Chase and Status are sick of seeing “too much wasted talent not making it” because of systemic issues in music.
The iconic drum and bass duo, who got started in 2003 and burst onto the scene when they collaborated with Plan B on 2009’s End Credits, have opened up about their career has been focused on “developing and working with new generations”.
Will Kennard, AKA Status, told The Big Issue magazine: “We were seeing too much wasted talent not making it because the way the system is set up is not very fair.
“Music education has been cut massively at state level. So unless you have a lot of money or go to private school, you don’t have as much access to that world, which is ridiculous.
“Because the best kids often aren’t from those worlds.”
Will and his brother set up East London Arts and Music a decade ago, and they are planning to “open more schools”.
Will and bandmate Saul Milton (Chase) are living a life beyond their wildest dreams.
He explained: “Our dreams were never this big – so we achieved our dreams a long time ago. And that is an amazing thing to be able to say.
“We dreamed of DJing at The End. That felt like the pinnacle. Just being part of such a cool scene and being accepted into it as professional DJs was a dream.
“Everything from then on was a whirlwind.”
Chase and Status have gone onto play Glastonbury, but the iconic festival was never something that was even “on their radar”.
Will added: “Our younger selves would not have even understood what the hell we were talking about if we’d said we would end up playing with a band at Glastonbury.
“It was not on our radar. We were vinyl-collecting kids obsessed with smashing up a rave in front of 300 people.”
And they never would have expected their music could top the charts.
Will said: “It was so underground. We were making then music that your mum didn’t understand and that wasn’t on the radio.
“There was no way of hearing it unless you went to an underground club or listened to pirate radio. Back then, Steps were at Number One.
“So the idea that the weird stuff we were making in our dark room could be a number one record like we had [with 2024’s Backbone, featuring Stormzy] would have been so weird.”