You’ll no doubt have heard of The Brand New Heavies, they’re a band that formed in the mid 1980’s and carved out a career with their unique blend of jazz, soul, funk and disco which has seen them performing live all over the world for over three decades. They were pivotal to the Acid Jazz movement that formed from the ashes of the rare groove scene and helped to catapult them to super stardom. Accompanying them on this roller coaster ride were fellow English acts such as Incognito, Us3, and Jamiroquai who went on to become somewhat of a household name in the years that followed.

After hearing of a forthcoming UK tour to promote their latest record ‘TBNH’, we were keen to chat to the band, after a few sketchy phone lines, we finally caught up with Sy Bartholomew from the band in a hotel room nestled in the deepest depths of Croatia where he was resting after a “lovely night of traditional food and wine”. We chatted about the early days, musical formats and what’s on the top of his Christmas list….

Firstly, can I just say what a pleasure it is to chat to you, I used to love listening to your music when our local nightclub in Torquay used to host an ‘acid jazz’ night on a Tuesday in the early 90’s…..

You’re more than welcome!

You started out in the 1980’s, what is your fondest memory from the early days?

I’ve always been in bands ever since I was at school and we used to bunk off school to play, we used to go to friend’s houses at weekends to play and annoy people with our noisy drumkits. I formed a band called La Kimbo with a bass player friend of mine from school, we used to mess about in the drummers bedroom and we took a cassette to a club called ‘The Cat In The Hat’ and these older guys played the tape and that’s where it all started from. The next thing I knew, I was a professional musician and was touring in America and Japan and seeing places we’d never had the chance to visit before and this was all because of that tape!

I look back and think that I lost my hobby, I used to play guitar in my spare time and this was stolen by the band! it was no longer a pastime but a living for me! 

It was amazing to see all the early bands such as Corduroy, Mother Earth and The Sandals on the scene, The Sandals were great as they used to host club nights and these were great places to network and meet other bands in what was fast becoming a really big music scene which spread like wildfire from town to town really quickly!

Was it a tough time getting established on the music scene?

With the rare groove scene spreading into the dance funk scene, it was truly multi-dimensional in that it wasn’t just the music, it was the attitude, the fashion and it was picking up a lot of interest from the media too including magazines who were keen to run features on us and other bands who were spearheading the scene at the time. We put our first record out on a label that was a subsidiary of Chrysalis Records. All of a sudden, there were loads of these subsidiary labels popping up all over the place, I think it was because the indie scene was doing so well at the time, you’d have labels coming down to London from Manchester and selling loads of records to the main shops and that spawned the major labels to setup these smaller labels so that they would appear as ‘indie’ labels to the record buying public and hence sell more music.

A guy called D-Mob (aka Dancin’ Danny D) formed a label around the time that acid house was really starting to take off and the house music scene kicked off which basically stemmed from the massive warehouse parties that we’d be going to all the time, these merged into something which just became a little more commercial.  It was around this time that we got dropped from our label and as luck would have it, Eddie Piller and Giles Peterson were also starting a label from a tiny little back room in Old Street (London). They took the Acid House name and created the ‘Acid Jazz’ label. They even took the acid house smiley logo and added a beanie hat and glasses and a little goatee on his chin to create an almost beatnik looking version of the classic acid house face. I don’t think they ever thought it would blow up to create a whole new genre of music at all, just the luck of the draw I guess!

 

I remember Jamiroquai hitting it really big back in the day, did you ever play alongside him?

Oh god yes, we met Jay when he was living in Ealing and his first single ‘When You Gonna Learn’ was released on the Acid Jazz label, we played with them when they first got signed, I think if you look on YouTube you’ll see a video of a showcase that he did when he was first signed to the label (Acid Jazz) and he then signed to Sony for a LOT of money at the time. I remember when we sent a cassette to London Records who we signed to after Acid Jazz, this was mainly because the majors had such clout in the industry back then and were able to make things happen a lot faster than being on an indie label. I remember talking to Jay and asking him what it’s like going on tour and he said that it was great, the girls and ‘fun’ he was having (say no more…) was off the scale and from then on in, it just blew up almost overnight!

 

You’ve had some incredible vocalists in the band over the years, which would you say you enjoyed working with the most and why?

Well that’s a naughty question isn’t it, I’m just gonna hurt someone’s feelings, you might as well ask me which of my kids I prefer!

As a diplomatic answer, I’ll say that every singer we worked with bought something different to the table so they were ALL incredible to be around when they were in the band. I remember some amazing musical moments that we shared with people and they come and go as we progressed so it’s hard to actually put a ‘favourite’ out there. I remember writing the track ‘Brother Sister’ and jamming that for ages, we had a few singers before N’Dea (Davenport) came on board, even a few guys in the really early days but then when N’Dea joined, that’s when it really started to happen for us and we started to tour outside of the UK. Our time with Siedah Garrett was a really good laugh and I remember thinking that the voice that came out of Carleen Anderson was absolutely incredible, it was amazing to know that she grew up watching James Brown from the side of the stage as a kid! To share the stage with her really was something else.

Now, we have Angela Ricci with us and she’s great as well. We also have a new drummer, the old drummer left as he just wasn’t happy in the band and that really lifted a heavy veil off the band and allowed us to bring the spirit back that we had before. I think the band we have now is really strong and that allows us to go out and really enjoy the live experience. We spend a lot of time with the band and the last thing you need in the tour bus is bad vibes! You want everyone to be in the same place….

 

Your latest album was released in September, do you have a set process when it comes to recording? Or does it differ from producer to producer and album to album?

Yes, the first album we recorded was done for very little money, we’re talking about £1000, I think there were a number of sessions involved which were quite ‘loose’ affairs, when we recorded ‘Shelter’, we used a very expensive studio and we’d always turn up right on time as we were spending a lot of money on the place and we wanted to make sure that we were squeezing every minute out of it. For the latest album, it was just me and Andrew and we would go in and work on some bits, jam out some grooves, some of the tracks were already sitting on the shelf for a while and we would dust them off and change a few things and then all of a sudden, they just seemed to fit. We sent some music out to Siedah Garrett who was In Los Angeles and she recorded the lyrics and sent it back to us,  we just did it like that and it seemed to work. I’d like to tell you that we travel the world in a private jet staying in places with infinity pools but we don’t, so every penny we can save is good!   

We had fun recording the new album, we had some of the classic guys back, Matt Steele (keys/Piano/Synth) who has been with us for about 20 years now which is a terrifying thought cos that reminds me exactly how long we’ve been in the band! We added strings to some tracks and we did get pressure to wrap things up and get the album out, I wish that we’d had a bit more time…..

This is the problem, when is ‘done’? You could go on forever and NEVER get anything new out!

This is it, you can and it’s easy to get stuck in that trap, there were a couple of tracks and a few contenders which never really got finished and because we had limited time and resources, we had to sit down and decide which of the tracks were going to be included. We also met with Acid Jazz (the label) and they told us which ones they thought should be on the new record, which ones were ready to go, which ones needed more lyrics etc. and between us, we came to a point where we were both happy. So what you have is a record that we’re really proud of that was sort of finished under pressure but is a body of work that we really put everything into. I remember when we were touring in America, we went to Tallahassee and we spent some time recording in George Clinton’s (Parliament/Funkadelic) studio which is amazing. We met him and he was just off on tour and he asked if we’d like to use the studio and we just jammed in there and partied and it was great, not a lot got done but it was a crazy time! Sometimes you just need to let your hair down!

The feedback we’re getting for the new material is great, people seem to be really liking it which is the important thing!

You guys tour all over the world, where would you say your music is best received?

Well, we just played a run of dates including one in Ljubljana in Slovenia and at the start of the show, you’d come out and kick things off and everyone was very reserved and come the end of the show, everyone is really getting into it and enjoying themselves….

I remember in the early days, you’d get to the point in a song and you’d clap your hands above your head, trying to get the audience to copy you but they never did so you’d just gingerly go back to your guitar and carry on regardless! And what you learn in the business is that if you just carry on rockin’ and groovin’ the feeling of ‘uptightness’ just tends to dissolve and people can’t help but get their groove on!  

In Japan it can be a bit strange as they sit down at shows and even those gigs saw everyone on their feet come the end!

It’s a nice feeling, that’s our goal, if we get people to that stage at every show, we’ve accomplished our mission!

You’re playing in Brighton on Halloween, then Zurich on the 1st November and then onto Exeter on 2nd November, are you going to be having a stern word with your booking agent?

Who bloody arranges our tours?…..the problem is that gigs come in, sometimes in the middle of other tours that you’ve already booked. It was like the Croatia dates, they came in AFTER we had booked the UK tour and despite the schedule being absolutely ridiculous, we agreed it would work and agreed to do it. Zurich is a separate thing altogether, it’s just a case of getting up a bit earlier than normal and being tired but the shows are always a weird thing, you do them and you just feel energized, you KNOW that you should really be getting to bed but you always hang out with the fans instead!

 

Do you find that it takes you longer to recover after shows these days as you get older?

I have kids so I guess they dictate your sleep patterns! I think as long as you get 5-6 hours and a couple more in the afternoon, it kinda works out okay

 

I mentioned the Exeter show on 2nd November we’re going to be there for the show, what can we expect the setlist to look like?

We’re going to be playing some classics, we’re going to be playing some new stuff and with the band we’ve got at the moment, I can guarantee a really lively night. If you’re a musician you’ll love it, if you like the songs you’ll love it, if you like a bit of tomfoolery, you’ll love it as well, you might even meet someone new….

Well I’m married so if I meet someone new I think the wife might have something to say about it!

Or you might fall in love even more with the person you’re already with! I guarantee an increase in love levels to EVERYONE who comes to the show, you have my word that things WILL happen!

 

Changing the subject completely, vinyl has made something of a revival in the last 5-10 years, did you ever think that the format would last as long as it has done?  

I always felt that people who like vinyl keep hold of it, it takes up a lot of space and then there’s the option of having ten million songs on a card as small as your fingernail and you can access them all with the click of a button! I have a friend who gave their teenage kid a turntable so they not only have their phone and their laptop but now they also have a record player which is incredible. You also have to remember that the old record players didn’t even need electricity, they were powered by a wind up motor and when the aliens come in 100 years-time and there’s a big war, all the computers will melt and MP3 files will simply disappear into thin air leaving just records behind to save the day! And you know what? They will sound as good as, if not better than the computers that people use to play their music on today! New technology hasn’t necessarily improved sound, it’s just made things more portable and easier to consume. Do you remember when a 1TB hard drive used to cost a fortune?

I remember my first PC which had a 20MB hard drive which would store next to nothing but we used to get by!

My first AKAI sampler back in the 80’s used to take floppy disks and I remember having a bag full of disks with various samples on them that used to take ages to load into the unit, happy days! 

One of the best thing that ever came out was using twin turntables to play a break over and over again, that really was next level shit at the time!

Exactly, Hip Hop was a scene that started in the mid 70’s in America and has stood the test of time, long may it continue….

Have you heard our Hip Hop album? 

I can’t say I have, tell me more….

You’re telling me that you’ve never heard of The Heavy Rhyme Experience? (Heavy Rhyme Experience, Vol. 1 is a 1992 studio album by The Brand New Heavies. It includes collaborations with Main Source, Gang Starr, Grand Puba, Masta Ace, Jamalski, Kool G. Rap, Black Sheep, Ed O.G., Tiger, and The Pharcyde)

 I honestly can’t say I have ever heard of that….

You’re gonna have to check it out, you’ll love it! One of the songs from the album ended up on the movie ‘Happy Feet’ (the one with the penguins) “Jump and Move and Jump and Move….” You’ll love it, I think it’s one of our finest pieces of work!

Is it on Spotify?

God, I don’t know, if it is and you play it, does that mean I get a share of the 0.00001p that it generates?

 You’ve got it! Don’t start thinking about retirement just yet!

But think about it, if a million billion people read this, I might make a couple of quid….literally, a couple of quid!

Indeed, that’s the power of the internet!

I’m just saying that I’m a bit bitter but all in all, the internet is a wonderful thing! That’s another thing with the music industry these days, if you can’t make money selling records anymore, you REALLY need to be able to play live in order to survive and that is what is spawning the mass increase in people learning to play instruments and create more bands as a result so MAYBE the internet isn’t such a bad place after all? There’s a real thriving jazz scene in London at the moment, young people playing gigs and fusing jazz and fusion and rapping over the top of it and people are really digging it, it’s amazing to see.

I did notice recently that there seem to be a lot more people playing instruments these days which is great to see. I think if you start out learning the bass guitar, you’re more inclined to move to things like funk as it’s just more fun to play!

Absolutely, I used to learn slap bass years ago and not only does it sound so much better, it makes you look cool as fuck!

Exactly! And once you’re into proper music, it’s hard to go back to computer generated music, thank goodness that real music is back!

Lastly, it’ll soon be Christmas, what’s on your list this year?

Gosh, what do I need? I need someone who is really good at tiling to finish off my shower! I do need a new amp and a few new pedals and some time to record more stuff, cos I want to do some more new music. Maybe if Father Christmas has a word with Old Father Time, they might just get it right!

 

At this point Sy interjected and said that he needed to go as he was late for the soundcheck and the band wouldn’t be happy with him.

 

You can catch The Brand New Heavies on tour at the following dates.

TNBH is available NOW to purchase, please DO purchase it rather than stream it owing to reasons explained above!

 

Interview by Steve Muscutt