international news _ 17th April, 2006
Back To Basics' Star's Clean-Living 20:20 Vision
Text by Jonty Skrufff (Skrufff.com)
Back to Basic's original DJ Ralph Lawson chatted to Skrufff this week as he prepared to set off for an Australian tour with his acclaimed electro-funk four piece 2020Soundsystem and admitted that he'd delayed taking the band seriously earlier to pursue his first love of hardcore partying.
"I lived in a farmhouse in the middle of fields with no neighbours so you could make as much noise as you wanted. So after every Back To Basics, that was the after-party," he recalled.
"We had a sound system in there and a studio and loads of people would always come back, you'd find yourself kicking people out of your f++king bed on Monday morning to crawl into it yourself. That was every single weekend or most of the 90s actually; I hardly got f++k-all done," he confessed.
The Leeds based former Londoner stressed he's not given up hard living entirely though said that the birth of his first son in 2000 completely altered both his perspective and productivity.
"People don't realise how much it takes out of you, when you're partying, time is a different thing, hours pass like minutes and before you know it, it's f++king Tuesday, then it takes you two days to recover, then it's the f++king weekend again. It just goes on forever," said Ralph. He also admitted feeling ambivalent about either of his (now two) sons following in his footsteps into the music business declaring 'it's not the first thing you'd advise your kids to do, is it?'
"The music business is the music business and it hasn't changed since f++king rock & roll came up in the 50s," he added. "To get through it you need to be pretty strong and I've definitely lost friends along the way, and I say 'lost' I mean plenty of my friends have died. It's not something you want for your kids."
His experiences reflected those of German party animal Sven Vath who told Skrufff several years ago that he quit taking cocaine the day his daughter was born after being present in the hospital for her birth and 'feeling wrong'.
"I still see many colleagues, DJs and people in night life, getting older and still doing cocaine and they're really paranoid and keep on telling the same lies," the 40 something superstar DJ added, "Today, I like a drink and I like to party but somehow I have to keep a balance. I know I don't want to push it too hard because it is not necessary and not worth it."
2020Soundsystem's new album No Order is out now on 20:20 Vision Recordings.
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