Large Up Interview: Jus Now Are Taking Soca Back to The Future

Words by LargeUp Crew, Photos by Arnaldo James—

Amidst the surge of soca tunes released for this year’s Trinidad Carnival, you may have noticed, on tracks such as Bunji Garlin’s “Truck on D Road” and Machel Montano’s “Junction,” the emergence of a fresh yet nostalgic sound that immediately commands your attention with signature percussion and authoritative bass. If you were paying attention, you might have even sampled a bit of this phenomenon last year when Bunji Garlin released the song “Savage.” We decided it was time to unmask the masterminds behind this new evolution in soca: Trinidad’s Keshav Singh aka LAZABeam and the UK’s Sam “Interface” Chadburn, collectively known as Jus Now.

The pair, driven by a genuine passion and love for West Indian music and culture, are paying homage to its history with eyes bright towards the future. Their material, distinct from current trends governing the direction of soca yet right on time with a movement towards new directions within the genre, diversifies the playing field while still appealing to the West Indian spirit. Their deviation from the norm has thus far proven favorable, gaining respect from colleagues and fans alike, not to mention clients like Machel, Bunji and Beenie Man.

While it might seem as though they have already found their place in soca, the inherently explorative nature of these musicians promises even more innovative Carnival seasons to come. With a mixtape and a European tour in the works for this summer and production work for Trinidad’s famed Laventille Rhythm Section, the duo are definitely keeping busy during the post-Carnival season. We linked Jus Now  to find out where they come from, and where they’re going.

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LU: What does Jus Now mean? How did you come to that name?

LazaBeam: Well, in West Indian Culture and in British Culture, they mean two completely different things. I’ll let Sam explain.

Sam Interface: On my first trip to Trinidad in 2011, I came to stay with Keshav. We met a couple of times in England and he said if you ever came to Trinidad you can stay with me. He was actually really busy at the time playing in a band called 3canal, in a big show that goes on for about 12 days, and I flew in during their intense rehearsal. Fell asleep in a band room. For the next couple of days I was kind of finding my feet in the country and living Keshav’s life going to rehearsals… one day I was just really hungry and was like, “K, you said we were gonna some food like jus now, man what’s going on? I’m starving.” And a friend said, “Jed, ‘jus now’ is a different ting here” so it might mean 20 minutes, two hours—it might never happen. You jus have to relax, its our culture.” I got here thinking I need to do this and experience places and, within a week, I realized a lot of that won’t happen because the culture is so laid back. You just lay back and relax, that’s the life.

LAZA: To him, Jus Now means something has already happened. For us it’s gonna happen, it’s a balance thing. The first thing we were working on was original, producing for other people and our own music. We got into a room and ended up doing a remix for our bredrin and live member, Serocee, We then produced our first track “One Time,” which later became part of One Time, an EP, and when we were working on that I just started shouting and screaming ‘Jus Now’ and ‘One Time’ on a track. In terms of the essence of the project, it was all about the phrase, Jus Now.

LU: How did you get indoctrinated into Trinidadian culture? Was it primarily through LAZAbeam?

Sam: It was almost by accident. I met LAZAbeam in a nightclub in Bristol. We were introduced by a mutual friend. He was like this guy Keshav, he loves drum and bass. We didn’t really get to talk that night but we met up again and managed to hang out a bit at my studio. He was like if you ever want to come up to Trinidad give me a shout. I’ve always been obsessed with Caribbean culture, specifically at that point, Jamaica. Growing up in Bristol, there’s a huge Jamaican community and I loved the food [and] the music. I was very interested, and he was a friend living in the Caribbean—also around that time I split from my girlfriend and was in a weird transitional phase in life and wanted to get away from my normal routine. So I just took the plunge and went on this trip not knowing what to expect. I came to spend a month out here, played Mas, went to Panorama.

LAZA: He kind of saw traditional Mas with me working with 3canal but also modern mas, bikini and beads. Sam struck me as the kind of person who would understand that and, by the end of the trip, he had become an honorary Trini.

Sam: I literally just got dropped in a band room with 3canal practicing and hearing rapso, clothes being fitted with Anya [Ayoung-Chee] hanging out. By the end of the month I had experienced such an amazing culture with amazing people and it had a massive affect of me. I’ve been obsessed ever since, really.

LAZA: Rhythm section is a big part of who we are. We’re even working with Laventille Rhythm Section, producing their next album. They’ve been a huge influence.

Sam: My first experience with them was playing Jouvert with 3 Canal with the truck behind them. I mean all these musical experiences which were all quite alien to me affected me profoundly. The stick fighting, the music had lasting effects. I feel as though you hear those things in the music we make. But it’s really experimental.

LU: Sam, what’s you’re favorite thing about Trinidad then, so far?

Sam:  I love the rhythm section. Being amongst rhythm, when there’s 25-30 drummers with the bass. It’s a physical experience, much in the same way I fell in love with dance music, it gets inside of you. That has to be my favorite thing, being amongst the rhythm section and steel pan, feeling that energy. Other than that I’m addicted to doubles.

LU: What is your favorite spot for doubles?

Sam: On Aranguez Main Road, we found a place we called ‘Gunta Doubles.’ The guys have tear tattoos. They don’t really speak but they have chutney, and the right amount of sweet sauce, and the barra is good. The Doubles Factory in Aranguez as well, that’s the best.

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LU: Your music isn’t strictly soca. What would you call it?

LAZA: That’s a common question we get. Our music is widely variant due to our different cultural backgrounds. We grew up listening to all different things like dancehall, Michael Jackson, soul, world music, tribal music. Roots music is a big part of what we do. If you want to define it in terms of keywords, I think folk music is very key. It’s definitely a kind of callaloo. It just has to be things that we really believe in. We have to understand it, so we can do it justice. On our SoundCloud, it’s listed under “sub soca.” If you listen to our stuff, the BPMs are never the same, there’s a whole lot more that we’re into and [you will] hear that more and more. We have a offering coming really soon, it’s a mixtape and its very experimental. It’s not what we’ve been doing for the past three years. We went to India and played at a folk festival and we were the Trini/UK representatives. We contextualized the music part of that in the mixtape you will be hearing soon.

LU: Recently soca has been heavily influenced by EDM. Did that play a role with you guys getting into soca?

LAZA: Soca is basically dance music, and it’s been like that since the late 90’s. Sheldon “$hel $hok” Benjamin, who was also my mentor before he passed away, made a string of hits doing dance music back in the 90’s before people jumped on the whole EDM wagon. On my part it was more of an inevitability. I grew up the son of a Trinidad and Tobago ambassador. When I was a kid, people like 3Canal, Machel Montano, Ras Shorty I and Superblue would visit the residence and I got to jam with them.

Sam: I suppose the current EDM trend in soca is probably less of what we love about soca. We’re into more of the roots, rhythm, steelpan kind of sound of soca even though our music incorporates the electronic production. We’re not fans of brash synth sounds. It’s not really what we’re about but at the same time when you’re producing for other people you kind of have to incorporate it in a bit. We try to do it in a classic, rootsy way. What we’re really about is bringing more drums and bass into soca, a lot of tracks could squeeze a lot more bass in there. Especially me coming from England, we love bass in music. Music that we can feel in our stomach.

LU: Bunji has definitely evolved as an artist over the years, and I would say you guys have been pretty instrumental in the transition from where he was to where he is now. Would you say he has reached his potential?

LAZA: Bunji is a man with constant evolving potential in soca. He has shown that in his career, [since] he started with “Send Them Rhythm Crazy,” which was his first soca song because he was a dancehall artist [first]. He made that decision to jump into soca. He’s constantly been evolving in a upward way. When he won Soca Monarch, I don’t think people in the industry was expecting that. He keeps evolving and that has a huge part to play in his success. When you say reached his potential? Nah. He’s just now getting started. To have as big of an artist as Bunji to be part of Jus Now’s evolution, it’s amazing to have the support of someone like that. He’s all about different. He’s one for changing things and evolving soca music.

LU: How did you guys start working with Bunji?

LAZA: Trinidad is a small place. I’ve known Bunji for years. When I moved back to Trinidad from the States, I started working with people like Maximus Dan and 3canal and a lot of Rapso people, roosty kind of guys, Treason (3 Sun). I made a song with [Bunji] way back. And it was a long-standing thing, seeing him at fetes like ”Yeah I hadda link yuh” but it was never the right time. Then when I was with Sam about three years ago he sent the a Capella for “Tun Up.” We were working on a Beenie Man single, “D Way Yuh Wine” and we actually had him between takes sing Bunji’s song “Tun Up.”

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LU: On your song “Savage,” you sampled an old calypso. Where did the idea of sampling in soca come from? It’s almost unheard of…

LAZA: That’s true. People don’t do it that much, but we’ve been doing it, though. The cornerstone of hip-hop and dancehall and modern reggae and dubstep has a lot to do with sampling. With respect to business, it must be done properly. We struck an agreement with Maestro’s estate before the song came out. The song came out a month later than it was supposed to because of negotiations, and the person who was in charge of Maestro’s estate, his mum, passed away a week before we were supposed to release the song. So we had to wait and pay respects.

Peter Doig, the world-renowned painter, is a friend of mine and he used to have these wicked parties at his studio called “studiofilmclub,” which is where Sam and I first played out. He used to rinse out this Maestro track  “Savage” for me, which was part of his renowned record collection, every time I was at one of his parties, every Thursday. Everything he played, it felt like I needed a copy of that record [to] do something with it. When Jus Now got together, it was the perfect time. When Sam and I linked up we did it, took it to Bunji and you know the rest.

Sam: When you hear more of our stuff you’ll get that. We’re more about making the old school sound futuristic than following the more obvious trend.

LU: What soca artists would you love to work with?

LAZA: The crop of guys who were working with is really on it and it’s a nice situation. Bunji, Machel Montano, Kees, Serocee, 3Canal, MX Prime, Kerwin Prescott… very happy to be working with these guys.

Sam: I’d actually like to do a tune with Olatunji, and Silva, who is part of Destra’s band. Farmer Nappy, I feel as though is the most underrated soca artist. We may be working with Patrice Roberts. I definitely would love to go to Jamaica in the future. [I’d like to] go to America and work with R&B artists, not even just big people. We are incorporating world music so it’s about traveling and collaborating with people wherever we go.

LU: Have you guys seen the “Truck on D Road” parody, “Cow on D Road”?

LAZA: He was so serious about it, he made two videos. Bunji probably finds it annoying that the cow thing keeps on following him, but maybe we can make a humorous tune about that next year or something. It’s also hilarious that when we were in India, before we finished the tune, there were so many cows around and we actually were singing that out loud before it even happened! Talk about the power of suggestion.

Hear more Jus Now over at their Soundcloud.