Simon Emmerson - Witness

We slowed Roots down to add a groove and bass line, in fact we did that to a lot of the tracks on Witness. I love my bass lines. You say Witness was never toured but I went to numerous SoH's gigs were the set list was centered around tracks from the Witness album?? I met Steve K and Phil at a Radio 2 folk awards when the Afro Celts were up for best live band along with SOH (who won it). I mentioned to Steve K at the awards that I was thinking of moving my family from Hackney, East London to either From/Somerset or Bridgeport/Doest as I was fed up with dodging the bullets driving home from gigs on a Saturday night. The end of my road had been labelled by the press 'murder mile' and over that year I had seen two fatal shootings, numerous stabbings, let alone all the grief my son was having from all the local gangs. He sold me on the Bridport option, not known for it's gun crime (yet). Within months of moving down here Billy Bragg (who is also local) phoned to say he was organising a series of song writing sessions with the school kids at the local comprehensive with Steve and would I like to get involved. In the course of these sessions we'd meet up after wards and chat about music, life, slag off the music industry whilst having a few beers together, the stuff musicians do best. Steve and Phil had seen the Afro Celts at the 1st really muddy Glastonbury's (1997?) and really liked the show and our use of beats/electronica, he invited me to a few SOH's gigs. I loved their live show and thought his song writing was amazing as indeed was Phil's playing. However I knew nothing about the genre 'Folk Rock' (still don't to be honest) and found their studio albums a bit....dull and flat for my tastes. He was responsive to my ideas and criticisms and suggested we do some work together. The 1st thing we did was the BBC 2 Beatles folk tribute to Rubber Soul, their alloted track was the George Harrison compostion 'If I Needed Some One'. And very good it was too. I think we did Roots next, which was originally written as a possible contribution for the Imagined Village album as it raised all the issues of English Identity and Cultural confusion. They both loved playing over our grooves and production ideas so we went on to do the whole album. For me it wasn't really a case of making a SOH's CD ' full of beats and grooves that the kids in the street were gonna love', it was more a case of letting the production and mixes draw out the narrative drama and strength in the song writing. Each song was like a mini play with it's own story line, set of characters, sense of place. I love 'All I Ever Lost' and 'The Dive' and think these mixes are some of the best Mass has done recently. On some of the tracks we actually took out all the beats and went back to the acoustic performance. The slowing down of Roots was indicative of what I feel about a lot of folk rock (what little I know about it): it doesn't really groove, it's all too frantic and rigid. there's no space. That's why I loved mixing Jim Moray's 1st album, for the space and grooves. I felt the same about a lot of Irish contemporary trad stuff when we started the Afro Celts. A lot of Irish trad at the time was for me like the folk equivalent of jazz rock/fusion: technically brilliant, played at break neck speed but lacking in any soul. Virtuosity for Virtuosity's sack (and where were the bass lines.....no bass line=no show). I love my dub, reggae, soul and jazz: dance music based around feel and emotion. Once we had the tempo's settled we then built up some nice rhythmic feels based around Steve's Mandocello playing and everything else just fitted. The vocals had space to breath and express themselves and Phil's fiddle/mandolin and guitars became central to the 'emotional curve that surrounds the sonic spectrum of the mix', as a big wig American producer once said to me and I've been using the phrase ever since to impress people. So I hope your impressed.