The man behind the highly successful Y3K and Bedrock Breaks compilations, and proprietor of the Kilowatt breaks label, Guy Hatfield aka DJ Hyper will soon hit our shores once again. Samurai caught up with Guy to chat about his adventures in the worldwide breaks scene.

The UK’s M8 magazine was right on the money when it noted that “thankfully, for every head up his ass ponce there’s a Hyper, capable of making music and compilations that are exciting, fresh and accessible!”

You spend a large part of your time playing in the US. What attracts you to the scene over there?

It’s very fresh and exciting. You’ll be in a club in LA that’s playing hip hop, you’ll hear something by Bad Boy Billy then a drum n bass DJ will take over in the same room! And for that reason it’s a really exciting place to play. Obviously they’ve had their own economic problems, with fewer people going out over the past couple of years but it’s still a really vibrant scene.

So how would you say the UK scene would compare with the Australian scene at the moment?

The Australian scene is probably really really strong, breakbeat got really big in around 2000 and it’s doing really well over there. It’s been around over here for a long long time now, initially in the underground and then it got bigger and bigger. I think it really exploded in Australia because I think people are really up for it, they’re up for going out, having a good time and really letting go. I think breaks allows people to do that, and in Australia people have really gripped it by the horns. It’s really exciting.

What a lot of people like about it over here is that breaks has so many influences, so almost no matter what your background, you can get into it. A lot of club nights here will start with a hip hop DJ who throws in a bit of funk and a few breaks at the end of their set to warm up for the breaks DJs who will hit the decks later on. Is that sort of thing common in the UK?

It depends on the sort of night you play. There are more sort of out and out breakbeat nights but also people mix it up a lot. I play at the Big Beat Boutique once a month and in London recently I played drum n bass with Plump DJs, which was a sort of live act and other times I’ve played almost techy house. I often throw in a bit of hip hop, they do sort of lend themselves to each other, really. It’s all breakbeat at the end of the day, it’s the same beat. It’s all different takes on the same idea.

I sort of found out about you through being into Tayo. How well do you know him?

Yeah me and Tayo, we were doing Creamfields together just a couple of weeks ago in Buenos Aires… He used to do all the press for the label and I did the promotions for it. So I’ve known Tayo for years and years…..

And where did the two of you meet?

Oh God! Ummm… I mean really, we just met through talking to each other as we were working on different parts of the same project. He’d be doing the press on the record and I’d be doing the promotions so we’d have to communicate to get the job done effectively.

So how did you get into promotions? Is it common for a DJ like yourself to get into this area?

I was doing promotions way before I started my career as a DJ! I was never going to do DJing as a career, that would not have been smiled upon by Mum and Dad. So I went out and got a ‘proper job’, moved to London and saved up some money to set up my own promotions business (Waxworks). The DJing took off after the Y2K compilation really, it sold huge amounts and all of a sudden…... I ran Waxworks for a while before selling it to set up my own label (Kilowatt) and I’ve been doing that ever since and DJing as well, which is a lot more manageable.

How is Kilowatt doing at the moment?

Well, we’ve signed artists like Terminalhead, who is doing really well for us and we’ve got some good new stuff coming out. I’ve done a track with General Midi and there are other collaborations out as well.

Sounds promising. Who are your preferred people to collaborate with?

I enjoy working with lots of different people. My engineer Ronnie, who I work with full-time we did the Fibonnaci sequence with BT. Then there’s General Midi, we’ve done a couple of tracks together. Usually I work with Ronnie though, we’ve produced most of the tracks on the album like the Pink remix. The next remix we’re going to do is for Paul Van Dyk.

Lots of things on the cards! Speaking of collaborating with producers, I’ve heard that BT describes you as one of his favourite DJs.

Really? I didn’t know that. Right, that’s nice to know! I was supposed to do a remix with him a little while ago but it didn’t happen. I don’t know what happened there. It was a shame, really because he’s one of the artists I respect more than anyone in the scene. It’s really nice to know that someone who you’ve got so much respect for and has been around for that length of time takes an interest in what you do.

He came up to me once when I was playing in LA and was all like “Man, your music is some of the best I’ve heard in breakbeat, no one else is doing it like this” and, not recognizing who he was, I just said “Nice one mate” and he walked off. This other guy came up and said “How does it feel to be complimented by BT?” so I ran after him, saying “Thanks Brian..!”.....

It must be great getting kudos from somebody you respect and look up to….

It’s unbelievable getting respect from your peers, let alone people like Brian whom you’ve admired for several years, sort of like confirming what you are doing.

So you’re gearing up to come out here…. Have you played both Sydney and Melbourne before?

Yeah a couple of times. I’ve played Sydney twice and Melbourne twice, maybe three times. I came out here to do the Two Tribes festival a few years ago and I’ve been over every year since. I’m only doing around four gigs this time, over the Christmas period, but I’ll be coming back out to do a Ministry of Sound in Australia compilation series, or a compilation one-off anyway, in about April or May next year.

Is that going to be a breaks compilation for MoS?

Yes, it will be a breaks compilation coming out through Ministry.

Wow! That should be great exposure for you…

Well I think compilations are worth doing, you know quite a lot of albums such as Y3K and the Bedrock breaks series are some of the biggest selling breaks albums. Hopefully we can get a series up and running in Australia… it gives us a real focus on Australian compilations so it would be nice to do. A lot of DJs spend a lot of time working in the Australian market and I’ve had experience doing the American thing but I’d love to so the same with Australia. You know, I love being there, love the people, so I’m looking forward to getting it done really.

So are you sort of trying to concentrate on the Australian scene… is that a new thing for you?

It’s not really a concentration on the Australian scene as such… It’s just doing sort of….what I’m used to doing, what I’ve been doing with Bedrock, basically they release my compilations throughout the world. Now this one I’m doing at the moment is reflective of the tracks I’ve been working on, remixes I’ve been doing like the remix I’ve just done for Pink. People like that will be on the compilation.

Basically what we’ve done is that we’re licensing the tracks and licensing the compilation to different people. In Australia we’ve licensed it to Ministry of Sound so they can do a proper job on it. JBC are picking it up for Asia whereas The Chemical Drive is going to pick it up in America. We’re doing it like that so we can concentrate on territory by territory instead of sticking it out through a company in England and hoping for the best, really.

That’s good. So you’re concentrating on the different markets and tailoring the sound to each one?

That’s it. I’ve spent practically the whole year going around the world, I go to the states once a month, and I’m doing weekends over there, Eastern Europe and Asia about four or five times this year and it’s just good to put out something in line with… to reflect that really.

Catch DJ Hyper touring Australia on the following dates:

Fri 19 Dec: Berlin Bar, Gold Coast
Sat 20 Dec: Babylon, Canberra
Fri 26 Dec: The Lounge, Melbourne
Wed 31 Dec: Traffic, Adelaide
Thu 1 Jan: Sounds on New Years Day, Sydney