You could accuse PJ aka Starkey of living in a Truman-esque world, Starkville if you will, where he is of course the mayor. This could really only come from a bipolar and clearly deluded mind, but if you’ve ever put on a Starkey record, or immersed yourself in his new long player Ephemeral Exhibits, you’ll get the sense that whilst he may be a little crazy, his music is definitely cutting through the shit and should without a doubt be heard by a wider audience.

Brought into this world as Paul Jerome Geissinger but he’s known as PJ to his friends. And although Ephemeral Exhibits, out now on Planet Mu may well be his first long player, the 27 year old producer has been blasting our ears with his music, or as I’m sure PJ would call it Starknoise, since 2005. With over eleven original productions, numerous remixes and the now legendary Street Bass mix CDs, the Philadelphia resident has come a long way from his tinkling on the ivories as a 5 year old.

It was the first output of an angular, distorted musical mind on his own label Slit Jockey that was to grab the attention of tastemaker label Werk Discs. The UK imprint put out his marauding, grime-spiked concoctions as the Local Headlines 12” and featured him heavily on their wryly titled Grime FM and really presented this US producer, who after a stint living in London, was awestruck with the underground London Grime scene and affected his music profoundly.

Now into 2009 and we have a twelve track album pulsing and corpulent with attitude, energy and dexterity, and which is easily in my mind one of the best, most engaging albums of 2008.

Check out Starkey’s take on Nas and Lauren Hill’s classic.

Click Here to Download Starkey “Pyramid Scheme”
(Stream & Download Courtesy of Media Contender)

Starkey Interview:

Media Contender:
Lets get into your new album Ephemeral Exhibits. Is the name of the album a poignant statement about your music or just about music in general?
Starkey:
It’s basically a play on words and can be read two ways. The first way is that this album is a snapshot in time; the music that I’m making at this point in my life. Once you release a record, it’s out there for the world, and you can’t change it.
Those versions are the final versions of the songs, and they are suspended in time. The second way refers to the fleeting nature of the recording industry in its current state. With the Internet really taking over, how we hear and hear about music, things are moving quicker and quicker every month. What was new six months ago is now old. Things are constantly changing and morphing. Music that is regionalized gets de-regionalized the moment it hits the web.

Media Contender:
Your sound resonates heavily with UK grime and, on this LP more overtly dubstep. How has UK music and your time living in London impacted you as a musician. And would you have been making the music you make now without it?
Starkey:
Grime, in particular, changed my life. It was the single most exciting form of music I had ever heard. It was definitely London and Philly together that made me love that music. It had the raw energy in the beats along with a new take on MC vocal styles. I think my time in London, when vocal garage like So Solid Crew was really big, definitely got me interested in that overall sound. But it was Wiley & Dizzee Rascal that really did it for me.

Media Contender:
How did you stay in touch with the UK movement when you moved back to USA?
Starkey:
The Internet. It’s funny, when I met Dev79, we ended up starting to work together because we were the only people in Philly (that we knew) that knew anything about grime. He was like, “so what music are you into right now?”, and I was like, “well there’s this music coming out of London that I’m really into called grime.” A few months later we started the first party in the US to feature grime.

Media Contender:
And then along came dubstep. What was your first introduction this other vital London sound?
Starkey:
Probably Loefah, Vex’d, Digital Mystikz, their early stuff. I liked what they were doing, but overall I didn’t get fully into the dubstep sound right away. However we mixed things up from the start, basically whatever we could get our hands on. The exchange rate wasn’t as bad between the US and UK back then, so we were ordering records and shipping them across the pond. Some of the earlier dubstep, which had a bit more 2-step / garage vibe, I wasn’t as into at the time. However now I can listen to stuff like Horsepower Productions and really enjoy it.

Media Contender:
Being a big fan of The Roots and Jazzy Jeff among other Philadelphia luminaries myself, has this impressive legacy influenced your music in any way?
Starkey:
Philly as a hip hop city has more influence on my music than the actual people coming out of Philly. I do enjoy the Roots, Jill Scott and others, but I wouldn’t say that they necessarily influenced my music directly. But hip hop is THE MUSIC of Philly. It’s the dance music, the party music, the chillout music… everything. It influences all aspects of life in the city, you can’t escape it.

Media Contender:
The opening track on the album is the instrumental Gutter Music (which is like Wiley getting his nuts clamped in a vice by a raving electro gypsy) is getting a 12″ release on Blackdown’s Keysound label with a vocal from Durrty Goods. Dare I say it a match made in heaven. Did you have an input in the link up?
Starkey:
Yes it is! My VIP mix will also be on the 12″ and digital release. Blackdown hit me up a few months back because he was interested in hearing some of my newer tunes and writing about me in his Pitchfork article. So “Gutter Music” was one of the tracks I sent him. Both he and Dusk were really into the track and offered to release it on Keysound. I always knew that I’d want to re-work the tune for a vocal, and when he suggested Durrty Goodz I was like, “umm… yeah… of course.” So, the rest is history now. The record should be dropping in the early new year. I’m definitely very excited about it. I’ve done tunes with Ghetto and Kano in the past, but they were just mixtape tracks. This is a real release, which is much different.

Media Contender:
Even though your tunes are fiercely instrumental with no real need to extra vocal furniture, do you have any further plans to link with MC’s or singers for your productions?
Starkey:
Yes definitely. I love vocals. Much of what makes my sets and the sets that Dev79 and I play when we tag with each other, different from others is the heavy use of vocals. I’m already working on some tunes with a few other people, but don’t want to say names at this point. Hopefully some of them will surface in the next year or so, possibly for album 2.

Media Contender:
The Generation Bass show on Radio One really helped roll you out on a larger platform, even though you have been plugging away for a number of years. How was that experience and how has it changed things?
Starkey:
It was great. I was flattered when Jamie and Roly (Vex’d) asked me to be a part of the event. That show definitely allowed a larger audience to hear my music, which I am forever grateful for.

Media Contender:
What’s next for Slit Jockey?
Starkey:
Well we just released a DZ 12″ of his Bobby Caldwell rmx and Regulate on Slit Jockey. But the next records we’re doing are going to be Seclusiasis Records. There’s a Raffertie 12″ EP almost finished, along with a Dev79 12″ single of what I feel is THE first street bass track “In Ya Face”. But there will definitely be more Slit Jockey releases on the way as well. Just nothing concrete yet.

Media Contender:
What does 2009 hold for Starkey?
Starkey:
BIG THINGS!!!!!…haha….I hope. Definitely playing a bunch of shows and working on the next album. I’ve also just finished some remixes, which I’m really excited about. One for Armand Van Helden, for Southern Fried Records, and the other for DANCE AREA, for Erol Alkan’s new Phantasy label.

Ephemeral Exhibits is out now on Planet Mu.
Discover Starkville for yourself here: Starkey on Myspace, and Starkey Music