Sydney based, internationally renowned record label Future Classic is brought to you by three DJ’s: Nathan McLay, Chad Gillard and James McInnes.
There’s no question when it comes to who’s ruling the Ozzie music scene, the FC set are a solid non-mover, producing infectious sounds that get the Australians partying from sunset to sunrise. These boys seamlessly merge the best of the bygone vinyl with the freshest sounds globally, hinting at the music scenes of London, NYC, Zurich and Barcelona. Blending disco, funk, dancehall, minimal house and abstract electro, not forgetting some killer romantic oldies (check 47:30 mins in on the mix), musical musketeers Nathan, Chad and James host regular parties and manage their own self-titled record label. When they’re not on the turntables, Future Classic discover, introduce and support musical big deals, such as Sebastien Tellier, Little Dragon and Aeroplane to an Ozzie audience. Running two residencies in Sydney: Adult Disco, a hedonistic disco, techno, bass mashup and Sunhaze, a chilled out Sunday session (BBQ included) with a soul, hip hop, disco vibe, these boys love keeping busy.
We added to their to-do list asking for an exclusive mix. Warning: listeners incur common symptoms that include nodding of the head and movement of the feet.
When did you start your record label?
N: 2004
What’s the back story?
N: I was working at another indie music company called Inertia that does distribution in Australia for labels including XL, Warp and Ninja Tune. My job was to set up their digital department as it was the early days of iTunes and web sales so I was lucky to be sent to Europe on their behalf to meet the other labels we looked after in oz. I was also DJ’ing a bunch and one of the Euro distributors I met offered to distribute some of the unsigned music I was into and it came from there.
How would you describe the Ozzie music scene? How does it differ from the rest of the world?
N: More sun, less clothes.
J: I think it’s getting healthier, the more radio stations like FBi and RRR and more actual promoters making great parties, the better. Australia is pretty well known for its rock bands but now it kind of feels in the last 10 years that we’re a new force to be reckoned with for dance and electronic.
Where are your favourite places to DJ?
C: Our Adult Disco parties at The Civic are always pretty fun to play, obviously the sound and the space are important but once you’ve got those two factors sorted it really comes down to the audience. Having an open minded crowd that wants to party always makes for the funnest sets.
J: The Civic for the sound (and the mixer) and Goodgod for the people (and cherry bourbons).
N: Outside. In the day.
Who was on your summer playlist?
J: Satisfied ‘n’ Tickled Too by Taj Mahal, I’m His Girl by Friends and Summermadness by DJ Cam so far. Unfortunately south of the equator we’re still in winter, but our winters are like 20 degree days so hopefully our lists still count.
N: Four Tet’s club stuff is on fire and Caribou’s solo project Daphni. They played back to back for four hours at Nuit Sonores festival in Lyon in June and it was the best dj set I’ve seen in aaaages.
C: Our Summer starts in December so it’s a little way off yet. Some of the stuff that I’ve been excited about this year would have to include Kindness, John Talabot and Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs, they’ve each released great albums this year.
If there had to be one track that summed up Future Classic what would it be?
N: Poolside Do You Believe? Such an instant summer jam.
J: Woah! That’s hard. I think Touch Sensitive Body Stop or Mario & Vidis Changed (John Talabot Private Mix) OR Sleepless by Flume.
Text: Felicity Carter
