Rip It Up

Guy J Interview

Words By

• Cyclone

Australia has its own cult mix compilation brand in Balance, rivalling Global Underground in its prime. Israeli progressive house trailblazer Guy Judah, or just Guy J, is the latest DJ to headline a volume in the arty spin-off Balance Presents…, after London’s jozif.

In fact, Judah’s set follows the paradigm of Sasha’s Involver as he re-edits or remixes tracks from the likes of Henry Saiz and Robert Babicz.

“I’m super happy with it,” the perfectionist announces. Famed for his anthem Lamur, Judah has become a regular visitor to these shores. Already he’s touched down twice this year, initially playing the Rainbow Serpent Festival in Victoria over summer, then lately promoting Balance Presents… (unfortunately,
he’s bypassed Adelaide).

Ask Judah when he hooked up the Balance project and it’s more recent than might be imagined, being in the last three months.

“Some of the tracks I had the idea before [but] I didn’t know where they would go.” Of course, Judah was familiar with the Balance brand. He especially admired Joris Voorn’s techy Balance 014. “It’s an amazing CD.”

In the past Judah has conducted interviews by email. It’s not because the DJ is suss on the media, but because he speaks in broken English with a heavy accent – a challenge for an interviewer. Nevertheless, if Judah struggles with language barriers, he has transcended musical ones. Indeed, Judah may be typically identified with progressive house, but he has affiliations with techno, even releasing music on Sven Väth’s Cocoon Recordings. Tellingly, he listens to the experimental Radiohead in downtime.

Judah’s Balance presents… is deep, dubby and “home-friendly”, yet the DJ maintains that it’s not so different from what he plays out – in a club environment, anyway, not somewhere like Rainbow Serpent.

“Rainbow is a festival, so I have to play stuff with more energy, but this Balance CD is also what I usually play. I’m not sticking to one genre when I DJ. So it starts with this downtempo, deeper tech-house and it builds up – and this is what I also try to do in my DJ set. I think when you go to a club and you play a set, you want to tell a story with your music – and this is what I tried to do with the Balance.”

The Tel Aviv DJ/producer, currently based with his wife in Antwerp, Belgium, emerged in the mid-2000s. He signed to John Digweed’s Bedrock Records, airing Save Me. The label has issued his two ‘artist’ albums, the first 2008’s Esperanza. Over time Judah has done much to revive prog, restoring the melody while blending in elements of techno, ambient and, subliminally, dubstep. Last year he launched his own Bedrock sub-label, Lost & Found. Its second issue was Persistence by the US deep houser Kevin Yost, who established himself in the ’90s with tracks such as One Starry Night, only to slip off the radar. Yost’s jazzy aesthetic is closer to that of Mark Farina than, say, Digweed.

“I’ve known Kevin Yost’s music for a while. I heard I think it was a set he made for online radio. I heard this track and I tried to contact Kevin and he told me that all the music on the set was his.” Judah suggested Yost release something on Lost & Found, “crossing fingers he would agree”. Yost was amenable. Judah had intended to unleash a third album this year, but then Balance Presents… came up.

“I think being realistic it could be next year,” he says now. “I have a lot of material for an ‘artist’ album but, like the Balance, I would want it to be perfect – for me.”

A great deal has been written about the EDM boom in the US and Judah, too, is touring there. But this internationalist is more excited about another expanding scene – India’s. The populous nation has “obviously” long been strong on psy-trance, but now house is big. “This year, and last year, it’s really like the
beginning of an era.”

WHO: Guy J
WHAT: Balance Presents Guy J (Balance)