Nizlopi - O2 Wireless Interview

United Kingdom | by Steve Jenner | 17 June 2006

Virtual Festivals: You're playing Wireless, which of course does actually have wires. Will you be keeping it quite acoustic like or cranking it up and letting loose?
JP: It really depends if it’s a beautiful hot day, England are doing well at the World Cup and we're on fire. We may well crank it up. We throw everything at every gig we do, creating new songs just before we go on stage taking the attitude that every gig could be our last. There may well be a heavy metal hip hop remix of JCB, or David Gray's 'Babylon' song.

Do you get sick of everyone associating you with the JCB Song?
Luke: No. As an independent Label (that we set up with my family 5 years ago) it feels great to have had a large mainstream success. It's great to be able to be able to be an underground folk hip hop band. And play our stuff to millions of People. And not be owned by anyone. We recommend it.

To us there's something a bit late '90s garage about that tune. Is the Artful Dodger an influence?JP: Well I've never heard that before. Hmmm. Me and Luke loved Craig David. Music is a funny thing; you can be playing away and then suddenly be quoting all sorts of music some that you don’t even like. No genre lives in a vacuum.

Many of the folk seeing you at Wireless will - as a result of its phenomenal mainstream success - only be familiar with said song. To prime them for a whole Nizlopi set, what other subjects do you celebrate in your repertoire, apart from heavy construction vehicles?
Luke: Well that song was actually more about family and the ability of the magic in life to carry you through the shit times somehow. But we celebrate people doing what they love. Not giving in to our bullshit culture that is deathly, but creating what we believe in, and feck (sic) the experts and authorities. We celebrate love and the community, rockin' it. And doing rudies [us, neither]. And joy.

Cheap shot - on the subject of Construction-based number one singles - Have you ever been mistaken for Bob the Builder?
JP: [Disappointingly unruffled] This is the sort of question musicians love. As Luke said the song is about family, not really heavy machinery.

You're playing at Big Chill, it's a lovely festival - are you chilled folk at heart or do you get a little bit stressed at the pressures of modern life from time to time?
Luke: We get very stressed. It's a bit mad really. We do music so as not to sell out to the mad rush of life. And we are the busiest most speedy buggers we know. We are still trying to figure out how to go high and far with our music without killing ourselves! Sustainability, it is hard.

In the privacy of your own home, or in rehearsal, do you ever just crank up an amp to 11 and rock out like muthaf**kers?
JP: When me and Luke got together playing music we played heavy metal and then heavy metal funk, and even though that’s quite a long way from what we do now it still comes out in our playing. I have a distortion and wah wah pedal for my double bass.

Where the hell did you come up with the name Nizlopi?
Luke: It was inspired by Nena Nizlopi - a real sexy crazy Hungarian. Di Nizlopi was her Mum. She was a Sagitarian. I loved her.

OK....... Were you tempted to write a World Cup song? If so what would it be like?
JP: We did in fact write a world cup song, Called 'Part of me is Gay'. It's chorus goes: "Part of me is gay, part of you is gay". I think it would have been great to hear that chanted from the terraces.

Nizlopi will perform on the main stage at O2 Wireless in London's Hyde Park on Saturday 24th June.

You can download their famous JCB Song here.