Interview by Joe Delon, September 21st 2018

It’s a great pleasure to have Detroit hero Mike Huckaby record the first mix in our new series. We caught up with Mike to know what he’s been up to recently.

Q: The mix opens with your remix of Jorge Caiado’s ‘Cycles‘ on Groovement. You played alongside Jorge and Stereociti at the launch party at Lux Frágil in Lisbon back in May – any memories that stand out from that night and your time in Lisbon?

MH: Yeah I remember that system! It was a really nice system, and dj booth too. And the story about how they had to redo the entire club to make it work. The crowd came late, but the room filled up nicely. Lisbon is coming about these days.  I am happy to be the first in this podcast series. Working with Groovement was a good fit. They had a lot of nice things going and I like the shop a lot, and his sisters artwork for graphics. I’m really into that. And often, the deal breaker will be the look of the label or not. I’m influenced by that a lot.

Q: Your recent contribution to the NDATL 10 Year Special Edition release was called ‘Sunset With The Jazz Republic’ – how was this track related to the classic ‘The Jazz Republic‘?  What does The Jazz Republic mean for you?

MH: I’m trying to reserve the jazz republic for more downtempo stuff like I did for Jazzanova but there have been house tracks that would fit the jazz republic sound too. I’m sorta working on a jazz republic lp.

Working with Kai Alcé is another thing that’s been working out really well. I think his idea of releasing limited edition 12s including only artists that play his party is a brilliant idea. He fucked everybody up with that concept. Sorry to say.

Q: Clone recently unearthed several original copies of the legendary Roland King ‘Versatility EP‘, which was out on M3 back in 1997. Both Rick Wade and Shake also released on M3 under aliases. Can you tell us the story behind the label and ‘Roland King’? (who ran the label, why the aliases? etc.)

MH: Yeah I used to run that label. It was the label of the shop, Record Time. Roland King was an alias I created because I was heavily into the Roland s770 sampler. Still the best sampler. Super warm filters on that thing that will blow any Akai sampler away. Yeah I was surprised that they found those copies. I have to ask Serge from Clone about that next time. Norm Talley was the person who first told me about it.

Q: While you’re busy touring Europe, do your other projects take a backseat or are you able to keep up your production and teaching initiatives on the move?

MH: I keep it all going at the same time. Monday – Thursday I’m working on tracks, and then on the weekend I fly out and dj.

Q: You’ll soon be heading to Europe for a couple of months on your Fall tour – any studio housekeeping that needs to get done before a long trip like that? (plants need watering, synths need dusting..! etc.)

MH: I take care of all of that and unplug everything. My mom checks on my apt for me so I’m good.