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For Record Store Day, we caught up with vinyl killer DJ turned super-producer Will Kennard, aka Status from Dubstep’s dynamic duo, who said young music fans have lost touch with the highs and lows of scouring indie record shops for hidden gems.
Will believes that with the rise of the internet – and new music being available at the click of a button – teenagers don’t know the joy of discovering hidden gems on white labels.
Back in the 90s, a teenage Will would spend hours in the basement of BM Soho and try and score the latest releases before the other Jungle junkies.
The Blind Faith star remembers there being a hierarchy amongst the clique of DJs and regular customers, but that just added to the appeal of becoming part of the scene.
He said: “My favourite record store is BM Soho. It used to be called Black Market Records when I first started going there in 1994.
“I’d be in the basement, where they sold all the drum’n’bass records. The shop was tiny, with two, big, PA-sized speakers that took up half the space.
“Big-name DJs like Ray Keith worked behind the counter and they’d be blasting white labels and promo records really loud.
“It was an iconic place, one of the centres of the whole Drum’n’Bass scene. Everyone in there would try to be cool, so the place had a bit of a moody vibe to it, and it could be intimidating.
“And there was a hierarchy among the customers: DJs would get the VIP treatment, be invited into the back room and given all the promos first.
“The odd tourist would wander in and people would take the piss out of them. So it was very cliquey, but that just made me want to be part of it even more.
“I always dreamed of working there, but you could never get a job unless you were a friend of a friend of someone already there.
“But if you did work there, you were almost famous and could get bookings as a DJ. At that time, I was just DJ-ing in my bedroom and desperate to be part of the Drum’n’Bass scene in any way that I could.
“There was no internet back then so the only way to discover new music was to go to a club or record shops. If I was 15 now, I’d probably still be going to record shops, but I’d be scouring the internet as well.
“It’s all online forums now. I’d hate to think there will be a day when there are no record shops, but they’re probably going to be a bit more rare than they are now.”