BRIGHT YOUNG SLING

You might not have imagined it, but apparently A$AP Rocky is the kind of guy you could bring home to your parents. Well, Star Slinger’s dad was impressed. The Manchester-based producer (known to his padre as Darren Williams) was touring with the Harlem rapper when the unlikely encounter took place. Now seated in his Academy dressing-room before he plays the launch of ABSOLUT Unique, he chuckles at the memory.

“It’s really funny actually. My dad came to a show we did and I was kinda nervous of him seeing A$AP Rocky’s performance because he always talks about drugs and shit. Luckily he didn’t hear any of his set. He did meet Rocky! I’ve got a really good picture of him and Rocky together. They both look ridiculously happy together, himself and Rocky – hilarious! Odd.”
So A$AP can turn on the gentlemanly charm?
“Surprisingly yes! But I guess that comes with being a bit of a hearthrob. Like, say if he’s meeting a girl’s parents or whatever – he’s always cool with them. So when he met my dad it was just everyday stuff for him!”
These surreal occurrences are fast becoming everyday stuff for Star Slinger. It happens when you’re a hotly-tipped DJ touring the world and whipping the blogosphere up into a frenzy with each new mixtape. Not that it’s all glamour. According to his Twitter, he’s spent the afternoon psyching himself up for his Dublin set by making “a rap beat with the sound of a door slamming sampled straight from EastEnders”.
I feel guilty, our evening interview is happening right in the middle of a live Emmerdale episode which would be full of material.
“I was doing some beats for Juicy J, a rapper from Memphis, and I was looking through some samples I’d already taken. One was EastEnders, but none of the dialogue was good enough, so I just took a door slamming and used that as a drum in it! It worked pretty well.”
Generally, inspiration comes in more conventional forms. Crate-digging in his adopted home of Manchester, for example. The Nottingham artist was into a wide range of music from an early age. Initially taught the keyboard by his father, by the age of 13 he was listening to trance and begging his mother for turntables. His teens saw him strumming the six-string in pop punk bands, making “really shitty music!” until he finally immersed himself in hip hop and made the move to Manchester. There’s a feeling that dance artists there have infused their sound with warmth and exotic textures as a reaction to the Northern cold and rain.
“I guess so, yeah,” he nods. “People making tropical-sounding rave music. Plus, there’s lots of warehouses converted into clubs in Manchester. And I kinda think we’re still influenced by that. A lot of us weren’t around in the Haçienda days but we wish we were. A lot of us do make dance music because we grew up listening to Pete Tong. We got into dance music quite young.”
The past two years have found Star Slinger expanding his horizons beyond that scene. He’s reworked the likes of Childish Gambino, Jessie Ware and Little Dragon and begun putting out original songs. He expects to finish his debut album within a year and has just signed a deal with EMI.
“There’s lots of talk of me going to LA and New York, popping into studios and just working with people who need beats and music.”
Already, he’s thinking big and ‘pop’ in terms of collaborations.
“I wanna make a hit record for somebody really commercial. I know a lot of people would say they don’t wanna ‘sell-out’ but, as a producer, you’d be lying if you said you didn’t want to make a hit. That’s what a producer’s job should be. It doesn’t matter what genre it is, if you were a rock producer you would want to write a rock hit. I’m very pop-orientated so I don’t mind making a hit for someone very commercial, that’s what I want to do before I die for sure. I would love if somebody just went over-the-top, to see how far I can take it. Like, can you imagine Rihanna on a Star Slinger song? I think you could. If her voice was on it, I think it would sell itself. I don’t think I need to be some big name.”
On the evidence of his Academy set later on, a thrilling collision of booming hip hop, frenetic dance and gorgeous soul, he soon will be.

Star Slinger was in town for the Dublin launch of ABSOLUT Unique.