Bandcamp Blog

Throughout the mid-1990s Fila Brazilla and their label home, Pork Recordings, trailblazed a legacy of vital albums and remixes. They developed a magical formula for releases that gleefully flipped a middle finger at categorization and caught the attention of electronic music fans worldwide. At the height of their popularity, demand for Fila Brazillia remixes grew to fever pitch. Reworks of over 80 tracks, including those for Radiohead, Busta Rhymes, The Orb, Lamb, and Black Uhuru, hoisted the band up the music industry totem pole, helping drive sales of Fila Brazillia albums higher with each subsequent release. Then there was a big falling out, nobody talked, a studio was pulled apart, and the stream of music trickled to a halt.

A decade or two later, Steve Cobby of Fila Brazillia, and Porky of (not surprisingly) Pork Recordings, have made up. They meet regularly in the shedio (a 15ft x 8ft studio that is loosely disguised as a shed, and sometimes utilized as a post-pub dog house) behind Cobby’s home, and they make music together as The Cutler. “Can you imagine the number of marriages saved if everyone had a shedio?” jokes Cobby.

During their previous escapades, as label guy and music maker, Cobby and Porky (occasionally known as David Brennand, in case you were wondering) never collaborated on music. “He showed no aptitude or prowess in the studio. But he’s a massive music fan, so he’s become an executive producer of sorts on The Cutler,” explains Cobby. Their latest release, Everything is Touching Everything Else, represents the best of the three Cutler albums released in quick succession over the last 12 months. “I’ve got my mojo back – God knows I have no idea where it went, but in the early 2000’s I was convinced that me and music were splitting ways,” confesses Cobby. “I was going to find something else to do. But search as I might, nothing else has hoved into view that’s even comparable to being an artist – whatever I do it has to be creative. I’ve got 30 years of skills, I might as well use them,” he adds.

The mojo is indeed back. Everything is Touching Everything Else is a varied album of songs and instrumentals loosely shepherded by Cobby and Porky, into a collection that is on par with the cream of the albums released on Pork Recordings. “Happenstance and spontaneity seem to guide us,” explains Cobby. “Romulus and Remus” sounds like Peaking Lights or Wild Belle rope-dope’d by a dose of gritty bottom end. “Quite Rightly” unfolds at a more leisurely place with pretty harps and floaty Hammond organ, while “Namaste” is a proper dubby bass bin smasher. The vocal harmonies of Archie Heslewood and Little Glitches warm up proceedings on “Roll Those Laughing Bones” and “OFGB” respectively.

Like the best Fila Brazillia releases, Everything is Touching Everything Else cannot sit still and fails the “file under….” test. Genres are blurred, tempos mixed. Electronic, analog, organic, and sampled – it’s all part of the recipe. “If you have diverse tastes you subconsciously channel that into your music. If you pick little bits from the zeitgeist things don’t age so quickly. I always thought it was exciting to see how you could straddle the digital and analog worlds – they’re just colors. I never used to think drum machine or drummer? And we never thought of ourselves as just players or only programmers because they’re not mutually exclusive – either way you’re only moving air,” says Cobby, before he ices the thought with, “The only thing you find in pigeonholes is pigeon shit – if there’s a rule invented by a purist or arbiter of taste it is meant to be broken.”

Cobby first met Porky in a pub in Hull, England, through a girl that Cobby was seeing. She happened to share a house with Porky. They hung out and bonded over music. “He educated me, especially with respect to reggae,” says Cobby. “I thought his record collection was fantastic.”

Hull, by Cobby’s own admission, might not be the cultural center of the world, but it has spawned some notable creative types: residents past and present include poet Philip Larkin (who famously shunned the Poet Laureate title and was deemed “the saddest heart in the post-war supermarket”), Bowie’s Spiders from Mars band, The Beautiful South, The House Martins (remember London 0 Hull 4?) and The Fine Young Cannibals. “I used to go out of town and think wow there’s a lot going on here,” says Cobby. “But because there’s nothing else to do in Hull you can get a lot of music done. I get less distracted.” Cobby and Porky both possess quick-witted, self-deprecating demeanors. In a recent conversation with Cobby, humorous cultural observations flowed liberally amidst rants about British Imperialism, being a Dad of two boys (“I’m just a spare part, they don’t really need me”), and the state of the music business. “Hull keeps my feet on the ground. They don’t like a tall poppy here – if you get above your station they will absolutely slaughter you, they don’t like show offs or big heads.”

In the late 1980s, Cobby was signed to Big Life as a member of the group Ashley and Jackson, and Porky morphed from friend to manager. “Actually he mismanaged me, I had to fire him,” laughs Cobby. “But you know, he’s like a boomerang, I can’t get rid of him, it’s amazing we’re still talking.” Post Ashley and Jackson, Cobby linked up with Man (also known as David McSherry) to form Fila Brazillia, and they would quickly sparkle as the jewel in the crown of Porky’s label. Their six albums and countless singles for Pork were often lazily classified as downtempo or electronica – neither tag summed up the myriad of styles their instrumental output cleverly encapsulated. Setting up their own studio and releasing on their friends label, Fila Brazillia avoided all the pitfalls that generally plagued bands. They made making music their day job, churning out tunes day after day without having to keep an eye on the clock or budget. “We were a small cottage industry and being prodigious was something we had in our favor.” Pork never ran advertising, but word was spread not only by way of consistent and strong musical output, but also the marketing of the remixes they did for major labels with much larger advertising budgets. Porky and Cobby have always done business in a hype-free way, “I was only ever interested in music being the reason why people should be drawn to an artist. To be honest, the older I’ve become the more I despise the whole look-at-me culture,” says Porky who once told the NME to “knob off” when they threatened to send over a photographer for a press shot.

Alas, the 9-to-5 approach eventually took a toll on everyone. “After 10 years it felt like work, it was quite mundane, and it lost some of its sparkle,” explains Cobby. Cobby and Man split from Pork Recordings in 1999 and started their own label called 23. “We’d reached an impasse. Porky felt like he’d become a glorified supermarket manager with people shouting at him all the time. He’d lost faith, we’d lost faith in him… it was an awful time.” Unfortunately, not long after, Cobby and Man also fell out. They sold their studio and went their separate ways. Man went into academia and currently lectures in Audio Production at the University of Lincoln.

After a very quiet decade involving very little production, but a whole lot of playing Dad, Cobby decided it was time to make music his business again. And after a lengthy period of silence he and Porky made up in the safety of the shedio. “It’s a really good excuse to talk to each other and get back into each others lives if we pretend we’re in a band,” says Cobby. “And the upshot is that we’re actually making some good tunes.”’

Their evergreen ability to not take themselves too seriously (despite Cobby’s serious musical chops) means the sound of the The Cutler is as open-minded and free-flowing as the releases that first put them on the map. However, in the current music marketplace they now face new challenges. The cottage industry days of Pork Recordings, where CDs selling 30,000 copies and boatloads of remix requests would pay reasonable wages for three, are gone. Porky, Cobby, and Steel Tiger (Cobby’s new label with Sim Lister) now exist in a music marketplace that’s propelled by Facebook and Twitter, and selling music is a different ball game. “People do still tend to think that music is free,” says Cobby. “Even my kids will say, ‘You actually bought music?’” They’re hoping for a shift of peoples psyches and music purchasing habits. “It’s an unsustainable model, you can’t expect artists to be doing this just for the love of it,” adds Cobby. “Nobody wants to be rich and famous – we just want to make a living wage.”

Georgia Anne Muldrow and Dudley Perkins are not the first couple to live and make music together, but their righteous output and candid outlook on life (especially the state of the music business) sets them apart. Today marks the release of their new collaborative album The Lighthouse, the latest of 12 releases on their SomeOthaShip Connect label. “It’s like a guide,” says Dudley, about the title of the new record, “so people can see through all this dark stuff that’s going on right now. Unfortunately, here in America, we mostly we praise the darkness.”

I recently made a mid-morning call to the couple at their home in Las Vegas, and on-speaker phone I could hear their kids running around. Mom and Dad sounded relaxed and laid-back amidst the little ones’ excitement. “Georgia didn’t go to sleep ‘til 5am making music and recording,” explains Dudley. “We are parents, we look after the children, but otherwise we are recording.” After some casual chat our conversation takes off with Dudley leading the charge. Occasionally he sounds like a streetwise preacher and Georgia chimes in with a well timed “ya’ know it” when he hits a high point. Between them they drop a mix of inspiring insights, and well-thought-out rants about corporate America, war, and people’s listening habits. For me it becomes a fascinating, entertaining, and surprisingly motivational call, that reflects the messages in their music.

If cookie cutter soul or hip hop is your thing then SomeOthaShip Connect releases will not float your boat. “People say we make weird music, but we speak common sense – we make real hood music,” says Dudley. In Interplanetary Peace Talks, a documentary released about Dudley last year, there’s a scene in which they’re at Amoeba Records in Los Angeles. While his daughter is shopping for CDs, Dudley is calling out customers buying commercial hip hop: “get out of the dark section – they talk about you, they put you down…listen to something about compassion and good things,” he says. In the title track to Seeds, her fantastic, Madlib-produced, solo album released last year, Georgia sings, “Who’s going to look after the Seeds, We’ve taken more than we need.” From warfare to welfare, mother nature to raising children, their interests and subject matter run wide and deep. “It ain’t about poppin’ mollies, gold chains, runnin’ the streets and rollin’ up with 22s, it’s about oppression, welfare lines, rape, and abortion – that’s hood music. It’s not hard to speak on what you see, but people turn a blind eye.”

Dudley grew up with seven siblings, and was raised by his single mother in Oxnard, California. Hip hop became a major obsession in his life at a young age, but unfortunately he also got heavily involved in drugs, alcohol, and gangs. After high school, he went into the U.S. Navy serving during Desert Storm. He eventually left after realizing that the war was against his principles. Returning to the Los Angeles area he reconnected with childhood friends like Madlib, Oh No, DJ Romes, Kankick, and Wildchild. He was featured on the seminal Lootpack Soundpieces: Da Antidote album as an MC and also as illustrator of the album, which was released through Stones Throw Records. He went on to record for German hip hop label Good Vibe under the name Declaime, recorded solo soul records for Stones Throw, and made appearances on other labels.

Georgia was born in Los Angeles to a musical family. Her father was jazz musician Ronald Muldrow, a soul jazz and hard bop guitarist and a regular member of Eddie Harris’s band. Her mom, Rickie Byars-Beckwith, is leader of the Agape Choir and a noted spiritual teacher. Georgia left Los Angeles, to attend The New School’s jazz program in New York, where her fellow students included Blue Note artist Robert Glasper and singer Bilal. Eventually she would collaborate with up and coming producer Waajeed, appearing on his critically acclaimed Platinum Pied Pipers’ Triple P album. On 9/11 she was riding the NYC Subway underneath the World Trade Center and the events of that day led her to return to Los Angeles.

Dudley sought out Georgia after seeing her perform and asked her to feature on “Coming Home” from his 2006 release Expressions. They soon became a couple, and with Dudley’s encouragement Georgia became Stones Throw’s first female signee, releasing the soulful, wonderfully eccentric, and critically acclaimed Olesi: Fragments of an Earth album. Unfortunately subsequent struggles with alcoholism resulted in Dudley’s hospitalization, but the event became the catalyst for the couple to quit drinking, change their diets, and aim for a healthier lifestyle.

Keeping each other in check, building a family, and allowing room for each other to record, the two have become a powerful team. “We do this to have something of our own on this earth. Georgia Anne Muldrow and Dudley Perkins are a definitive brand, we’re the blueprint, you can only copy it,” says Dudley. “And that’s how we’re all supposed to be – a blueprint, an individual experience,” he adds.

They set up the SomeOthaShip Connect label in 2009 because they wanted to control their own music and masters, and had become fed-up with third-party label deals. “Sometimes you have no choice but to play with other labels to make a living. Some people look to blow-up and become famous right away with big label backing – and we’ve toyed with it, but it’s a crazy road to go down,” says Dudley. They signed a distribution deal with label manager Jay Devonish at Toronto-based eOne, and he aptly handles their day-to-day business. “I’m fascinated by them – musically and in general. They are two crazy creative cats who never cease to amaze me. They are smart and have amazing insight.”

While Jay watches the business, Georgia and Dudley have hit some high notes and bent listeners’ ears worldwide. They’ve played live in the Langa Township of Cape Town, South Africa. Georgia has collaborated and written for Erykah Badu. Mos Def was so inspired by her song “Roses” he licensed it to use on his benchmark Ecstatic album, and Georgia remixed Robert Glasper for his Grammy-winning Blue Note release last year. BBC DJ Gilles Peterson awarded  Ocotea, recorded by Georgia under her Jyoti moniker, Jazz Album Of The Year and praised their “stinging originality in a world of musical predictability,” and Canadian artist The Weekend recently sampled “The Initiation” from “Olessi” for The Trilogy. “Every day there’s something new with Georgia and Dudley. Their output is inspiring, and their message is needed right now,” says Jay. “They get the power of the music they are making – they want to wake people up.” Despite these recent achievements, Jay thinks there is still room to grow and reach their potential. ”They’re not there yet, but we’re on the right track,” he says.

In addition to their own label they occasionally release music on Mello Music Group. But otherwise the plan is to build a roster and continue pushing their sound and message on SomeOthaShip Connect. “It’s not our choice to not be on a major label, but we speak on things that major labels probably do not allow. We could disrupt their whole system. Their music is tainted and plays at a lower vibration. It’s made to keep the gods inside of us asleep,” theorizes Dudley. “The music industry, like the food in grocery stores, is poisoned. People take these poisons willingly. Marketing will do that to you. Marketing will make you eat doo-doo, and doo-doo is what’s on the radio right now.”

If you’re in the U.S.A., you can catch Georgia and Dudley perform at the following:

NY @ Brooklyn Bowl May 21

LA @ Low End Theory May 22

And also on Boiler Room TV on June 25