DJ SUSHI INTERVIEW FROM GIANT ROBOT MAGAZINE, ISSUE #15 FROM 1998. GR: How would you describe your style? DJ SUSHI: I really don't know how to answer that question because I'm just having fun. If I had to describe it, I would say that my DJ style is wild, repetitive and unorthodox. GR: How did you first get into DJ'ing? SUSHI: I was about thirteen I think and I was at a party and there was a DJ there. His name was DJ Splinter. He knew how to scratch a little bit. And I started talking to him and he introduced me to DJ tapes and video battles. From then I was addicted and started messing around on my own when I got my own turntables and mixer. Later DJ Splinter was with me in the Typical Scratch Nerds. GR: Wasn't there another member of that group? SUSHI: Yes, DJ Jujitsu. GR: Did you guys have another name too? SUSHI: Sometimes we called ourselves the Otaku Scratch Crew to confuse people for a joke but it means the same thing. "Otaku" is word same as "nerd." GR: And where does your DJ name come from. Does it mean sushi in how you mix sounds together? SUSHI: Not at all. It's just making fun of how Americans and others look at us in Japan, always in stupid stereotypes. So I call myself one the most obvious Japanese things, which is sushi, just to make fun. GR: So it's just a joke then? SUSHI: Yes it's all a big joke (laughs). GR: What DJs or musicians or music do you listen to? SUSHI: I don't listen to music really. I just listen to sounds. I like the loud sounds of traffic and trains more than a lot of music I hear...but I like some of the Boredoms music and I like the attitude of the Sex Pistols but not so much their music. I admire the recordings of QBert, Cash Money, DJ Shadow, DJ Krush and a DJ from San Francisco called Eddie Def who sends me tapes sometimes. GR: You mentioned that DJ Splinter showed you a lot of DJ battle videos. Which ones do you think influenced you or you liked to watch repeatedly? SUSHI: Splinter would show me all of these different battles and DJs but I was more interested in the pioneers. I wanted to know who started what or who created what. GR: Some have compared your style to QBert's because of the crab technique. Is this a fair comparison? SUSHI: Yes it's fair because he created it. Like I said I'm into pioneers. He created it and I mastered it. GR: I read somewhere on the Internet that the reason you never entered any DJ battles is because you are too shy. Is that the real reason? SUSHI: No. That's more stupid bullshit. The reason I have never entered any DJ battles is simple. The word "battle" means to fight, like in war or in sports. But that's not what DJ'ing is. It's an art, not a sport. You don't have competitions between two painters to see who can paint a piece of art the fastest. Do you? GR: And why haven't you or your crew ever released any records or CDs? SUSHI: Because I believe that music is only a momentary thing. You have to be there at the time it is made to fully appreciate it and to respect it. It cannot be bottled like some spring water to be sold later for profit. GR: So why did you press up those two dub-plates? SUSHI: That was Splinter's idea. They were supposed to be for a few people only and not to be played for lots of others. GR: But are you not glad that people get to hear your music? SUSHI: Not really because then your music gets into the hands of critics who are just stupid people who don't really understand music but pretend that they do or put wrong meanings on things. GR: Are you referring to your song "Aum Shinri Kyo"? SUSHI: Yes that is a good example of totally wrong interpretation. In Japan, a newspaper said that I was responsible for the mentality of that type of anarchy but that's typical stupid Japanese reaction. Really the song is saying to the people of Japan, 'Just stop and think about life for one minute.' That is why I don't like to do interviews. Too many stupid questions. GR: Okay..... How would you describe the technique that the Typical Scratch Nerds used? SUSHI: We just liked to do good scratches and try to do new stuff. We did one kick and snare song just so we could do it. But that style is out-dated and over done now. GR: What gives you the inspiration to DJ? SUSHI: My inspiration is my moods. Depending how I feel, the music will sound. If I feel shitty, it will come out shitty. If I feel good, it will come out good. GR: What techniques are you working on now? SUSHI: I'm trying to master the flare. I think it's harder to come up with combos than any other scratch. GR: What do you think of all the new DJ equipment coming out that makes it easier for DJs to do certain turntable tricks? SUSHI: I'm from the new era of DJ'ing where the curve has been added to the fader. I give much respect to the DJs who sounded clean on the fader without the curve. GR: Where do you see yourself in the future? SUSHI: I see myself in the future as poor, hardworking regular Japanese citizen with nothing to do with DJ'ing. GR: Seriously? SUSHI: Yes already I am starting to hate DJ'ing and the whole fad of DJs. It makes me sick to even be a part of it sometimes. I wish I would have been DJ'ing years earlier because I think I really like it but sometimes I feel like everybody else is jumping on the bandwagon. It's too commercialized now and it makes me sick to see all this crap. GR: Crap? Like what specifically? SUSHI: A good place to start is the word 'turntablism' which is a stupid trendy word. And then there are all of these DJs now taking sponsorship of products. They think like they are like sport stars or something. But it's the worst type of commercialism because it comes from within the musical movement. And then there are more and more pointless DJ battles that are just a big joke to make money off of video tapes. I hate it all. NOTE: that only forty copies of this rare issue were distributed before it was recalled by order from Sushi. Consequently his mother has kindly granted Giant Robot permission to reprint this only interview the late Japanese DJ ever did. The interview was recorded over a three way phone with a Japanese interpreter translating the Giant Robot questions posed by Eric N. Since this interview there has been a regenerated interest in DJ Sushi since "The Lost Dub Plates" EP was released in 2000.