Don’t expect new music music from veteran electronic producer Fatboy Slim (aka Norman Cook) any time soon, with the artist revealing that live shows have taken over as his main focus in recent years.
Cook, who began his professional musical career as a member of indie rock outfit The Housemartins in the ’80s, has been an electronic producer since his work with Beats International at the advent of the ’90s, ultimately going solo as Fatboy Slim in 1996.
Though massively popular in his native U.K., Cook’s success also extended globally, with his breakthrough record – 1998’s You’ve Come a Long Way, Baby – reaching No. 34 on the Billboard 200, and third single “Praise You” hitting No. 36 on the Hot 100. However, he’s been largely absent from the charts for most of the past two decades, with his 2004 album Palookaville arriving as his last studio album to date.
Instead, Cook has largely turned his focus towards his live show, though new music does arrive sporadically. In 2024 alone, Cook released the singles “Role Model” and “Bus Stop Please”, which were his first new tracks since 2022’s “Speed Trials on Acid” with Carl Cox.
Speaking to British publication The Sun’s Bizarre column recently, Cook explained that his output has slowed dramatically due a lack of passion for creating new material.
“My last two singles just came out of a live show,” he explained. “They were both things that I made just to play on the side. I had tunes that nobody else had in my set. And that kind of caught on with people when we worked out that we could clear the samples and release them.
“The thing is, you can’t make music unless you’re absolutely passionate about it and it drives you from the moment you wake up in the morning,” he added. “I just don’t seem to feel like that any more. I feel like that about DJing and about putting on things like this, but I’ve kind of lost my passion for making music.”
In 2010, Cook collaborated with Talking Heads frontman David Byrne for Here Lies Love, a joint concept and soundtrack album about Imelda Marcos, the former first lady of the Philippines. To date, this is the closest thing he’s come to making a new full-length record, though he admits to struggling with a sense of obligation alongside his live sets.
“For five years, I tried to beat myself up about it and go, ‘You should be doing this’, but then I thought, ‘Well, everybody likes my DJing and I enjoy that more, so I’ll do that’,” he continued. “I’m hoping that one day the passion will come back.”
