The Three B's - zero dB

One of our readers is hiding something – a love for zerodB that stretches back years, and inspired a Neil Combstock collage decorating ethic for their bedroom. Much to the surprise of Neil upon entering said bedroom.

Chris Vogado dished the filth on their own adventurous affrays in the Captial: "We were DJing in Edinburgh quite some time ago, and Neil befriended, shall we say, a certain young lady. He 'went back to hers' (nudge, nudge), and to his horror when he got in the bedroom found loads of pictures of him on the walls of her bedroom! Freaky – there are plenty more [stories] but maybe leave that for a 'dB Memoirs', eh?"

Another story for the dB Memoirs is that of their debut album, 'Bongos, Bleeps, and Basslines', which has been scoring glowing reviews and has been accredited as "the best release put out by Ninja Tune, ever" by Trevor Jackson. "We've been amazed at the response so far, people stating things like 'album of the year'," said Chris, "Of course our friends are completely behind it as well, but the main feedback is coming from myspace.com, which has been really cool. Trevor's remarks were very kind, one that we're not sure we can live up to, but hey, you gotta give it a go!"

Fans are chomping at the proverbial bit for the album's relase, now set back to Sept 25 after being held up over sample issues, especially concercing Samba Do Umbigo, now renamed Coisa De Gringo. "Sample issues, sample issues, sample issues; think it was Q-Tip who once said "forever clearing samples for my new LP," and now we know exactly what he means," Chris explains, "We had to drop a sample or two from [Samba Do Umbigo], the vibraphones have been replaced with a piano - personally we prefer it anyway, so all good really. The name change was just taken from the lyrics as well, Coisa De Gringo translates as 'reason of the foreigner' so I'm told!"

The resulting album is a mix of hard jazz, hip hop, house, and electro with a Latin and African styling. There's an ethnicity about it that absorbs several modern music traditions at once: it's a retrospective approach with futuristic intentions. Sadly, you're more likely to encounter samba, tango, bassa nova, and different strains of jazz as presets on a keyboard than in popular music and present education, while world music can be purist and aloof to younger ears. ZerodB's personal tastes are reflected in all the tracks, though perhaps not fully represented: "We're into all forms of music and think that there shouldn't really be any categories. For the LP we collated around 40-50 tracks from all styles and genres, and then whittled them down to the nine that are on the LP."

Chris puts their decision down to "years of listening, lots of DJing, and seeing what works and how it works", an experimental process engineered through fifteen years of graft with Neil. They found themselves working together in a studio at college and discovered that they had practicable commonalities when it came to music and recording ideas. The album sees dance music become more organic, reaching back to the styles which first played heavily on the beats. The analogue nature of the instruments and samples means that the tracks seem far removed from what we know as electronic music. The blending with hip hop adds an urban edge to the Rio de Janeiro nights theme, and for Chris it is the style of his favourite vocal on the album: "For me I think it has be Pace Rock – delivery and content goes a long way for me, he just sounds so cool."

A sense of relief has also been building for the duo as the album launch draws ever nearer, but already they are putting plans in motion for further releases and a tour. "We've been sat on this [album] for a year now, so it would be really good to see it out there. We're starting to get quite a few remix requests in again now, so we've started on those (just finished a heavy one for UFO, and halfway through one for Bonobo), but on top of that we're starting to look at taking Bongos, Bleeps & Basslines live for next year - and it's looking pretty mad so far!"

In our last interview, they claimed they were looking to help children all over the world in their bid for world domination. Have their plans changed in the last few months? "Been there done that, we're now looking at ways to improve London's underground – not the tube!"

You can catch zerodB at Edinburgh's Departure Lounge (at The Caves) for a DJ set before the live madness ahead. There's a definite jazz theme at Departure Lounge, which will be kicked off with a warm-up by resident Astroboy, ahead of his own mini-tour of Finland in October. Support from the Joe Acheson Quartet, already turning heads at Ninja Tune, brings the live element alive with a full band performance of their funky jazz and 'folksy overtures.'