At the end of their latest Australian visit the chart-busting duo dissect their hugely-successful tour, lament their ‘nu rave’ tag, and weigh in on the recent DJ Mag Top 100 DJ Poll cheating scandal.
Nick Bridges and Jon Pearn look chuffed, and it’s no wonder. After two weeks in Australia playing as Bodyrox to packed-out clubs and festival crowds, the two are suitably sunned and smiling. One could almost be forgiven for thinking these two politely-spoken, friendly Brits were just another two travelers calling Australia home for awhile. Almost; for not many other traveling Brits have a number 2 UK single under their belts, major labels banging on their doors and worldwide tours beckoning.
It’s been a veritable rollercoaster ride for Bodyrox since their crossover single ‘Yeah Yeah’ became one of the tracks of 2006, reaching #2 on the UK singles chart and doing similarly well across Europe and here in Australia. Now, a year later, the boys are back with another single, an album in the pipeline and – after a two week tour throughout Australia that has seen them play several Godskitchen parties in addition to stops in support of their GenerationNext mix compilation – a love for Australia, and local crowds.
“The thing that has impressed us in Australia is how professional and friendly everyone is,” Nick says. “I think the clubbers over here are quite switched on and even in the regional places so far we’ve been able to play proper techno and the crowds have been up for it.” Jon agrees, “the reaction has been really good. Coffs Harbour was amazing; there were over a thousand people in the one room and it really went off! Adelaide was around 1,500 people as well; it’s been absolutely mad.”
Mad indeed; before flying out last Sunday the boys notched up more than a dozen appearances down under, packing clubs in all major cities in addition to stops on the Gold Coast, Cairns, Darwin and other regional towns. As the duo explains, however, packing clubs and festivals is one thing but making hits is another, and after the runaway success of ‘Yeah Yeah’, both Jon and Nick have felt ‘definite’ pressure to continue making commercially accessible crossover hits.
“It’s a weird thing,” Nick explains. “When we set out Bodyrox was never meant to be a crossover thing. It was meant to be an underground thing and then that [‘Yeah Yeah’] crossed over. [But] other projects that we’ve done purely to cross over haven’t really worked so you never really know. There’s no real formula to building a track to cross it over. Obviously now we have crossed over, we’re under a lot of pressure to the same again, but fingers crossed we’ll do that with the new single.”
This new single is none other that ‘What Planet You On’. Teaming up yet again with Luciana – previously heard on ‘Yeah Yeah’ – Bodyrox have again delivered the goods in the form of a minimal-edged electro stomper with a storming, aggressive vocal. Industry pundits are already championing it and, having taken out the top spot in DMC’s Buzz Charts as well as poll position in the Cool Cuts Chart, it seems the pressure hasn’t done too much damage and the pair can look forward to another high chart placing following the single’s release on Phonetic late next month.
‘What Planet You On’ will, inevitably, draw scathing attacks from the anti-nu-rave Gestapo; after all, it was Luciana’s unmistakable vocal and Bodyrox’s own tight production skills on ‘Yeah Yeah’ that gave way in part to the ‘nu-rave’ title last year. Both Nick and Jon, however, are quick to comment on the term’s use and, more commonly, its misuse. “It’s mad isn’t it?” Nick says. “Everyone from us to the Klaxons and a lot of punk-indie bands are being labeled nu rave, so I’m not entirely sure what nu rave means anymore.”
“I said in another interview that journalists love to tag everything so that when it goes out of fashion they can slate it.” Jon agrees, “we were one of the first people to be tagged with it, so I suppose we could be seen as the pioneers of nu rave in the UK, though I don’t really know if that’s something to be proud of.”
Something the pair were extremely proud of, however, was their surprise nomination in this year’s Ivor Novello Awards, which honor excellence in singing and songwriting. “We never expected anything like that,” Nick reveals. “Dance producers are hardly ever nominated so it was a massive shock for us. Unfortunately we were pipped at the post by Amy Winehouse, although she isn’t a bad person to be pipped at the post by really. It’s one of the those things we’re still a little bit surprised about to be honest.”
Nominated also in this year’s DJ Mag Top 100 DJ Poll, Nick and Jon aren’t particularly surprised by the recent allegations of vote rorting (as featured by ITM HERE), but they maintain that with such polls – including ITM’s own inthemix50 – it’s a case of having to be ‘in it to win it’. “It’s [the DJ Mag poll] one of those things that – given the opportunity – it’s better being involved in than not,” Nick says. “It’s definitely a massive marketing thing; strangely though, a lot of punters and some of the clubs do take the results as read. We’ve had nearly 1,000,000 hits on our MySpace site, so we thought we’d put a banner up on there and, you never know, we might make it.”
Bound for Europe once more, this weekend they will touch down in Amsterdam for appearances at the annual Amsterdam Dance Event. Bodyrox will then spend the rest of 2007 preparing their eagerly-anticipated album and building further hype for the release of ‘What Planet You On’. For now, as the pair explain, their own Juki Records imprint is on hold. “We’re not really bothered about signing anything at the moment,” Nick says. “We’re really busy with the album and pushing Bodyrox so we’ll wait and see.”
‘GeneratioNext’, mixed by Bodyrox, Dr Willis & Scott Alert, is out now and available through GeneratioNext/Shock. Bodyrox’s new single ‘What Planet You On’ – complete with remixes by Air Bureau, Brian Dalton, Padley & Johnson, Martijn ten Velden and more – will be released on Phonetic late next month.
