went to Brazil to DJ and find this one special girl. But on his first gig in Sao Paolo he lost all of his records:„That was a total mess. It was a hard time for me without my equipment. Imagine, I wanted to get famous there and get all the girls, but I had no records! But I survived, I had good solutions and I dont want to say more about this part! You have to read the book! laughs Actually I didn’t want to have all the girls, I wanted to find this one girl. Its a lovestory. I am a very romantic DJ.“
by Martina Dünkelmann
For Phil there are too many timeless tracks. Here are Barbee´s favorite Top Five Concept Albums:
GOLDIE „Timeless“
VENUS GANG „Galactic Soul“
PUBLIC ENEMY „Fear of a Black Planet“
FALTY DL „Love is a Liability“
DUBTRIBE SOUNDSYSTEM „Bryant Street“
