Beat Spacek Shares some Smart Phone Secrets Behind his New Album ‘Modern Streets’

Beat Spacek is the latest project for soul music innovator Steve Spacek. Over the past 15 years he’s released material under various names and collaborated with the likes of Mark Pritchard and J Dilla. Modern Streets is the name of his latest release, a comprehensive road map of blissful electronic sounds and synthetic funk. And he made it on the move using not much more than his iPhone. If you think your smartphone use could be smarter, Spacek just proved you’re probably right.

Steve kindly walked me through the making of Modern Streets, using apps on his iPhone and iPad to form a fresh palette of original and unclassifiable jams. The finished product finds the middle ground between late night nostalgia and a vision of the future, a place where Spacek can use the laughter of a child as inspiration for an entire song. He also talked about the evolving concept of Modern Streets from artwork to production to his recent date in the Boiler Room.

THUMP: Hey Steve. Ok, first up, tell us what apps you used on the album and where can we download them?
Beat Spacek: There’s a ton of them really. The first one i downloaded was iSyn which was only 99 cents. It’s amazing once you get into it. There’s three tracks and this mad access feature which when you tilt the screen certain ways allows you to mute things or bring filters in or just do mixes on the fly just by moving it around. For “I Wanna Feel” I was working on Basicore 64, which is free and really basic. Then I brought in some synths from iSyn and Figure which is by Propellerhead. Even though they’re all quite simple, the sounds of the synths are really raw, really edgy. It almost sounded analogue.

The album’s called Modern Streets, a general but evocative reference to environment. Are there particular places or situations where you feel most inspired, that were important to making this album?
On a bus, at a friend’s house, in between travelling at the airport. But really I’d been writing the whole album in my head for a while. I get most influenced when I’m out and about which is why I’m into the miniaturisation of production, it’s just easier to travel with. A lot of ideas will come to me then go away and I’ll forget. This album is made up of the ideas that kept coming back which I had to lock down.

It’s been described as “liquid” and “spacious”, BBC Music even referred to it as “horizontal”. How would you describe it in your own words?
Maybe slightly political but still very warm. Dealing with digital can be quite cold though so it’s got that techy influence as well. It’s based on my ethos of designing music wherever it wants to go in terms of tempos, genres and styles, but always using that dance palette. Some of the best dance tracks have that tearing drum and bass with a beautiful melody on top and that juxtaposition between light and dark really works for me.

Visual ideas and associations are clearly important to understanding this album, and your music in general. When it comes to artwork, what’s your process for choosing a representative image?
Much like music, I’m always looking for something that’s timeless. With Andy Gilmore for the Africa HiTech record, I liked the way he uses geometry but then adds warm colours to his work. I like that red, green and yellow combo being of Jamaican descent. For this album, the artwork was actually done by my daughter when she was in kindergarten, it hangs in the wall in my house. When I was thinking about the art I took a shot of it on my iPhone with a custom lens. The shot was quite nice because it reflected a strip light in the kitchen and it just had a nice vibe. I played with it in photoshop and toned it up a bit and that was it. It was low res but and there was some apprehension about using it but I said I was cool with it pixelating in different sizes, creating that randomness of seeing new things in a different perspective. It’s unashamedly digital and I think that’s really nice.

You’re Sydney based, but you were a regular on the London club scene too. What were the best parties when you were living there?
Plastic People was like the mecca for UK music culture. The club owner managed to distill the essence of what you’d want in a perfect club. The area was trendy and fashionable but above all, the people that went were there for the music and everyone was always getting down. The sound system was phenomenal and vibe was almost like going to church. It was spiritual. Sometimes someone would drop a tune so heavy that someone from the crowd would have to walk up and put their finger on the record and be like “sorry you’re gonna have to rewind that” and it was totally cool to bring the intro back in, everyone would be screaming. On a normal night the manager would stop the music at half 12 or 1AM when the main riff raft had gone and hold the music for 15 minutes. We’d pull out these amazing German decks and play on with vinyl. And it wasn’t about the DJ skills, it was all about the selectors. People were mixing or whatever but it wasn’t about that, it was the craft of selecting, so you were encouraged to go all over the place, from techno to rare groove to reggae. Unfortunately they just shut down though like a month ago. I guess good things must come to an end.

True, but with Beat Spacek we have a new beginning too. The album’s out, and you played Boiler Room recently?
Yeah with Ben Fester and Preacha. I’ve done a couple of nights at Goodgod and they came down and they’re definitely on the same tip. They’re free with their music and just play the best of whatever they’re feeling. That’s what it is, if you just play what you’re feeling and you’re open with it then the crowd will feel it and those guys understand that. Proper rudeboys, man.

Listen back to Beat Spacek in the Boiler Room here. ‘Modern Streets‘ is out now.