Audio Zeb
Stop the Earth, I Want to Get Off!

Whether it's been under his own name, as the Spy from Cairo, or with his Organic Grooves collective, multiinstrumentalist and producer Zeb has been one of music's most prolific purveyors of worldly dub rhythms.

Born of Italian gypsy parents, Zeb lived in London for a stretch as a teen and played guitar in a number of bands that were heavily influenced by new wave, roots/reggae, and funk/rock. But it was his moved to New York City several years later that let Zeb hone his electronic dub sound.

Zeb's latest album, Stop the Earth, I Want to Get Off! takes the gypsy mentality to the extreme, blending Arabic, African, Brazilian, and Eastern European rhythms in a melting pot of electronic dub.

Zeb sat down with MP3.com to talk about living and recording like a gypsy, the DIY approach, and his forthcoming plans to release an EP of Balkan-influenced tracks on Wonderwheel Recordings, the label of Turntables on the Hudson mastermind Nickodemus.

MP3.com: Hey Zeb. Zeb: So what's happening? Not a whole lot. How are you doing? I'm great, actually. Nick [Nickodemus] and I just finished off a nice little EP of Balkan tunes. Oh, cool. Yeah, we're actually online looking for some cool pictures of crazy gypsies for some cover art. Sounds great. Let's talk about your album, Stop the Earth, I Want to Get Off. Is this your first since 2003? Yeah, maybe 2004 really. There was A Spy From Cairo and before that was The End of the Beginnings in 2003. After that I kind of laid low for a while. I've done a couple of singles and remixes. But I wasn't really quite inspired actually. I don't know why. It just, it happens, because I've always been very prolific, but I've had a really bad couple of years in general. Also, I had a lot of trouble with my living situation, New York is becoming more and more gentrified, and I moved a lot. Oh, I see. One year I actually moved like six times. Wow, that is a lot. Yeah, it was crazy. And I have two cats. It was crazy. I had to leave one cat with one friend at one point, one at the other one, and me, I was living somewhere else, constantly like in a temporary kind of situation. So it was really crazy. So it was more of like a crazy personal time and less focused on the music kind of a thing. Yeah, basically. Also, because I don't really have a studio, I work from home and I need to set up. I need to find a good room that sounds good, you know what I mean, that doesn't bother the neighbors. I mean, it's a nightmare when you think about it. So, yea, for several reasons, I wasn't making a lot of music for a while. So when did you start recording this one? Well, some of the songs are actually fairly old, some as much as three years old. Some of the tracks are whatever I could put together while moving around. So it took me much longer than it would normally do, and I can put it together in a couple of months if I'm comfortable and I have a place and I get used to the sound of the room and all that. But a lot of tunes were done just in literally really gypsy style, and I was actually doing it at people's apartments in the sitting room, and then I would mix it in the next apartment. So it was kind of difficult for me, too, to find some kind of homogenous kind of sound for all the songs, even though it's kind of cool in a way to have different character for each song. So it was truly a gypsy experience. Yeah, it sounds like it. This is like a final chapter of three years of this stuff--hanging around, running around, not having a place really in general. How does the recording process work for you. Is it all you and machines and recording yourself or does it come out during jam sessions you have with other musicians, like the Organic Grooves stuff? Yeah, there is a lot of misunderstanding around that too because what really happened with Organic Grooves was really Sasha and I, we would sit around at his house and put down the basic foundation of the songs ourselves. I would normally play most of the instruments, like I play the bass, and then put down some keyboard parts and stuff like that, and he did the beats. And then we would get the guys to come and record. We never really did it live. I mean, live we would just jam. So this time around was just you in a room--in various rooms, actually, throughout the city? Yeah, basements and peoples' sofas and s*** like that, even in some bedrooms. I would have called it Sofas, Sitting Rooms, and Bedrooms if I had a second choice for the album title. Yeah, I was going to ask about the title. Have you ever said that phrase out loud, "Stop the Earth, I Want to Get Off?" Well I don't want to take full credit for it. I actually stole it from a poster. Since I was a child, I was a big fan of--have you heard of Mafalda? I've heard the name, yeah. She was an Argentinean cartoon character in the early '70s, and she was like this really emancipated, really intelligent little girl--very jaded. She was a little bit like Lisa Simpson. OK. She was like a smart, extremely, how do you say, precocious for her age, you know. OK, sure, sure. And she had this little brother that was younger, and he was always depressed. And there is a poster of him that was actually big in the '70s where he is sitting at the edge of the world. You can actually see it, sitting there with this tiny little head, and then at one point he stands up and he screams at the top of his lungs, you know, "Stop the Earth, I want to get off." It's funny you just say that, if I scream that, it's exactly where I got the idea actually. I haven't actually started screaming that yet because I'm not completely mad yet, but yeah, soon enough I think. So you guys are about to head out on the road in a little while to promote the album. Is that right? Yeah, actually Nick and I, we're going to do because for me it's very difficult because I'm not really a DJ. I don't even want to become one now. It's not really my jurisdiction. I'm a musician for starters. I started off as a guitar player when I was like nine years old and I've played in bands and stuff but I've always liked samplers and s***. When they first came out I was always really intrigued by the fact you can record parts, loop them up, and you don't actually really need a band. If you're smart enough, you can just play a couple of instruments and there you have it. It saves a lot of time and arguments with other people, going back and forth between different rooms and waiting for the drummer who is late or something like that, or the singer who's got too much ego, you know what I mean? Sure. As they say, if you can work alone and do the work of three people, all the better. And I'm not really much of a club guy. I'm more aloof than that. I stay home a lot. Preferably, I would like to basically, I'll just say, a career as a producer only. I wish I could always sit in my underwear, you know what I mean, and just going on and just work with software and s***, which I love. I mean, that's what I'm really into. So Nick will be laying down beats on the turntables and you'll be programming stuff and playing live instruments over them? Yeah, I have some of my tracks prerecorded, and that way I can actually jam with a guitar over it. I have a synthesizer guitar, so I can switch from the sound of sitar to like a classical guitar. I also play the oud, the Arabic lute, which is on the first song "Monia." I'm trying to bring that out live, too. I actually finally received the special pick-up for it because it's a very difficult instrument to mic up. My idea is to jump from the oud to the guitar and play all those different sounds through the synthesizer. OK, cool. So what's next for you? You guys are working on this EP. Is that going to come out soon? The Balkan thing? Probably in April, yeah. Sounds good. Well Zeb, thanks a lot for the time, and I'm sure we'll talk again very soon. Oh, you're welcome. Thank you. All right, man. See you later. All right. Bye-bye. Take care.