Simian Mobile Disco
Failed U.K. rockers reinvent themselves as headbanging house DJs

On their debut album, Attack Decay Sustain Release, Simian Mobile Disco’s James Ford and Jas Shaw pack an all-night rave’s worth of minimalist beats and synthesizer shrapnel into a concise ³⁶ minutes—if only they’d been as economical with their tour budget.

“We blew the whole lot on our light show,” says Shaw before a set at Brooklyn’s Studio B. “It looks like Doctor Who’s time machine,” brags the afroed Ford. “It’ll get bigger when we have more money.”

The way things are happening for the
Manchester, England duo, expect to see
them piloting onstage UFOs or emerging
from laser-armed pyramids in no time.

Along with French daft punks Justice, Simian Mobile Disco are at the forefront of the so-called blog-house movement— that recent wave of rock-friendly techno (Digitalism, DJ Mehdi) that’s all over the YouSendIt circuit. In the past year, SMD have remixed cuts by Air, Björk, and Muse, while Ford has produced albums for Klaxons and Arctic Monkeys. And recently signed to megalabel Interscope, they have a chance of expanding their audience— something the pair actually tried before.

Ford and Shaw spent the better part of the past decade playing keyboards and drums in the quartet Simian, who released two albums before splitting up during a ²⁰⁰⁵ U.S. tour. “It was not ami-

FAST FACTS

> Attack’s “Scott” is a tribute to electronic-music pioneer Raymond Scott, explorer Robert Falcon Scott, and cult singer Scott Walker. “There are a lot of good Scotts in the world,” says Ford.

> SMD’s pet peeve? Not getting a copy of a remix they’ve done. Says Shaw, “It looks weird when I’m buying my own record in a shop.”

cable,” says Ford. “We had a fight in a fish
restaurant and decided not to continue.”

With seafood-related beefs squashed, Ford and Shaw asked their former frontman Simon Lord to contribute to Attack (the trancey “I Believe”), where he joins slightly-better-known Ninja from the Go! Team. “We didn’t ask Jay-Z or anything, because we didn’t want anyone more famous than us on our record,” Ford explains.

Despite their fledgling status, the pair
still enjoy some Hova-size excesses. “We
spend loads of money on eBay on effects
pedals and synths,” admits Shaw.

“Plus, I drink too much,” says Ford, surveying the meager backstage offerings. “We’re not at the point where we can ask for a meditating room or a pool filled with plastic balls to swim around in.”

“Those are actually on our rider,”
clarifies Shaw. “We just never get them.”
B Y LANE BROWN
PHOTOGRAPH BY DAVID BLACK

Jas Shaw and James Ford, photographed for Spin in Brooklyn, New York, July ⁷, ²⁰⁰⁷