BONAFIDE EXCLUSIVE: GRANDMASTER FLASH INTERVIEW AT LOVEBOX FESTIVAL

During this years Lovebox Festival Bonafide sent Prof C Renwick to talk to OG vinyl wrecker Grandmaster Flash. As this archival clip from The Tube demonstrates Flash is nothing but open-minded with who he works with (and what they wear).

Our interview focused on not just Flashes legacy but also what he is still aiming to invent, and explored his wide ranging interests and influences. Check out the quote below and look out for the full article in issue 05 (slightly getting ahead of ourselves). Props to Rizla and Exposure for facilitating.

You’ve spoken a lot about DJs so far. Are there bands whose records you like and think you’d like to work with?
“God, there’s so many! If I was making a heavily percussive record, I’d probably want to work with the Incredible Bongo Band – if they were together. For rhythm, I’d want to work with Sly and the Family Stone. For power and strength, I’d want to work with those guys who did Johnny the Fox – Thin Lizzy – I love the way that sounded! I’d probably want to work with massive bands like The Grateful Dead. All these bands I’ve mentioned can probably rock ten stadiums over because they’ve become experts on how it has to sound and how it has to translate, whereas newer bands have to learn about things like how to build a set list, what works when, and how to send a crowd home in joy.”

Can you expand on how you think modern technology has enabled the full realisation of what you and others started in 1970s New York?
“Modern technology allowed all these different worlds (genres of music) to come together. We become one again and that’s what I was thinking early on when I was doing this in my bedroom: there’s got to be a way to take this white rock group and put it with this funky black group, and take this funky white group and put it with this underground black group, and bring all these things together. Now all of these DJs have taken these things and taken it to another level by playing it to masses of people. I’m interested in learning from these people because we do the same thing: we’re all interested in bringing things together and serving the people. If a DJ thinks about things in any other way then they’re a legend in their own mind only.”

Filed under: Bonafide Exclusives, DJ/Turntablism, Rap, Uncategorized, Video by J.G.