URN

Natasha Tompsett

Right so I’m here with Jamie Woon. Readers of The Mic and listeners of URN may not have been familiar with you until the recent single Night Air, personally I first heard you through your work with Subeena a few years back, how would you say that since then you have developed musically and where would you like to progress to?

Yeah I guess I was kind of singer/song writer, playing guitar and making a living sort of doing gigs and selling my CDRs like that, not really releasing many recordings apart from Wayfaring Stranger a few years ago. Then I went to the Red Bull Music Academy and did a couple of collaborations there and that was about the same time I started producing my own records, I was quite inspired by that experience. That was the time I made that track with Subeena and I made a track with dEbruit in the same week, it was the first time I’d made a tune with someone where they’d just given me the beat. It was nice because I kind of labour over stuff...

Too much?

Too much sometimes yeah! Get myself into a big angsty ball... Yeah it was cool to work like that, fun working with other producers and now I’ve obviously started producing my own stuff and bringing those two worlds together. I’m looking forward to producing more because I’m kind of handy with the software now and know how to get the sounds I want, for my next record though I’d like to keep them separate but I’d like to work with another producer and make something quite fast.

Wayfaring Stranger was remixed by Burial, how did that come about given your acoustic roots?

I got an opportunity to release a 12inch, Wayfaring Stranger, this guy called Charlie Dark who runs a night called Blacktronica and another guy called Mark Gurney who runs a record label called 2nd Drop, they were both DJ’s and heavily involved in vinyl and electronic music which was kind of a new world to me. They were running this label that was funded by Brixton council called LIVE Recordings which was to help young people get an experience of working within a record label and they gave me an opportunity to put a single out. So I could have a remix on the B-side and after hearing Burial’s first album, I was mad for it, I didn’t realise how difficult he was to track down at the time and I’d mentioned it to one other person who happened to be a mutual friend of Burial’s! So she said yeah he really likes male vocals I think he’d be into it.

Happy coincidence!

Yeah it was! So we were put in contact through myspace then met up and have been friends since really.

How does it feel to have big names such as Radio 1’s Mary Anne Hobbs and Gilles Peterson championing you?

Gilles and Mary Anne are both legends, they do things their own way and play the music they really love. No ones playlisting it for them so it’s a massive honour.

I recently learned that your mum has done backing vocals for some of your tracks, you must have been brought up into quite a diverse musical family, given your acoustic roots did you think you ever think you would venture down the electronic route?

I see myself as a singer songwriter first and foremost, I think styles can go in and out of fashion generally and personally, sometimes you’re more up for listening to a certain style of music or making certain sounds. The reason I took so long to make the first album was that I didn’t want to do a straight up acoustic recording of my songs, I did want to produce them and I wanted to find a sound that fitted the sentiment of the songs and I wanted to have enough songs that I really liked. So it was kind of incremental and I longed it out for a reason, but at this time in my life I don’t think there’s a particular style that I’ll say “yeah that’s what I’m gonna do forever...”

We’ve got artists now such as James Blake and Mount Kimbie and whilst I’m sure you tire of being placed on the same ‘lists’ as them it seems fitting to acknowledge the shared progression and exciting development of your sounds, with this in mind if you could create an ‘ideal’ line-up to play alongside what would it be?

I really like what both of them do and I think the exciting thing at the moment is that the technologies available are so liberating, making music that can get played anywhere but also the sounds that you can bring to a live situation, it’s quite exciting. As far as a festival that I would curate, everyone and anyone! I’d probably just ask Emily Eavis to do it! She seems to do a pretty good job!

In regards to the Ramadanman remix, how did that come about?

I think I met him at DMZ a long long time ago, yeah he’s young he was like 18 I think -

A student!

Yeah stupidly young! He sampled a fragment of Wayfaring Stranger and put that out via Mark Gurney on 2nd Drop records, so it was a mutual appreciation. I always thought back then that he’s got such a distinctive sense of rhythm the way he does it with his beat repeats, it always reminded me of new jack swing or RnB, it’s got a kind of swagger to it.

In terms of live performance, obviously tonight you’ve got quite a big set up, is that something you always hoped and planned to do rather than going down the DJ route?

Yeah I never planned to DJ but it’s quite funny because people are starting to book me for clubs, like tonight is a club night really! We’re on at 12.30am...

Mount Kimbie have played down here!

Oh they have, wicked! Yeah it’s quite an opportunity to play something a bit more hyped up, something I’d like to go out and dance to. But.. I do write a lot of slow jams as well! I would like to DJ as well one day maybe but I don’t have the patience to go out and find loads of new tunes its quite daunting, you have to be on it every day.

In terms of going out, you said you met Ramadanman at a DMZ night for instance, do you find you can’t go out anonymously anymore?

I don’t think I’m very famous at all ha haa! That’s why I’ve grown this beard... disguise! People keep telling me I’m going to be really famous or it’s all going to change for me but I try not to buy into that too much.

BBC sounds of 2011?

Obviously that is a massive leg up, a massive exposure, I mean sometimes I cop people checking to see or pointing at me but it’s very rare! I just wanna make music really.

Would you be a bit hacked off it you couldn’t just go out with your mates in the future?

If it gets to that point I sort of refuse to believe these things are out of your control, if it starts getting like that it’s probably time to humble yourself.

Regarding artwork, do you like to get heavily involved in the creative process?

All the artwork from my record is done by Duncan Bellamy who’s my housemate and also the drummer in the band the Portico Quartet, he’s a great painter, great artist. He’s been making these symbols out of repeated words which look really odd like totems... future Aztec vibes!

Now to wrap it up, we have a little nickname for you – The Woonster. Have you heard that one before or have any others to share?

I’ve had every permeation of Woon that you could ever think of! Woonster, Woontime, endless puns... Woon flew over the cuckoo’s nest, hit me baby Woon more time, dark side of the Woon... In Liverpool everyone was shouting Wooney at me!

The Woonster, we wish him every success.