Gilles Peterson and James Lavelle on That’s How It Is: “I never knew who the fuck was in the crowd”

Duo recreate their legendary long running West End night for Printworks

From the scrapping Davies brothers in The Kinks to the on-off history of Orbital, sibling rivalry has been responsible for much great music over the years.  You don’t even need to be real siblings – brothers in arms desperate to impress, like Morrissey and Marr, or the Beach Boys and The Beatles out-experimenting each other on Pet Sounds and Sgt Pepper’s, work just as well as examples.

“It was like Gilles (Peterson) was the older brother and me the younger,” admits James Lavelle of the early days of That’s How It Is, the legendary club night the pair ran at London’s Bar Rhumba with promoter Janine Neye‏ and visuals designer Swifty.

“There was a bit of friendly rivalry,” says Lavelle, who had been a mere 18 years old when the night started.   “I was running Mo’Wax and Gilles had Talkin’ Loud, so when you got something new you kept it to yourself, for a couple of weeks anyway – and then you’d share it and give them a copy.”

We’ve gathered Lavelle, Peterson and Neye together via the marvels of Zoom because the night, which ran every week for a stunning 13 years between 1993 and 2005, is being resurrected as part of the Printworks Hydra season, the South East London’s venue’s closing season. 

Resurrected in some style, it has to be said. Where the original That’s How It Is was, give or take the odd guest appearances from the likes of DJ Shadow and Patrick Forge, was pretty much about the residents, the Printworks all-day extravaganza on Easter Monday sees a truly momentous line up assembled.  Much of the line-up is made up of those who soundtracked the night with their landmark productions – only actually appearing in person rather than via the joys of vinyl. 

So, as well as Peterson and Lavelle, who is due to play live with UNKLE and go back to back with Charlie Dark of early Mo’Wax crew Attica Blues, we get Austrian loungecore kings Kruder & Dorfmeister, Carl Craig, Nightmares On Wax and Roni Size B2B with DJ Krust, all representing the various corners of the huge musical canvas the club rolled out.

“I’m really pleased we’ve got Bonobo on board as well,” adds Peterson, adding how important it was to represent a new generation of producers who’ve continued on a similarly eclectic musical mission in recent years.  Four Tet protegee and hotly tipped newcomer Anish Kumar is another notable inclusion.

“You could really play whatever you wanted,” Gilles says of the That’s How It Is agenda, “from trip hop – well, I didn’t call it trip hop then, but we were the first people to play that slower beat stuff in a club – through to turntablism and drum & bass.”

For Lavelle, who originally hooked up with Peterson through a Saturday job at Ladbroke Grove record shop Honest Jon’s, the night and the freedom it afforded gave him the chance to experiment and establish his own style as a DJ.  Especially the warm up sets, where the compulsion to keep feet on the dancefloor is considerably relaxed,

“When you talk about trip hop, for me, Bar Rhumba is really where that sound developed.  The warm up was really important.  I was finding my identity within the mix, I was coming from a bit more of hip-hop side and I was trying to find records that would work in there, things that weren’t aggressive, that were kind if more soundtracky, things I was discovering.  That’s where a lot of things were played for the first time.   I would play Tranquility Bass, I was into house and techno so I’d bought the Nightmares On Wax album and I’d play ‘Knight’s Interlude’ from that.  And then records started being released that were in that vein.  I think Gilles was actually the first to play DJ Krush down there. 

“The beginning would be Terry Callier or Sun Ra, then you build it through the slightly more soundtracky side of hip-hop, but with a big melodic perspective.  Then I was playing a lot of Massive Attack records, because that’s where I’d come from.  You had cut and paste records before that, like Coldcut, but for that slower sound, and all those eclectic records being played together in a group, Bar Rhumba was where that developed.

While it’s true that That’s How It Is was officially recreated once before at Peterson’s We Out Here festival – “we managed to get the original banners that Swifty made for us“ remembers Janine proudly – the announcement of the Printworks date generated an unexpected outpouring of love from those who’d attended the night.  Even trip hop royalty Geoff Barrow had been in touch.

“Geoff was saying that it was the first time he’d heard ‘Sour Times’ in a club,” says Peterson.

“I think we were the first people to play Portishead in a club,” Lavelle adds.  “When I tried to sign them Geoff gave me the acetate of the record.  Because of the culture of acetates (dubplates) at the time, it meant that something like ‘Teardrop’ by Massive Attack, it would be the first time it got played.”

Aside from a small hardcore crew – “a couple of friends of mine, a couple of Gilles’ friends, a couple of Janine’s, who were there every week,” recalls Lavelle, the dark, low ceilinged room at Bar Rhumba meant the clientele, famous or otherwise, remained much of a mystery, even though pop stars like Bono and Bjork and assorted Hollywood actors would turn up from time to time.                                             

Ultimately, the appeal of the club, Janine reckons, lay in how the ordinary punters rather than the celebrities, were treated.  “I think people really felt like it was a club that they were members of,” she tells us, “A place where they belonged.  We were always doing giveaways like mixtapes and whatever, little giveaways, which made people feel included.  People kept them – they still have them today.”

No doubt, many of the Monday night regulars from Bar Rhumba will be turning out in droves on Bank Holiday Monday and although the cavernous, industrial main space of Printworks couldn’t be more different from Bar Rhumba, those in search of a more architecturally accurate recreation of the unique That’s How It Is atmosphere can search to murkier room two and lose themselves in the smoke filled darkness.  Dance like no-one is watching, as they say, because at this club they almost certainly won’t be.

Gilles Peterson, for one, definitely won’t be.

“For years I never knew who the fuck was in the crowd,” laughs Gilles, “and that was one of the reasons we loved it.”

Ben Willmott