DSI catches up with Groove Armada after their headline set at Homelands. They’ve just rocked seven thousand people, “probably the biggest crowd we’ve ever played to” and not everyone would be up for being grilled by Sister Midnight. In fact, it seems Andy’s shy, so Tom Findlay does the chatting. He’s a relaxed, salt-of-the-earth type and the conversation flows easily. He feels the gig’s been a success, “it’s the traditional start of the clubbing year… the future of dance music is still alive and well”.

That said, the line-up seems rockier than ever!
I think it’s a difficult time, I’m a believer in that Tony Francis theory of music moving in cycles: you know, rock music’s refreshed itself a lot in recent years by going back to the basics, bands like The White Stripes... And I kinda feel dance music’s doing the same thing, it’s kinda re-orienting itself with its roots, and that’ll take time to come through. I’m not sure these big events are the best way for dance to project itself. Points at Sister Midnight's Acieeed Smiley bag These are the days we need to get back to!

Er, can you say that, headlining the main stage here?!
Yeah, I can cos they’ll probably still book me next year anyway.
It’s a very credible, cool line-up, but maybe they needed to put a few of the cheesier people in, just for the numbers. I’m not gonna name names, I’ll get myself into trouble! There’s a lack of cheese here, and cheese does sell tickets. I'd have thought the organiser would’ve hoped there’d be more people here. But from my point of view, it doesn’t seem to have made it a bad gig… Bestival - which is gonna be a big festival this summer – was quiet last year, but it was a great festival, and as long as the spirit’s there, you can still make it work. It was good today. I did worry when I came in, but we seemed to get a really good, healthy crowd.

How does DJing compare to playing live?
It’s totally different, like tv and radio. I can’t really say. When you play live it’s a very intense experience, it’s a better projection of ourselves when we play live, cos we’re basically playing other people’s records when we DJ – which are good records, but they’re not ours! So the live thing’s where we really do ourselves justice, I think, and it’s something we do really well…

People might be surprised at the difference in your sound.
Yeah, we do ‘stick it in a bit’ when we DJ. I do totally different sets, I can play in lovely, little, sweaty clubs and play funk and all the stuff I grew up loving. When you’re on the main stage at Homelands, in front of 7,000 people, it’s gets a bit more ‘meat’n’two veg’ and you gotta stick to it.

What do you think of dance’s current electro direction? Who’re you into?
I think that’s great, cool – I mean it’s still house music and it still obeys the same rules and it’s a bit ‘Emperor’s new clothes’ but I love it. You know, Tiefshwarz are really brilliant, been doing amazing things for a long time; I love Plantlife, a funky outfit from out of LA, who’re playing the [Lovebox] festival, as well as Mylo – I’m plugging the festival, but I wouldn’t have booked them otherwise, they’re two bands I really respect. All power to Mylo, he’s that little bit younger than us, and it’s kinda his time. I’m really pleased for him and he’s been making great music.

Go on then, tell us about Lovebox…
I’ve gotta plug Lovebox, cos we’ve been working that hard at it. I’m proud of the fact it’s an independent festival, one of the few not backed by Mean Fiddler or SJM. Anyway, cut to the chase, it’s in Hackney, Victoria park, July 23rd and 24th, it’s gonna be brilliant and quite cheap.

Why’s it moving from Clapham Common?
We had problems with things like dB limits, really boring things, which made us feel like we couldn’t make Clapham work the way we wanted to. And Hackney’s kinda closer to us, it’s where I live… where most of our mates, most of those DJs live… So basically we just gotta get out of bed, brush our teeth and stagger down there, much easier!
It is very hip, but it’s a really exciting part of the world and Victoria Park will look lovely in July, the cherry blossoms are out and that’s worth 30 quid alone.

So what else are you up to?
We’ve had a ‘Best Of’, that was fine. We’re doing a residency in Ibiza this summer at Space. Then after that, it’s new album time. Andy’s living in Barcelona, I’m living in London and we’re going to record an album together.

What, in two different cities?!
It totally works really… We’ve been sat in the same studio together for about ten years, and actually we’re gonna do things a bit different this time round and we’re gonna be working in separate studios. It’s good you know, really healthy. We are a bit like a married couple. He knows about my digestive problems and things like that, and it’s all fine. It works better that way, we’re very happy!

How’s it affecting the sound?
With the Best Of, we kinda feel we’ve got the monkey off our back and we don’t need… We’ve done that with At The River and Superstylin’ and I See You Baby and stuff. We’re kinda moving on, we’re just gonna do what we wanna do this time, like when we made our first, first record (which was Northern Star on Tummy Touch) and just be a bit self-indulgent. I mean, I think Radio 1’s really good at the moment, it’s got a great playlist, but I’m not gonna get worked up about that this time round. I just wanna make a good record that I’m proud of and tour it. Without being too smug, we’re big enough that we can do that still, without feeling like we have to have the hits, or the platinum album. So we’re just gonna enjoy it this time.

For more info on line-up, times and tickets: LOVEBOX WEEKENDER