I started and stopped producing music a bunch of times from when I was 17 until I started trying to do it full-time, so I guess its tough to pinpoint what artists influenced me directly…It was always more about trying on a different genre of music and seeing how it fit. So I had kind of an oldskool UK hardcore phase where I tried to produce with this Mod Tracker and decided it was too confusing, the hip-hop phase where I used some samplers, a boring experimental phase with some FX pedals and guitars, etc. The only artist I can pinpoint specifically was Jimmy Edgar. I thought what he was doing was really unlike anything I had heard at that time, plus he was my age so it kind of instilled a hope in me that making music and putting out records was a possibility.



While I think Dial is a great fit for your music in terms of overall mood, I do think that you sound really different because your music has that American grittyness and dirt that made all those classic records released from the mid 80s to the mid 90s so great. It often seems German producers (with more than a few notable exceptions, of course) tend to neglect the soul and overemphasize precision. Having lived here for a while now and being exposed to a lot German house and techno: is this something you would agree with?

80s and 90s Chicago house is a huge influence for me and I've always really loved the way those tracks were produced and mastered (or not mastered). I think that what you end up creating in the end is just a product of what you listen to repeatedly. As far as other producers are concerned, I think it's really tough for me to speak for anyone other than myself. Even though I've lived in Germany for a couple of years I can't begin to pretend to know what anyone's background is or why they are making what they choose to make.

You have this rare gift of undermining or contrasting even the most forceful rhythms with these bittersweet melodies, which always reminds me of Larry Heard somehow. I take it that “Dedicated” is your personal tribute to him?

Thank you! I definitely think that Larry Heard is one of the best house producers of all time. He managed to have so many different projects that all sounded distinctly his own. I've never thought of 'Dedicated' as a direct homage to him, but I listened a lot to his Mr. Fingers album 'Amnesia' around the time that I produced that track so there is probably a lot of influence coming from that album in particular.



“Glass Eights” has been getting really great reviews so far, I think mostly because it does so well what few House albums have achieved: to sound like a real album. How much thought did you put into the sequencing?

It was really important for me in creating the album that it could be listened to all the way through. I think you have to take into account what format you are using, and creating a CD that is a collection of 10 DJ Friendly dance tracks didn't seem like something that I would want to listen to or buy, so I tried to focus more on the way that my favorite albums from other genres were arranged. I think with an album you have a huge opportunity to tell a story, so I just tried to do that to the best of my ability. In the end I made myself completely crazy with trying to decide on the proper sequence of the tracks. When you work with the same material for so long you have all of it memorized, so I would play the beginnings and ends of the tracks in my head and reorder them when I was walking around, working, eating dinner, etc., trying to find the best sequence. The process was totally maddening, but I really loved it too.

I read that you bought quite a lot of Dance Mania records and your recent LWE mix featured some of the more explicit and raw jack tracks. Is this something you could ever see yourself doing – music that is very immediate and brutal?

Yes, I think about that a lot actually. When you are working with samples your options are really limitless, so the idea of doing a project that uses something like just one drum machine, one synthesizer, and a microphone sounds really appealing.

Top 5 Dance Mania tracks?

1. DJ Tone - Breathe Again
2. Lil Louis - How I Feel
3. Vincent Floyd - Your Eyes
4. Parris Mitchell - Follow Me Ghetto (Acid)
5. DJ Slugo - Wouldn't You Like To Be A Hoe

Speaking of that LWE mix again: where is your limit in terms of prices for records? (Just wondering because I keep meaning to pull the trigger on that G-Strings 12” but still haven’t)

I am pretty cheap, but there are some records that are really important to me that I feel like I should own for some reason, so I make exceptions for those…but not often. I think the most I've ever spent on one 12" is 65 Euro, which is sort of ridiculous, but I guess it's like anything else…if you have a strong connection to something you want to be able to look at it and hold it whenever you want. You don't want to listen to an mp3 of it or look at an image of the cover on google.

Reading about your remix for Darkstar finally made me put 2 + 2 together: Would you like to incorporate vocalists into your music in the foreseeable future?

I'd definitely like to try it sometime soon, but I haven't fully figured out who I would want to work with yet!

Darkstar "Gold" (John Roberts Remix) HYPERDUB 08.11.10 by DARLING RADIO PROMOTION

How has Berlin been treating you so far? Are you planning on staying there?

I really like Berlin right now. It's taken me awhile to get comfortable here, but lately I wake up most days feeling totally elated, so I think that's a good sign. I don't know if that is directly related to the city but I don't think it really matters either. I'm definitely planning to continue to live here for the foreseeable future.

Interview: Florian Aigner

John Roberts @ HHV