Celebrating Fatboy Slim’s first ever number one – nme.com interviewed him on the songs that made him who is today
RECORD YOU FELL IN LOVE TO: ‘I LOVE TO LOVE’ BY TINA CHARLES “This isn’t exactly love, but I had my first snog at a school disco to this record, so I remember it quite vividly. I must have been thirteen or fourteen. Taylor Fox, if you’re still there, thank you.
HEARTBREAK RECORD: ‘I WANT YOU’ BY ELVIS COSTELLO This one’s really personal, really painful. I won’t go into detail, but my first heartbreak happened about a month after this song came out. That line about did you call his name out as he held you down‘… Ouch. Such a vivid, cutting record.
RECORD THAT SUMS UP YOUR SUMMER: ‘MUSIC SOUNDS BETTER WITH YOU’ BY STARDUST “This summer of 1998 was definitely both my most memorable and my best summer ever, it was great fun from start to finish. I spent most of it DJing in Ibiza, and heard this record a lot – so until the day I die I’ll be back in Ibiza every time I hear it. A great place to be.
RECORD FOR A NIGHT ON THE TILES: ‘1999’ BY PRINCE God knows how many times we’re going to hear this record in the latter stages of next year, but I still love it. I just hope there isn’t going to be a really cheesy remix of it, but there probably will be. I quite regularly play it on New Year’s Eve when I’m DJing, and it always goes down really well.
SONG TO CLEAR THE TOURBUS: ‘QUANTA LA MERA’ BY THE SANDPIPERS It’s got a bit in the middle where a bloke with an American accent starts talking and goes, ‘The words of this song mean I am a simple man from the land of the palm trees. My love is sick fawn seeking refuge in the forest. With the poor people of this world I would like to share my fate… ‘ Not a dry eye left in the house. Well, no eyes left in the house at all, actually.
RECORD YOU WANT FOR YOUR BIRTHDAY ‘1999’ BY PRINCE – REMIX Pertinent to my ‘night on the tiles’ record choice – I did hear a mix of ‘1999’ that Judge Jules played last week in his show. I don’t know if it’s a bootleg or if it’s an official one, but it actually was a very tasteful remix. I don’t know where it came from, I do suspect it’s a bootleg. Jules tends to get hold of these things, and I imagine I won’t be able to find a copy myself. But I want one.
MIDNIGHT ON NEW YEAR’S EVE 1999, WHAT DO YOU PLAY? I think you know the answer to that one. But, funnily enough, I won’t be playing anything. I’ve just found out I’m going to be on an airplane at midnight this year. I’m playing three gigs on New Year’s Eve, my first time ever going around different clubs. It’s me and Paul Oakenfeld and Todd Terry playing three sets in different cities, but we’ll actually be up in the air between London and Manchester at midnight, so we’ll miss the chimes. We’re going to try and take a beat box on the plane with us so we don’t have to do without ‘1999’.
WHAT RECORD DO YOU WISH YOU’D MADE IN 1998? ‘INTERGALACTIC’ – THE PRISONERS OF TECHNOLOGY REMIX (UNRELEASED VERSION) My first choice would actually be ‘The Music Sounds Better With You’ by Stardust, but I can’t say that one again. The Prisoners of Technology‘s first remix of ‘Intergalactic’ is excellent, but I managed to end up with the only copy of it because the Beastie Boys nixed it. They didn’t like it. It’s brilliant – the speed is doubled up, it’s a really pokey drum’n’bass mix – but what they did is speed the Beastie Boys vocals up slightly and, as I found out later when I remixed the next one, the Beastie Boys are a bit precious about that. And so they released an instrumental version on the 12″ instead, because they didn’t want the vocal version released. But they made one test acetate of it, and the people from the record company very kindly gave it to me, so I have the only copy in existence. It’s great, because whenever I play it around the world everyone just kind of freaks out when they hear it. It’s such a shame because it’s my second favourite track this year, and it didn’t even get released.
WHAT WOULD YOU LIKE PLAYED AT YOUR FUNERAL? ‘LOVELY DAY’ BY BILL WITHERS ‘When I wake up in the morning… the sunlight hurts my eyes…’ This is my favourite song of all time, even though the fact that it was used in that tea advert recently cheapened it a bit. It was played at my wedding and it’s in my will to be played at my funeral. But I have a second choice creeping up as I get older, which is ‘In My Life’ by The Beatles. What a perfect record for the occasion.