SmartShanghai | Interview: DJ Vadim

Interview: DJ Vadim

By Ian Louisell, Jan 29th, 2009 | In Nightlife

Russian-born, London-raised DJ Vadim was one of the key Ninjatunes DJs to bring hip hop to an international audience in the early 90s. His trademark is incorporating the diverse elements of hip hop, soul, reggae, nu jazz, and electronica into his work, and his critically acclaimed release The Soundcatcher (on bbe) is an album that reflects the international, instrumentalist mindset of this legendary DJ and producer.

Local promoters Free the Wax are presenting DJ Vadim, performing with his wife vocalist Yarah Bravo, this Friday at The Shelter. SmartShanghai called him up on the phone while he was on tour in New Zealand to talk about some stuff.

SmSh: What's going on in New Zealand?

Vadim: It's beautiful; lots of nature, not very many people live here so it's quite untouched.

SmSh: Pretty different from Shanghai, I think you'll notice when you come here.

Vadim: How many people live in Shanghai?

SmSh: About twenty million.

Vadim: Wow, that's like the whole population of Australia in one city.

SmSh: Yeah, and not a lot of trees or animals either. So, is this your first time to China?

Vadim: It's gonna be the first time to mainland China, I've been to Hong Kong, four years ago. We're presenting our [Yarah Bravo] new albums. ...I know we're not gonna get to see much in three days. I hope we get a chance to come back.

SmSh: I hate to bring up bad news, but on the blogs, I looked on HypeMachine -- the first thing that came up is something about you having surgery lately?

Vadim: Yeah, I had cancer earlier last year. I've had surgery and Yarah helped me find the right doctor and treatment. She was really instrumental in me recovering from that. We received the good news just before Christmas time that I'm cancer free.

SmSh: Excellent. Has the whole experience influence your music?

Vadim: It's kinda made me more productive and appreciate life more because it gives you a second chance.

SmSh: Like I mentioned, I read about this on the blogs. What are your thoughts on the blogosphere, hype machine, and people getting your tracks for free?

Vadim: It's a great way for people to communicate and to share ideas and music and design and news. It's just a new way of communicating I guess.

Well, it's kind of like 50/50 in the sense that I work hard to make music and I make my living through selling music -- people buying my CDs. So I hope that people understand that when they take tracks for free. If someone rips a track from me, ok cool, you rip a whole album, cool.

But then, if you like it, you got an obligation to come to the show, and buy a t-shirt. If you're gonna rip something, you've gotta give something.

SmSh: Another technology question: I'm sure when you first started DJing, it was all turntables. Now a lot of DJs are going partly or all digital. What are your thoughts on that?

Vadim: When I started out there was only one way to DJ -- turntables and a mixer. Nowadays, you can do the same thing in so many different ways. Some DJs only use CDs, Ableton, Serato... at the end of the day, it's all about entertainment. You go to see a band to be entertained to have a good time. If they do it well and it's entertaining, that's great.

SmSh: Traveling around the world with all those records, do you ever run into problems?

Vadim: A couple of times I've had record boxes come missing. One time in L.A. about ten years ago, my records turned up on the conveyor belt but the record box never turned up. The records were going around individually like 'what the fuck?'

SmSh: Damn. So what's the best city to play in?

Vadim: You can't really say that. Some cities move forward, other cities regress. Like New York kind of died down with Giuliani, and things getting really expensive. A lot of my friends that were in music had to get like two jobs, really hustle. I really like San Francisco, Paris, London, my hometown.

SmSh: What's the wildest shit you've seen go down at a show?

Vadim: Well, about three years ago, we were playing in Rhode Island when that club burned down [Ed's note: Vadim is talking about The Station nightclub fire].

People thought it was pyrotechnics, part of the show or something and others were like "no, the club's alight." Something like eighty or a hundred people died, and we were playing across the street that night.

SmSh: Oh no, Chinese New Year is on... hopefully, no incidents.

Vadim: Yeah, no fireworks in the club.

SmSh: There's not much of a fireworks problem in the underground hip hop scene. Who's the hottest MC in the game right now?

Vadim: Well you wouldn't wanna bet your money against Lil' Wayne, but as far as what I'm feeling, I like Mos Def, The Roots, Talib Kweli. What's the scene like in Shanghai?

SmSh: It's a mix. In the bigger, predominately Chinese clubs, it's mostly imported commercial hip hop. But there's an underground scene as well. The Shelter brings a lot of better international DJ's through.

Vadim: Yeah, that's where we're playing, what's that like?

SmSh: It's an old bomb shelter; like a basement party where hundreds of people get crunk and dance till six in the morning.

Vadim: I guess we'll have to keep the party going until six then.

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Tagged: Interviews Event Previews Concerts Clubbing