Nasty's back and blessed

By GRAHAM REID

Born in Fiji and brought up in Auckland, he's expat dancefloor master and dreadlock monster Freq Nasty - Darin McFadyen - who has been in Britain for over a decade mixing and scratching the likes of Fatboy Slim, Gorillaz and KRS One.

When he was in Kiwiland he was in bands, but hip-hop took his heart then jungle took his soul. In the UK he mixed with some of the best in jungleland, shifted into hard-edge breakbeats and style-shuffling, recorded a thumping debut album, Freqs, Geeks and Mutilations, and his latest album, Bring Me The Head of Freq Nasty, brings ragga, garage, rap and faux-Latin into his tough breakbeat signature style.

He's on Brighton's Skint label alongside Fatboy Slim and X-Press 2, has been on the BBC's 6 Mix sessions, and in the next few weeks will play in Saigon and Taipei after making some AV stuff with the guys from Weta Studios in Wellington. He's briefly back in town to play. We thought some questions were in order.

So Mr Nasty, is it bula, kia ora or whazzup?

All of the above will do.

You left here in about 91 but have come back frequently, what are the most obvious changes you've observed in the dance and DJ scene here over that period?

I get back about this time every year, do a bit of winter dodging, and the biggest change is people are starting to make the music here. That's the defining factor in any music scene.

Ten years ago looking to England was good and a lot of music was imported and we started to learn about the sounds - but now there's Kog, Pitch Black and the hip-hop scene and people don't have to look elsewhere to sustain a scene.

Do we have a distinctive sound?

Yes and no, because you get a lot of the Kog stuff and their breakbeat, hip-hop or house is as good as anything in the world. Perhaps there are some defining factors but it's just quality music so it doesn't matter where it comes from. Having said that, a lot of local hip-hop has a South Pacific sound and no one else is really doing that.

It's a matter of the artist developing their own sound rather than something that just comes from New Zealand. But, having spent a lot of time in London and coming from here, I could probably pick it.

Your music has changed too, seems to engage a greater diversity of styles now. Is that just having your ears more open as you mature or a matter of musical survival in a tough market by having a point of difference?

I'm conscious of trying to do something different. I could have repeated the last album and done chapter two but when that came out there wasn't really a breakbeat sound and no one had done an artist album in the breakbeat scene. I wanted to do something that stood apart in the way the first album did.

You work out of Brixton which is a cauldron of music from Jamaican, Indian and other communities, and are on the influential Skint label out of Brighton. Is the world you work in one of connections and contacts?

In a way it is. There's nothing I like better than on a Saturday afternoon wandering through [Brixton's] Coldharbour Lane and hearing the Muslim music blaring out of the butchers shops, then the Jamaican tunes fresh out of the island coming out of the cafes, and hearing some hip-hop or breaks.

That mixture of cultures keeps your head primed for the fusion of sounds which London does so well. In terms of being on the label, it doesn't affect me so much. Whatever makes Skint distinct is maybe because it's in Brighton which is very much little London these days. But I'm not sure how it works on me making music.

Personal questions now. You got money in the bank out of this gig?

I make a living, for sure. I spent a long time not getting paid but the good thing about England is, although the competition is intense and the moment you slip up there's someone waiting to take your place, if you can establish yourself you can create a vibe and space for yourself. And that gets you established around the world.

The scene me and a core of others have created means we all do well, we can play anywhere in the world and get a good festival billing. I'm blessed.

Your real name is Darin and you spell "freak" as Freq? Is there a history of poor spelling in the family?

That's the New Zealand education system, I think.

If you went on Stars in Their Eyes who would you most like to be?

I've got an AC/DC T-shirt on now. Tom Waits is my favourite singer. But I'd go and see Kiss any time. It would be scary.

If you went on Pop Idols what song would you sing?

That's interesting. The song that's been going through my head over the past couple of weeks, is Total Control by [80s new wave band] the Motels. Did they have any other hits? I think it was just that.

Last one, the dreads. Is there life in dance culture if the dreads go grey?

In dance now if you are making the music you've got to love it because, with all the MP3 scenario, a lot of people are losing money. It's not that easy to make a living whereas people used to bang out things and sell 15,000 copies.

What dance is doing now is fusing with rock. Dance has had its day being its own entity, the new kid on the block. It's having to innovate again like it did 10 and 15 years ago. Mixing with rock is the next level, and rock has had to do the same thing because it spent a fair amount of time in the wilderness.

You see this in the UK now, rock acts can't believe they are hip again ...

I guess it's come through people like Coldplay, which is middle of the road but well done, and the White Stripes, which made rock sound fresh again. The rock people are just loving the attention again.

But the way forward is the fusion of rock and dance. It's about making something relevant and new out of all the sounds that are out there. So there's life out there, for sure.

Performance

* What: Freq Nasty

* Where and when: main room, Galatos, 17 Galatos St, tonight; also appearing Real Groovy, Queen St, 6.30pm