Having been following Last Japan from the early early days circa Oi, it’s great to see an artists go from strength to strength and most importantly evolve. His latest track ‘Scanners’ is a far cry from his early heavy material but in my opinion this is some of the strongest material to date. The main reasons I have followed Last Japan so relentlessly is that he has always had his ‘finger on the pulse’ so to say. The lingering synths are very reminiscent of the new sound coming out of the Night Slugs label and the overall track is a stunner. There is a gigantic mix of influences in this track, that make me wonder if we are gonna start to hear a change in direction from the young producer! We also had the chance to have a quick chat with the man himself!
LAST JAPAN – SCANNERS [320 kbps]
Truants: Hey, how’s it going? What have you been up to since you last made us a Truancy Mixtape? Last Japan: It seems like such a long time since I did that mix for you guys! Apart for my studies, I’ve been working hard trying to get as much material under my belt before i have to knuckle down into dissertation hell!
Your sound has evolved quite a bit since i first heard your music way back when. Has this been a conscious decision or just a natural progression? It’s definitely been natural progression, when I think back to when I first started I’m not as fond of the artists I loved back then. So as my interest in different artists have changed, I’ve picked up influences from all of them along the way which has help build my sound.
I heard your collaboration track ‘Big Man’ with 321! How was it working with them? Is this something you would like to do more of? It was great fun! Definitely something I’m going to do more often, they’re really professional lads and I think it shows in the track, and he fact that people seem to love it and its had more radio airplay on 1Xtra, Radio1, and Kiss than i could have asked for, they seem to be battering it!
I hear you have a new EP on the horizon called Rocstarr, could you tell us what kind of sounds to expect and what inspired you whilst making this EP? It’s a quite varied EP. I like to switch it up on each EP. Jungle Warrior, having some tribal, jungle etc influences. Oi! – even though it wasn’t an EP as such but that was more straight up electro track. So for this EP I’ve taken a lot from dubstep, funky, drum and bass, amongst others, hopefully it reflects in the tracks.
Are there any artists outside of electronic music world you would like to work with and why? Shakira (Very jealous of Brodinski), erm… Beyonce. Haha, don’t know how that would work, oh an Lil Wayne! Someone give him the call.
You have been playing loads of high profile gigs of late, have there been any major highlights so far? Noise Life in Budapest and Paris, sets abroad are always really good fun!
Shakedown by your side project The Brockout was one of the highlights of this year! Have you got anything more planned for The Brockout? Yes, we’ve been writing the rest of the EP and we’ll have a Shake Down VIP to come soon.
What does the future hold for Last Japan? Just progression on the foundation I’ve managed to build for myself in such a short time. ?
