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Luke Una on the joys of compilation: “It’s a bit like making a classic pasta sauce”

Who’s up for a second helping of É Soul Cultura?


“Acid house, for me, probably more importantly than the music itself, blew the doors off in terms of my listening experience. Listening to majestic, weird records at 5am at someone’s house in Chorlton, you know. It could be a John Martyn record, it could be a pop record or a Brazilian record. I just suddenly started listening to music differently, and I’ve done that for a very long time.”

Luke Una is in full flow as he reminisces about his long and storied musical journey. Just days before the recent release of his ‘É Soul Cultura Vol. 2’ compilation, he finds the time to sit down for a Zoom chat via his Manchester home, having just returned from his first-ever show in Albania. Behind him is a densely packed wall of vinyl and a colourful screen print of a pair of giant elephants dancing by sea and speaker stacks. Once used as festival flyer art, the image is a polychromatic reminder of one of the many landmarks he’s able to look back on.

A maverick selector whose musical force has been making its presence felt since rave’s earliest days, his commitment to seeking out and sharing captivating sonic morsels — combined with gravitational charisma and down-to-earth demeanour — has seen him garner quasi-mythical status among dancers, enthusiasts and peers. 

Known and loved for the Electric Chair events he co-ran with long-time collaborator, Justin Crawford, and later the Electric Elephant Festivals that transplanted the duo’s love of unfettered eclecticism to Croatian shores, these days Luke keeps the fire burning via his Worldwide FM residency, his ongoing Homoelectric nights, and recently founded Homobloc Festival. On top of this, he manages to maintain a tireless touring schedule — though the days of boundless late-night hedonism that accompanied his younger years appear to be a thing of the past.

In the past two weeks alone, he’s punched in at no fewer than nine shows. But, rather than burning the proverbial candle at both ends as he once did, the heightened self-preservation instinct that age and wisdom bring dictate that nowadays he stealthily heads for the back door long before the house lights are switched on. “No one remembers you’ve gone,” says Luke. “They say to you ‘Oh, the last two hours were great’. And I always go, ‘Yeah, it was brilliant, wasn’t it?’ But usually, I’m in bed. I don’t wanna be all Joe Wicks and smug police, but it’s really nice when you wake up [the next day] feeling healthy.”



Now aged 56 — and looking remarkably bushy-tailed for it considering the man hours he’s spent in amongst it — Luke is sober, eating sensibly, and taking care of mind, body and soul. And yet, even without the added enhancement of party favours, his passion for “unifying the diverse” through music burns as brightly as ever. “It’s exactly the same,” he says. “First of all, I have no moralism about people who get cosmic in whatever way they decide. I mean, admittedly, at 4am if someone coked-up is having the seventh looped-up conversation in your ear about how much they love you, it might begin to slightly grate on you, but you know, I’m used to it and I’ve been in that world all my life.”

When presented with news of Luke’s newfound sobriety, some of his friends expressed concern that the quality of his DJing might suffer as a result, but the absence of mind-alteration has in no way diminished his set-crafting inspiration. “In the beginning it was scary. You have no props. Nowhere to hide. But actually, I think I’m DJing better than I ever used to because I’m technically better. People say, ‘You don’t take as many risks when you’re sober’ but I dunno if that’s true.”

Before the Covid pandemic struck, Luke had thinned out his gig diary to carve out room for some non-music-related endeavours, notably working with co-conspirator Crawford on hospitality-related ventures in his Manchester hometown. While his pre-pandemic slowdown may have been self-imposed, the enforced disco-blunting that we collectively experienced for those long and confusing years served to whet his appetite, re-igniting his burning desire to create. “It reminded me of how much I miss being involved in music, all day and all night.”

True to his newly invigorated intention, the first instalment of É Soul Cultura arrived in the early summer of 2022, instantly gaining affection and repeat listens thanks to the vivid and winding narrative woven into the carefully compiled collection. It should come as little surprise that the second instalment is every bit as engaging as the first, with all manner of tried and tested curios selected and programmed across a gorgeously immersive and non-linear journey.

Merging new with old, abstract with burnished, Luke’s seasoned aptitude for audio alchemy permeates every corner of Vol 2. “It’s a bit like making a classic pasta sauce, you know. You don’t want too much garlic, too little onion, and so on.” Luke goes on to explain that he had no intention for the album to occupy the saccharine realms of the coffee table comp. “God forbid,” he says. “No disrespect to those albums, I just didn’t want that. I wanted a real collection of music, I wanted to reflect all the different corners of the pyramid, if you like.”



Exhibiting a flagrant disregard for stylistic restriction, the music takes us on unexpected turns from beginning to end, with enlivening moments manifesting throughout to discount any notion of chill-out fodder. That’s not to say that “laid back on your sofa” moments don’t arrive, they most certainly do, it’s just that they’re magnificently measured by a satisfying selection of off-kilter counterpoints.

Effortlessly meandering through the languid boogie of Veronica Mickie’s ‘Lost Children’ into the transcendent swells of Rare Silk’s ‘Storm (Arp Duppy Chip Mix)’, off-roading into the stripped futurism of LFO’s ‘Shove Piggy Shove’ before taking a hyper-atmospheric deep dive into Andi Otto’s ‘Bangalore Whispers’, lazy afternoons morph into aberrant after-hours as every corner of the Una record shelves is mined for material.

Engaging and gently animated for the duration of our conversation, Luke brims with ever more enthusiasm as he discusses some of his many favourites from the LP. He name-checks almost the entire tracklist as he joyfully recounts his relationship with each tune — like road testing the “timeless house” of Mr Scruff’s ‘Giffin’ at Electric Chair, and the pleasure he felt when he was able to explain to enquiring American jocks that the track was, in fact, UK made.

He seemingly revels in the licensing process, too, through which — with the help of the team at Mr Bongo — he was able to secure the rights to so many musical pearls, from shining light on the little-known Yargo B-side ‘Marimba’ to managing to represent the “pre-house, late 70s electronic sound of Japan” in the form of Bach Revolution’s ‘DE 108’. “We started the [licensing] process as soon as the last album was done. You don’t always get all the cherries, but that’s not a bad thing because you need to save some for the next moment.”

Now on sale, the album looks a lot like being another resounding success, and Luke can count it as the latest in a long list of jobs well done. And, while he doesn’t appear in any danger of succumbing to ego (as more than a few in his trade have been known to do), it seems some of those around him feel the occasional need to remind him to keep his feet well planted. “My mate went to me ‘Wait a minute, you’re only fucking playing other people’s records’. Well, of course, I am,” he says.

“But the thing with a compilation, I think it’s something more than that, hopefully. And that’s what you aspire to. I think if there’s a general reflection, a story of where you found something, it doesn’t matter whether you bought it on Bandcamp or you bought it while smelling the dust of the record in a shop in Paris. A compilation is telling a story of the tracks you love.”

Moving ever onwards, the third iteration of ‘É Soul Cultura’ is already in the pipeline, and Luke shares that he’s starting a new label with Mr Bongo. Already slated for release is material from a band called Transmission Towers, alongside some respectfully crafted edits. “There’s life in the old dog yet” exclaims Luke, as our thoroughly enjoyable conversation comes to a close. “I think if you come back to something you love — without sounding too ‘namaste death cult’ about it —I think you find a natural rhythm with it and you find you get quite centred with it.

“And, you know, you don’t make any fucking money out of these things, but I’m not really bothered about that. I just love it. I really enjoy it.”

Patrizio Cavaliere

Click here to buy your vinyl copy of É Soul Cultura