Classic Album: Django Django, Django Django

Because Music, 2012

Because of their assured electro-rock swagger, and consistently incendiary live shows, you might be forgiven for thinking that Django Django knew exactly what they were doing when it came to making their eponymous debut album.

And because of the sweeping scale of their sound, and shimmering polish to their production, you might also hazard a fair guess that it was made by a veteran of the studio, with a jaw-dropping array of vintage gear at his disposal.

“Nah,” says amiable bandleader, Davis Maclean. “I had no idea what I was doing. And it must have cost us about £80 to make that record!” Ah. So it turns out that having bugger all money is the mother of invention, then.

Maclean, along with Vinnie Neff on vocals, Jimmy Dixon on bass, and Tommy Grace on his trusty Juno synth, made the best of what they had. Sometimes that was a Yellow Pages standing in for a drum kit, and sometimes that was coconuts and Lynx cans on percussion duties.

“It was so lo-fi,” says Maclean. “But I liked the limitations. I would just say, ‘The drums should sound like this’. And I would hit a phone book with the drumsticks or a deodorant can, or whatever was lying around the kitchen.

“Really it was a case of just pushing things. I was just making it all up. Seeing what we could do with just the computer. We didn’t even have a sound card. The mic went into the back of the computer into the sound card that came with the PC. And I was just using every effect module that Cubase had. Version 1, too.”

Like all the best music, it was ideas that led the charge. Maclean, a jobbing DJ by this point, with some of the weirdest and widest record crates around, drew from his immense influences on wax. All of his favourite records became jumping off points for Django Django’s music.

“I was big into crate digging and picking up everything from jazz, rockabilly, and psych rock, to dance music and dub. That was the backbone. We wanted the album to be about the songs, really, rather than the process.”