Mo’ Wax — Where Are They Now: Innerzone Orchestra (1996)
Mo’ Wax was a record label started by James Lavelle in 1992, which closed about ten years later. Initially they released 12" singles and licensed a compilation from Japan of Japanese Hip Hop, until 1994 when they began releasing albums of their artists original work. While some of these artists such as DJ Shadow, DJ Krush, and Money Mark continued releasing music after Mo’ Wax closed, others have seemingly disappeared from the music scene. In this series I will look at each artist on Mo’ Wax and try to find out where are they now…
Innerzone Orchestra was originally a solo project run by Carl Craig which released their debut 12" on Craig’s Planet E record label in 1992. The 12" featured Innerzone Orchestra’s Bug in the Bassbin on one side, and two songs by Craig’s Shop project on the other. Planet E also released a compilation in 1992 called Intergalactic Beats featuring Bug in the Bassbin and others, with most of the tracks written by Craig under aliases.
Soon Bug in the Bassbin became an underground hit in England, as DJ’s began playing the song at 45 rpm which sped up the beats and created a sound more like that of Drum and Bass. Craig spoke with Clash Music about the song in 2009:
When I first heard a DJ playing ‘Bug In The Bassbin’, I knew they were playing it faster than normal, but I didn’t really have the concept of how it would inspire people. I knew that I wanted to inspire, but I didn’t have any idea of how it would be an integral part of inspiring guys to make breakbeat or drum and bass or whatever. I mean, breakbeat itself was something that was going on at the time when I made ‘Bug…’, with Shut Up And Dance [UK pioneers of old skool breaks and rave], that kind of stuff. But when people were inspired by ‘Bug…’ to make early drum and bass, I had no clue that would be the case.
Meanwhile, James Lavelle had become a fan of Carl Craig’s work and began inviting him to contribute remixes for Mo’ Wax. The first of these released was Ravers Suck Our Sound for La Funk Mob in 1994, followed by the Spoon remix of Rob Dougan’s Clubbed To Death in 1995.
In April 1995 Craig made an appearance at Lavelle’s Headz club night, and in Muzik’s July 1995 issue they announced James Lavelle had licensed Bug In The Bassbin for Mo’ Wax, later announcing that Lavelle had been in Detroit working with Carl Craig.
Innerzone Orchestra had laid dormant since 1992, but in 1996 Bug In The Bassbin was finally re-released on both Planet E and Mo’ Wax, with the Mo’ Wax version featuring new exclusive remixes, such as Carl Craig’s Jazz Mix. Craig discussed the revitalisation of Innerzone Orchestra and Bug In The Bassbin in 1999:
…it started mainly when James Lavelle and I came to an agreement that Mo Wax would reissue the record and we would get a small budget to do my own idea of a remix, the “Jazz Mix.” That’s where the whole idea of expanding the Innerzone Orchestra came from, was just me getting into doing that mix.
It originally came out on a compilation called Intergalactic Beats, the vinyl version of that. And we sold that in different coloured vinyl versions, as a double on grey marble, and as a single on red, blue and all kinds of different colours, up until maybe 1994/5. So maybe until a year before Mo Wax put it out we were still selling it as part of our catalogue, and it was still selling quite well. So it wasn’t a song that was dormant when they picked it up. It was a track that had made it’s bones on the drum & bass side of things, or the beginnings of the drum & bass side of things, as well as on the techno side of things. It just got more hype through the drum & bass outlets in the UK to where it actually got picked up.
In September 1996, Mo’ Wax’s Bug In The Bassbin reached #68 in the UK Singles Chart, and #73 in the Scottish Singles Chart. The song also appeared on Mo’ Wax’s Headz 2B compilation in November 1996, which reached #34 in the UK Compilations Chart.
This wasn’t the last time Carl Craig worked with Mo’ Wax, as the label would release As One’s Planetary Folklore in 1997 and a handful of releases from Sherard Ingram’s Urban Tribe project, both of which Craig contributed to. But outside of these collaborations Craig had moved on from Mo’ Wax, and when Innerzone Orchestra released their debut album Programmed in 1999 it was released by Talkin’ Loud in the UK.
Part of the reason for the label change may have been due to how Innerzone Orchestra embraced its Jazz influences further, as Craig took on more of an arranger position and brought in other musicians to contribute. He would explain to Billboard that the idea for this new direction came after creating the Jazz Mix of Bugs In The Bassbin for Mo’ Wax:
My remix was more associated with jazz than techno…Francisco Mora was the drummer for that project, and because he had played with Sun Ra’s Arkestra, I was really excited to work with him. But utilzing live musicians and intergrating them with my own concepts, I was able to develop something new. The ‘Bug In The Bassbin’ remix got really high praises, so I just decided to go on from there with the Innerzone Orchestra.
Programmed credits Francisco Mora on percussions, Craig Taborn on piano, and also Carl Craig himself, creditted as Blakula providing keyboards and bass. Richie Hawtin also appears on one track, with Craig and Hawtin previously both providing remixes for La Funk Mob on Mo’ Wax’s Casse Les Frontières, Fou Les Têtes En L’Air.
Programmed received mixed to favourable reviews, with Muzik awarding it 3/5 and concluding that while the album wasn’t “a disaster which often comes with artistic detours of this kind,” it also wasn’t “as exciting as it believes it is.” In their review they singled out the new recording of Bug In The Bassbin as no match for the original.
In their August 1999 issue Wire reviewed Programmed and also complained about the new versions of tracks like Bug In The Bassbin, explaining that “regardless of their qualities, their inclusion transforms a potentially radical album into a merely good one.” While they had their complaints, overall they were positive, but felt “greatness is within Carl Craig’s grasp now, yet he is not quite there.”
Outside of the UK, JazzTimes thought it was brilliant, Vibe called it “a revelatory work”, Spin awarded it 8/10, and All Music 4.5/5 explaining, “If Programmed can be faulted at all, it’s for the sense that Craig is doing too much here, tackling too many different styles of music; the fact is, that feeling exists for only a short time until the album’s many facets come together with surprising grace.”
In the UK Programmed entered the Hip Hop and R&B Albums Top 40 Chart at #38 where it peaked, and the album was toured, with Craig taking his MPC 3000 sampler to perform alongside live musicians across Europe and North America.
Following the release and tour of Programmed, Innerzone Orchestra went mostly quiet again outside of a tour in 2009, and have not released anything since their debut. But Carl Craig has continued to be prolific, and returned to Jazz in 2002 for The Detroit Experiment, and in 2009 for Tribe’s Rebirth.
More recently in 2017, Craig released his album Venus. Described as “one of his boldest endeavors to date”, Venus saw Craig combining Techno and Classical music, collaborating with pianist Francesco Tristano to transform several of Craig’s Techno songs into Classical pieces. This was followed by 2019’s Detroit Love, a mix album released on Craig’s Planet E and !K7.
During 2020, Craig has taken part in a live performance at Junction 2, a virtual festival which was streamed online, and has also continued to present Detroit Love, his show on Worldwide FM which began in 2018. 2020 also saw Carl Craig present a sound installation which was commissioned for New York’s Dia gallery. The installation, titled Party/After-Party, will run until Summer 2021, and features an original 20 minute experimental piece played in a basement meant to evokes a warehouse club event.
