Kish's main insta: https://www.instagram.com/kishkash1/

Steezlords (music production): https://www.instagram.com/thesteezlords/

All City Radio Show: https://www.instagram.com/theallcityshow/

Kish Eats: https://www.instagram.com/kish.eats/

Soleful Podcast: https://www.instagram.com/soleful_podcast/

We took a trip down to London to spend some time with Kish Kash, talking Sneakers, Music, hard work and more, even taking in some recommended miso with the man himself.

The conversation explores the evolution of cultural influence, particularly in the context of hip hop and sneaker culture. The speakers discuss the term "influencer" and its loaded connotations, contrasting it with "cultural curator." We delve into the history of Aylesbury, highlighting its musical and cultural impact, including figures like Rob Stringer and Silver Bullet. The discussion touches on the influence of Malcolm McLaren and the crossover of music and fashion. The speakers also reflect on the importance of archiving and documenting cultural artifacts, emphasizing the need for future generations to understand the now.

Summary

• Influencer and Sneakerhead Terminology 0:00
• Cultural Curator and Influencer Perception 1:55
• Musical Roots and Cultural Impact of Aylesbury 4:44
• Early Hip Hop and Cultural Influences 10:16
• Tribalism and Music Preferences 17:19
• Sneaker Culture and Collecting 18:52
• Record Collecting and Cultural Documentation 20:55
• Radio and Media Experience 47:22
• Moving to London and Career Transitions 55:41

Mentioned in this episode:

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So Kish, cash, hello, Adam, influencer. Is it okay to

say influencer?

It's not a I'm not an influencer.

It's quite, yeah,

I was wondering about influencing, right? That whole

thing started way after. I mean, I've been around a long time, so

I would say that I think that's a bit of a misnomer,

yeah, because I'd think of it is kind of what you

did kind of predated it. And I think if you say influencer now,

it's quite loaded, yeah, because there's a suggestion of, well,

yeah,

because if I get offended with the term

influencer, and I don't know, I don't know if that's if that's

correct to be like that, but I'm thinking it's, it's like,

there's another term that does my head in a little bit as well,

and it's got a negative sort of connotation, or has it, or is it

in my head, or is it in the head of everyone else, is

sneakerhead? Now, the thing is, I think Bobbito came up with the

term sneakerhead in his article in The Source magazine, or he

might have even had that as a term before, but it's the first

time it was in print. But, yeah, I remember, I remember that. So

then when, when I was at this panel discussion where Bob was

one of the guests, and somebody was deriding, you know, the term

sneaker he goes, yo. I came up with that term, and then it

flipped on its head. It's like, yo. If bobbio said we're sneaker

heads, then, and he's the one who came up with that term, and

he's OG, og, yeah, there's no way it can still but the thing

is, you know, sometimes language evolves right, and what was

offensive sometimes becomes less offensive, and some things which

weren't intended to have an offensive sort of nature become

offensive. So maybe it's a question of that as well. I

don't know. Adam, we have to write to our local MP to find

out.

I think there's two different things with

influencer, and I think, I think the thing that you can

potentially get from it, which is why I wondered, I wondered if

you'd be kind of into it or not, is, do

you know what I say I am? And this is the wankiest

term I could ever come up with before we get into that cultural

curator. That's how I look at that. But anyway, back to what

you're saying, yeah. So what

I was gonna say is I think that what you can

potentially get with influence, influencer is the kind of

suggestion that someone has thought, I just want to get some

free stuff. Because there was a time when all of a sudden,

people it became like a career ambition,

yeah, yeah. Well, it is, yeah. This is the main

thing. But the thing is, I've got a thing about being given

free stuff. It's not free because it's a payoff, because

if a brand gives someone something, there's a reason why

they want them to have it, and it's to give it a bit of

cultural gravitas, maybe, or or basically, a bit of, you know, a

spotlight, or whatever, a co sign, you know, it puts it on a

level, that puts it right there, into the zeitgeist. So the thing

is, then it's a payment. You see, it's a payment for services

given rendered, because if I put it up on Instagram, then the

product's been advertised for. How much, in comparison, to,

say, direct to consumer, direct to your target audience, as

opposed to, hey, I'm going to put it in a magazine. I'm going

to put it, you know, on the TV. We don't know what that will do,

you know, probably be blanket recognition or something, and

maybe we'll get a few sales out of it, or maybe people are still

aware that we're in the mix. But yeah, with that, it's like,

boom.

It's kind of like a kind of parallel to that is,

say, if you were DJ and you just get a really well paid gig, you

can kind of think, I can't believe I'm getting paid so well

for doing this gig. Doesn't happen to me very often so, but

you can then think, well, if I balance it out against all these

things that I've done for free over the years and for Goodwill

and stuff like, I'm not actually just getting paid this great

amount for this isolation thing. No,

you're getting paid for the moment, up until that

point, all those years of like, graft, you know, accruing

knowledge, accruing, you know, sort of your points, as it were,

yeah, you know. And it's, it's a case of, the end result is, this

is, this is our home. We've done our due diligence, we've we've

busted our our gut, you know? We've hammered our head. And

right now, this is, this is what, this is the result. So the

thing is, you're not paying for the time when it comes to DJing.

This is the thing. A lot of people get the thing, oh, you

pay. You get paid for the hour. No, I'm getting paid for the

everything up until that point that took me to get there all

those years of digging records, you know, digging for records,

going in, you know, chatting to people, sharing, music,

swapping, buying whatever, all those hours, days, weeks,

months, years spent doing that. Yeah, what is what you're paying

for. That's

it. And this is kind of a good point, I think, to

kind of look at your story and where you started from, and how

all the kind of cultural cache, I guess you could say, like your

journey in kind of getting to where you are at the moment. Oh,

yeah. Um, high Wickham, wasn't

it? No, no, no, no. Elsbury, which is just, yep,

that's fine. Ellsbury is where I'm from. And. And high reckon,

is just down the road, but it's all in Buckinghamshire. But, you

know, elsby Born and bred and proud of it. I mean, the main

thing is, the musical history of elsby is quite on the low. It's

happened and it's and I'll tell you how it's affected culture as

well. But, you know, I think Marillion, let's go back, you

know, not hip hop, okay, brilliant from elsbury. And

loads of people performed in elsby. David Bowie performed in

elsby. Loads of things clockwork. Part of Clockwork

Orange was filmed in Aylesbury, the underpass scene. And that's

filmed the the fryer square underpass. So, yeah, there's a

lot of things that happened in Ellsbury. Then you've got say.

So I went to I hated it, but I met a lot of good people there.

I went to the Ellsbury grammar school. One of the alumni from

Ellsbury Grammar School older than I is Rob stringer. Now, Rob

stringer is very high up in Sony, very high up, I think he's

like at the top, like that, and he's an ex sales student, which

is quite mad. I only found this out recently, like last year,

and then there's all the people that come from elsby. So when I

was growing up, silver bullet was hanging out in the

McDonald's with a lot of people who subsequently became my good

friends. And I was, I was, you know, serving them like, you

know, McDonald's, you know, which is quite mad, which is

crazy. And for those who don't know who silver bullet is, he's

hardcore hip hop, late 80s, the whole fast rap thing, influenced

by Rakim Kane and all that kind of stuff, and big and public

enemy in terms of sound, and the sort of progenitor of what led

to the sort of whole, that whole sort of cosmic slop of music

that was going on back then. So you had hip hop, then you had

the emergence of acid house, which then sort of morphed into

hardcore, which morphed into jungle, which morphed into drum

and bass. All the old jungle heads are ex Hip Hop DJs or the

originals. So when you chat, when you see DJ hype, the first

appearance of DJ hype is on the back cover. He's part of a hip

hop group. I've got the 12 somewhere. I cannot remember

what it is, but DJ hype is original hip hop. I mean, you

know. And then we when silver bullet was hanging around, one

of the guys hanging around with silver bullet was my friend

who's just recently passed away, MC Conrad. MC Conrad went on to

partner ltj Bookham, as you know, with good, good looking

records, and all the releases on logical progression and all the

live shows that they did, and they were, they ruled Drum and

Bass throughout the throughout the 90s that it weren't so sir

Connie, these old friend of mine. He's from elsbury, and one

of my old school friends, and this is probably got the high

working reference from is Robbie Lasker, aka the principal, aka

the producer in caveman, yes, which was the first hip hop

group in this country to be signed to a major label, which

is a big deal. Robbie's my schoolmate and I was there when

he was making, you know, some of the tunes in his bedroom, on his

bedroom studio. I in fact, even own the Akai s9 100 sampler that

he made positive reaction on, and the the damn DP for MCD and

all the other little bits that he did, the down with the king

remix for Run DMC, all these crazy things. So that's quite

mad. So just, just on that,

yeah, because I probably don't know as much as I

should about that first era of rap, and I think it's kind of

unrepresented or unproper, like, it's a lot more significant than

it's kind of given the credit for, like, but as I understand

it, Caveman were, were the first sort of group over here doing

like, the sort of jazzy sort of stuff, yeah, yeah, I

think it's a fair one.

So was it, was it quite when the guys were doing

that and you were around that, was it kind of like this, just,

this is just something different. Well, just

a mad thing was, is, um, yeah, it was different. The

whole approach, Robbie's whole ethos, when he was putting me

onto the tricks that he was doing, to do the beats and

everything, and we were beat digging. But he was beat digging

before me, he was, he was going up into London or wherever, you

know, to get jazz brace with without my good homie still to

this day, Mark, Mark Priest, who goes by the name of President p

but his DJ name back then might have been DJ fade. And he was in

a group called the Academy with MC Conrad and with Robbie,

before Conrad broke out and and before Conrad became, I'm trying

to remember, because bullets, silver bullets, original crew

was called triple element, and Conrad and him with the MCs in

it, and my mate, les alert, he produced it, and luggy produced

it. I think they produced bring forth the guillotine in 21

seconds to comply both classic rap records from that era. So I

think he may have gone from triple element to the Academy.

And then, you know, they all went their separate ways. Robbie

did caveman, and then, and then, and then Connie went off with to

dreamscape or wherever, and got up. And then bookend was like

playing it back, going, Who is this guy? We've got to find him.

And then, before you know it, you have history made, you know,

but it was a mad one. But yeah, Ellsbury, very fascinating. That

regard, another school friend of mine in my class still mates to

this day is my mate, Ted cockle. Ted cockle, he left school and

he went to start work at CBS at the time, as it was known in

ravens Lane, the industrial estate in Aylesbury. CBS later

became was bought by Sony, yeah, right. And then Sony, you know,

BMG, combined, later, at a later date. So anyway, Ted always on

about music. He was putting on stuff at the school, the school

dance. He was putting, you know, he's putting stuff on. He was

promoting at the well ed in he was well early on his bands. He

had Oasis, I think, play early at the wellhead, which is a pub

in window, which no longer exists. He had, I think, blur. I

think he had all these big, big bands that later went on to

transform the music scene in this country. He had him on the

early so, and then he was working at CBS at the time. And

then he trans, he moved to London, and he started working

for Sony on great Marlborough Street. He's got, he tell him

he's got to start writing his memoirs. He's got stories for

days like, um, like having to help Jennifer Lopez get into a

dress because, you know, the dress was too small, or

something like that. I don't know. It's just mad. He's got

mad stories. So Ted, then he, then he basically left Sony and

me, he moved to BMG and became co president of no BMG. He

became co president of Island Records in this country with

Darkus. So he's had so many people on his watch, you know,

heading that up. So, yeah, that's quite mad. And then

another school friend in the year below is Chris Price, who,

great guy. He's in charge of radio at Radio One, I think, or

he's in the mix, very high up somewhere in the ether. So elsby

has a big sort of lineage of music people, not just myself.

That's pretty impressive. Yeah, which is mad I went to school

with Doctor Who, Doctor Who's Doctor Who? Jody,

Jody Whitaker, yeah, no way.

She's amazing. You still mate, no, what? Jodi, you

better get on this podcast. Seriously, girlfriend, not cool.

Man, hold it down for the old school. We

didn't, we didn't fall out. Well, she's

not been in your podcast. Shock yet.

Work on it, right? Jodie, if

you're listening to this, you better be

was it kind of your community that was around you

that brought hip hop to you? Then? No, no, I was

already on hip hop from the from the early, you

know, growing up in the late 70s, early 80s, uh, hip hop was,

was the new thing. It was very exciting. We were up. I don't

really know how I remember the message playing on radio and

loving it. And also the Green Cross Code, man, because the

thing is, they took part of that, into that part of that

rap, into the Green Cross Code thing to get kids to to remember

not to do certain things. Don't step while you're close to the

edge, you know. I mean, okay, was in the Green Cross Code

thing. And, yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, you know, you're

exposed to everything on TV. You know, three channels back then,

my God, three channels, BBC One, BBC Two, and ITV. That

was it. There's no channel four. When Channel Four

happened, it was like, whoa. Well, I

went to when I went on holiday to America and

Canada, my mind was blown cable TV. It was like, what's going

on? But even the basic amount of channels, if you didn't pay for

cable, was plethora. Yeah, it's just like, wow. You know, CBS,

NBC and you know, all that ABC and all these ones. Was like,

whoa. It's just like, crazy. It was just mad. So mine was blown

they were like, you only got three channels back home? And

go, Yeah, my God, we got all these. I was like, Whoa, it's

crazy. So, yeah, so being exposed again, you know, via my

travels, but also with what's going on at the time, you know,

it was very exciting. Malcolm McLaren obviously bringing being

a massive influence on British culture, not just from the punk

scene, but on the hip hop scene and all of that Blondie rapture

coming out. I mean, there was, there was certain Rock City crew

coming out in 84 so the thing is, that was, that was a long

that was a long time after so we were up on hip hop and also

Electro. You see, because hip hop and electro were combined,

it was the whole thing, you know, you know, we know Planet

Rock, we know all of that stuff, sampling, craft, work and

everything. So the sounds were morphing into each other from

the early and then you had the whole influence of punk and the

whole influence of disco. It was like there was so much more than

the whole 80 stuff going on in terms of sounds. It was

incredible, really. Yeah,

so I suppose an interesting thing to think about

with you, and your sort of journey is Malcolm McLaren, and

that crossover of music and fashion and stuff was, was that

sort of, yeah, isn't it with you? And

the man of digging was also got to give due

credence to um two tone scar, you know, and the whole scar

movement as well, and how that influenced so the things, you

had the whole Hip Hop look, but then you also had the whole

football casual look, but then you had the whole mod look, and

then you had the whole two tone look, and all these things all

clashing together and having your own interpretation. So

growing up, you had the fluoro socks. There was a craze for

fluoro socks. Then there was a craze for stay press. Then after

the stay press craze, which I think obviously came from the

two tone thing, was the farres. Yeah, I think. But before, in

between the farrows and the stay press was the waffle trousers. I

mean, there was so, so many different things. We had the

loafers as well. We use wearing loafers. And he also had the

trainers as well. If you're having a kick about in the

street, you gotta be wearing trainers. Football casuals

wearing trainers. Hip hop artists are wearing trainers.

And you got all that in the mix of the fashion and going to the

local LSB markets and getting stuff on the cheap there. That's

how it was. There was no designer stuff. If you, you

know, you made a Lacoste at school. It was like one Lacoste

shirt. Whoa. I remember all the bootlegs and the fakes they were

in the in the market, etc. There was a shark, which was, which I

remember quite, quite, you know, quite vividly, and all these

sort of things going on. So star wise, it was like, Yeah, you

just gotta, you gotta do what you gotta do with those pencil

thin ties? At one point, there was the tight collars, and,

yeah, it was a crazy time. And then the whole set, the paninaro

sort of look, came in. And, I mean, there was, there was so

many expressions, it was going off, and it was very tribal back

then. Yeah, so if you was a certain way, you didn't look

that way, you know what I mean, you had your identity, and it

was all about identity, being proud of your identity, but

being proud of that little, little pocket of subculture that

you occupied, and your friends. But yeah, hip hop, it was the

one. And you know, you had your Puma Dallas on GV list because I

wanted to be different. There was no biting your style. Do you

know what I mean? It's a whole thing, like, if you've got that,

I'm not having that. It's a thing that's gone out the window

subsequently due to consumerism. But hey, things evolve, things

change. You're not gonna, I'm not gonna decry that. But yeah,

it's a fascinating one.

Yeah, the tribalism something that I find really

interesting. Because, yeah, I don't, unless it's there, and I

just don't know, because I'm that disconnected from the

younger generation. It feels like you can't really tell very

easily what music someone might potentially

be. Yeah, I think everything's a bit more

democratic, bit more open now, yeah. And it's like you can be

into that, and you can be into this, you know. So when I was

hip, when I've always been firmly hip hop. So when my mates

started getting into, you know, popping pills and all that kind

of stuff, and going into raves in the in the middle of a field,

that wasn't my bag, we really stuck steadfast with hip hop.

But yeah, it was, it was quite interesting, you know, that

whole thing, because I was around it, I was surrounded by

it, you know, and what was being played at the time, you couldn't

get away from it, you know, my mates were going to, like,

velvet, underground, kinky, galinky, you know, all these,

all these house nights, they were going to dreamscape,

they're going to telepathy, they're going to oxygen, they

were going to all that stuff. I mean, I went to a couple of

ways. I went to Exodus a couple of times around 94 Yeah, I

actually, I definitely think it's 94 because I remember I

messed up my Jordan, my Jordan threes. It's quite funny,

because I'm wearing a pair of Jordan threes right now, but

Jordan threes with that mythical shoe. So my friend Robbie, who I

previously mentioned, from caveman, he went to New York to

New Music seminar. So he got plugged into what was going on

in New York and the look and what was what was popping there

and coming back, I was going to America. I was going to Houston

and I was going to Winnipeg in Canada. So two different

expressions there as well. What was taking you there family? So,

yeah, so my mum's brother was in Winnipeg, and my cousins were

there. And then in Houston, my auntie was there. So I was going

to Houston, and I was going to Sugarland, which is later where

I met Bun B, because he lives in Sugar Land. But anyway, that's a

whole other story. But the thing is, it's like, so I was going, I

was going to, I was going to Houston, and seeing all these

trainers that weren't available over here, and going to Canada

as well as and coming back to the UK with trainers that

weren't available because I was skating as well at the time. So

yeah, and then Robbie was going. He went to New Zealand. He came

back with the Jordan threes, right? And everyone bugged out

the black cement Jordan threes. They weren't available in this

country because Jordan ones were distributed in this country for

some weird reason, Jordan twos and threes weren't okay. Don't

know the story behind that. I think Nike was a licensee back

then. Maybe that was something to do with it. And basketball

culture wasn't that that prevalent in this, in this, in

this country. Five years after five, no, six years. Yeah,

Jordan's coming 88 Yes, this year. So in 1994 that was 10

years of Michael Jordan being with Nike, right? Jordan Brand

hadn't quite happened yet. He's offshoot, right? That happened,

I think, 96 with the Jordan 11. But what happened was, they

celebrated Michael Jordan being, you know, with Nike for 10

years. So they retro, the Jordan one and the Jordan two, the

Jordan three, and I think quite I don't think the Jordan four

was retro then, can't quite remember. So it's the first time

that I could actually own a pair of Jordan threes. The only other

time we ever saw Jordan threes, apart from on Robbie's feet, was

in this seminal, mythical, fantastic store called four star

general, which originally started on Carnaby Street by a

guy called George, who I later get to became friendly with, but

then he moved it to Camden, which is ironic, because that's

where I live. But what was mad was they that Jordan and Nike

retro those shoes, but again, the mythical shoe for me as well

wasn't just the Jordan three, but it's the. Jordan two as won

by the skinny boys on their cover, you know, back in the

day, and couldn't get the Jordan twos. They got retro, but they

didn't get retroed here. So be subsequently, many, many years

later, I think in around 2001 or 2002 before I could actually

first own a pair of Jordan twos. And a Jordan twos were the first

Nikes, I believe, to be made in Italy, because Michael Jordan

wanted that luxury look. He wanted a shoe that he could

wear, you know, to dinner and on the court. Horrendously

expensive, but they weren't distributed, as said in the UK,

and it's a theme that he touched upon later with the Jordan 11,

because that's why they had their patent leather, and they

looked very decadent and looked, you know, in a certain style

that you could wear with a suit, or you could wear it on the

court.

So for any listeners who hadn't guessed already, you

know a lot about sneakers, right? A little bit. So who

wants to know? So who's asking in the 90s, how are you getting

your information on that? Because obviously, you know. Now

we can go on digging,

right? The thing is, right? You're flicking through

magazines, you're seeing videos, and you're seeing record covers,

and you've seen 12 inch covers, you've seen the inner sleeve,

you've read in the notes. You know exactly where this the song

was made, who the engineer was, you know where it was mastered.

All this information, bam, bam, bam. It's all going in your

head. So you know that chunking was, was the place to throw

down. You know, that's where public enemy made a lot of the

chunking house of hits. I think it was called, this is where the

bomb squad made a lot of stuff, you know, that was the, that was

the first and then, you know, you had battery studios as well,

where a lot of stuff, you know, and drive Records recorded, and

stuff like that. And you got to know this stuff. This is before

DND, before Premier, before that stuff, you know. So it's really

interesting to see that. And it was, it was the same thing with

that information, knowing what records were coming out,

chatting to people, chatting to the people at the record stores,

what's coming in and and going on your travels. But when I was

going to London, I was going up from the train on my own, from

elsbury, on the train, bombing up young person's railcard into

the center of town. I was potting around. I was just go

and walk in the streets. And that's how it was. I remember

going to Camden, because Camden is like, Yo, that's the really

cool spot to go to. You got to go to Camden. I remember going

to Camden start digging for records coming across there.

Went to salt soul shop. Wasn't that impressed by the salt of

soul shop? Actually, maybe that's my petulance back in the

day, I don't know, but I was just like, Nah, it's not on the

it's not in the same level as blah blah. And, you know, I

think there was a short quarter park where there's a shot called

apartment, called rap, things called Parkway, and just going

around Camden Market, all those sort of spots, going to

Portobello Road I was in. I'm still into comics, and I used to

go to Forbidden Planet, the original one, on Denmark Street,

and around the corner, around the back alley. There was

another, there was another there was another spot which is a

secret comic shop which had everything even cheaper.

Literally doesn't exist anymore, that Ali, well, it's been

transformed. You got alternate there now. But, and that's

before Forbidden Planet moved to St Giles, high street. So he had

that. He had top 10 comics in Soho, which was all owned by

Paul Gambaccini and Jonathan Ross, things like that. Yeah.

And then just going, just going, just going all over the spot.

Then on Portobello Road, which is what brought me there was two

things. Slam City skates was on Talbot Road in that area. It's

really sketchy back then, um, going there, I think it's about

86 and then fantastic store opened up. Oh, actually, wasn't

it? Fantastic store was Jonathan Ross, I can't remember, but

anyway, fantastic store was on Portobello Road, so I'd go there

to get comics. Do you know what I mean? So it's just going all

around, just on the dig. So be comics, it'd be records, it'd be

clothes, it'd be trainers, it'd be everything. I mean, you just,

if you're in it, you're in it. So a lot of it was just talking

to people that, or just just just walking around, yeah, just

walking around. Because the thing is, the thing is, though a

lot of information was held back, because once you had your

spot, didn't want it to blow up, because it's only a certain

amount of stuff to go around. So could go around. So you had your

secret spots, so you didn't talk about it. I remember going out

to King's Road, just chippy. And all the French labels, they

were, they were big. So you had a chippy, just a floral Street

in Covent Garden. And chippy was the big, big label. You know,

chippy had a longer moment than, say, NAF. NAF did. NAF NAF got

played out really quickly, which is another French label. You had

C 17 in chevignon, and they were there, they were there. But

chippy was the sort of the piece de resistance. So, I mean, that

was the one. And then what happened was a chippy open up on

King's Road, and it's like, Okay, let's go down King's Road,

and then go, let's go further down King's Road. You see a

vintage shop called Flip, and there was another flip on long

acre in Covent Garden, vintage Americana. Vintage Americana is

Brit big American classics. Was another one as well in in Covent

Garden, which later opened up at the end of King's Road. Then you

had a place called bluebird garage. It's still there. Now

it's Terence Conran. But before that, it was like Kensington

Market, because high street Ken was another spot to go to. Got a

shout of Fiona cartilage. She was responsible for that hyper,

hyper and all these things that were going on really associated

with club culture. Slick willies. Was a place there as

well where you could get American baseball hats and all

American stuff. Because American football was big as well. It

started to blow up. You know, 84 you had the Chicago Bears when

it was on Channel Four TV. Channel Four just started. They

got the rights and William the refrigerator, Perry, what would

pay? And all these, all these sort of names. So that was big.

So Willies was there. So he had all these places sort of pulling

you here, there and there, and here, Mr. USA in Wood Green. I

was going to Wood Green, and which is crazy when you think

about it, because that's one of the gnarliest watts in London.

But from Aylesbury all the way up to Wood Green, I think it

must have been about 88 No, not 88 about 8990 or something like

that. And they had, you know, the place that sold the fitted

hats, New Era hats and all that kind of stuff back then. Start a

hat. Start was massive. So all these places in play, and it was

pulling you everywhere. And you sort of dig a swank on swank on

old Compton Street, mash on Oxford Street. That's a seminal

spot. Very influential. Kareem and his business partner, maybe

his brother got be friendly with them later on in life, but he

had all these things going on, but going down King's Road,

right? You had the bluebird garage, and it was all market

stalls, and there was all different people doing different

things. And this is where I met Simon Porter. Now, Simon Porter

was very integral to the story, because he had his stall, which

was selling Stussy. And I remember I was wearing stucce In

the 80s because he escaped and I discovered it in America. And I

was wearing it was a little bit after ocean Pacific was cool.

And then I was where, yeah, we were in that we were in lifesa

beach. We're wearing Mambo, all these sort of surface surf

associated brands, because there was no such thing as street

wear. There was no such thing as skatewear, but surfware was co

opted by the skaters. So lifesa Beach was another one. There

was, there was a whole load of other things right in play,

anarchic adjustment. And, you know, there was all these, all

these spots, you know, all these wild revolution, all these

different labels that were insane, which was from over

here, Jed, Jed wells fully respect him. There was a shop

called M zone as well, just off Carnaby Street on Loudoun its

court, all these spots. So I remember going to bluebird

garage, and I see Simon port there. Didn't know him at the

time. Got to be mates with him. He's still mates to this day.

And he said inducing and going, I'm actually charging for this.

This used to be this much. Yeah. I mean, you know, used to be 18

quid a t shirt or whatever. And he suddenly jumped up to like,

2522 25 quid or something like that. It's like, Whoa. What's

going on here? And I remember buying a couple of bits. I still

got the denim stuc shirt I bought off him to this day,

which is quite mad. And you also had flying records in there,

which is the whole Junior boy's own lot going on. And that was

at the bottom of King's Road in a massive record store right

there. And record stores were focal points, really. You know,

you're meeting other people there. You're meeting DJs.

You're meeting people into music. And it's a music culture.

You're buying tickets to go to certain clubs there and all that

kind of stuff, you know, rather than, you know, you get the

ticket ahead of time, because it's a little bit cheaper than,

say, you know, having to queue up on the door at the day, you

know, trying to get in, and queuing up and not getting in.

But that didn't happen to me, quite fortunately. But you had

all that going on. I mean, one of the benefits of Robbie being

down with Robbie, when he was producing caveman, suddenly he

was like, Yeah, everyone wanted to know caveman ever wanted to

be mates with Robbie. And it would be like, Charles Peterson

hit him up, going, yo, do you want to come to my night? So

we'd go to Charles's night. Would be guest listed in like

that. It was all patterned up. Robbie sorted it out. And that

was like, you know, 1990 onwards, Westwood, Westwood. It

was on westward So, all that kind of stuff, you know, boom,

we're wherever that's going down. It was, it was interesting

times. And just the the music, and just coming across stuff,

and just, you know, being to the mix. I was buying records

anyway, from the early, you know, I was buying vinyl

records, probably from the age of 10 or whatever, with my

pocket money, you know, yeah, it was, it was about, not, you

know, and then that, I've never left it. I'm still buying

records now, and that's how, you know, for me, where I'm at right

now is shaped by two things, music and football. You having

to kick him out in the street supporting Manchester, United

States, you know, thanks to my my older brothers, in a sense,

they used to hang out with when I was growing up in Elmhurst

estate in elsby, Robert and Andy and having a kick about in the

park wearing trainers. You know you're going to the ducks in

elsby, and you breaking or attempting to break or trying to

do more, like the robot and popping and locking, to be

honest. And, you know, you got your trainers on, you know?

Mean, so it was, is that? So it's hip hop and football. That

why I am here right now. That's the twin helixes,

right? Okay, so, would you move to London at one point?

Yeah, right. Yeah. You know, I

moved to London and, um, just to be in the middle of

it. No. Well, it was a happenstance, actually, because

what happened was, I was in elsby until 97 doing, you know,

I didn't really have much direction. I, you know, I

didn't. I was surrounded by all these people making music I was

in, you know, I remember when I went to Monroe studios with

Robbie, when he was producing MCD, the damn DP that had been

around 9293 I come across, I meet MCDs partner at time in the

group, silent Eclipse, DJ fusion, the original fusion in

hip hop. And we just got chatting and all that kind of

stuff. While, while D was doing his bars, and Robbie was in on

the other side of the glass, and we were in the room with Robbie

at the back, and we just chatting. And. He's going, Yo,

you know, this is I was talking about, yeah, I'm collecting

records, man, yeah, I'm on this thing. Boom, and, you know? And

I thought I knew Hip Hop records, right? And it was, nah,

the whole thing, there was a whole thing that just opened up

from that moment. And it's like, Simon goes, Yo, you should come

to Liberty. Grooves in, in tooting. And I go, Yeah, I've

seen that shop, but I've seen it advertised in in hip hop

connection. All right, I'll come to tooting. I go to tooting.

It's where I meet Johnny F, a man who later ripped me off, who

owned it was a life lesson. And that's where I met a lot of

people. I met Mark I met Mark B there. Rest in peace. He was a

great friend. I met Julian from the creators and site, and Simon

from the creators there. And the mad thing was, was Simon from

the creators. He used to go to high Wickham, right? And I

didn't know Simon at the time, but I was mates with Brian

Garvey. Brian Garvey was part of our old crew. He went to this he

was a year above me, and his his brother, Redmond, was in the

same year as me at school in St Louis. And then to the grammar

Brian started a magazine, a fanzine, which is way ahead of

its time, called Concrete funk. Now, concrete funk, right? It's

pre Big Daddy, pre wax Poe eggs, pre all of that. It's listing

all the breaks. It's listing this, this, this, this, and

having you know little little, it's a fanzine dedicated that,

aside from your creators, was one half of that, right? So it's

quite, quite random. And I hadn't met Simon until 1993 94

when I was hanging out in Liberty grooves and the creators

were just starting. So, but the actually, I don't think the

creators had started at that point. But I met Julian, okay,

and because he was all about dealing records, and Mark B was

all about dealing records. And that's where I met. That's where

I met Ty rest in peace. That's where I met shorty Blitz and all

the guys who worked at Liberty grooves. That's where I met the

Brotherhood. That's where I met a lot of people, you know. And

it was a scene we've got. We were getting pulled to get a

flavor of the month. My flavor of the month was going down

there. That's where I first saw the roots perform in 19 roots

perform in 94 when they were living here in Kentish town,

they were living, which is where I live now, random. So, I mean,

so all these sort of like things that thread through my narrative

and the coincidences, etc. It's quite it's quite crazy, but

yeah, so it's like Liberty grooves. That's where I

discovered. This is test pressings. This is acetates.

This is the reel to reels that level of collecting, yeah. And

it was like, okay, because I was already shopping at Mr. Bongo,

because she would already opened up his section of Mr. Bongo

after leaving Tower Records, you know, I was already going to all

the record shops in Soho, you know, groove, you know. And then

when groove changed, you know, they moved it sounds uh Ben and

and Christopher long and all these other they moved their

sort of part of groove to sound source records, I do believe, on

Monmouth Street and then Neil Street. And then catch a groove

opened up after with destiny and Matt White and all these other

spots and unity records where it was Kenny boots and and Ronnie,

who used to hold it down there. And I later went to work for

Ronnie at major flavors, which was quite, quite crazy. But

who'd ever thought back then I was going to end up doing that?

Whoever thought that when I was working, when I was buying

records in Lexington Street, where Mr. Bongos was originally

located, I'd end up working there, you know, just around the

corner on Poland Street, many years later. But it was, it was

fascinating, though. But you know, doing that all these

little moments, all these little sliding doors moments, is quite,

quite crazy. And then what happened was, so when I'm at the

studio and I'm going to Liberty cruise, that's where I met

Johnny F, and Johnny F was going to New York quite a lot on he

and I found out the story, the back story, and this afterwards

chatting with Bob and with stretch. But he was going to New

York. He's a blogger. I gotta give it to him. He's a bloody

good blogger, because he blagged me. He blagged a lot of people.

He blag Stretch Armstrong. He black, black barbeto. So he was

going and going and buying record, buying missions, and

buying stuff up and coming back, as were the guys at bongos. He

was going to different spots, but yeah, Johnny had a serious

Hip Hop collection. I mean, I had a pretty serious one by that

point, but he had a serious and I had a good breaks one as well,

but that's when I met some fantastic characters, still to

this day. But Lee, right, and the he was, he had this wants

list, and I was looking through this once it's going, what the

hell is all this? He right. I didn't even know that half this

stuff existed on wax right in Aylesbury. We weren't getting

this right. We went getting Mike and Dave records. We weren't

getting all these sort of pressings and these real low

presses of Boogie wrap, you know, we were or 12 star

records. We weren't getting none of that in ellesbury. And also

the stores in London, if any store did, probably have them

back in the day, it probably would have been groove. But I

got to know groove a little bit later, and once stuff was sold

out, was sold out, right? That's how it was, and it was in

people's record collections. I. But he So Lee had this list of

all these Mike and Dave records and this. And I was like, going,

what the hell is all this? So my mind got blown up, like, Yo,

there's so much more out there, so much more. And there's all

these little local presses that you know, that you wouldn't know

unless she was there in the Bronx or in Queens or wherever,

and they just hocking out at the back of their car, which I stout

now and do know? And it was just a flashpoint moment. And then

that's when I got pulled into funding the gutter snipes EP,

the trials of life. EP, because I was, I was going up there, I

was buying records, and then Johnny was, oh, yeah, can you

give me some money to go get some records, blah, blah, blah,

and all this kind of stuff. And so all my wages, I'd give to

Johnny, and then Johnny would go off on to New York and come back

with a whole back box record. Of records. And it was a bit of a

pretty twisted arrangement, when you think about it, because I'd

get first dibs at the records he got back, but I'd be actually,

I'd actually buy, being buying them back for what he was

selling them for, right? Maybe a little bit of a discount, but

I'd actually funded that. Mean, if anyone should be making the

money off, it should be, yeah, whatever. Yeah, exactly. So it

was a bit like, it's a bit skewed. So I've got some crazy

records, crazy records. I got my, you know, my main source,

Adam, first press off Johnny and all this kind of, all that stuff

like, you know, but, but, you know, it's a bit of a weird one.

So I'm at the gut snipes still friends to this day. You've got

Russell Payne, who was massively influenced, probably by Robbie

the principal. That is, you had Stuart sell one graffiti artist,

Top Boy rapper, rapper in the sort of vein of cool G Rap over

here, and the original DJ for, I didn't know about this scene,

this whole South London scene extending to the coast of, you

know, the south coast, but the original DJ was first rate,

right? Paul, I'd like to become mates with. Paul got bounced

from the band, the new guy who came in prime cuts I'm still

friends with to this day. And so Joel was the DJ for gutter

snipes. And so I ended up funding the trials of life EP,

and got ripped off because I never saw the money back. Johnny

pulled the money from that. He put it into the freestyle

frenzies with Stretch Armstrong, who he blagged. I think he owes

money to stretch for it, and then it was meant to go into the

acanelli track. Breaker bitch neck called you rapper thinks on

it, and it's a classic record. There's test presses. I never

got the test presses. I never got a single one. They go for

1000s. Yeah, some

of the yakinelli ones, that's my money. Johnny roast,

it's my money. So, yeah, JP has got JP has had a

couple go his way. And I never got given one. And to me, to me

to this day, it's like, Yo, if you've got that record, you got

my record. Now I'm just saying, like that bitter, just the facts

I paid for those records. Never got the money back from that

entire deal. That deal went south stretch. Didn't want to

know. I think there's case too many cooks. He was going to come

out on liberty grooves, all these leases come on Libby

grooves. So that went south. So that's a life lesson for me,

expensive one. I put a lot of money into that. I never got any

feedback. So, you know it is what it is, but it's a deal with

between me and Johnny and no one else. So was this when you were

working at this is when I do. This is when I was working

right? I hadn't even got into working at record stores at that

point. I didn't get to work at my first record store until

about 99 I think it was that's when I worked at Mr. Bongo but

I'm still going up and buying records and stuff. I was working

in call centers. I'd work, I'd worked at McDonald's, and I went

to work at a Mexican restaurant, nailsbury, then I went to work

in call centers. I mean, yeah, on telesales, which you seen

Dave Brent the office, Right? Steve, seen the Steve Carell

version as well. I have to say, nail on the head, right, dart

right on the bullseye, with that culture that surrounds what goes

on in offices in the UK and sounds of things in America, and

the personality types that you get there and or what you

haven't to deal with to live through that, I've done my call

centers in offices. Yeah, exactly. So we've survived,

yeah. I mean, we've done our tours of duty. Adam, come on,

man. Blood in, blood out, we're out of it, yeah? So Donald fair

share of shitty jobs. So that's what I was doing at the time.

Yeah, it was just a crazy time, you know, dealing with that, you

know, and trying to juggle things and get into and get into

what we get onto. But it was a moment of serendipity. Guy left,

Mr. Bongos, and the guys knew me, and I go, Yeah, I can do the

job. And, and they go, all right, cool, right. Come in,

come in. And it was that, was it? The dream was to work in a

record store back then have that thing where, you know, you're

surrounded by music, you boom, you know, and put people onto

music. And it was great. And I'm still mates with the guys from

bongos to this day. How

does it work in terms of, like, the whole like, don't

get high on your own supply sort of thing. How do you not just

burn your entire wage?

You burn everything. But the thing is, when you look

at it, though you're not burning anything, you just, it's energy

transfer. It's like transforming, transferring the

money from that into something else. And who knew but I.

They're now assets. They're now our investments. They're our

bank accounts. These things, not just even fiscally, though

culturally as well. We're documenting history. And which

is where I stand right now, is I'm all about, as I said, I say

I'm a cultural curator. I'm about I like this, like that.

I'm curating my sort of narrative here, and trying to

not depict a history solely through my eyes, but apply my

vision to what I've seen, what's influenced me and what I value,

but bringing other people into it as well. That's the goal. You

see, it's collecting always been the kind of mindset

and a habit of yours.

I mean, I guess, yeah. I mean, maybe I get it

from my mom. My mom's the person who just doesn't throw anything

away. I mean, anything away? Well, there's collecting in this

hoarding Exactly, exactly. So I think my mom's more more of the

of the latter, and I'm more of the former. I'd say, yeah. I

mean, yeah, there's a there's a things have to have a purpose,

of meaning, you know, apart from just being tapped Jeremy, my

mom's. But the thing is, it's great, because I was actually

having a dig through their attic the other day, and I was coming

across stuff that, you know, the stuff of mine is still there.

And I was like, Oh my God, what I found, oh shit. I didn't take

him out of the bloody egg. Okay? What I even found video tapes

right now. Back in the day, you used to get given promo

videotapes, if you work for a magazine or whatever, of the

video by the artist. I've got a few of them. I don't know where

the hell I got them from. How? Right? I have got them, right? I

ain't got that many. And I was like, What the Oh, my God, I

forgot I had these, but where did I get them from? Haven't got

a clue. So, you know, if you're a music journalist, you probably

got given you probably got sent the video as well as the track.

You'd probably get the vinyl sent to you or the CD, right?

Radio DJs would have got sent the vinyl or CD upon request.

Wouldn't got sent the tapes, uh, tapes or dats. They were, they

were currency as well. Do you know? I mean, Westwood probably

got a whole load of that sent because he had a got it sent

straight from the studio, played this on the show before they

even had a chance to mix it down, or, or forget, or they

might have mixed it down, but haven't even a chance to bounce

it onto wax or whatever, onto CD. But yeah, it was mad, and

I'm like, Whoa. I was like, Okay, wow. So yeah, there's our

other thing that I'm gonna have to suck for pointing out and

documenting. Because a lot of these music videos, a lot of the

ones that are broadcast on MTV, they don't have them. The record

companies didn't keep them. And I don't think director didn't

keep anything. No one kept this stuff. It's crazy when you think

about it. Mad. Do you mean, yeah,

because I suppose you get into the end of the point

where physical matters, yeah, exactly. But

also, the video has been played on the show, on the

shows, right? It's been distributed, right? We don't

need it anymore, yeah? No one understood the value of

preservation at the time, and it was a very disposable time. It

still is, now ever more so, you know, nothing's built to last,

and it's mad. It really is going through the archive, going

through no not the archive, going through parents attic,

coming across a box of magazines. Then inside it

there's Beat Street records, not the Beat Street records in

America, but I remember there was a Beat Street records,

cheeky guy, right? I remember he's Top Boy. Used to ring him

up. He was based in Abingdon, and he used to have a plug to

get in promos and all that kind of stuff. I think I bought, um,

drop a gem on him, off him, or something like that. Go, see, I

just got this hot record, and he was only able to get huge. I

mean, you have to hit him up. And you go, you and they send a

postal order to him. Yeah, right. Post order, boom. And

then the records are calm, and there's all this kind of stuff.

And I you see the list sort of thing is, it's like going

through record collector, or going through blues and soul,

going through Hip Hop connection, going through

whatever publication, seeing who's advertising, going there,

going to record fairs, you know. And it was just absolutely going

to black music fairs, going and then discovering and continuing

to do that, going to market stalls, wherever you were,

whichever country you was in this, where's the record store?

Where's the sneaker store, you know, going through the phone

book, literally, you know, it's like, was it NASS says in the

break, back to the grill again, remix, um, serial killer working

through the phone book, which, I mean, it's like, literally, just

do that. But, you know, with cultural stuff, yeah, you know,

but

yeah, just, just on the point of kind of archives

and stuff. Like I was, I was a big wrestling fan when I was

little. Oh, come

on, yes, WWF, when it was called that, yeah. And I

love the Cogan and

all that. Like, I don't know if anyone has

consumed more content about 90s wrestling than I have, certainly

not in my with the amount of books I've read about Yeah. But

one really interesting thing is when WCW, which was the rival,

Rick, folded, yeah. So they they folded after a bit head to head

competition over the 90s then WCW sold. Us to WWF for $2

million or something. But what I think Vince McMahon had

realized, or managed to leverage, was that gave him

archive footage for a multitude of different independent

wrestling promotions that have been absorbed in that kind of

regional network through the seventh WCW

had done exactly what happened to what ultimately

happened to WWF. What

I find interesting with the wrestling is, I think

you can compare certain wrestlers to rappers in terms of

Persona, style, things like that. You think about Million

Dollar Man Ted DiBiase. Think about maybe Slick Rick,

for example. You know, yeah, you know,

he's super technical.

Jake the Snake, yeah. I mean, I

remember all Jim saying, yeah, he's got the

psychology gets in people's heads. There's you could spend

some time drawing parallels between the two things. Totally,

yeah. But yeah, that, that whole sort of archiving things

interesting. Like, did you have any sort of mind of thinking

when you were collecting all these things and all these, all

these sneakers and things, I

was just, it's just like, it was just the one and

things I want to get that want to get that got some money, I

want to get that at that point now, I realize, you know, it's

not about what it's not about, for me, it's about what you

give. It's what you give back, what a future Gen gonna be

looking at. You see, we've got the VNA, you got the British

Museum, you got the Natural History Museum, you got the

design, music, all these fantastic institutions, right?

What about the now? Who's, who's preserving the now? We are the

cultural curators, not just myself. I'm a cultural curator,

people don't realize what they're doing. I mean,

Greenpeace, he's got the vinyl coming out his test press. His

test press has gone out insane. And the thing is, it's like one

of those things he's chosen to discipline, and he's focused on

it, and very, very well, he's up there with the best, if not the

best. He's got some crazy stuff that he's paid me, and I'm

looking at and going, all right, cool. I've got a wider sort of

net, so I've got the vinyl, I've got the sneakers, I've got the

some some key clothing, you know, and magazines and videos

and this and that, you know. So Dan's doing his thing. I'm doing

my thing, you know, boy James liebens is doing his thing. Um,

our boy, James liebens is doing his

thing. Yeah, you know,

all these different all building up little pieces of

the jigsaw puzzle. So now it's time to start bringing the

jigsaw puzzle together. So my sneaker archive is one for is

the first step for that private for now, but the eventual goal

is to bring it to the public. You know, we saw the how

fantastic Roger gassmans Beyond the streets exhibition was

received at the Saatchi Gallery at the start of last year, and

it ran for it was, I think, their most successful

exhibition. Wow, you know, and that just focused on art, and

only that much of street art and graffiti culture, and done very,

very well. But, you know, you got everything from cornbread

all the way to the now, you know, and to people who might

consider that isn't street art, but it's influenced by that, you

know. So it goes in, I think Jonathan yo was in it, and

things like that. So it goes from there, here and everywhere,

you know, and it was fascinating. You had your pieces

by moe Goldie and all that kind of stuff there, which was great.

Adidas was a key, was a key partner in that whole story,

which is fantastic, but we need something permanent, and we need

something on a bigger scale, and that will be done, whether it's

not via me or somebody else, somebody else will do it. If I'm

not going to do it. So right now, I'm going, I want to do it,

but if I don't get to do it, I'm just putting the little seed out

there. Someone will do it. You know, we need to document the

now for for the future generations. So

just going back then. So we've kind of looked at the

90s. What was the 2000s like? Did you move to Brighton for a

bit? Yeah,

that's right, yeah. So I moved to Brighton in 97 so

I was in elsby, and I started seeing a girl, Caroline, who was

at University of Sussex. So got pulled to Brighton from before

97 and it was quite mad, because then I I met my friend, still to

this day, I live with I live one of them signed Kirk twins. I met

grant and Ed. He ran the 145 store, which is a streetwear

store in Sydney Street in Brighton at the time, and Joel

and Josh and all these other people there. Rupert Dom, it was

great. And then I remember bump into them before I lived in

London at the Contents Under Pressure exhibition with Lee

stash and Futura. No, stash wasn't involved. It was Lee blue

and Futura. And that was one of the first exhibitions I went to

in Shoreditch. In fact, it was the first one I went to. And it

was a place that became known as tram shed, which was the state

place. I don't think it's still there, where they had the Damien

Hirst up there. I don't. If you remember that, I mean, but they

had a Damien Hirst in formaldehyde cow suspended from

the Salem, all that kind of stuff. I always thought was a

bit overrated, but the concept was fantastic. But yeah, so

there was that, there was that, and a bump. Remember bumping

into them there. Then I ended up moving to Brighton, because my

mate, Joe, was like, Yeah, let's move to Brighton. I want to live

there. And I was like, well, that works because, and I used

to be at the I used to be at the I used to work at the Mexican

restaurant with him, so I was like, Yeah, let's move to

Brighton. End up moving to Brighton, and that's where I

first got onto radio with sign Kurt, because sign Kurt knew the

people who are setting up the record the radio station in

Brighton at the time, brand new one who helped set up kiss

Eugene. I think Eugene was one of the partners and but anyway,

they because, because sign cut, previously been signed to Sony

BMG with their music, and had also done some tracks on skint

at the time, which is the one of the labels in this country, skin

and and wall of sound, which I later ended up working For. And

so, yeah, so go in there and then grant scratchy, and we got

the show. We got we and because I was so plugged in with what

was going on in London, and Kurt was so plugged in with the

people who were bringing surf 107 to the airwaves, we got the

show. We've got, we've got the hip hop show. Had no broadcast

experience before. Did you

take to it quite easily because of all the kind

of going around and talking to people, when you've been going

everywhere and just chatting shit, so you just chat

in front of you, right? Jeremy, that's all it is. But it was

interesting because I'd never, never even thought of that, and

I never even thought of, you know, later on, DJing or

whatever that came afterwards. But si was the DJ. Kurt was the

producer, and grant and I were the CO hosts. We interviewed

some great people. We interviewed some great people.

What do you highlight? I mean, well, bambata, wow, which was an

interesting one, considering he had a dude with him who was a

bit younger, and we know why. Back then, there was only

rumors, but we had bambar, gracious guy, fantastic guy. I

subsequently met cool Herk and Grandmaster Flash and not so

cool, but bam, was really safe. Had them, had Jungle Brothers,

great guys. No, bam, baby, bam. Now you know, who else did we

interview? Do we interview dilla? Think we interviewed JD,

yeah. We interviewed a lot. Mark B came on the show. He played

his remix of the of a creator's track, which never came out

until recently, and it was the only time it ever got played on

anything. It was dope. Killer. Keller's first radio appearance

as part of the 360 physicals. With the 360 physicals was on

our radio show. I'd already met Keller by then. I learned Keller

since he was called pot CP, when his beatboxing outside of

bongos, and he goes, What's this? What's this? And

beatboxing track, go, Oh, it's this. Go, yeah, that's right.

Go, Yeah, you're good mate, you know? I mean, so, so, so, yeah,

Kells is still my bro to this day. Yeah, we had so many, I

mean, Jurassic five. We played Jurassic five the first on the

show. If our show was in London, we would have got a lot more

props. Our props would have, would have been bigger. We

played Dilated Peoples first. We played Luke pack first. We

played everything first. I had access to the tracks because of

my relationship with bongos and because radio pluggers started

getting I got to give a big shout out to Harvey Jones and

Sally from zont, which is a music promo company based in

Stratford Ackland, workshops. They did all raucous they did

gorillas. They did so much stuff, you know, lemon jelly.

They were all over the place. And they were, you know, Harry

was super plugged in. And so, yeah, we played a lot of stuff

first. And I think Kurt's lost a lot of the dats. I don't know

where they are. Everyone's moved around so many times they don't

know where things are. But, yeah, yeah, we had a lot of, we

had a lot of great, great moments on that show how long it

ran for. And then what happened was, I spoke with my girlfriend,

and then I started hearing this voice every time I ring up,

zonked. I started hearing this voice going, what the hell's

going on as a voice, as girls voices, not Sally, who is this

girl? So anyway, this girl had started working at zonked, so I

didn't think nothing of it. And then my boy, Ziggy, who was

still one of my best mates to this day, he started his record

label called blue juice, with his partner called Graham, who I

ended up later living in his flat with for a minute. And what

happened was he was going like, let's go up to zonked. We've got

to deliver the records hand, you know, to zonked. I was like,

right, fine. End up going to zonked for the first time. Never

been there before. Everything before that had been voices on

the phone. That's where I met Harvey. That's where I met. I

think actually had already met Harvey in town at the record

store. Actually, I hadn't been to the office because in

Stratford, bit of a mission, especially coming from Brighton.

So we drove, we drove Ziggy. Ziggy drove to Ackland, going in

there, and then I see Sarah, and I'm like, Dang man, she's fine,

yo, and she's a leads lass. Anyway, we ended up, you know,

she came down a couple of times to Brighton, and then then we

ended up getting together. And then she was living in

Stratford, so then I ended up going visiting. Stratford quite

a lot, and ended up moving up to Stratford. So that was around

2000 and then I started continuing to do the radio show

without the guys, because they we got moved around on the

schedule so much. But I was still adamant that you needed to

do a radio show then it's a bit of a bit of a good thing to be

doing it. So I maintained doing the show. I had Mex come in

DJing at one point, and so that people, but then they all

dropped out. So I ended up having to do the DJ and the

presenting So, and then got bounced off the show, you know,

scheduling changes and all this kind of stuff. So it was what it

was. The station didn't really invest in the show. Yeah, I

didn't it, didn't talk about it, and didn't understand the value

of what we brought and the connections that we had to bring

what we did to the table. So then I was, I was moved up to

London. I'd work. I started work at Mr. Bongos. I was commuting

to Mr. Bongos from Brighton to London, and then I ended up

moving from that to bad magic, because Greenpeace brought me

in. He goes, Yo, I need a label manager for bad magic, because

he was at A and R so I was working in West London. And I

was commuting up from Brighton to West London. And then that

got a bit untenable. So then I started, you know, staying more

over in Stratford. And then eventually it became a, you

know, Stratford on the on the central to Notting Hill, and

then walking up mad finger man, this is one of your face power

moments, you it's like so wall of sound. Mark Jones, fantastic

guy, not in good shape right now. My prayers are with him,

but I learned a lot of him. Wall of Sound was the other big label

at the time. His skin a wall of sound. The whole big beat sounds

was popping off like crazy. Wise Guys to Shay in that I'd already

had that big hit based off the Budweiser. I think it was the

ULA LA. And I didn't realize, though, but freaking bloody

fear, Wise Guys, was snatched the guy that used to see written

up on the fucking side of the train lines as I was going on

the train from Aylesbury to London, all them years ago. He

was bombing it. A lot of the guys that I now know who are up,

sort of teach being put up. I saw coma. Saw diet, all these,

all these names up, and I got to meet him later on, which is kind

of Drax. Got to see him all later on. It's mad, but, uh,

yeah, so Greenpeace pulls me in, and I met Greenpeace in Mr.

Bongo. He'd started fat lace magazine him and drew swear. I

met Rob Percy's, where I met James Lebens. It's where I met a

lot of those guys. And we're still firm friends to this day.

And then Greenpeace was, you know, and Andrew were writing

for hip hop connection. You've got crazy stories. Yeah, that's

how they're able to do fat lace, actually, because they were on

assignment with HHC, they do their stuff with fat lace as

well, which is brilliant. And they were getting flown by, you

know, the record companies at the time, however, come

interview this size, come interview this size, blah, blah,

blah, like that. And that Sal Greenpeace and that met

Rosenberg and all that sort of stuff, the whole Eminem early

thing and all this kind of stuff. So, yeah, it was

interesting. I mean, I remember, before I even worked at bongos,

and Harvey from zongton, I were in in bongos before, before it

was open, because Eminem was recording just about, Eminem was

just about to blow Slim Shady, you know, Slim Shady was, was

the hot topic. And he was doing a thing for Channel Four. And it

was like, you know, you know, we were going, okay, look, we, you

know, we want to get some drops and some time with you for, you

know, to promote my radio show. And the manager at the time,

this dude used to work at stress magazines, like, yeah, sure,

we'll get you after, after we've done our thing with Channel

Four. Afterwards, they're like, no, no, no, we're going now. And

we nearly kicked off. We nearly got into a fight with MLM and

his manager, and it was just like, and we're just thinking,

why he's being such a dicks man in the time that we've just been

wasted doing this, arguing this, we could have done what we

wanted to do with you. Jeremy, so don't really have a lot of

respect for that side of things. I mean, greenie and that lot are

well plugged in with that. So is what it is, you know what I

mean? But, you know, it's one of those things little bit salty

for me. But anyway, so basically, right there, bongos.

This is all going off, you know, Greenpeace is there. And then

he's going, Yeah, I'm going to pull you into bad magic. And all

right, cool. Let's do it. And then the creators come out on

bad magic, which is Julian. Oh, I'd already been buying records

off for years and SI, and that's when I actually met si done

concrete funk with him. Years ago. I hadn't met before, then

hadn't met at Liberty grooves, and they were there. Vinyl

dialects were doing their thing as well. And those guys are

absolutely great. Still. Chat to Ezra to this day. Yeah, it was a

great time around there. I remember being on the phone a

cage. And, I mean, seriously, one of the, you know, not, not

cage, actually, not cage was cool. I feel the agony. Feel

that agony was an agony. Let's just say, anyway, too. I mean,

you know, because he had a track came out on bad magic, and it's

just like, dude, just like, Come on, man. But then black twang

got signed, and that was an astute move. Always rated twang,

and, yeah, that was a great moment. But the thing is, now

this is something right, Adam, right? The bad magic office,

right? The wall of sound. If it's all under the West way, and

Portobello, the bad the Wall of Sound office is there. Right

next to it is sainted PR. I'll talk to you about that in a

second. About the saintly PR, because there's a little thing

on that one you go along a little bit. And Ackland

workshops is just there under the West way. So that's where my

office is meant to be, and that's where a lot of the stock

of water sound was also stored. I couldn't occupy that office,

because there's a certain artist in that office that you see

every day go, called Banksy, right? So the office, the water

sound office, we had OG original banksies surrounded by them,

right? And I see Banksy every day, and I'd be like, oh man.

And I'd already, we'd already seen banksys work on just off

Poland street, on top of great Marlborough, or whatever was at

the bottom of Knoll, and it was on the side of the building over

there. And when it appeared, we're like, what the hell's

going on there? That's not graffiti, but it's like,

graffiti. Oh, stencil work. So we would be questioning the the

validity of it all. Are still getting questioned to this day,

in fact. But anyway, I used to see him every day, and I'd be

like, I gotta buy one of these off. He goes, Yeah, I'll sort

you out proper, right? We're not talking prints or anything.

We're talking the original paintings, right? And

I never did get one. I was, I wasn't being paid a proper wage.

I was on expenses there for whatever reason. It was a real,

real, you know, you know, it was like the label couldn't afford.

I don't know, there's a lot of whatever going on. I think water

sounds sort of subsidized it. But anyway, I mean, I was there.

I was going to the XL office around the corner. I was seeing

my boy, Nick, that used to work with at bongos. And then that's

where I met Toby. Felt well before he started cavent. And,

you know he was working for James, and I'd already met James

in bongos. And Lavelle, that is, sorry. And because he's come in

and buy records, they all the DJs used to come in, yeah, that

was going on. I think actually, they might, I might actually

gone from Mr. Bongo to major flavors, actually, and then to

water sound, don't quote me, and I'm trying to remember how it

went down. Or I might have been doing both jobs at this I might

do major flavors and all of bad magic at the same time. Can't

quite remember. And then after that, went to scenario records,

but yeah, there was all that going on. And I'd see Banksy

every day. To this day, I didn't buy a single plane

painting of him. Well, that's what I was gonna ask him

before

I was even mad, right? I remember I've been in

the office one day, right? He comes in, he goes, Yo Kish. I

go, all right. He goes, Uh, he goes, I need a pair of hip hop

looking trainers. I'm designing this cover. And I was like, Huh?

Goes, Yeah, do you know one? And I'm wearing Adidas rivalries on

my on my feet. Uh, no. Metro attitudes, sorry, they're

slightly different to a rivalry. So anyone who's is a real

sticker for this, I've got to be very 100 with this. I had my

metro attitude loads in the Knicks colorway, which is, which

is as worn by the great Patrick Ewing the Center for the New

York Knicks, for those who don't know. And I go, and I take him

off. I go, all these do? He goes, yes, they're perfect, like

that. And he so my trainers were actually painted by Banksy on

the bad, bad meaning good series on one of the ones he does a

howitzer, cannon or missile launch, or whatever you call it.

And the sneakers on the feet, on the feet of that are my shoes,

the original artwork of that was originally given away by Tim

westward on a competition. But I can't remember who's got the

story about that. It might be my music partner, Turkish to my who

knows the full provenance of that, of how, where that no, it

was for skits is right? It's for skits is mix for I think it's

fabric, and it was the bad meaning good series, right? And

anyone who DJ that fabric was did their own compilation.

Scratch perverts did their own one, and so on and so forth. I

think it was skits is one. And then slightly

different series, isn't it? Because you've got

fabric live, is the one, yeah, but yeah, the bad meaning goods,

yeah, the four off compilation series, that's right. They were

all done by Banksy, or the artwork. That's right, yeah. So

that's the artwork for one of those. I think it's

skits. Is one, and it was going to be given away on westward

show. It didn't. And then I think it suddenly Sun some the

artwork ended up with someone, might have been skits, and then

he gave it to someone, and then, boom, I don't know, I don't know

where it is, but whoever's got that, yo, they're my shoes. So

there's another one. It's like, Yo, come on. Yeah,

the retirement fund you've missed out on, yeah, your

mind's got a bank see that that's probably worth 10s of

1000s. Doesn't even particularly like it. I was like, why don't

you get rid of that and get some art, some kind of high value art

that you love, because it's going up and up and up. Is it?

Is it gonna consistently? I think now

where it is, where he where his sort of story is,

within the entire tapestry of art and history, and where it

is, and the commentary that he gives, whether you agree with it

or not, whether you give it validity, or if you think it's

clever or not. I mean, it's a point of debate, which is,

again, makes it very relevant. There you go. It's there. Yeah,

and it's going to keep on going up, you know? And that's how it

is. And so if I had it, I wouldn't give it up unless I

would only cash it in, unless I was destitute. That's the only

time, if not, if you don't need, I'm always in the advocate,

right? If you don't need to sell, don't sell, you know, if

you've got the room for it, if you've got if you if you're not

sure, if you're not sure, if you're not sure, if you're very

privileged and not in a short, you know, short of a bob or two,

what are you getting rid of it for? Keep hold of it.

I just think, could you find something else of that

value that get you get more joy out of that's, that's the thing

you

could but, I mean, we're banks position financially

in comparison to say, I mean, I'd love to have a Rothko. I'd

have a Rothko over a bank. See, yeah, I'd have a basket over a

Banksy, but you go in another stratosphere up, yeah, yeah, no,

in terms of them, because they're no longer with us, and

as we know, hip hop's littered with them as well, characters

who were who are bigger in death than they were in life. So

this time, then, when did you start because, you've

got these relationships with brands and that sort of thing.

Now, when did that sort of side of your story start to develop?

Well, the thing is, right, at bongos, we'd get given

some things to wear by Gimme five. Michael koppman used to

shop in the store. Fraser Cook is another one who's now at

Nike. Used to shop in the store. Michael still got Gimme five.

And for those who don't understand what gimme five is

the reason why, right the price of Stacy clothing shot up in the

late 80s, like I said earlier, is because Michael Kaufman comes

into the story and becomes the distributor for Stacy. That's

why. And so he's got to get his gut and, you know, all that kind

of stuff in it, and it just went up, and the cost of production

went up, loads of things, loads of factors went up. So he's the

guy responsible for that. And it was mirrored as well across

Europe and wherever else. So there's no thing, but he's a

mate to this day. And yeah, and we used to get given stuff to

where there there was a thing like mates used to look after

mates. And if you want to build something, you hook up your

mates first, and they're all wearing it. And everyone's

going, Dave, guys are really cool. These girls are really

cool. Oh, I want to wear it. And then, you know, that's how it

sort of percolates. That's the story of supreme. That's that

supreme got, got so big, you know, James was like, Okay, I'm

going to give this away to this, this and this, right? You give

it to your friends. I want everyone wearing it in the

scene. And once everyone's wearing it in the scene, it

becomes the most desirable thing. But then what he did was,

if I can sell 20 of them, I'm going to make 10. Gonna short

the supply, right? You know, that's, that's, you know,

that's, that's what he did. He, he sort of, he brought it to the

it's what the Japanese did. It's like, it's like, it's like, it's

all of that, you know, supply and demand. If you control the

market, you're good. You know you have, you know your

characters, like Michael, Michael koppman, going, Hey, you

got this. Then, when working at water sound, had close

relationships with Puma. They had close relationship with

Rizla, who did clothing as well. They had close relationships

with Griffin as well, with Jeff, with Jeffrey and karina's brand

Griffin, which started up on Portobello, right? Well, it

started up before that. Sorry, but their first ever store was

on Portobello Road, and I later subsequently did a collaboration

jacket with them. So I've gone from, you know, going into their

store, not knowing about the history of the brand, but

finding out that Jeff, Jeff's graduate collection, I can't

remember if you went to Central Saint Martins on London College

of Fashion, was the clothing that was bought in its entirety

by Jazzy B and worn in the early soul to soul videos, back to

life and all that stuff. So Griffin is closer in there. So

his story starts back then, and then my story starts back then,

over there and over here, and it all intertwines at a later date,

which is quite crazy. But I remember going into the Griffin

store, very conceptual. It's brilliant. And my friend Remy

kabaka worked in there. And Remy used to come into bongos after

hours, you know, on a Friday or whatever. And, you know, we used

to drink and whatever and just listen to records and stuff. It

was a Hangout. And yeah, Remy, then he sort of navigated his

in. He was like, working APC. He was working years, working at

Griffin. Remy is now in the gorillas, right, okay. And I

actually have, right, another bit of music equipment. I have

that Remy wants back, but I'm not ready to give it up, because

I've just started music production. I have, I have Remy

kabakas MPC 60, right? He sold it to me years ago because I was

going to start making music. I didn't get round hit back then,

but now I am doing it now, Remy. So anyway, he's, he's, he's,

he's one of the gorillas. So when you see the gorillas

performing, he's performing Damon Auburn, and I don't think

Jamie performs, or maybe he does. Now he got a clue, but

yeah, that that's going on. Germane, so yeah, it's quite,

quite fascinating, really. You know how that sort of story is

going on. So there was these moments where I always saw the.

Collision of music and fashion ever since Run DMC and added us,

right? It was evident, right? And the fact that, Yo, you get

these people to wear that stuff, sales are going to go like that.

People are going to want it. It was evident to me from the early

right, for wearing this stuff. We're looking fly, you know,

people want to be down with us. You know, a superficial thing. I

don't know. Do you know? I mean, hey, I'm not here to discuss

that, but what I'm saying is, that's what happens. So it's

very fascinating. And these sort of relationships started

building up, building up. The Americans were way on it from

early as case point with the Run DMC, Adidas Association, without

that, you have no Travis, Scott Nikes. You have no Kanye Yeezys,

you you don't have any Drake Jordans, you know, and all this

kind of stuff that doesn't happen, right? You know, this is

the now. You don't have Rihanna doing Fenty with Puma. You don't

have any of that, you see. And you don't have Missy Elliott,

you know, doing her stuff with adidas many, many years ago, at

the height of her powers, and doing a fantastic job as well.

Do you remember when, like, Mr. Elliot was wearing all Adidas

and stuff. She had her own line with him. I mean, which is

great. This is before Beyonce and Ivy Park, you know, this is,

this is these little sort of things coming into play. And so

it sort of started happening. And then, you know, you, you

know, people started, you know, hooking stuff up and wanting,

you know, people to earn certain things and all that kind of

stuff. And it just sort of happened. There's no sort of key

Flashpoint moment. It's just a little it's an evolution into

that, really, and understanding the value of that is very acute

to me. You know, it's like when Puma wanted, you know, when Puma

wanted black twang to wear, you know, their product on stage

when he's doing, you know, the kickoff tour and all that kind

of stuff. It's all these sort of things that come into play, and

it's the development of that. And now we stand where we stand

now. Things that have really helped propel it, though, are

when you can visually get a sort of a window into and into the

behavior and the the effects, the consequences of doing it. So

Facebook, not so much, but you had groups that set up. It

started up in Facebook, though. Prior to that, you had forums.

You had forums such as crooked tongues, as Nike talk and all

that kind of stuff, where people are looking doing that. And then

you had magazines, etc, you know, sneaker freaker and all

these kind of things which are still in the mix now, doing

that. Then, I think, then you had riff Trooper, he did his

blog, which was great. And it was blogs as well. Blogs were

very, very key in this. Then you had blogs that developed into

big media beam offs that they are now Hypebeast, yeah, you

know freshness. But freshness was the first, I think, out of

that lot. And then freshness is now, I think it's nice kicks. I

think it's morphed into nice kicks complex. Complex started

off by Mark echo, based off the back of the magazine, right? And

now it's a media conglomerate, hype beast, as I said in high

synobility. You had, he had another one at the time, slam X

hype, which just started off by Adam Bryce. I don't know where

that sits now. I think he does New Order magazine. Now, think

that's where that sits. But you got all these things in play. I

don't. I wouldn't really attest vice to be part of it, but vice,

at that time, did have a cultural sort of cachet, as it

were,

same sort of model, though, isn't it? Is like the

complex and stuff, I

guess. Yeah, that's more subversive. More

subversive. The story of vice, though, is a tragedy, really,

when you think about it, especially when you think that

Gavin McGinnis is the founder of the proud boys from Vice. So

yes, are you gone from that to this? You're going from very low

and he, you know, establishment, into becoming super right wing.

Just, you know, it's an interesting evolution, shall we

say? Yeah. So yeah, you see all these things, but yeah. And

then, so the one of the flashpoints has to be the advent

of Instagram, yeah, literally, you know. And then, you know,

it's absorbing all the other technologies that came out, you

know, subsequently vine, vine, you know, Instagram did its own

version, and Twitter to a point, but no, it's Instagram. You can

actually visualize everything, and then you haven't looked

back. You've got Snapchat now you've got tick tock, and you

got a Myra, of other ones. I'm sure do you,

because in Instagram's the only one that's weird. I

don't have time for more. Do you do? Do you kind of maintain,

because for the listeners that aren't aware you've you kind of

do the sort of sneakers in the fashion stuff, but then you've

also got your kiss sheets, yeah,

there as well. Yeah. Got all the, all the sort of

dimensions, as much as I can handle. At the moment, I haven't

got a team to help me do it. I mean, I got a manager,

obviously, you know, shout outs to Colleen, but you know,

generally, all the content, everything I've got to help

create or call in favors to. Yo, can you take a photograph of me

and all this kind of stuff, all these things going into play?

Yeah,

it must be really time consuming, and it must take a

lot of headspace. Yeah,

I guess, I guess you just got to do it when you can

do it, you know. But you got the kids out there, yo, they just do

add it all the time, and they make. Will help, and they just

do all together. I don't have that. My mates got kids, or they

got jobs or whatever, and all this kind of stuff. So it's a

case of, well, not jobs. I say they've got more traditional,

you know, vocations in life. So, you know, it's like sometimes

calling the neighbors or going down to the coffee shop and

asking one of them to take photos or whatever, all that

kind of stuff. So, yeah, it's quite do. You can be a bit

challenging. Do you

occupy a different space? Would you say, then, to,

like a lot of the kids that are doing similar stuff, do you

think your audience? You've, you've got your own sort of

audience?

I don't know. I mean, there's it intersects, that's

for sure. But the thing is, the some of the people following me

aren't looking to follow it like I'm not looking. I don't know. I

don't I wouldn't want to say, actually, I think it'd be

incorrect of me to say what, what people are getting from me.

I think it's best to talk to them, because I think whatever I

say would be a skewed perspective, and I don't think

it'd be truthful. I

wonder if so in my in my career, if you want to call

it, that my line of jobs I've done and things I think I

probably got to a point, say, mid 30s, where I kind of felt

like getting a little bit older can have a benefit, because

there's almost like a and maybe, maybe you could call it an

unconscious bias, that People might be ready to trust you a

bit more in a different way, yeah, than if you're saying the

same thing and you say, Yeah, 21 Yeah. So you, it'd be

interesting to know if maybe people, because you're not a 21

year old, if there's a different type of trust there because of

that's,

yeah, that's a very good point. I can't answer that,

but yeah, I mean, maybe we got to apply it to people that we

look at, you know, growing up,

yeah, because I wouldn't, I wonder if the kids

saying the fashion stuff, yeah. I

mean, who knows, but I do know, you know. So yeah, we

look at, I look at the I look at the insights into who's

following me in the age groups and the age brackets than that,

across, across quite a my route of of key people,

I guess what you might get with kids is that things

will be So potentially, kind of quickly taken up and quickly

dropped. Yeah, there's not kind of like a loyalty in the length

of time of like nurturing, no, no, the relationship between a

brand and a consumer and stuff, right?

Yeah, no, totally. Things are getting more fickle.

Or are they getting fickle? Or are our is our perspective not

recognizing that what might be a quick moment in time to us is

actually quite a long time to the people who are in that mix,

but they can just process and deal with it quicker. I don't

know, there's an argument for both ways.

That's it. So just going on to the food, then onto

the case sheets. How did that come about? Is it always, have

you always been kind of just wanting to check every sort of

different spot? Yeah,

exactly the same, same thing, right? I'm just an

idiot, right? It goes around just wanting to try new shit. I

mean, I'm literally like, you know, I've got my spots, great.

And then I'm like, Yeah, let's, let's see, you know, I mean, for

me, right? We've got a finite time in this universe, right? I

want to explore as much of infinity as possible in my

finite time. So that's what it comes down to, and food, right?

I mean, on this planet, we are the only species that can

transform our raw materials and process it in the manner that we

do. You know, no one else cooks. I mean, there's some fantastic,

you know, natural processes that go and on, the ways that bees,

you know, you know, metabolize, you know, pollen into honey, you

know, and how beavers will build dams and all sorts of things.

You know what I mean, fantastic. But the way that we do it, we

the only ones that cook. We're the only ones that have found

different ways to cook, you know, the techniques, and keep

on evolving that and developing things, you know, challenging

the flavors and the compositions and the contrast, the textures

and all this kind of stuff presenting Well, my friend

Justin, who I met years ago at Mr. Bongo buying records,

fantastic, lovely man. He's the head chef at Arts Club Dover

Street, right? And when you see the creations he make, I'm

going, Dude, I don't want to eat that. It looks beautiful, yeah?

It's like, it's like a sculpture. It's like, the

colors, the everything about it is just phenomenal. Justin

IP, yeah, I think you mentioned him on Keller's

podcast, yeah, brakes head, isn't he? Yeah, Justin.

He likes, He just likes, he just likes really cool

stuff. He's in his trainers. He's into his food. Obviously,

he's a chef and, you know, all that kind of stuff. So, yeah, he

hit me up the other day, when are these coming out? And I was

going, Yeah, I was going, these, you know, we chat. I don't get

we don't, you know, he's, it's hard. He's working crazy hours.

He's got family as well. But you know, it's really hard to make

time to see some of the people that you care about these days.

Yeah, I guess something I'm getting from you

with this conversation is something kind of around you

want to experience these things, but then you share it with the

world. Yeah, exactly, all these different

things. Totally. I'm not not trying to gatekeep. I'm

not trying to do the Secret Shop stuffing. Game. Do you know what

I mean, it's like beyond that now, you know, we've really got

to celebrate and champion good talent when given the, you know,

the opportunity and the platform to do so,

yeah, and even, like the archive as well, what you're

wanting to do with that?

Yeah? Yeah. It's about celebrating, you know,

designers. It's about celebrating technology. It's

about celebrating all these stories that surround it. I

mean, I've done the podcast series with Jason Coles talking

about it. We've only got two series. We've got to do some

more where we talk to key people within the footwear industry

from a different perspective. So I've interviewed some fantastic

people behind the scenes. You know, Stephen Smith, legendary

shoe designer, started cut his teeth at New Balance in the late

80s, fresh out of uni design school, his story then

gravitated to Adidas. Then after Adidas, he went to Reebok, then

after Reebok, I think after Reebok, I can't remember he went

after he but then he went to Nike, and he has designed some

of the key serendipitously, just purely by happenstance, as well

some of the key moments like the New Balance 990 he designed it,

and it's now one of the biggest shoes the New Balance have all

them. Years ago, Adidas, he designed the torsion artillery,

a shoe that I wore religiously when it dropped. It was such an

incredible Adonis basketball shoe. Was dope. It was

brilliant. So much so that when Jeremy Scott got his chance to

collaborate with Adidas, it's one of the silhouettes that he

chose actually to mess around with, which was quite

cool that Jeremy Scott stuff's crazy, though, the big

wings go all that

stuff, yeah, Lil Wayne warrior and all that kind

of stuff. Yeah, it's mad in the teddy bears and all that kind of

stuff. It's crazy. It's very, very pop culture, really, if you

think about it, you know, how you do you think it's tasteful?

Do you think it's distasteful? I don't know. He's making a

conversation out of it. I think it's brilliant. He's poking fun.

But you know, you see these sort of little moments. And then,

then Stevens designed the Reebok into the pump fury in 1994 which

is still one of the most incredible running shoes ever,

and it still looks batshit crazy and futuristic to now. So he did

that. He designed Paula Radcliffe's zoom streak, which

he won the marathon in in the world record time at the time.

So he's had some fantastic stories. And then now he's

heading up all the design at Donda, you know, Yeezys, all

that. Stephen Smith, so his story is phenomenal. So we've

had him on the podcast, but trying to explore all these, you

know, with the archive, as you say, you know, look, when you

look at the box, the design of the box, the artwork, the

graphics. I mean, you're just talking about people who are

applying their, their touch to this, their their creativity to

this, this whole process, you know, videos that advertising

that goes with the shoes, everything the content that's

been created about them to to build up this story around these

shoes, is fantastic. It really is, yeah,

and it's something that always gets thought about

with Apple products packaging, but yeah, maybe doesn't get kind

of thought of in the same way with footwear. Yeah. I mean,

you got to give it to Steve Jobs, visionary, ever

since day one. Story starts, obviously, in the to us in the

80s. I remember when I went to Winnipeg and my cousin had the

apple 2c computer. I was very proud about it. And that's

probably worth quite a quite a bit. Now, actually, when you

think about it, I bet you they haven't got it still, but, um,

when you think about that story, and then, you know, then, then

you got booted out the company, then comes back and just like,

yeah, we're going to do it like this. And haven't looked back

since. Obviously, they don't have Steve Jobs. May the rest in

peace at the helm. There comes a point where innovation and how

do you push it forward, and who you got in play, if you've got a

lot of bean counters in play, gets really hard to be

innovative, doesn't it, really so we'll see what the story

holds for for a lot of these companies moving forward. But

yeah, in terms of innovation, in terms of how things get pushed

and evolve, etc, it never gets it never gets it never stops

being exciting. Yeah,

just because you mentioned Donder, something I

thought about that we haven't touched upon is kind of Kanye is

impacting on on reissue and throwback and dead stock

sneakers, because he was, like, wearing a lot of Jordan fours

and things like that. Wasn't me

when he was even before, even before Kanye. Gotta

give it to Pharrell. Okay, you know, because Pharrell is a