Rob Da Bank

From his earliest years, Rob da Bank has been absorbed with music. As a kid he played trombone in his dads brass band, was a teenage Goth and a bass playing indie kid. Later on he bought decks and developed a love for dance music. A career in the industry was a natural step; he took on the role of teaboy at Muzik magazine where he became a respected journalist. A decade ago he created the easy going Sunday Best club, which ran for seven years in Clapham and spawned an admired label, now home to Grand National, Lazyboy, Max Sedgley, Subway and others. Although he’s DJed in clubs for many years, Rob feels broadcasting is his first love. He has two shows on Radio 1; the anything-goes early morning ‘Blue Room’ and cutting edge ‘One Music’. Rob has recorded a number of compilations, most recently for Sunday Best, and has spent the last two years curating his own festival, ‘Bestival’.

“I never thought my DJing would take off, never thought doing the radio would actually happen, never thought the record label would go anywhere… it’s only been within the last couple of years that anything more has come out of it and that’s great. But I could’ve easily seen myself having to do something else in my life, apart from dance music, any point up until a couple years ago.” Rob da Bank

Fabric 24 is an enticing, quirky collection of tracks fluidly combined with the help of Ableton Live. Opening with the broken beats of the ‘Balkan Hot Step’ and ‘Preacher Man’, Sunday Best favourite Soul Mekanik asks if we ‘Wanna Get Wet’. Heading into sexy melodic techno, Michael Mayer cooks up ‘Lovefood’, uber- producer Nathan Fake offers the bleepy ‘Dinamo’ and James Holden gloriously reworks ‘The Sky Is Pink’. There’s sublime atmospheric house from Triola, Plastikman’s insane scattered beats, the Phones remix of The Futureheads indie-pop ‘Hounds Of Love’ and Whitey’s ‘A Walk In The Dark’. Moving to darker territory with the growling club mix of ‘Bleach’, Rob twists the mix with the sunny sounds of Pépé Kallé and heads back to the dancefloor for brooding techno from Ananda and Vitalic. We finish on a high with a classic cut from Mr Fingers, and there’s just time for ‘one more’, the original cut of ‘Your Love’.

“The Roger Milla track is included as a tribute to John [Peel]. I first heard it on his show. When I took over the shows it was something we played for the same reason. That’s his record, totally… I suppose I’m somewhere between John Peel and … well, a DJ!” Rob da Bank