Simian Mobile Disco

The purveyors of big room mirror ball house are back with Temporary Pleasure.

First came the anthemic remix by Justice, then from the ashes of Simian stepped James Ford and Jas Shaw under the new guise of a mobile DJ unit. Their debut album was heralded as one of the best in modern dance culture, garnering critical praise and spawning a handful of recognizable hits, rare for an album of its genre. After intense touring and both members lending their production skills to other projects they are back with Temporary Pleasure, the instrumental album chock full of vocals.

“Usually when you send stuff away there is quite a high rate of people not being able to do it or don't have time or whatever,” recounts Jas Shaw from his East London studio. “So we sent off about eight or nine instrumentals to different people and they all came back wanting to do it, so that definitely changed the plan of the album but we were really happy with it.”

Having originally intended for the album to be mostly instrumental the two Simians were pleasantly surprised to have their plans scuppered by the involved interest by a swag of incredible talent. Beth Ditto, Gruff Rhys, Alexis Taylor, Jamie Lidell, Telepathe and Chris Keating from Yeasayer all feature on the album, which was mostly cobbled together an hour or two at a time after shows whilst on the road. It was being on the road though that put them in touch with the singers, many of whom they'd run in at festivals or had watched perform. Jas explains that this proved to be a much more organic way to go about finding talent for their tracks.

“It's nice doing it that way because you immediately have an idea of what they sound like and you don't have to go through the machinations of getting in touch with someone's manager or anything like that. It becomes more fun and feels a lot more human that way.”

The recording process was similar to SMD's first album Attack Delay Sustain Release, the pair using vintage analogue synths that Shaw says is an integral part of their sound for their unpredictable nature.

“We both have a fairly serious eBay habit,” laughs the producer. “Basically we do use a lot of vintage synths because they have a lot of character and they always end up doing things that you don't expect. In many ways it's the imperfections that make them what they are, whether it's a keyboard being slightly out of tune or playing the wrong patch, these are things that are largely ruled out when you're using software. There's a certain roughness that they give to electronic production that I love; I'm not a huge fan of a really pristine sound.”

Their sound has in a relatively short space of time propelled them to the forefront of the live electronic act/band scene, something they had not even thought about when they started out. Upon leaving Simian they formed Simian Mobile Disco to get away from the constraints of playing live and to enjoy the simplicity of playing records. As their remixes started gathering attention it seemed the release of their own material was inevitable. Talking about the pros and cons of playing live and Djing, Shaw comes back to the use of vocalists and why they are so important.

“For us it goes back to being producers and having been in bands ourselves. Regardless on how you feel about vocals (in a dance track) it is the most recognisable part of a song and the thing that people will immediately connect with. It's the most direct link for most people so ruling them out would be a bit of a foolish thing to do really. But adding them to electronic music can be a whole different thing because often someone will have a really good idea that works as a song but doesn't fit with electronic production. But because it is an area that can potentially go wrong I find it quite interesting.”