NOTE : The following are Jason Harding's responses to Re:mix's questions which formed a side-bar to the Wellington music scene article.

Why do you think the Wellington music scene has been producing such good
music of late?

"Look at acts like Jet Jaguar, The Nomad, Trinity Roots, The Black Seeds, Fat
Freddy's Drop, and The Phoenix Foundation. These are all guys that have been
working on their art, and their crafting of it, for six or seven years in some cases.
Same with producers like Mu and Mike Gibson. So on one level it's partly a case
of simple time and effort, combined with pure, God-given talent obviously. On a
separate-but-related level there's acts like Mephisto Jones, DJ Vee, Audio
Sauce and Stylus77, and producers like Dr Lee Prebble, who've worked with
and around a lot of that first bunch of people and acts I mentioned, and they've
drawn inspiration and ideas from them, and been able to articulate their ideas a
lot quicker thanks to that 'mentoring' relationship. There's a flipside to it as well
where people see and hear acts and think "I could do better than that…" and go
off and try just that. It's the balance of keeping your ego in check and being able
to support, respect and even love your peers, but still thinking and acting for your
own ego and its own ambitions. Most people in the Wellington context are pretty
grounded though, so keeping the ego checked isn't a big ask for them. Labels
like us and LOOP fostering that talent helps too I guess, but that's just an un-
checked ego talking (haha)."

How is Wellington beneficial for your business?

"To be perfectly honest it's pretty much essential as our parent company is based
here, so in the big picture view it simply wouldn't have happened otherwise, "ain't
nothing going on but the rent" y'know. Financial requirements notwithstanding,
we would never have done the label had we not had the wonderful music our
friends and whanau were making stuck in our heads for the five or so years up to
the end of 2001 when we kicked Capitalrecordings off. Since then it's become
fairly well essential. We are involved with acts from Auckland and other parts of
the country as well, and Aussie in Jet Jaguar's case, but everything we do ties
back to Wellington in one way or another, be it production or recording or
inspiration or Mum and Dad."

What is needed to maintain the standard of music high in Wellington?

"Continually shit weather will help obviously. It keeps the peeps indoors practicing
or writing or recording. For serious though, it's the odd 'X' factor that makes
people want to call Wellington home that'll keep it rocking. It keeps people
coming back here from trips overseas and touring to write and record their music
in a place that they feel comfortable, surrounded by understanding, respect, and
love from their peers, friends and family. Oh, and thank God for e-mail too I must
say."

What are the goals of your record label?

"To help artists develop their creativity to the fullest extent possible within a
commercial context that allows us to be at least self-sustaining, hopefully
profitable and, best case scenario : stupidly fuck-off bling bling rich."

Used courtesy of Re:Mix