Bambooman Talks

 
Music

Bambooman is a part of a new wave of beat makers and producers coming out at the minute that are becoming harder and harder to define. With a sound that flits between hip-hop, house, techno and triphop, he has blurred boundaries beautifully on works such as his Dulcet and Hollowed Ep’s released on Sonic Router, as well as production work done in the meantime with British soul singer Segilola on Somewhere Along The Line, released on King Deluxe. I caught up with him after he had just played a storming set at Stour Sessions to learn a bit more about him;

Who are you, where are you and what do you do?

Hey! My names Kirk, I grew up in good old Yorkshire and currently live in Leeds. I make music under the alias Bambooman, and occasionally under Grouphums. I also run the label Health.

How would you describe your music?

Textural beats music, heavily influenced by hip-hop, dance, minimalism, jazz and sound design.

What’s your favourite musical memory?

Playing shows with my old band ‘fistfullofyen’ or just jamming in our guitarist's attic.

What music are you currently listening to?

Sun Araw, Moondog, Strange U, Michachu, Hector Plimmer, Golden Teacher, Crewdson, Venuq… All the 22a Guys.

What were your influences growing up?

Musicwise I was really influenced by Battles' first 2 Eps, and Don Cabs American Don Album, as well as stuff from bands like Faraquet and Dianogah.

Also I listened to a lot of Hip-hop, both my brothers had crazy collections so I was heavily influenced by the stuff they were playing, in particular I remember borrowing Edan's Primitive Plus from my brother Kerry and just listening to it over and over on the school bus just buggin' out hard, trying to wrap my head around what the hell I was listening too. A.E.O.C off that album is still one of my favourite tracks.

What kind of music do you play in your sets and how is it different to your recorded stuff? What's your favourite song to play out?

I only play my own tracks in my sets, or collaborations or remixes. I usually break them down so I can play in the samples and other bits live, also recently I started doing some more improvised live bits in the sets, using a looper to record in loops of found sounds, percussion and instruments and then processing them live, alongside playing in samples etc. I try to cover all the bases of the styles and feels that I make, so tend to start quite ambient and move up into hip-hop then on to garage until I’ve gone full circle tempo-wise. 

I guess it all depends on what kind of show I’m playing, if I’m playing with a band I might choose to play more ambient or natural sounding tracks of mine and less uptempo stuff. If I’m playing a club and it's late I might dig out more Techno and Garage tempo bits . 

What music do you like to dance to or hear out?

I don't know really, all sorts but nothing in particular, just great music. I’ll be head-nodding to a Steve Reich show set just as much as I would at a hip-hop night.

Who would you most love to work with, alive or dead?

I’d love to remix 'It's So Cold In The D'. Just putting it out there.

What’s your favourite song you’ve made?

Out of tracks I’ve put out I would say ‘Fields’ or ‘Dulcet’ are the ones I'm most proud of.

Anything you’d like to add?

Look out for my new 7 inch dropping in March on Sonic Router which features a collab track with Jehst called Rusted, and a track called Thickets on the B side. Lots of projects dropping soon so hold tight!