THE waters surrounding Arisaig are rightly renowned for marine mammals. But next month the west highland village will be welcoming a different kind of aquatic creature to their shores as DJ Dolphin Boy visits the Astley Hall to preview his hotly anticipated Sketch remix album.

The DJ and producer has been working on his re-interpretation ever since a Hogmanay conversation with Sketch lynchpin Iain Copeland on Knoydart.

“We just got talking about how rare it was to have gigs like that where we were having a great time and getting fairly paid,” says Dolphin Boy aka Andy Levy. “We’re both a bit long in the tooth now and we thought we should maybe combine forces.

“I’d been making unreleasable bootlegging music for dj sets for ages, sampling stuff I really have no business sampling and Iain said to me he could provide me with all the stems from the Sketch albums, the fiddles and the pipes and the mandolins, as well as his synths and beats, so we decided we’d do that. For him, it’s quite an economical way of making a new album,” adds Levy.

However, with Sketch – Copeland on percussion and synths, Charlie Stewart on fiddle, Angus Binnie on pipes, Pablo Lafuente on guitar, Seamus MacLennan on mandolin and Darren Maclean, vocals – already having a less than traditional sound, the challenge was to reinterpret traditional tracks that had already been given a modern spin.

“Sketch don’t play traditional folk music by any stretch,” admits Levy. “I decided, however, that I wasn’t going to use any of Iain’s parts – the beats and the synths – as I wanted to get away from what Sketch sound like already, which is kind of techno, trance-type of stuff. I thought I’d try and do something else with it.

“However, I was limited by the fact that a lot of the tracks are pretty fast. They’re all up in the 126 beats per minute range – the kind of house music speed. So I was able to slow a couple of tracks down to get some variation but I was generally stuck with those fast beats. I couldn’t make a chill-out album of it.

“So I tried to go round the genres and thought: ‘I’ll try a bit of blues on this one, or a bit of electro swing’. I’ve got some breakbeat stuff, some deep house, it has a bit of variety.”

Levy’s musical journey to trad remixer and DJ of choice for the folk music world has been a long and varied one.

His first musical epiphany came thanks to his older brother, who was at that time into punk.

“My big brother took me to see The Clash when I was pretty young and then I got into dance music. But I’ve always just liked music, as long as it’s sincerely meant, you know? Anything that isn’t too manufactured.”

From there he moved through the genres until the dance revolution of the late 1980s when he began to make mix-tapes and hand them out. He then chipped in with a friend to buy an Atari computer with Cubase on it and began to experiment.

“We didn’t really know what we were making. Neither of us knew what we were doing at that point. It was just general electronic stuff using samples,” says Levy.

Levy’s real epiphany, however, came when he started to use traditional music set to house and hip-hop beats. It was not, however, a conscious decision.

“I lived in a flat with a couple of members of Shooglenifty and I had been making music using samples from different types of what was referred to then as ‘world music’ and I suddenly realised I was surrounded by all these great Celtic musicians and I should maybe be using their music instead of using African or Arabic music.

“Then I started getting a few gigs on the back of some mixes I had done and shortly after I got asked to provide ‘a couple of hours of electronic folk music’ for a festival in Cork which set me off on the course I’m on now, I guess.”

On the back of these early mixes, Donald Shaw then asked Levy to remix a compilation from his record label, Vertical Records, which became the Vertical Variations album.

“It just seemed a natural progression at the time.There just seemed to be a bit of an unfilled niche,” adds Levy.

Dolphin Boy has since been a regular at festivals and trad gigs since, travelling the world with his eclectic mixes and taking his unique take on traditional music to places as varied as China, Georgia and Rajasthan.

It’s a life that has yet to lose its lustre, and Levy insists he still enjoys travelling and bringing music to new audiences.

But for the last few months his home has been his studio, as the release of the Sketch remix album neared completion.

“I made it to Knochengorroch and to Eigg but otherwise I’ve been pretty much at my computer,” says Levy. “We’d given ourselves this deadline, myself and Iain, that we wanted to have something ready in time for this July 14 gig in Arisaig. So there was a bit of pressure to have the album ready by then.”

DESPITE the time pressure, and the long, lonely days at the computer, Levy says he is happy with the finished product.

“It feels like nothing is ever finished but you have to let it go at some point. I’ve had just enough time to do this and not so much that I end up mucking about and overcooking stuff so I’m pretty happy. But then like everything else I’ll hear it in a year or so and think: ‘Ach, I wish I hadn’t used that hi-hat’ or something. But that’s inevitable.”

As for the future, are there other trad bands around that inspire? And would Levy look to replicate the Sketch experience with a different band?

“There’s plenty of people around doing interesting stuff. There’s a band called Yoko Pwno who are recording an album on Skye Records with Iain soon. And the stuff they have is really good and interesting.

“There doesn’t seem to be many people pushing the boundaries just now. Or perhaps they are pushing the boundaries in different ways that I’m too ignorant to notice but very few seem to be trying anything outside of the box. But maybe these things just go in cycles.”

For now, though, Levy is happy to plough his own furrow. And, with Sketch remixed, that singular vision is set to be unleashed on a whole new audience.

DJ Dolphin Boy plays Astley Hall in Arisaig with Sketch on July 14
For more information go to: www.totalsketch.com