Jon The Dentist: 'I Fucking Hate Hard House'

Jon The Dentist has been one of Britain's most prolific and influential techno and trance producers, ever since the early 90s, when along with Baby Doc, he created some of today's (hard) house templates. Mezz chatted to him at his Cardiff base this week.

Mezz: What's happening in your world right now-
Jon The Dentist: "It's all going off at the moment, I've got so many projects happening, including my own label Phoenix Uprising, and a top secret project coming out on Nucleuz in the near future under a different name. Plus I'm working on another new tune today, which is in a European hard house style, though I use that term very carefully because I fucking hate hard house."

Mezz: Many people would call your music hard house, what does the term mean to you-
Jon The Dentist: "Hard house is helium rap vocals, boring, same old breakbeat and percussion patterns, a bassline that's never even seen a reverb unit in its entire life…, what I loathe is that cheap English style of hard house. I've grown up on music from labels like Bonsai and German labels like DMD, music which is good quality German techno- stroke- hard trance. The Germans call it 'hard house' funnily enough, and they get the shocks of their lives, when they book all the usual suspect UK hard house DJs. I like European music, mainly."

Mezz: Your new album is full of vocal drenched uplifting tracks, what were you aiming to achieve with the record-
Jon The Dentist: "It's coffee table music. It's one of those CDs you put on your coffee table and play when you come back from a party. We're trance people, that's where my roots are and I'm going back to those roots. This album is a precursor to that. There are a couple of hard house items on the album but they're done very tongue-in-cheek and are more a parody of it."

Mezz: You've written on your sleeve-notes some unusual 'free advice'; 'Watch out, Karma will always catch up with you', why-
Jon The Dentist: "Because as people have got to know me more and more, a lot of leeches have attached themselves to me and I've been,.., I wouldn't say taken advantage of because I'm too clever for that, but I have had people taking the piss. I'm not one to get revenge, I always think if you're going to dig a grave you'll dig it for yourself. It's a little stab at a few people who've tried to make my life a misery here in Cardiff and failed miserably."

Mezz: You've also thanked your dentist on the new album, why-
Jon The Dentist: "The reason I name-checked him was because he did a lot of work on one tooth for me last year, it was a nightmare. We tried to save it with a root canal, failed and it was very very painful. I went through 6 months of dental hell last year, which is the irony of calling yourself Jon the Dentist. It's the payback. The whole experience was horrible, but I still go back all the time and there's another tooth that might have to come out. I don't enjoy going to the dentist but it's one of life's necessary evils - it's better than leaving them because if you get infections they can ultimately kill you. The fear of the dentist is balanced against the fear of death."

Mezz: Are you DJing much more in the UK these days-
Jon The Dentist: "Yeah a lot more, but to be honest I'm still more interested in DJing abroad. I'm not embracing this hard house thing though everybody else in the UK seems to want to listen to it right now. I like Mauro Picotto stuff but I find most hard house sounds like happy hardcore."

Mezz: Are you going to be DJing more in Ibiza this year-
Jon The Dentist: "Not really, I don't really like Ibiza apart from the sun. I'd rather spend summer down in Cornwall. Cornwall's got that vibe, they're really into trance and techno down there, and it's a joy to play to them because they understand the music- they're not saying 'Have you got anything harder-' I prefer playing deeper music. There's also so much great music out t Tags

• Jon the Dentist