From his early days working at the local Kwik Save - which paid for his vinyl addiction - Mr Scruff has always done what it takes to achieve.

Electro, hip hop, house, & 80’s soul was the base for his musical experience but he didn't stop there, going on to learn more about blues, disco, funk, soul, reggae, jazz, african and latin music. He's worked very closely with Mark Rae for Grand Central which turned into a very strong musical relationship including many a 4 deck club performance. He also had some battles with DJ Food who in turn helped open the door for his influential signing on the Ninja Tune label in 99. As well as providing a great platform for his releases Ninja Tune put Scruff on tour with some of their artists include Roots Manuva and The Herbaliser.

Mr Scruff has been DJing for some twenty years now, a lifetime in dance music. He's also been recording his own material for the last fifteen of that period, and this month his many admirers have the chance to get their mitts on his first album, androgynously titled 'Mr. Scruff', now re-mastered and re-released on Ninjatune. In honour of this event, RA gave him a call at his Manchester home. First things first - what does he think of the new version?

"Well I was involved in the project every step of the way. When I started out I was quite inexperienced, and didn't know what mastering was all about. Now it's ten years down the line I know what to expect. Certain tracks have been quite radically overhauled and I was really pleased with them. It's true a lot of people didn't know this album existed, but with 'Keep It Unreal' around, that was quite understandable. 'Mrscruff' was released before Ninja raised my profile quite a bit, and was almost like those times in the 1960s, where jazz musicians would press up to 500 copies of an album prior to signing to someone like Atlantic. Unless you're a proper trainspotter you wouldn't know these things exist!"

I'm interested to know how the thinks the musical style may have evolved between albums. "I'm not sure really. I have quite an open approach, and I'm never sure what I'm going to do when I go into the studio, other than enjoy myself. I started off with a really wide remit and haven't even got close to exhausting it yet. There's certain things I won't try, like deep house or nu school breaks - certain things I can't do or don't like. I know nu school breaks are massive in Australia but I think they're dreadful, with oriental samples and siren noises. Some deep house I'm not into as well, it's pretty lazy and full of cliches."

Mr Scruff (real name Andy Carthy) started DJing with cassettes in the 1980s, his method of switching between tracks a low technology approach - pressing the stop button! He confirms however that this period holds a considerable influence over his current way of thinking. "Of course, yeah. I was never a specialist DJ, and house music would be stuff across the board from Chicago to the New Jersey sounds like Blaze. You couldn't afford to specialise too much in those days, whereas now there's so many specialist DJs. I'm not saying that no-one should be a specialist - I really admire people like Louie Vega or Frankie Knuckles, bouncing around between all those reference points, but so many people are doing it because they don't take any risks. It's like a diet of chips and burgers, you soon get tired of the same thing after a while."

At the moment Carthy says he's having fun, doing a few gigs and working on the next installment of the Solid Steel mix series. "I approach music in the same way each time, having fun but not under too much pressure. Ninja really respect that as well, they give me a chance to breathe".

Scruff has two regular UK residencies, in Etch (Brighton) and the Keep It Unreal night, every first Saturday in Manchester. "They're both really important to me," he says "and are an integral part of, a base from which to work. I love knowing the general way the crowd behaves, the room, the security - I like having that insight, whereas some venues you can't be so sure they'll like what you put on".

"I don't like the sound of MP3. You still can't beat
hearing a record on a good sound system, and anyway...
I don't particularly trust computers!"

As far as formats are concerned, he prefers to stick with vinyl for now. "I don't like the sound of MP3. You still can't beat hearing a record on a good sound system, and anyway I don't particularly trust computers! You won't learn as much as you do from a record cover, either - who's on it, who produced it - you don't get that on MP3. I'm interested in pulling back the curtains a bit, seeing what's inside."

Finally we talk about TV and radio, fuelled by my curiosity to know if it pisses him off when 'Get A Move On' gets played on so much British reality tripe. "There's loads of programmes on TV, and there's nothing I can do about it. Once you let your music out there you don't have a choice of what to do with it. Every time some naff celebrity does something over my tune, I think of some French teacher who's been using 'Fish' as a teaching aid. The money helps as well! It is odd though; 'Get A Move On' was deemed "too specialist" by Radio 1 but now it's on daytime TV loads! It shows how safe and unimaginative radio programming is - I'd much rather hear something like Juice in Brighton than some bland hairdresser radio".

And there we leave it - Carthy is a contented man it seems, as long as the input into his music remains un-policed and un-pressured. It's what's helped him become one of Britain's least pretentious, most knowledgeable and most appreciated DJs.