Label Feature - Tsuba

Trends in dance music change quicker than seasons and new sub genres are spawned weekly, so when a highly relevant label reaches the 5 year milestone by simply churning quality house music, its quite refreshing. Although when you have someone at the helm who has over 15 years of experience in the industry, it’s not that surprising.

Starting his own imprint was a natural progression for Kevin Griffiths when the label he was managing in 2006 came natural demise. Now some 60 releases in (vinyl, digital, vinyl only, limited editions) and with two sub labels in tow, Tsuba is one of the go to label for quality house music. Its catalogue boasts releases from Dyed Soundorom, Peace Division and Sascha Dive to name just a few and over recent years its been a key label in shaping the European house sound.

To mark its half century the label is releasing a special two part EP, which sees some Tsuba classics remixed by the likes of Sebo K, Art Department and Arto Mwambe as well as new material from the Tsuba family; Federico Molinari, Christian Burkhardt, Bearweasel among others. Naturally celebrations are being had with special events at Fabric, Watergate and Supermarket (Zurich).

With a packed release schedule and upcoming releases and remixes from Tazz, Larry Heard Tsuba is showing no signs of slowing up. I caught up with the man behind it all and Dean Muhsin – the Bear half of Bearweasel, owner of Dispersion PR and long term friend of Griffiths – just before the birthday celebrations got under way at Fabric, to talk about the last 5 years, the next 5 years, Suburban living and being grumpy old men.

Pulse: I guess the best place to start is where it all began – the whole house music journey? Kevin: Oh goodness me. Well for the last 15 years I’ve always been a vinyl collector and buying lots of vinyl records. I first got into house music from the mixes of bands like Happy Monday and Stone Roses by Okenfold, Farley & Heller and those kinds of people and just sort of progress from there gradually, buying more sort of ‘dance’ stuff . Then I went to a John Digweed night called Babealicious in Hildenbrough , which was is in Tunbridge - in the middle of nowhere basically. It was quite unusual for the dj to put on this sort of night and I was just completely hook watching him mix and from that point on I brought some decks…

So was that mid 90’s? K: Yeah, that was 1995, around that sort of time. From there when I graduated University I sent out about a hundred letters to various record labels and promotion companies and eventually got some work experience at a company called CD Pool which was basically a promo service for DJs playing CD’s. It was stuffing envelopes and doing all the mundane things for about 3-4 months and then I started working with record labels helping them compile CD’s… Dean: Yeah, that was when I meet you..

K: Yeah it was.. 

D: Jesus, fucking ages ago.. 

K: Yeah, 97/98. I started working with labels and building up those relationships. Then my next job was for a music website, which was like a download site, they were a bit ahead of the game, though. So I was signing up digital rights from record labels, around the whole dot com boom but it didn’t really work out for one reason or another…

They were offering MP3’s? K: Yeah, MP3’s 

D. It was ground breaking, they offered loads of labels exclusive deals and started paying out a lot of money. It was around the dot com boom so there was a lot of money that wasn’t really there and they offered labels advances. I think the label I was working with at the time was offered something like an £8,000 advance, which was mad. This was proper Renaissance stuff. 

K: It was proper music biz guys, they were talking to labels like Warp and then talking about £100,000 advance for a 3 year exclusive deal on their digital rights. It turned out they were just too early then. 

D: This is when we still had dial-up connections, to download 320 MP3’s! 

K: Yeah, the site just didn’t work very well. They kind of tried to do the whole dot com thing, and to attract investment they had to have various departments to look like a fully functioning company. But actually they were selling about 5 downloads a week and employed about 20 people. 

D: It’s crazy to think, they could have been Beatport. 

K: Basically yeah, they were just a bit too early and ballsed it up.

How many labels signed up? K: I think we signed up about 50-60 labels, quite a lot.

Big labels? K: Yeah, labels like Soma and Euphonic - kind of the more interesting side of dance music. I was working with labels a lot more, creating relationships, so from that job I moved to Amato (Distribution) which in terms of gaining experience in how to run a record label and just in terms of how business things work, it was completely invaluable. It was a really mad job, I was managing around 70 labels which was a bit crazy but I learnt so much. From there, my next job was running Fine, which was Tiefschwarz label.

In Berlin? K: There head office was in Berlin but they wanted to start a London office, which is what I set up. It was sort of natural progression from the distribution side to running a label. I did that for about 18 months and then for one reason or another – financial mainly, they decided to close the label. So then it was the perfect point to start my own label.

So, it’s 2006, vinyl sales decreasing and piracy on the way up what made you want to start your own label? K: Well, I’d always wanted to do my own thing, it was a combination of the timing of it. I didn’t really want to just run another label because I had done that. I just wanted to do my own thing - probably a little insane, given the market. Having said that the market was a lot more buoyant than it is now, it would be a lot harder to start a label now, defiantly.

 

"I think I just focus on putting out quality records which is what the label is about, that’s the most important thing and I shouldn’t lose sight of that."

 

You said recently in a interview that the 5 years celebrations are sort of a full stop on the first chapter of a the label. What exactly did you mean by that, a new direction? K: Not so much a new direction, it just feels like the pressures off a bit really. You reach 5 years and you sort of establish yourself and I feel like I’ve done that. I feel reenergised really. 

D: You’ve got a bit of a more of a happy go lucky attitude. 

K: Yeah, it’s quite difficult with the declining vinyl market; the last year has been a bit ‘difficult’ at times. It’s become a lot more like ‘I’m going to enjoy it’. 

D: Play with the label a bit. K: Yeah, exactly.

Like taking risks on artists that you wouldn’t have done at the start? K: Yeah probably, I think Tsuba will become a little bit more eclectic within the house music realm. I’ve been buying a lot of vinyl again which has really excited me. In terms of coming across new music I think there nothing better than buying vinyl actually, it can be a little bit soulless just buying download the whole time.

Do you think we could see Tsuba releasing any artist’s albums in future? K: I’d like to do that actually, yeah. There’s no immediate plans but I think the people I'm working with, that’s certainly something that’s on the horizon.

 

Going back, you mention you ran for Fine, which was based in Berlin. Berlin is obviously Mecca for electronic music and lots of DJ’s and producers now reside there. Have you ever thought of moving? Is there a benefit to living in Berlin? K: Um not really, I quite like living in Tunbridge (Laughs). I wouldn’t want to live in Berlin, I like going there but I couldn’t live there. I don’t know, I’m quite British, I quite enjoy the whole British culture and having a family as well obviously that is quite a bit factor in not moving to somewhere like Berlin. I don’t think it matters in terms of creativity.

Is there any benefit to label being based there? K: I guess, maybe. When I played at Watergate I saw Dyed (Soundorum) and Hector – you bump into those sort of people if you in Berlin but with Skype and Email I’m chatting to these people all the time anyway. 

D: I don’t know really, every time I go to Berlin I rant and rave about how much I like it there. Personally I have the same feeling as Kev, though. I like complaining about things and in this country, you can complain about things a lot. Also like Kev, we live out in suburbs so it’s quite and leafy and not far from London and I like that part of my life.

I don’t know if it serves you better as an artist, I know quite a lot of artists who have moved out there and their careers have developed really well, like Ed Davenport, Mark Henning, Spencer (Parker), quite a lot of people. I think its less to do with location and more to do with that big act of commitment, when you say to yourself ‘I’m going to move to another country because I really want to do what I want to do’ it doesn’t really matter where you are, once you’ve made that commitment, that your uprooting everything, its like, you’ve got to do it. Certainly Berlin is an amazing place and it’s great creatively, particularly because you’re talking about less rent and really vibrant scene but I think it’s more about that change and commitment to doing stuff differently that is the catalyst. I think if an artist who was struggling in London and said ‘right I'm going to move to Barcelona and make it work, chances are there probably going make it work. 

K: Its so much cheaper, to live, anyway. I can see why people do it, especially if you single. 

D: Yeah, I have to say if I was single and didn’t have my own business then I would have probably considered it. K: I would miss the Britishness though of Match Of The day and stuff like that. 

D: I have to say I would as well but then I’m British about everything. The first thing I think about when I get to airport is think about coming home. Seriously, I just don’t like going away that much. It makes me sound like some grumpy old nutter, doesn’t it? [Laughs all round]

K: I guess you being in Staines and me being in Tunbridge Wells there sort of this suburban vibe. 

D: There is! I can chart all of my friends who are on this suburban tip. 

K: It makes no difference as to where you are, as long as you can stay online. If your passionate about what you do, it’s kind of irrelevant. 

D: In terms of artistic creativity, I think there’s as much to be gained from being isolated, as there is from having a group of people around you. In fact recently I’ve being reading interviews with a lot of Berlin producers who said there’s too much cross over, too much idea swapping and too much of a scene for people to really focus on what their doing.

 

The London scene has been fairly healthy over the last couple of years, do you think its been a reaction to the whole Berlin thing. Do you think London has its own sound? Is Tsuba a part of that? K: I don’t know really. That’s not the intention with the records I sign. I don’t know if London has a sound. 

D: I don’t think London has a sound K: I think its more reactionary. I don’t even think London has a scene as such. London’s so vast that there are so many little scenes and they all cross over and cross pollinate. For example you could real off 10 dj’s and producers that all know each other, but people in London and in the UK in fact, just people in general, everywhere, I think they just get on with what they do. I think its just a lot of different people doing a lot of different things and they all happen to be from London. It’s really fertile but I really don’t think there’s a scene. It depends how you view the word scene. I think, well, do you view a scene as lots of people who know each other? Because certainly everyone in the music industry in London tends to know each other one way or another and there are all very polite, nice and friendly.

And that’s not the same in Berlin? D: No, Berlin’s exactly the same. In fact, it’s the same worldwide. There’s always this professionally courtesy. I played in Berlin the other weekend and I had friends who came out because they weren’t playing themselves. It’s just a bit of a community in general. I do think cities influence things. Particularity Berlin and London because of simple facts; there’s a lot of people, a hunger for the scene and things like licensing laws which mean parties can go on for a long time, which is incredibly beneficial. I think dance music in general now is pretty global and it’s not big enough to say London’s a scene, everything kind of crosses over. I’ve probably contradicted myself about five times in that monologue. (Laughs all round) But that’s the point, it’s really difficult to define. 

K: I don’t think either of us really like to be part of a ‘click’. To certain degree, an insider looking in. We don’t ‘hang out’ at particular nights or whatever; we just do our own thing and talk a lot obviously about music and what were into, because we like it and that’s what we enjoy doing, rather than just being seen to be at a particular party or whatever. 

D: Yeah, There is a bit of that that goes on. There’s a lot of parties that everyone has to go down and hang out at when there not working and stuff but the general vibe of living in the suburbs is you don’t do that. Weather we like it or not, were on the outside. I think that were just fucking uncool. I know I am anyway (Laughs). 

K: Yeah, grumpy and uncool (Laugus) but I like it like that to be honest. 

D: Me too!
 

"Certain things will be digital only, simply because they work better in that realm. Its not a bad thing that some thing's aren’t on vinyl. I think you just need to be flexible."

What do you guys make of the ‘UK bass scene’, the dubstep crossover into house and techno? K: It’s an area I’ve never delved into really, Dubstep.

 

But what about house djs playing Dubstep in their sets? K: Yeah, fair enough. Last night I played this night in Leeds and Leif played garage for an hour which was kind of like ‘wow’. I mean it sounded really different and fair play to him, he’d been crate digging, finding all these really old things. I think if you can be eclectic and bring new things in – which is actually what I’m doing more when I DJ now - its more a cross section of things. Buying vinyl the records are a lot more interesting and a lot harder to programme into a dj set, but actually I’d rather make it a bit wonky that just have 2 hours of drums that’s really easy to mix. Its good to be a bit more eclectic.

D: I really rate the Dubstep thing actually. Not all of its for me, but then a lot of music isn’t for me and that doesn’t necessarily mean its not good. Some of the music that I hear, particular from the age of the producers that are doing it, I think its fantastic. I have to say, though, I think that about all types of music. It is quite cool that a lot of it (Dubstep) is associated with the UK.

K: Like Croydon

D: Yeah, well Tech house came from there as well. I Just think the bass scene is really interesting, it’s got so many different facets it’s got the potential to bastardize loads of different music. I’ve got a really strange thing, part of me a purist and part of me’s all for bastardization. Basically, I’m just a massive hypocrite, on everything.

K: (Laughs)

D: My worst habit is playing devils advocate, on everything, so I’m terrible in interviews. But yeah, I think when you say people like Prosumer playing records – I hate the name of this genre –that would be termed as ‘UK Funky’ and stuff like that, in Panorama bar, that’s kind of like what acid house was. But now its completely fresh and it helps keep things interesting.

Could you see Tsuba releasing stuff that not 4/4? K: To be honest, probably not. I think you have to be careful with that kind of stuff – not to confuse your audience. The aim is to be eclectic under the umbrella of house music but I don’t think I would release non 4/4 stuff. 

D: I think that sentiment is really underrated, in running a record labels. A lot say ‘well, your just limiting things’ but then the opposite end of that is, if you wanted to release ‘bass music’ or whatever then start a new imprint and give it a platform of its own. 

K: Yeah, if you dilute what you do, you probably don’t reach the kind of people you intending to, with that type of music. 

D: Its not just about what a label wants to do, its about that people who support the label and buy the records. Throwing curveballs is really cool, some labels have grown out of doing it, like Warp for example. I think if you start a label that’s your passion, putting out house records or whatever, if you start switching that up, it looks cynical and in most cases, it is cynical. I’m not saying eclecticism if wrong, though… 

K: I definably know what I want to release on Tsuba and what the labels about.

You’re not really one to follow trends then? K: To certain degree Tsuba kind of follows my tastes and how my tastes develop and sort of eb and flow. There a common theme in everything I release, which is pretty deep. I can veer left and right from that but I would never completely alienate what the original starting point of the label was about. Hopefully people follow my tastes to a degree. It seems to have worked so far.

Kevin, your obviously in control of the day to day running of Tsuba but do Dean or other people help you out with the A&R or is that strictly your domain? K: Yeah, just me. I’ve always made all the decision’s really. 

D: No one could help Kev with his A&R, he’s a one mad board meeting! K: Yeah, I’m obsessed, massively. I like being 100% in control but it has its pros and cons, sometimes it drives me mad! Ultimately I would rather that I was in control of it. D: Kev will ring up when he’s kind of unsure of stuff but then you know that he knows what he wants to do. So it’s like – not in a bad way – but he doesn’t need the advice. Its kind of like he’s working it through his system and 99% of the time it’s the right decision. 

K: I drive my wife insane sometime, if I'm not sure about something I will play it to her loads of time and she’s like ‘don’t put this pressure on me, please’. 

D: You just externalise your decision making process. K: Yeah, basically.

What would say to people who have the view that if a track/ set of tracks aren’t strong enough to put out on vinyl why sign it and only release it digitally? K: Well there are two markets, that’s the thing. Some artists are geared towards digital and some to vinyl. There will be some things that sell nothing on Beatport but 500 on vinyl and vice versa, so that’s why I’m flexible. I’ve got a vinyl only label (Tsuba Limited), Tsuba colours which is more kind of deep house - and ultimately geared toward the vinyl market as well - and then there’s Tsuba. Certain things will be digital on that simply because they work better in that realm, its not a bad thing that something's aren’t on vinyl. I think you just need to be flexible. 

D: I think that’s really good from an artist point of view as well. Its actually really good. 

K: I never say it’s a digital only release, I never mention that because it’s irrelevant. It’s just a regular release. 

D: Its also making sure you put out stuff in a way that’s going to get that artists and that release noticed the most. 

K: The good thing about doing digital is you can be really quick, you can sign something and put in a month or ever quicker. 

D: For example our last EP, we gave Kev record and because he went for the digital option it was out within a month and we didn’t feel like we sitting on it for ages. 

K: If you do something on vinyl, sometimes things can be 4/5 months before they come out. It’s options, every release is different and having these options works well.

It strikes me that there is a strong senesce of family and you keep it among a group of core artists. Do you think that’s important to the success of the label? K:  Yeah, I think so. I think I do a bit of both really, there a core group of people I work with but at the same time I’m quite open to working with new people. Dance music is about singles, so if I hear something I really like I might do one or two releases from a particular artist but over the long term it’s nice to work with people like Dean. It’s a bit of both I think but its nice having the family thing when you do things like Fabric tonight, its great having Dean down to play. 

D: Its always nice working with mates, especially in an industry that’s relatively informal.

Is it easier of harder working with friends like Dean? Have you ever had to tell him to do a mix again or something? K: It’s easier I think. The last (Bearweasel) single we went through a process. It took a while, didn’t it? To get the last single right. 

D: It took a hell of a lot of understanding from you, because we just don’t meet any deadlines and I have a terrible concept of what’s right and what wrong. I don’t know how to describe it with us. 

K: But if its not right, its not like Dean will send me something and I will go, ‘it’s right’. If it’s not right, Dean will know. 

D: Yeah, I think one of the advantages of knowing him is that I wouldn’t send him a tack that I didn’t think was right and that’s also because he’s really open and he discuses everything and talks through his decisions with people. You can work with a mate and have lots of arguments and stuff or you can work with a mate and it can all go fine. But I think the most important thing is when someone properly gets it, that’s all your looking for.

So then is it harder to work with new artist, that you don’t have a previous relationship with and to try and get it right. Someone like Nina Kravitz for example, was it harder to get it right? K: Nina is really nice and easy to work with. I remember I got the mix from her (Okain – Scream – Nina Kravtiz mix) and it just took on a life of its own. It’s the most fantastic remix, such a brilliant remix and in 10 years I think its one of the greatest remixes I’ve had. It’s just kind of a classic disco- house record. 

D: I don’t know anyone who got on that record at the beginning who isn’t still playing it now, which is pretty fucking rare these days. 

K: Yeah there’s really something quite special about it.

Any artists that have been a pain to work with? K: Yeah I guess there’s been a couple but I won’t name names.

Always the way, I guess? K: Yeah. I try and develop a relationship with everybody that has single - on Skype or on the phone. Generally I get along with people quite well which I think is important. I’m quite prompt with royalty statements and the kind of business side of things, which I think people really appreciate.

Is Tsuba a labour of love or a profitable business? K: I earn my living from the label, solely, I’m quite fortunate being able to do that, I think its quite hard these days. I’ve got very low overhead’s, I do pretty much everything myself. My wife’s my accountant, Dean does the club promotion, I’ve got a friend who does the artwork but aside from that, I do absolutely everything. That’s probably the only way that you can actually make a living out of it.

Is that sustainable do you think? Will Tsuba be around in another 5 years? K: I don’t see why not, I really don’t see why not. I mean now I’ve reached 5 - going back to the full stop thing – that’s really re-energised me actually. I really can see 10, defiantly. This year is already mapped out, so that’s 6. I’m really enjoying it and as long as I’m continuing to enjoy it then (pauses) bring it on really!

Even from when you started Tsuba, back in 2006, there’s a lot more music out there now. Is that a good thing? K: You have to delve a bit deeper. There’s a lot of digital releases, that’s a bit tiresome. You can start a label and be on Beatport in a week, that’s why I’ve started buying a lot more records again. All the good shit seems to be on vinyl. There’s more quality controls, If your going to press something on Vinyl you’ve got to be serious about what your doing. It’s going to cost you £1000 to press 500 records so you need to make sure the stuffs good, because it wont sell if its not. 

D: You know what? I think it is good. You can talk about the whole quality control thing, there being too much stuff, the democratisation of music being a negative thing and DJs having to wade through too many fucking promos but at least we have choice. We have choice in doing these things. If you look at someone like Burial, who produced his first album using overdubs in Sound Forge, I think it was, that would have never happened (years ago), and that was an incredibly important thing, musically. Yeah there is too much music, I complain about it loads, as iv said numerous times – I’m a complete hypocrite, I do like complaining about things loads but ultimately I think technology, the democratisation of music and the availability of music is ultimately more positive than it is negative.

Do you think retailers like Beatport should impose more quality control and limit how much music goes on there? K: I don’t know, everyone gives Beatport a hard time but fair play to them, they were there early and established themselves in the market. They’ve got a hard job to do because obviously it’s the main destination for people buying dance music downloads, so therefore everyone wants to have their stuff on Beatport. I think there’s probably a space in the market for someone who does it really well with the more sort of interesting end of club music, in terms of downloads. 

And do you think that will happen? K: Potentially, I think someone will do it but the problem is, Beatpot have all the exclusivity with labels, so it’s a catch 22. I sell 75% of my downloads with Beatport so you don’t really want to rock the boat working with someone else, it’s a bit of a catch 22.

You often hear people who have been in the scene for while saying things like, ‘music’s not as good as it used to be’, ‘clubs aren’t as good as they used to be’, is that something you agree with? K: "I think it’s a lot easier to make music now and I will go back to my records form 10 – 15 years ago and there musicality in pretty much everything. There’s a lot more musical input into those records, whereas now there’s a lot of more sample packs, so there’s a bit of kind-of formula. I don’t want to be one of those grumpy old men that says ‘its not as good as it used to be’ but I think you just need to delve deeper to find the good stuff now." 

D: But when you do, Its better than it used to be. 

K: Yeah, exactly!

And the clubs? D: I think clubbing better than its ever been. 

K: Yeah, It’s just a different era, new people, new crowd, its makes everything fresh. I can’t recall a night from 10 years ago that was mind blowing. 

D: I just can’t recall a night from 10 years ago! K: (Laughs) 

D: I genuinely can’t. When your in your mid 30’s, you kind of think to yourself, well, it’s not meant to be as good as it was. It’s as good as it was for different reasons. You can’t keep chasing that first buzz, otherwise your going to be dead by the time your 25.

  

"Certainly Berlin is an amazing place and it’s great creatively, particularly because you’re talking about less rent and really vibrant scene but I think it’s more about that change and commitment to doing stuff differently that is the catalyst."

 

I wanted to get to your thoughts on music piracy? Some people would argue it get smore music heard.. K: (Long sigh) It’s stealing. I found a load of Tsuba stuff today actually, by accident. It was on a blog with all the artwork promoting my gig in Leeds last night. Saying, ‘we’ve got Kevin Griffiths coming to Leeds, here’s a link to the best of Tsuba 2010, the compilation I did last year. I was like, ‘cheers! thanks!’ 

D: What a fucking…… 

K: It just riles me, you know? Trying to earn a living out of it. I’m not sure it would make a huge difference to sales maybe….

D: This is the thing I worry about, I think people who are going to steal music, will steal music and people who are going to buy music, will buy music. However I think as generations go on the people who are going to buy music will get less.

K: Its just fucking annoys me when I see stuff up somewhere. These people are earning money from the traffic they get on their sites, advertising revenue and stuff like that. 

D: I think today with media, the Internet and technology the way it is. Its so easy to get a lot of information and a lot of entrainment around your for free, legitimately. Things like Spotify and stuff like that, you can get so much stuff legitimacy that I think if you care about something, spend a bit of cash on it, if you’ve got it.

I get messages on Facebook from kids overseas who send me stuff like, ‘I really love your music, I’ve downloaded it from Limewire and it makes me really angry. And then you send an email back like ‘please, please you shouldn’t do that, try and buy it’, and they will reply back like ‘well, I cant afford it’. I don’t think that’s much of an excuse but over the last couple of years I’ve started thinking to myself , the retailers need to start looking into this a bit more. 

K: Yeah, that’s what I’m surprised about, they don’t seem to do anything. 

D: Especially with digital. This is a global issues as with economics and stuff like IP logins. If Beatport are charging US dollars to a country who’s GDP is like ‘flow level’, then they need to rethink that. Personally I would rather take one cent profit from a release than take nothing at all because of piracy. I think the retailers need to start thinking a bit more about that. 

K: Or apply more pressure to these sites putting up links. 

D: I think the problem partially does come from the industry but I nowadays there is just a culture leaning toward….. 

K: You don’t pay for music, it’s just something you get for free. 

D: Kev’s got similar views to me which are slightly conflicting. We were talking earlier about how he wants’ to make Tsuba into something with added value. Other things that you want to buy into.

Like a brand? D: I think brand is a really ugly word for it but it is effectively true. I just like to think the whole music thing can spread and keep spreading. When I was a kid and I really liked something, was obsessed with something, I brought magazines about it and I saved up for it. 

K: There are two camps, people who will buy music and people who wont. Doesn’t stop you getting annoyed when you see your stuff out there on a blog. 

D: Yeah, it makes me incredibly annoyed because it threatens my livelihood on a massive scale. I represent over 40 labels, this is aside from Bearweasel, and I see piracy everyday affecting those and see their profit margins going down which massively affects what I do for a living. I don’t pay myself a lot of money, I do what I do because I like what I do and because I’m probably not going to be any good at doing anything else different – which isn’t a bad thing its just because iv invested the last 13 -14 years of my life into it. So I would like to think I can keep doing that. But (Pircay) is a massive problem, a massive million-headed problem and there’s lots of different ways of sorting it out. It’s as much on the industry side and particularly the retailers. If retailers sold in native currencies in every country and had it affordable for people then fair enough, the people who aren’t going to buy music wont buy music, but those who do go ‘ I’ve got few quid’, at least they will be able to get it. Like I say, those few pennies are better than not getting anything at all.

So is Tsuba Limited a reaction to the whole digital piracy thing? K: Not so much. I wanted to work with some new people and so something completely underground. Again going back to the flexibility thing really. I don’t make any money out of it but actually it just kind of re-energises me again. 

D: Tsuba limited is basically just because Kev fucking loves it! There are no rules to it. 

K: I stamp and number them all myself, and I really like doing that actually. It seems to work, the first one sold out in a week and the second one will hopefully sell out as well. I’ve just signed a third one and im speaking to someone quite interesting for the 4th. It’s just working with new people and its just a fun thing to do really.

You said you can see Tsuba going on for another 5 years. Are you going to just keep on doing what you’re doing or is there any new avenues you want to explore. Dean mentioned earlier about Tsuba offering “added value”, almost like growing the ‘brand’? K: Looking at labels like Ghostly, I really like what they do. They sell art and merchandise and interesting kind of things. 

D: That’s what I was getting at rather than branding. 

K: Especially with Facebook and things like that, being more in touch with your audience I really love that, its great to be able to talk to people. So with those relationships I don’t see why I cant branch out and start doing other things with Tsuba. Yeah, that would be something that I would definably like to do over the next few years.

More like a lifestyle thing? K: Yeah, I guess. As I get older I’m a lot more interested in things like art, so I guess it will sort of follow my tastes a bit as well.

That’s the future and the next step for Tsuba then? K: I think in the short term I will really just focus on putting out fantastic house records, that’s as much as I think about, then it will be little steps toward to the long term stuff. I’m going to re do the website this year, make it a lot more interactive - that will be something I look forward to getting my teeth stuck into.

What’s next for you, Dean, ever see yourself starting your own label? D: I’ve done it before. I’ve got a similar background to Kev, I’ve done pretty much everything in the music industry before arriving at promotion. I’ve always worked the promotion side of thing but I’ve been an A&R, run labels, done DJ bookings and quite a lot of management stuff. I like the idea (of starting a label) but I’m also really reluctant to do it because I wouldn’t have the time to do it. This is why I’ve got loads of respect for Kev; Kev started Tsuba because he had had vast amounts of experience and wanted to do it for himself, you get a lot of people starting labels now because they think it’s a tack on to what else they do, weather being a producer or artist….

And you think they feel its something they have to do it now? D: Yeah, it’s like a flight of fancy rather than actually something they think ‘I can really make a fuckin’ go of this. So yeah, no plans to start a label for me. No plans in anything, baring my day job, because that’s really important to me. Not that Bearweasel isn’t but Bearweasel I would rather be more something I find fun.

OK, so one final question, who are you ‘tipping’ for 2011? Whose the next big thing? K: I think Steffi, defiantly. There are loads of cool records about actually. Rio Padice – he's not doing anything new particularly, but he does it really, really well. 

D: Yeah, in fact the people im vibeing off the most are the people that have been around for ages, Fred P, DJ Q just loads of people really, too many to mention.

Kevin Griffiths Tsuba Mix Tracklist
Lawrence 'Just Like Heaven' (Dial)
Ron Hardy 'Track 2' (Rdy)
Gowetgone 'Burning Flowers' (Vidab)
Ethyl & Huxley 'Reflexions' (Tsuba)
Subb-An Feat Beckford 'Lovers Theme' (Spectral)
Tazz 'Underground 07' (Tsuba Limited)
Steffi Feat Virgina 'I'm Yours' (Osgut)
Tommy Bones 'After The Club' (Realtone)
Aybee 'Underworld' (Underground Quality)
Moodymanc 'Black Paint' (Larry Heard's After Dark Mix) (Tsuba)
DJ Sneak 'Delta Trippin' (a:rpia:r)
Tristen 'Current' (White Music)
Roman IV 'Lucy' (Running Back)
Tiny Trendies 'The Sky Is Not Crying' (Nuphonic)

Ben Coates