JASON 'PHATS' HAYWARD TALKS ABOUT EVERYTHING DJ AND THE ZERO 8

Jason ‘Phats’ Hayward Interview

After countless chart success and a rich career since the early ‘90s, Jason ‘Phats’ Hayward is still as excited about technology as he was when he started out.

Watch video of Jason Phats in action when he demo'ed the Zero8 on the Korg stand at the recent LIMS 2008 show

He began as a keen bedroom producer and moved onto DJing at the end of 1989, with residencies alongside Carl Cox (in his home town Brighton) just as the rave scene was taking hold of Britain.

Since then, as part of Phats & Small, Jason was thrown into the limelight with the unforgettable ‘Turn Around’, ‘Sun Comes Out’, and countless other gems that brought dance music to the masses.

DJing is still the core of Jason’s musical passion, spending most weekends on the road. Unashamedly a technology fanatic, Jason had been smouldering over a plan to make the most liberating mobile DJing system known to man.
So with this in mind, we caught up with him in his Brighton studio to find out what makes him tick and see how this master-plan had unfolded.

What got you into making music?
I was in bands to start off with, but my fascination with it all started at a very early age, I got my first guitar when I was five - I just loved it. I was into human league and heaven 17, but the album that changed things for me and got me into dance music was the Love Unlimited Orchestra remix album in the early 80s.

What was your first bit of electronic kit?
I got a Casio VL-Tone, that was my first digital workstation. You know that track ‘Da da da’ by Trio? There’s the classic drum beat Rock-1 rhythm preset and the Piano voice. It was great fun trying to recreate the sound of Heaven 17 and Human league on a £20 keyboard.

What was your first synth?
I got my hands on the Korg MS10 when I was still at school. It was the first synth I really got to play with. I couldn’t really understand it at first, but it’s phenomenal. What an amazing piece of equipment. The sound is completely unique to it.
I’ve got the analogue one sitting in front of me now along with the digital USB version that Korg made for the Legacy version, which is really good if you can’t get your hands on an original, but I’ve been using that throughout my whole music career. The filtering in ‘Turn Around’ was done by passing the signal through the MS10.

What are your current musical influences?
It ranges from minimal techno to funky house and with this explosion of the electro scene, it’s brought techno to the masses and this year has been a wonderful year for dance music.
A lot of the German minimal artists like Anthony Rother, Sebastian Leger and International artists such as Dirty South, Mark Knight, Dave Spoon, and Deadmau5 who’s one of the most talented producers to come out in the past couple of years. Ali Dubfire has done some really good work over the past year too.

How did you get into DJing?
I was already messing around with edits and stuff like that, but we used to set up on Brighton beach. Carl would cart around a big flight cased unit in a back of a van with a generator. The first night he did that I saw what he was doing on the 1210s and I just had to get myself a pair of decks after that.
About two weeks later I managed to beg and borrow a couple of 1210s and a Phonic mixer. I went around to the clubs in Brighton and managed to get myself a Friday night. It was called Paradise and had a big Ohm symbol for the logo. That was December the 1st 1989.
That Christmas I got all my records confiscated at an illegal warehouse party. I didn’t do any work for about four weeks. Then in 1990, Carl asked me to be resident at the Zap club and I worked with him there too.

When did you first spot the Zero 8 and what inspired you to use it?
I did a lot of research into what would be the best set up to take out on the road for the digital DJing. I saw demo online of the Zero8 and thought “wow”, I honestly did not believe it could do all the things it was claiming to.

How has your DJing developed recently?
I’m still out every weekend, all around the world. I’ve been taking out Ableton since March 2007. Playing vinyl and CDs didn’t seem like I was pushing things as far as they could go. It’s been exciting for me because it’s like taking the studio out, I feel like I’m pushing myself towards my potential and taking risks.

What’s the best feature and how has it changed the way you work.
I play to such different crowds, so the style of performance is very different. The main thing was to have a soundcard with eight stereo channels so I could play anything. I love the fact that it’s built into the Zero8 and you have a channel for each input, plus all the effects. But the thing I love most is having that many channels and the ability to control Ableton from it. It’s really easy to use in that capacity. It’s lit up and easy to find your way around.

How easy is it to travel with all that kit?
Things always go missing at the airport. So I decided that I had to start taking everything on as hand luggage. I have a bag that fits the Korg Zero8 and I can slip in my MacBook. I just make sure I have everything I need in the one bag and the Zero8 has made that a dream for me.

How do you have the Zero8 set up for DJing?
I use 16 channels running in Ableton. There’s four dedicated deck channels, which are for playing music and then a further four channels for loops, accapellas and Bass lines.
I have what I call the crescendo creator configured in the Zero8 and in Ableton, where I can create huge rushes of white noise and drums and effects. The possibilities are endless. There is nothing you can’t do playing out live in a DJ set that you can do in the studio.

Do you still have to use the mouse?
I mostly work with the Zero8, but I still like to navigate Ableton with the mouse. I fire off clips from the control section on the Zero8. You have four banks of rotary push button controllers and they’re lit up blue, it’s awesome. I’ve assigned play to the top four and stop to the bottom four.
I use one A and B for the decks and loops, and C and D for all the different effects inside Ableton. The combination of those with the Zero8 is just ridiculous.

Do you ever have problems setting up the kit in different clubs?
The Korg Zero8 is pretty much exactly the same size as a 1210 give or take a few mm. All it needs is to take out one of the Technics decks and the laptop can just sit on top of the house mixer, so it’s never a problem.

What’s your favourite effect in the Zero8?
The one I love that is just making people ask “What the hell is he doing up there”, is the loop delay. It just repeats what’s going on through the channel when you hold the button down. Used sparingly and effectively it can really work. Catching snares, vocals, you can create a crescendo using that effect. Another cool trick is to have a mad delay running through Ableton through the master and then loop delay the delay. It’s great. I use the BPM delay too, which is really handy.

So does the Zero8 have everything you could ask for?
It’s the Swiss Army Knife of mixers, it really is. It has everything and more that you could dream off. It’s got a Midi interface so you can plug your Midi controller in, there’s two FireWire ports on the back.
Even learning all the different EQ settings on the Zero8 is a task. They all sound fantastic, plus all the filters! It’s just gob-smackingly brilliant because there’s absolutely everything you require for a really versatile DJ setup and as a production tool.

What do you think of the sound and build quality?
At first I thought it was really clean and quite crispy, a really fresh sound in the studio. There was a few things I was worried about, but all my fears were blown out the window. I personally can’t knock it.
The knobs didn’t feel right at the beginning, but it’s when you start performing with it that you realise that they’re quite responsive. They seem to work best in that live environment.

Do you use the Zero8 purely for DJing?
I have various setups in the studio and I also have it wired up to the iMac which is running Logic 8. I have it as a project production system. It’s important to move around the studio and getting up and doing something different.

What can we look forward to in 2008?
I’m restarting my old Afro Cuts label after ten years to release some house stuff and a few artists I’ve met on my travels. But the main project I’ve been working on is a project/concept/label/artist thing called Geek. It’s like Gorrilaz meets Jamie T, meets the Streets – live instruments, electronic sounds, vocals and songs. That’s the baby for 2008.

Will the Zero8 be playing a big part in the new Geek project?
When we get to the stage where we’re playing out live, the plan is to use the Zero8 with the MacBook. I’d love to see this for the festival circuit in 2008, but it might not be until 2009.
There’s potentially a full band thing there, but to make it more of a gorilla set, I’m happy to just use the portable rig.
It’s a major concept, there’s a whole visual side to it and very much a live song-based dance music project. But it might get really complicated!