SCUBA

LONDON-BASED PRODUCER GETS SERIOUS AGAIN

“Creative, productive, concentrated.”

Perfect words to describe the work of Paul Rose, better known as that superior-type producer Scuba, who has been releasing pure musical heat since 2008 and heading the well-known label Hotflush Recordings since 2007. This man knows good music and makes sure to put it out there for our hungry little ears to munch on, so it should come as no surprise how on point he is with his music stylings. Growing up in London has its benefits when you can slip into clubs at 15 and experience that sort of level of musical culture and progression firsthand. Scuba has seriously been on the proper tip of electronic music with every single venture, album, and SUB:STANCE night he has curated at Berlin’s Berghain nightclub.

Known as being one of the first to really bring dubstep into the forefront of music, where he concentrated in finding his footing as a producer, Rose is one of those gems that are set on pushing not only the boundaries of electronic music but himself as well as a constantly growing artist. Once he set off on his first and second album, he came out with the Adrenalin EP where he set out with a conscious effort to do something different. As Rose (and many other artists) put it, “I feel like that’s done now and it’s time to move on… there’s an overarching conceptual aspect to what I do musically, which is quite hard for people to understand sometimes and I guess why people who take a particular track that they think doesn’t fit with other stuff they know me for and don’t look at it in context, are sometimes quick to judge.”

This year Rose has been trying to become more focused with his releases and he has had more then enough studio time, especially when we’re talking about a guy who gets bored with a day off and has also given up some responsibilities of heading a label, both of which result in more Scuba studio time. No problem with that.

“I made so much music last year, in all kinds of different styles, so what I’ve been doing recently is think about what I want to release and what kind of message I want to give to people. The conclusion I reached is that having spent three years making a point out of being almost flippant with the kind of stuff I release, it’s now time to get a bit more serious again.” He continues, “I will be releasing a lot of new Scuba material, but not in the form of an album. I will also be continuing a vinyl-only project under a different name, which I started in 2013 which I am leaving people to work out for themselves. And I’ll be playing a lot of shows.”

A little bit of Scuba is what this sometimes-stagnant electronic music pool we swim in needs. “The new music isn’t so much in song structures, but there are full vocal lines in a way that hasn’t really featured in Scuba stuff before… stylistically, the music is closer to the first two albums than Personality, which was a conscious effort on my part.”

After a big year last year, Hotflush Recordings in 2014 will have the same sort of flow to it as 2013: roughly one 12” release per month, with an unlikely chance of albums and a little more focus on the associated members parties they’ve been holding in Berlin and London. “One thing we are having a lot of fun with is the membership scheme [for our parties], we’ll be doing a lot more with that.”

Scuba re-emerges in Vancouver at the Electric Owl on Wednesday, February 12th. 

By Jamie Goyman