Mark Hawkins has been in the game for years, but is constantly reinventing himself. After releasing countless records under his real name during the noughties, he more recently assumed his moniker and concealed his identity. Now, he has pulled the veil from his face for the public to see, while also looking at himself in the mirror. We spoke to him about this and more ahead of his gig for Limit’s launch party on Saturday.
In a recent Facebook post, you talked about how you have been finding it hard to convey your complete story in interviews. I understand this must be difficult, especially in an e-mail interview. You expressed interest in writing your memoirs. Do you think you will do it? What do you think you would gain from it?
I have no idea to be honest. I keep writing bits and pieces I remember from over the years before I forget them, mainly for the fact that if I forget them, they are gone. It’s strange, in a world where almost everything is catalogued online, that I have a part of my life, the time I spent living in vehicles, which generally as a subject hasn’t really been chronicled in a major way outside of a few little bits and pieces here and there. You can form a very sheltered picture of what the kind of traveller meets raver culture was in the 90s if you look online, but I guess you never really get the flavour of what it was like to be there. I guess I think sometimes about compiling my own experiences, just to try and get across what it felt like to be in, a certain side of that scene, as I’m sure, there’s billions of tales which could be told. I think it’s a piece of British folklore which is in danger of being airbrushed from history somewhat.
On the topic of the self and identity, I’m wondering why you decided to adopt a moniker for your work, but one that is quite similar to your own name. Do you adopt a persona when you produce or DJ? Are you self aware of it as performance? You RA bio simply tells us to ‘listen to the music’.
When I produced the first records I made for Dixon Avenue Basement Jams, I had already released over thirty 12”s, many of which under my birth name, and it had got to the point where my birthname was kind of typecast, people expected a certain sound from me under that name and I felt I’d become boxed into a corner creatively, so it was a means of escaping that more than anything, but the actual choice of name wasn’t my own, but given to me by Dan from DABJ. He liked the name “Marquis” as it was L.I.E.S. artist Svengalisghost’s first name. I actually met the original Marquis at Dimensions festival a few years ago, and he was in stitches over that one, and a bit chuffed it seemed, so that was funny. And the Hawkes part came from the late, great, house legend Kenny Hawkes. I think Dan got a kick out of the fact that it was so similar to my birth name, but it was like the double bluff if you will, so obviously me that it couldn’t be me. We all got a kick out of that actually! But yeah, rather than a persona to hide behind or anything, it was simply an effort to try and get people to listen to what I was doing instead of writing it off because they thought they knew what I was about already, nothing more, nothing less.
A recurring theme of your work is social housing. You reference Cabrini Green, the Chicago Housing Authority, in your first release, and your album is called Social Housing. In a previous interview, you have spoken about your own struggles finding housing in your home city of Berlin. Has dealing with the subject head on helped you at all? Considering its name, do you think house music is the best medium through which to talk about these issues?
Well, I just look out of my window, it’s what I see. And I’ve lived in Social Housing for a lot of my life, outside of when I was living on the road. But generally it’s more like I made the music, and I’m just looking for a name for something you know rather than specifically setting out to make a political point. With Social Housing, I guess I was having a bit of a stab at what’s going on with a lot of places in the UK, where basically they sold off the council housing, never invested in building more, and then people wonder why there’s a housing crisis, and let themselves be conned into the idea that it’s other things which have caused that. As for a medium- at the end of the day, music is my medium, and if social factors are influencing that music, it’s perfectly acceptable for me to indicate that. I’d argue, that personally, I was educated politically by music throughout my whole life, from Frank Zappa through to Crass through to Spiral Tribe and DiY, I think actually it’s a pretty important way to get a message out there which really speaks to younger people who might not take much of an interest in politics otherwise. But I’m not intending to be too preachy or anything, just sometimes you feel like you want to make a little point without becoming some social media martyr or something.
You had several releases and several years before releasing a debut album. Was it always something you wanted to do? Were you biding your time?
I never even thought of it until Houndstooth suggested it. and that was almost 3 years ago. I spent two years writing it, so quite a long time really, but I wanted it to be the best work I felt I was capable of doing.
Do you think that Berlin society is more socially orientated than in Britain? What do you enjoy about living there?
German society as a whole I would say is definitely more socially orientated than the UK, where it seems to me the general population is sold down the river for a quick profit. Plus I know, whatever my financial situation here, I’ll always have a roof over my family’s head and food in our bellies. It’s cheap, it’s green, and there’s a lot of space not very far outside of the city, a lot of lakes & forest to visit which is nice when you want to escape the city. But also, Berlin is definitely very chilled when you compare it to other capital cities, it certainly doesn’t feel like a capital city a lot of the time. In the end, it feels like home to me, which is why I couldn’t see myself living anywhere else now.
You recently commented on rotary mixers, saying that they do not suit your style. Why do you think you have adopted a mixing style that involves chopping and changing with the line faders?
I think hearing Jeff Mills “Live at the liquid rooms” had a lot to do with that, alongside being big into Dave Clarke in the mid 90s. Whilst the music they play is a lot harder and naturally more techno than the house stuff I play in the main, I took something from those two djs I think. They were the guys that showed me that you didn’t have to only blend tracks together as smoothly as possible, and that more of a choppy aesthetic could be pleasing. You don’t really hear people playing like that these days at all. So that’s another reason I like it, just to sound a bit different to other Djs, and thow in a bit more excitement and energy. I think you can go out and hear a lot of DJ sets in this day and age which sound a bit flat and lifeless. It’s like you might as well just stick iTunes DJ on with a playlist. But I respect anyone elses personal decision on how they play or what mixer they like to play on, just I think there’s some people who bang on about rotary mixers, but they didn’t make that decision from their own experience, they just heard someone they thought was “cool” going on about it, and wanted to sound “cool” like them too by parroting on what they heard someone else saying. But each to their own, I don’t tell people they have to play on a mixer with line faders, so I kind of switch off when someone starts trying to convince me that I should be playing on a rotary, it doesn’t suit my style. That said though, since I wrote that piece, it has made me want to work out how I can translate my style onto a rotary, just so I can work with one if I have to. I can mix fine on them, but something is just lost for me if I have to play on one.
Do you ever think you will tire of mixing records? As you get older how do you see your practices changing? Will you still produce and listen to the same styles? I say this considering house music’s strong link to partying.
Well, I’d argue that out of all of the kind of music you hear played in night clubs, House is probably the one style which you can take out of that club context and enjoy on so many other levels, particularly once you start veering into stuff which is more in the direction of Jazz or Broken Beat or whatever. I didn’t really party for many years, I just turned 40, so when I go to play in a club, I’m most likely not approaching it in the same way as I did when I first started playing when I was 19. And I pretty much all but quit drinking this year, I’ll still perhaps take a couple of drinks in my spare time, but I’m 100% straight and sober when I play, as I see it that I have a job to do, and an experience to share, and I know that I play 20 times better when I’m straight compared to if I’m messed up. I used to hold my own for certain when I was worse for wear when I was playing, but I realised how much better I could be. But considering that 10 years ago, I had never imagined that I would be producing house, it’s hard for me to predict where I will be 10 years from now. But I’m pretty sure that I’ll always be a vinyl collector, as it’s a bit of a habit I’ve had since childhood, and I’m sure that even if I’m not making house, I’ll be listening to it from time to time, I don’t think there’s any music which I’ve been into in the past which I don’t go back to for a listen from time to time.
The tracks you play are what I’d call ‘proper house’ music. What do you think constitutes proper house music?
I think it’s just a certain feeling. A little bit raw perhaps, but for me, for it to be proper, there’s got to be some soul in the music in some way. But also I think everybody has their own perception of what personifies a particular genre tag, so it can all become a bit meaningless. I couldn’t tell somebody else that their own perception of House is wrong, because it’s always a personal thing.
Finally, have you been to play or party in Leeds before?
Yes, I’ve played three times previously over the past few years. It’s always been an interesting scene around Yorkshire, a lot of history in regard to the development of electronic music. So will definitely be good to be back, it’s always seemed to me to be a pretty up-for-it crowd.
Follow the link HERE to see Saturday’s event page.
Oliver Walkden