Not many artists can claim to have played a starring role in the birth of an entire genre - but Oliver Jones can.
Back in the early ‘00s, the producer and DJ better known as Skream was a central figure in the South London crowd that assembled influences from UK garage, dub and jungle to create something entirely new, blissfully unaware that the murky, atmospheric and bass-heavy sound they were pioneering would soon become electronic music’s next big thing: dubstep.
Jones was barely into double figures when he began DJing, and production followed shortly after, as early experiments with the music-making PS1 game Music 2000 led him to snag a copy of Fruity Loops 3 and begin honing his craft by remaking UKG and grime tunes in his bedroom.
As the nascent sound of dubstep developed, so did Jones’ own variation on the style, as early collaborations with longtime creative partner Benga and debut album Skream! - along with its era-defining lead single Midnight Request Line - aided the genre in breaking through to the mainstream.
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And break through it did. After taking the UK by storm, dubstep’s blueprints were picked up by producers in the United States and spun into something cruder and more aggressive, trading the genre’s subtlety and tension for cartoonish drops and enough distortion to make you reach for an aspirin. A few years on, and dubstep soon fell out of fashion, but Skream’s interests had already shifted towards disco and house music, proving that his talents transcend the limitations of a single genre or sound.
A decade later and Jones has come full circle, balancing a return to his early influences with the kind of kaleidoscopic, multi-genre palette heard on last year’s Skreamizm Vol. 8. Grime, garage, acid house, UK funky; nothing is off-limits in Skream’s world, as the producer joins the dots between disparate styles and sounds with the kind of confidence that only a two-decade veteran of electronic music can muster.
Following a recent performance at CRSSD Festival, we sat down with Jones to find out more about the gear and techniques he’s using in the studio today, take a look back at the production behind Midnight Request Line, and hear about the time he dropped his 13-year-old son’s first tune in a Boiler Room set.
Hi Oliver. How’s it going?
“I’m absolutely surrounded by wires at the minute. I’ve moved house and I’m downgrading my studio. My other studio was purpose-built, it was fucking amazing, but the house was too big - I’ve now moved from a top-tier studio to a room in a house.”
Are you having to get rid of some kit?
“I was thinking about downscaling anyway. I’ve got three Moog DFAMs - who needs three? I’m getting rid of two of them, I’m getting rid of the modular Moog stuff, I just don’t really use it that much. The DFAM I use on nearly everything, but I don’t really need three of them.”
Do you have a Subharmonicon?
“I do. I got it the day it came out, but I wasn’t massively impressed. It takes quite a lot of external processing to get the sound strong. I suppose everything does. I wasn’t really getting any solid, ready-to-go sounds. I’m not fully modular - I liked all the Moog stuff, but I found that I ended up making loads of things that I won’t ever use. I should have known because all my mates who are modular heads, as soon as they got into it, they didn’t make music for about two years.
“Basically, I’m just trying to make this room not look so messy at the moment - the room’s quite small.”
I suppose it’s a matter of figuring out what you need the most?
“To be fair, I use the drum machines the most, more than anything. My Moog Sub37 isn’t going anywhere, and I’ll probably keep my Prophet as well. Do you know what? I’m a fucking hoarder, because I’m going through the list of things I meant to get rid of.
“I nearly got rid of my Elektron Digitakt. I’ve got the first one, but I never really got into it. The last couple of days though, I watched some basic videos - because as much as I like trying to learn stuff myself, sometimes you do need a little hand - and I actually really like it, I’m glad I didn’t get rid of it. That’s been the beauty of moving, is realizing what I’ve actually got.”
Looking back a little bit, how did you get into music production in the first place?
“It was a Playstation One and it was Music2000, that was the first thing I made music on. It was 2001, I was still at school. I’d been DJing since I was about 11, but I was about 13 when I started making music. I was just at a friend’s house, I walked into my mate’s bedroom and he was just making tunes. I was like, ‘fuck, it can’t be that easy!’
“I got my mum to take me straight to PC World, and I got her to buy me a copy. That was what I started using, but I started to feel limited quite quickly. My brother used to use FL Studio 3, and I saw him using that. So I started using that on our Windows 95 PC.”
Were you just teaching yourself?
“Yeah. There was the track Pulse X by Musical Mob, which was out at the time, and I’d heard that it had been made on Playstation. I started by replicating that, and then just progressed from there.
“When I got into FruityLoops, that’s when I started trying to full songs, understanding BPM and understanding how to build songs. A lot of it was replicating, or trying to make stuff that I played. None of it ever sounded like records I’d played, by Oris Jay or El-B or Zed Bias, but it was just learning the structures and the sounds.
“I used to sample a lot from vinyl, so I used to sample their snares or their kicks or whatever, and just learned from there. It wasn’t long after that we started having songs played in clubs, really, it was quite mad.”
Was there a soft synth in FL back then?
“Yeah, it was the TS404. The TS404 is what me and Benga made all our basslines on. Plastician, also. That was before we knew what LFOs were. It doesn’t work the same any more, but the TS404 used to work like a 303, with the accents and slides. Obviously, we didn’t know what was at the time.
The TS404 is what me and Benga made all our basslines on. That was before we knew what LFOs were
“You didn’t have the Piano Roll back then in FL, you did everything in the step sequencer. So we used to draw in our filters like a velocity, almost. You’d key the notes in - it was exactly like a 303 really, when I think about it - and then we just draw it in, etcetera. Our wobbles were wilder than what we could do with an LFO, so we were drawing it in points.”
So you were using automation?
“The thing is, it’s not really automation, because it was all in the sequences. It was done per note, that would be the best way to describe it. You’d do it in the drop-down menu where volume and cutoff and things like that would be. So it gave you more control, really, than an LFO.
“We used to get some mad sounds out of it. We weren’t massively into processing, because we didn’t really know what processing was. We just took the sounds as they came. But that was mine and Benga’s entry into synthesis, really.”
Was that synth used on tracks like Midnight Request Line?
“No, no. We’re talking 2003, 2004. I got introduced by a mate of mine to a plugin called Junglist, by Synapse Audio. Most of the sounds for Request Line were made on that. Actually, to be fair, the bassline was made on TS404, but the rest of the synths were Junglist. It was Absynth as well, that and Junglist were the first two VSTs I ever owned. Well, I say ‘owned’... [laughs]”
You’re still using FL Studio today, right? What is it that you like about it?
“It’s hard for me to say, because although I can use Ableton and Logic, FL is my default. I know it like the back of my hand, it’s so quick. I fell in love with it because of the step sequencer. I remember going to other people’s studios who used Logic, when I was younger, and I’d be like ‘oh, can you get the step sequencer up’, and they’d be like, ‘what’?
“I just know it, I can get everything done quick. I like the workflow, I like the layout. The GUI could be a bit better, but it’s not the end of the world. I wouldn’t say it’s particularly aesthetically pleasing, but it gets the job done for me.”
How often are you experimenting with new gear and plugins?
“All the time. The guys at Minimal Audio just sent me over all the new the new stuff, and it's fucking really good. The Ripple Phaser is great. The last two days I’ve got about 30 new plugins. I'm on it all the time, sometimes too much.
I sometimes make the mistake of installing too much. I’m probably not the only person who makes music that’s guilty of that
“My problem is, with all these subscription services, where you’ve got everything at once, I sometimes make the mistake of installing too much. I’m probably not the only person who makes music that’s guilty of that. I tend to forget about stuff quicker, things that I actually really like, because I’ll really like it for three hours and then start fucking around with something else, rather than spending a week at a time on one plugin.”
Then you don’t end up getting to know them as well as you would have.
“You don’t, and you just end up preset-surfing, as well, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. The presets are made by pros, but it’s always nice to understand what you’re using.”
When you’ve only got a couple of things, it forces you to really get to know them inside out.
“Well, if we go back to my early days of making music, all I had was FL Studio. FL and probably four plugins made Midnight Request Line.”
Could you talk us through a few plugins that you’ve been using the most over the past few years?
“It depends what I’m making. I’ve been using the Arturia stuff a lot, the Vocoder V I really like. Serum, obviously, if I’m making bassier stuff. It’s just the standard, especially in dubstep. It’s the standard for a reason. It’s fucking great. The things you can do; you can completely mix your sounds in the plugin and just leave it.
I rinse the life out of the Output stuff. Portal, Movement and Thermal, I use probably on every project
“I’ve been using DC Snares. It makes modular-y sounds, it’s really good for minimal stuff. As for effects, I rinse the life out of the Output stuff. Portal, Movement and Thermal, I use probably on every project. I definitely use Portal at some point in every project. If I’ve got a lead, rather than adding reverb and delay, I put Portal on a bus and just merge between the two. Then send both together into another thing and process it from there. You can get some really nice movement.”
How about hardware?
“Mostly, over the last couple of years, I use my Roland TR-8 on everything. I use my Korg Electribe ER-1, and I use those two together for most of my drums. I’ve got a lot of Electro-Harmonix pedals, the Electric Mistress, the Memory Man. I like using the pedals with the drum machines, you can get a really nice signal out of them.
“I’ve got this old guitar effects pedal called the DOD FX7. It’s really fun, it’s very simple, but I really like the effects out of it. My E-RM Multiclock, that’s literally the heartbeat of my studio. I was using a Vermona quite a bit, but I got quite bored of it, I think I’m gonna get rid of that.
“Also, I tell you what I’ve been using which is really fucking good, is the Modal Electronics Argon8. Really like that. You need to gain-stage it quite a bit, but once you get the flow going on it, and just add a bit of reverb and saturation, you can get some really nice sounds out of it.”
Would you say you’re evenly split between hardware and software?
“It depends. When I’m writing house, it’s mainly hardware, but if I’m writing bassy, dubstep sort of stuff, it’s mainly in the box. I think that’s a sound thing. It’s two completely different sounds on a mix level. You can have a big more of an organic mix with the house stuff - with the house that I like, anyway. Then with the dubstep stuff, it’s got to be an in-the-box process, with your OTTs and multiband compression and stuff like that.”
Is there anything that’s on your wishlist at the moment?
“The Erica Synths Perkons HD-01. I was gonna sell a load of my gear and get that - I thought I’ll get rid of some stuff before I get anything in. I need to play with it a bit more before I get it, because I’ve got a feeling that it might be one of them that you can’t use on everything.
“It’s got quite a distinct sound. I need to hear it going out through some other stuff. It sounds quite industrial, I’m not sure how much everyday use I’d get out of it, and having a smaller studio at the moment, I need to think about what I’m going to be using all the time.”
I wanted to ask about Skreamizm Vol. 8. Are there one or two bits of equipment you can point to that were fundamental to the making of that record?
“Xfer Records’ Cthulhu, the arp plugin. I used it to generate most of my chords, and I used that on every track. I'm shit on a keyboard, but I know what sounds good - well, I like to think I know what sounds good, and I use that on everything,
“Each track’s kind of different. I mean, the track with Trim, Funky Sailor, all of the sounds for that were from the Korg Triton. At the time, I actually used the hardware one, but about a week later I got the plugin one and realized they sounded identical, which would have made life easier.
“A lot of sounds in that are u-he Diva, Prophet, and what else… a lot of that was just 50/50 between hardware and software. I used quite a lot of vocal snippets out of Output Arcade. The track I've done with Prospa, that was mainly done in the box, in a hired studio, laptop session. A lot of the Argon8 was used in Skreamizm Vol. 8, actually.”
I saw you post on social media a year or two ago, saying that when you started mixing your own tracks, it helped you become more creative. Could you elaborate on that?
“Mixing was never my strong point. I'm not sure if it's because I was surrounded by people who were great, and it put me off it because they were so good. Benga was a fucking mix genius. Growing up, everything was so sound-focused - dubstep, and especially being around the D’n’B lot - I could never… I mean, I can get my stuff to sound alright, but for the level of mix I want, I could never achieve it.
Mixing was never my strong point. I'm not sure if it's because I was surrounded by people who were great, and it put me off it because they were so good
“About a year before lockdown, I stopped mixing my stuff. I used Tom Demac - we’re good mates anyway. He just said to me one day, ‘let me have a whack at mixing that’ - I think it was the remix for Henrik Schwarz, Free Falling. I got him to mix that, and it just sounded great. It's how I wanted it to sound. I used to mix stuff into the ground and completely lose all the vibe of it. My strong point is a vibe, it's getting that groove going. The amount of songs that I just fucked off and never done nothing with again because I literally mixed them in the ground would probably be in the thousands.
“It just takes that pressure off you, like you can actually finish the song. All the process and everything, the internals of the track, is all still my doing. It's just that final polish. I remember Artwork said to me once: ‘if you broke the roof on your house, would you fix it yourself?’ I was like, ‘no’. He said, ‘well, look at that the same way as having someone mix your tracks.’ That changed everything for me, my output just skyrocketed.”
Do you see production and mixing as entirely separate disciplines, then?
“I understand production. I just don't understand mixing, it just doesn't compute. If someone does it in front of me, I'm like, ‘oh, yeah’... I’ve been using desks quite a bit more, and I like it because I can touch it. I've been laying off EQs internally and using them externally at the minute, I seem to get better results.”
You once said that the tracks you spend the most time on are typically the ones you end up liking the least, and the ones that are finished quickest are the strongest. Why do you think that is?
“It’s because you're starting it, working on it, and finishing it while still having the vibe going. Rather than coming back to it over and over, you've got that snapshot of energy in the track. I write quite long songs, which is becoming a lost art. I still like writing six, seven-minute tracks. So with them, I can get most of it down, but you have to come back to finesse certain bits and bobs. But I prefer simple tracks that happen quickly and you capture the energy in the moment.
“If you go back to all of my early Skreamizm stuff and all of that era, all of them were done in one sitting. There wasn't a single track that I did and went back to, ever. Unless, when it was getting released, there were slight minute things to change. That’s why that era was so fun, especially the pirate radio era when I had a show on Rinse, I was testing stuff out, I was playing stuff out and it was chaotic. There was so much of it, but it was all pure energy.”
So you think a track can lose its magic if you labour over it for too long?
“I do, yeah. 100%. I'm quite a big fan of imperfections and sometimes, if you over-listen to a track and they catch your ear too much, they can annoy you and get rid of them. Whereas those little out-of-time bits can sometimes add the complete vibe to a track.”
You and Benga put out a Charli XCX remix recently. How did that one come about?
“We’ve been writing music again since I was in lockdown. We've always spoken, but we just started sending each other music again, back and forth. We did the fabric show, our first show together in 10 years. Then we just got hit up by Charli. Thing is, it was long before the Brat summer, that whole madness. It just seemed like the right one to do.
The aesthetic of the original track embodied what me and Benny were about: high-energy, chaotic fucking rave
“We’re all sort of from the same era, you know. Charli started when she was 14 and I think I could only have been about 17 at the time. The aesthetic of the original track embodied what me and Benny were about: high-energy, chaotic fucking rave. So it just made sense. It was the first remix off that project.”
The official remix album just came out, but yours was released quite a bit earlier.
“Yeah, I know, the fuckers, they didn’t use ours! Bit annoyed about that. [laughs] But yeah, it just seemed to work at the time. It fell into festival season quite nicely. But none of that was thought of, obviously, it just felt right; we’d done the shows and then that came along and we thought, fuck it, let’s just do it.”
You played at CRSSD recently. How was it?
“I'm a big fan. I've been three times but I’ve played twice. I really like the crew behind CRSSD, it’s a great festival, lovely site. It's a really good aged crowd, really mixed. Since BPM Festival, it feels like one of the only [festivals] dedicated to good house and techno.”
What were you going for with your set?
“To be honest, I had a c*nt of a trip. On the Thursday I was in San Francisco; the Friday I was in Nashville, and I got caught in a hurricane on a flight. I literally had to go straight from the airport to the stage, I don’t even know what I had planned. It was only an hour-long set, I’m not really used to playing for an hour. It was all over a bit quick. But the good thing with the CRSSD crowd is you can just go and do what you do, you don’t really have to think about it too much.”
Am I right in thinking your son makes music?
“He was fucking about on FL Studio when we were in Bali. He made a belter; I actually played the song on Boiler Room. But he’s got no interest in it, and I’m not forcing anything on him.
“He did that tune on my laptop, the only thing I did was place the vocal. I arranged him a sound palette and placed the vocal for him and put it in time. He wanted that particular vocal, Amerie, I think it was big on TikTok at the time. I’ve got that file on my USB key, I played it in my Boiler Room with Flowdan. But he doesn’t care whatsoever. [laughs]”
You’ve talked on social media about going sober. Has that affected your music-making?
“I have to be careful how I word this... my productivity isn’t as high. Because I’m not sitting in the studio getting pissed and avoiding leaving the studio. I remember making a lot more, but I’d name projects with random letters and never be able to find songs again. Although my productivity isn’t as high, more stuff’s getting finished, rather than just mad fucking loops that no-one can do anything with.
Where I was just in a constant haze all of the time, I was neglecting outside of the studio
“It’s hard, because music’s such a personal bit of my life, and it dominated it for so long. And where I was just in a constant haze all of the time, I was neglecting outside of the studio. What I’m doing now is balancing my time in the studio to my time with family. It’s less chaotic in the studio, let’s put it that way. That’s a good thing.
“For a long time, my studio was associated with partying, so there were people in and out all the time. It was in my house - I’m not talking about random strangers - but if people came over on a Friday, the party would end up in there. It’s definitely more of a workspace now.”
Has the vibe of your music changed as a result?
“Not necessarily. It’s only been eight months, and four of that’s been touring. Normally, my studio time is in winter. I was obsessed with trying to create a new genre, mish-mashing everything together, which I still do. But I think I’m not in a constant haze. I actually think about what’s worth finishing, rather than thinking, ‘this is the best thing in the world’, then not actually finishing it.”
What are you working on at the moment?
“There’s gonna be new Skream and Benga music - a lot of that. Potential Skream solo album, just finishing up some paperwork before that can get started. I just did a remix for Self Esteem, and I’ve got a record with Sam Binga, Bianca Oblivion and Toya Delazy coming out next year. But yeah, still just grafting.”
