Hiya Felix! Where are you and what are you doing?

I've just got to the studio and I'm preparing a show for Capital Xtra, which we do monthly on Friday nights. Before that I did a bit of beekeeping today with my mum and dad.

With actual bees?

Yeah, it's a thing we've done all my life, we've always made our own honey.

So if you branch out the merch offering, we could all be eating Basement Jaxx on toast?

Er … yeah. I mean, it's not very Basement Jaxx related. I don't think the bees are going to know anything about that.

Ok, so Basement Jaxx then. You've got a new album (1) which is exciting because you've not had an album out in five years ...

Well, actually we have.

OK, but not including the score for Attack the Block …

We did a couple of films actually. Attack the Block and The Hooping Life, which is a hula-hooping movie that was released in the States and is kind of a left-field underground film. They contacted us and we said we'd give them a theme tune. But they ended up coming to London and saying, "Would you do this scene? Oh, and that one?" They kind of stayed in the studio until we finished it for them. We also put out an orchestral album called Basement Jaxx vs Metropole Orkest.

So what you're saying is, I'm talking rubbish. How relieved were you when you heard house music was back?

Well, that's part of the reason we did this album. But it's not like it ever really went away. Now it's all just very big and mainstream. A lot of young kids are into the early house that I listened to when I was 17. I think it's great. We played a US festival recently where it was just like playing in the UK in 1988: all the kids are really into it, wearing very few clothes and lots of facepaint, beads and flowers. The only difference now is everything's plastic. The beads, the flowers …

The music?

Yeah, it's less soulful. Like an aerobics class. Musically, I don't think there's much of it that will last. But it's great if the kids are having a good time with that energy and adrenaline. It's like going on a ghost train at the fair.

And it's still fun for you?

Touring and being around the world, it's very exciting and new, but we didn't want to become jaded rock'n'rollers. We took a bit of a pause. We took the foot off the gas a bit to concentrate on being human again and see friends and family. Also, you realise when you're away from home, you do cut off your ties. I'd get back and find out something happened and wonder why I wasn't invited and friends would say: "Well, you're never here any more." And it's a bit lump in your throat when you realise they're getting on with their lives and you're not included because you're always too busy in glamorous locations or whatever.

Is it true your dad didn't let you watch Top of the Pops (2) so you joined the church choir instead?

Yeah, he was always very proud of that fact that we didn't watch Top of the Pops. He played us Austrian music and Japanese music. He thought that made me hungry and want it more. It was quite an idyllic country life. Letting the hens out, feeding the horses, growing our own vegetables, time spent climbing trees.

The good life! Why even move to London?

I was very into jazz dance (3) and London was the centre for that.

When I first moved to London, I was living in Brixton, and I was always told you put on legendary parties at the Dogstar but whenever I went you weren't there!

That's because we never did our parties at the Dogstar. That's misinformation! It was under St Matthew's Church and the Telegraph.

Your new project, Power to the People, has people all over the world recording versions of your songs ...

Myleene Klass has done a version on her harp! I bumped into her at breakfast in Mexico earlier in the year when we did a show out there. She asked me what the weather was like in London. And I didn't know what the weather was like. She told me she played the harp, so I put her number in my phone as 'Myleene Harp'. I didn't recognise her at all.

So you got chirpsed by Myleene Klass?! She gave you her number pretty quickly...

I dunno! I told her I'd love to record her harp. And I did.(4)

You've worked with loads of names: Yoko, Kelis, Dizzee ... who was the most bonkers?

It's all a matter of perspective isn't it. We worked with Cyndi Lauper once and she was smoking bongs through an apple. She was very New Yorky in that Woody Allen, neurosis way where you explain every single thought you have and every worry. But having said that, she was sweet as anything. Very nice.

I thought Yoko Ono would be madder.

Yoko Ono was very cool. We were told she would arrive bang on time and leave exactly when she was supposed to. And she did. She's very disciplined. The weird thing working with her, I thought she'd come in being all Yoko Ono and she came and asked "What do you want me to say or sing?" Luckily I'd written some surreal poem and said, "You could read this along to the music." And then the NME reviewed the song and said it was an incredible reflection of her style and who she was. All very Yoko, they said. Haha!

Footnotes

(1) Basement Jaxx's new album, Junto, is out 25 August on Atlantic Jaxx Back to article

(2) Felix's dad, a vicar, also encouraged Felix to take violin lessons Back to article

(3) A London club thing that happened pre-Acid Jazz apparently Back to article

(4) Not a euphemism Back to article