Is James Lavelle Dance Culture's Top Clairvoyant-

Former trip hop hero turned eclectic/ breaks main-room DJ James Lavelle revealed this week that he's turned his back on seeking technical DJ perfection, in favour of mixing in tracks by the likes of Metallica and John Lennon.

"You've got to take people away and bring them back and mess with them, cos' it's fun," the former Mo' Wax chief told DJ Magazine.

"It's not everybody's bag, but it's what I do. I'm not pretending to be Sasha. I don't do ten-minute mixing. It's not seamless, it's broken."

Lavelle's decision to ditch DJ perfectionism for anything goes eclecticism could be significant, given his impressive track record with political issues, notably Tony Blair's notorious claim that Saddam was 45 minutes away from firing missiles at Britain.

"The statement that Saddam Hussein is going to bomb us doesn't wash with me," James told Skrufff presciently in October 2002, as America and Britain prepared to invade Iraq.

"It's about American politics and a very right wing American view of the way they see themselves in the world and we are being seen to associate ourselves with that," he said.

James Lavelle-Romania is out now on Global Underground.
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