Taking the music back to its roots

You've heard OF taking coals to Newcastle or selling ice to the eskimos.
In musical terms, both those tasks pale into insignificance compared to taking a musical genre back to its place of birth.
But that's exactly what Kiwi drum'n'bass exponents Shapeshifter have been doing, and with much success, burning up dancefloors in the UK with its Pacific-infused beats.
Drum'n'bass is a type of dance music that emerged from London's underground dance scene in the mid 1990s.
It's characterised by its fast breakbeats - typically between 160 and 190 beats a minute - with heavy bass and sub-bass lines.
It was a huge musical phenomena there for a few years, sparking several sub-genres, before largely returning to the underground.
But drum'n'bass made a big impression in NZ and Shapeshifter has been peddling its unique brand, mixed with plenty of roots, soul, hip-hop and dub, for more than a decade.
They've done such a good job of it too, that last album, The System is a Vampire, debuted at No1 in the album charts in New Zealand.
The band has just returned from another trip to the UK and Europe where Devin Abrams, who plays alto sax, keys and synth, says Shapeshifter kicked some serious butt on the latest tour to the Northern Hemisphere.
We caught up with Abrams six days after the band returned and he was still euphoric from the experience.
"It's always good to get back to the New Zealand sun, but we had a great time in the UK. It was really interesting to be taking drum'n'bass back to them," he says.
"We've been following drum'n'bass since the early 1990s so we were fully aware of the risk of taking the music back to its roots, but this was the sixth time we've been there since 2004 and each time we get a better response.
"It means we get to play to some pretty good drum'n'bass venues and it's great playing to packed-out halls with more than 2000 people in places like Sheffield, Oxford and Birmingham.
"It's still a massive scene over there and many of the people that see us say we are the best drum'n'bass band in the world."
And that's one of Shapeshifter's main points of difference, it's an actual band, rather than a DJ using the beats and lights to get the show sparking.
You come away from a Shapeshifter gig feeling like you've experienced a live event, rather than just another DJ spinning the discs, with the band putting on a powerful show.
"We were one of the first drum'n'bass bands in the world, and some would say the best. It was challenging at first as a band, because we didn't really have a role model, so we had to listen to the music and really think about how we could reproduce it live," Abrams says
"At that time as well, a lot of local people who were into the music didn't think it should be done live, but we thought that would be the best way to do it. It's the best way to get people into drum'n'bass and the best way for people to experience dance music."
Kiwis can experience the live Shapeshifter experience at a serious of gigs this summer, beginning at Mangawhai Tavern, December 26-27; Opononi Hotel, December 29; Riwaka Hotel, January 2; Butler's Reef, Oakura, Taranaki, January 3; Brewer's Field, Mt Maunganui, January 7 and Waihi Beach Hotel, January 8. Support for the shows will be Ladi6 - New Zealand's leading hip-hop soul artist - and Queenstown DJ Sunshine Soundsystem. For more info check out www.shapeshifter.co.nz.