TRENCH: There’s a lot of people out there who believe UK funky is now a past time. How do you feel about that, being someone who has consistently championed the sound?

Marcus Nasty: To be honest, I’ve never really given a shit about that—I’ve been around in music long enough! People say the genre died, but nothing just dies; it’s just not at the forefront anymore. It might quieten down a bit, but what actually happens is all the rubbish falls off: people who don’t really care about the music and people who are just following a trend. You might not be able to hear it anymore because it’s not as accessible, but that’s about it. Because, after that, came bass—which I had a major hand in. To be fair, I was always playing funky along with the bass, so it didn’t really affect me. A lot of people say funky fell off because they weren’t making money off it, because they weren’t getting bookings. But I’ve never had that problem, so I think that helped a lot. Now there’s a little bit of a resurgence, there seems to be a lot more interest in it. I knew funky would come back around so I’ve just got to do what I normally do: push and promote new producers and new sounds.

Obviously there was a time, around 2009/2010, where the scene went super quiet on us. Why did that happen—was it the MCs jumping on it? What are your honest thoughts on that whole period?

I don’t think it would be right to blame the MCs. I think blaming the MCs was a cop-out; even I used to say that, at one point. But we have to think about things properly. It’s not like garage or dubstep. We were the first genre in the Facebook, SoundCloud, Mixcloud age where music was far more accessible. So whereas a genre might last 10-15 years, in that 10-15 years, or 20 years, the first 10 years is a straight build-up. It might start in one area and then spread and last for however long. But we used to get a good 15-20 years out of a genre. Once the internet blew up, Jesus Christ! [Laughs] It just so happened that funky was there. So the music was just everywhere. Look at the genres that have come along since. You can’t say that deep house wasn’t as successful as garage; it was—it just didn’t last as long.

Why is that?

Because the music was far more accessible. And you can get stuff for free! Before, we had Limewire, but we’ve got round all that now. There’s just ways to get stuff. You can get stuff off YouTube, anyhow! So it’s so easy to get hold of. With any genre, there has to be evolution. Constantly. Everybody has to sound different and be bringing new sounds to the table. Let’s not let it get stagnant like that, because that’s what keeps happening to garage. Luckily, for us, garage keeps on coming back. But that’s only when people are getting bored of other genres. When another genre falls off or patterns out, garage always comes back. I’m not trying to put down garage—garage is great—but that is what always happens. Garage has had about four or five resurgences since it died down from its first, original time.

Do you feel pressure being the figurehead of an entire scene?

In a way, yeah. I didn’t feel the same pressure from grime, and I didn’t feel the same pressure for bass. Definitely not. Bass, I just had fun with that; it was totally, totally fun. I’m still having fun with it now! With funky, funky is my baby. I helped develop that baby and I was doing it for a very long time before anybody else got the idea to even call their music that or decided it was that. I put a lot into it. I went and done bookings for free, just because I was Marcus Nasty. I remember taking a booking in Leeds for £50 just because I wanted to get the music up there. I told the promoters, “I’m going to come up there and play this music and it’s going to empty the dancefloor, but please: I need to push this ting. It’s going to work and I’ll always look after you.” They trusted me and I give them all that. Big up the promoter, Marcus, in Leeds, because he allowed me to do that. A lot of people done that for me. That took a lot of love, though, because I suffered [laughs]. I suffered some hardships. I weren’t making no money—it was the opposite. I’m not a producer, nothing like that, but I just used my platform to push what I knew was sick music, that didn’t have a name. No one knew what to call this thing, but I knew what it was and I put it together. I put on a [radio] show and I just pushed it everywhere that I could. I weren’t sitting in London—I was flying up and down the country off the back of what I did with N.A.S.T.Y Crew. I said, “Yeah, you can put ‘N.A.S.T.Y Crew’ next to my name but I won’t be playing grime. I’m gonna play this new ting.” I emptied dancefloors up and down the country. But, guess what? See when the ting blew, all they knew was Marcus Nasty.

Do you think UK funky is in a place today where grime was in the late 2000s—you know, that ‘in limbo’ space?

I don’t think you can compare it to grime, in any sense. I think it’s now in a place where it’s more in-tune with garage. We’re all playing in really big places all across the world with this. We’re playing in the same places as garage, but also house at the same time; in between. For exmaple, I’ve played at [house music party] elrow... We’re crossing all kinds of barriers here and it’s all the sounds of the UK. It’s nothing but UK sounds. I think the only thing that is slightly not UK, is the tribal drums underneath it, but it’s an influence in the same way that grime and dubstep have influenced it. So it’s sounds of the UK with a slight touch of Africa.

What does the new school of UK funky need to do to ensure there’s never a moment of silence again?

I think, to keep the scene relevant and to keep it going in the right direction, what the DJs have to do and what the new producers have to do is stay away from imitating, from replicating, from sounding similar. Keep your shit original! What you’re playing has to sound original. When new producers come along and they’re blatantly imitating another producer’s sound—let it go. Don’t play it. Don’t go on radio. Don’t turn up nowhere and play that. Because all your doing is encouraging other producers and DJs to do the same shit. What that does is it gets stagnant and stale. Everything then starts to sound the same, and that’s where every genre loses.