A good four-and-a-half years ago, turntable wizards Kid Koala and Dynomite D decided to make an album their “skater friends would like” under the moniker The Slew. The vision was finally realised in 2009 with 100%: a rollicking, psychedelic collision of hip hop and rock.

When it came time to take The Slew on the road, Kid Koala and his touring offsider DJ P-Love (standing in for Dynomite D) decided they needed a rhythm section. Enter Chris Ross and Myles Heskett, formerly of ‘70s rock revivalists Wolfmother. With the band set to land here this month, inthemix hears what’s in store from the ringleader himself Kid Koala.

The Slew live show has been on the road for a little while now. How has the response been?
The Slew show was a big experiment, but we’ve been really happy with it. There have been mosh-pits and things [laughs]. That’s fun to see. We did nine shows in North America last year, and we thought at the end, ‘We’re having so much fun with this; I wish it could keep going’. It’s exciting to have an opportunity to do it all again.

How did you come to bring Wolfmother’s ex-rhythm section Chris Ross and Myles Heskett into the live fold?
It’s a funny story. On Wolfmother’s first North American tour, they went through Seattle, where Dynomite D lives. He and I had been working on this Slew album. He was invited to the show by the promoter who knew we were working on a rock record, and said, ‘You should check out this band’. They hadn’t brought a lighting person, so he actually ended up doing lights! He was blown away by the gig and met Myles and Chris after, and told me they were really cool fellas. I saw them when they came to Montreal.

I think it was really a timing thing, honestly. It turned out that the five minute window when I went down to buy tickets, and was coming out of the box office, they were standing there. We started talking and they said they were looking for a place to eat, so I showed them around Montreal and brought them to the studio. We hit off because Chris was into vintage keyboards, and I knew the perfect place. After hanging out for a bit, Myles asked, ‘So what do you do?’ I told him, and he was like, ‘Yeah, actually I was at your show last year with R2DJ!’ By the time Dylan and I came to bring The Slew on the road, we thought it’d be fun to have a live rhythm section. So we asked them, and that’s it! We never thought we’d get Chris and Myles. It was like, “Don’t those guys have Grammys?” [laughs]

How long did it take put 100% together?
Probably about four-and-a-half years. It’s a tedious craft making records. We took our time with it; there was no pressing deadline or record executive breathing down our necks. Everything about that record happened serendipitously. We wanted Mario C to mix it, because we were listening to a lot of Check Your Head and Ill Communication at the time. He liked the tracks and told us to bring them to his studio for the final mix.

Did you and Dynomite D have a shared vision for how you wanted the album to sound?
We wanted to make a record that our skater friends would like. This is a real heavy record you could skate to. We wanted it to land somewhere between a Public Enemy and a Black Sabbath album. On top of that, we wanted every part to be hand-cut off a turntable. That’s part of the reason it took so long! We’ve been goofing around with old rock recording techniques, playing turntables through amps and over-driving them. Using old space echoes and whatever else we could find to bring the dust into it.

Was working in this live rock context something you’ve always been keen to try?
You know, I never expected it to happen. It’s weird where turntables can bring you. The genre of The Slew record we knew, but we never knew how the tour would go. Before Chris and Myles, we thought we’d need 16 turntables and eight DJs and probably two months of rehearsals. We started making a list of DJs we could bring, and it was like, ‘Are we going to need a convoy of vans or something?’ As we started making that list, we thought it’d sound like the record, but look like some cerebral orchestra of sorts. So then we thought, let’s get a rhythm section, but whoever it is they better be as good as Chris and Myles!

Can you just talk us through The Slew onstage set-up a bit further?
We have six turntables, built with special earthquake-proof stands. Needles are prone to bass feedback, particularly if your bass player is jumping around on stage. We’ve also used spring-loaded tone arms so the turntables can play vertical and on top of that I have cut all the show vinyl on a custom record-cutter.

Everything is pretty prepped for that environment. We didn’t want everyone to be on egg-shells – you know, ‘Don’t bump the turntable!’ – so it’s just a throwdown. Chris and Myles have such a heavy groove to what they do, when I look out at the crowd, it feels like a hip hop show. Everyone’s moving in unison.

The Slew plays the Groovin The Moo festivals in May, plus a handful of sideshows.

Wednesday 5 May – Brisbane, The Zoo
Thursday 6 May – Sydney, Metro Theatre
Wednesday 12 May – Melbourne, Corner Hotel