This is PJ Hunter, the bass player from the band Deep Street Soul. We are signed to the UK label Freestyle Records & have been delivering our style of funk music for the past 6 years. We put out our second full length LP in 2011 and recently dropped the second 45 single from that release. November is gearing up as a busy one with a slot at AWME coming up this Friday night with Sietta @ the Lounge & then onto QMF the following weekend. After that it’s time to start work on the third album, which should hopefully see the light of day sometime in 2013.
Deep Street Soul have been around since 2006, how many times has the line up change over years?
I guess you could say a fair bit. We started as an instrumental group with the three core members being myself on bass, Mon (keys) & Ago (drums), we’ve been through our fair share of guitarists but I think we have that slot well & truly settled now. In 2010 Mighty May Johnston joined the band as a permanent vocalist, before that we had Shirley Davis belting it out & just recently we have added 2 horns to the group on a more permanent basis. It probably reflects the changes in the type of songs we wrote for the last album & what players are needed to get that sound rather than a conscious decision to add more members.
What’s your earliest memory of performing and who inspired you to start?
I grew up in a very small country town on the Vic/NSW border so the opportunities to perform we’re limited to the country & western held night once a month at the local pub!!!! Not particularly inspiring if you don’t like country & western music! I guess I always knew that I would play music and moving to Melbourne and being immersed into the rich musical history of the city was really my inspiration.
You’re signed to Freestyle Records in the UK, tell us a bit about the label and how the signing was inked.
We were really lucky to have the opportunity to sign with Freestyle. It all happened rather randomly via a Myspace email back in 2007. 5 years ago there wasn’t really the opportunities to release funk & soul music in Australia – at least in a sense that anyone outside of the underground scene was going to hear it and as the scene was particularly strong in Europe, that was where you wanted to have your music released. The label itself has been around for over a decade now and specialises in all thinks jazz/funk/latin/afro & soul. For such a young label their back catalogue is massive but more importantly from a local perspective they have been a real supporter of the Australian scene. As well as us, it’s also the home of the Shaolin Afronouts, Cookin On Three Burners, The Transatlantics & half a dozen other Aussie acts that have released product over the last 10 years. Another reason why we love them is that they give you free reign to just do your thing/.
You must answer this question honestly. What and where was the first gig you went to?
This might be reflecting my age (to be fair I was quite young at the time) but my first gig was seeing INXS & Ratcat @ the Tennis Centre in 1990. It was really a life-changing event.
‘Fess up. What records have you stolen from your parent’s record collection and why?
My parents had a terrible, and I mean TERRIBLE record collection. Too much horribleness to go into, but I did snaffle quite a cool (well I think it’s cool) Fats Waller LP that I manage to play out given the right venue & night.
What’s on heavy rotation on your record player right now?
Hiatus Kayote: Tawk Tomahawk EP, The Robert Glasper Experiments: Black Radio, & Hannah Williams & the Tastemakers: (self titled)
Do you have any particular ritual before you go on stage?
Perhaps it reflects the Italian influence of some of our band members but a short black & a shot of amaretto always does it for me.
If you could curate your own festival, where would it be, who would be on the bill, how many people would you let in and what features would it have?
Right now with the ‘Soul Of Melbourne’ record release out on Northside Records I would love to have a festival, gig, happening, whatever! that reflects the great soul/funk/afro music that is being made in Melbourne at the moment. We really need to celebrate the fact that right now we living through a golden age & amazingly this is being acknowledged globally as well. There are so many great musos & bands pushing each other to greater heights and the scene itself is really friendly and bands are encouraging & supportive of each other. A gig or festival that showcases this would be a wonderful thing
Because it’s more fun to do things together, which living artists from anywhere in the world would you most like to collaborate with?
For the purists who were at the gig maybe it was a bit old skool but after seeing J Rocc’s support set for Madlib @ the Prince a couple of weeks back I think I would die & go to heaven if he were to rework a song or drop a pure DSS style mixtape on me. Failing that I would love the band to work with the guys from the Timmion label in Finland! Purveyors of fine funk production & the geniuses behind Nicole Willis & the Soul Investigators.
What is your band’s music the best soundtrack for?
Sex education films?
You are playing at this years AWME showcases, where & which venue are you performing at and what should the crowd expect from your live show?
I’m really looking forward to the AWME showcases & not just our own show, the overall line-up this year is stellar! For anyone who hasn’t seen us play before, we don’t play pretty funk, it’s loose, nasty and down in the gutter southern stylee funk & soul. Massive vocals, a dirty Hammond organ, thrashed drums & blaring horn lines – just how we like it!
Catch Deep Street Soul with Sietta and Northside DJs as part of AWME
Friday, 16 November 2012 at 9.00pm – late
Lounge, Level 1, 243 Swanston Street, Melbourne,
