Finn: Mostly spending as much time as possible with my wife and daughter, family and friends. I have been constantly DJing and working on a lot of other things for years and years and I used this unexpected time off to take a break, but I am also catching up with all the books and films I gathered for some occasion, and other interests I had to neglect due to too little time or too many distractions. Else I have not played a club gig since March. As I am a seasoned DJ I sometimes wondered how it would feel to retire at some point, and I guess I know now, and I realized that I am not yet ready for it. I still buy as much music as I can still afford, and I do radio shows and podcasts with it, and I try to be up to date with what is still happening. Generally I try to act as responsible as I can in this situation and make the best of it.
Pete: My girlfriend moved in and we used the unexpected time off to settle down. I am also still working at Hard Wax once a week, and I practice my daily Yoga routines. As far as DJing is concerned, I played a few open air gigs that met the necessary regulations. But only until the beginning of November.
How has lockdown been for you both?
Pete: I could never really develop some kind of lockdown routine. It just felt just too absurd to spend most of your life indoors, in your own space. Like not being able to meet friends where and when you want, to visit a restaurant, cultural activities, and so on. But we try to adapt to it, and make the best of what we can still do.
Finn: A lot of what I have been doing for decades fell apart within a very short time, and that was quite frightening. But Macro, the label I run with Stefan Goldmann, did not stop, and most importantly I did not have much time to brood over the situation as Paloma, the club I have been doing the booking for in the past few years, shut down in March and pretty much instantly went into crisis management mode. We organized a successful crowdfunding campaign, a series of exhibitions, a quarantine podcast, fashion items and set up a label, and we are constantly thinking about other ideas to keep the club going and support our network. So thankfully I was quite busy, and I still am. Hopefully this will keep up until things swing back into action, and I kind of ignore the possibility that they might not.
Which artist and/or labels have caught your eye recently?
Finn: I was quite happy with the way UK Garage came back, there is a lot of interesting fresh new stuff on labels like Instinct, Dr. Banana, Vitamin D, and many others. On a disco tip I think Javi Frias, Snips, Very Polish-Cut Outs and the Sound Metaphors camp are doing mighty fine edits, and in terms of house music I think labels like Must Be On Wax, Blaq Numbers, Random Mind State, or Distant Horizons are well worth checking out. As a quite loyal soul I still cling to artists like Jeff Mills, Nature Boy, Kai Alcé, Dave Lee, Hanna, Boo Williams, Pépé Bradock and friends like Dynamo Dreesen, SVN, SW., Fett Burger, Lowtec and the whole Workshop posse, they all keep on delivering. But, as many others, I spend more time with music at home now, and there I am mostly listening to old soul music and new hip hop, and according mentions would definitely blow up this frame.
Pete: I still dig what old friends are doing, like Sleeparchive, Shed, or Surgeon. I also enjoyed current releases by Ploy, the Zenker Brothers or Leibniz. The recent albums by Autechre and Actress also really blew me away.
With clubs closed, this period has been difficult for DJs. What do you make of the government’s response?
Finn: Well, this period has been difficult for almost anybody. In hindsight a lot of decisions how to handle the pandemic were obviously too late and probably too hesitant. The virus hit hard because practically only few goverments were at least a bit ready and well equipped to handle such a situation, and more often than not they were simply overwhelmed with the quick rise of infections and how it affected the whole system. Some countries were run by incompetent politicians that had no real clue how to answer it, and still have not. The fact that there were so many populists in charge sure did not help either, and that hey had so many supporters that believed them. Rather expectedly the cultural sector was the first to go down, and will probably be the last to come up again. But we are also aware that Germany was not affected as badly as so many other countries. There were fundings and help programs early on, where in a lot of other countries people in creative professions were just left in the cold. But we understand if people in said professions get frustrated with how financial help is distributed, or when they get official advice to work in other fields or to apply for unemployment benefits, because what they have been doing for all their lives is just way down on the priority list. And on top of it there is the threat that many institutions and locations will just vanish, and nobody knows how they ever will be replaced, if at all. It is important to keep all this alive, but it is also important that the ones demanding support step out of their bubble and ask themselves if what they want to keep doing is a potential threat to many others right now. The virus is just very contagious, there is no cure as of yet, and reason and patience are key.
Where and when did you record this mix?
Finn: The mix was recorded live at Paloma on the evening of October 16th this year, using our usual setup of two turntables, a TR-909 drum machine, and a delay unit.
Can you talk about some of the artists that you’ve included?
Pete: A Power House night is a perfect opportunity to play music by artists I have really internalized over the years. With the selection for this set I wanted too express my love for Detroit music, as I often do. But in the process of preparing a Power House set I also often discover certain artists all over again. This time that was the case with Eddie Flashin’ Fowlkes.
Finn: In the past we often dedicated Power House nights to certain topics, but this time I just wanted to play some records that I had not used yet. In my case it turned out to be mostly pumping US 90s house, just because I was in the mood for it. The sound of these records is quite representative for what I play when I opt for that direction, and the overall sound was also more vital than the individual artists. But of course you can hear some people that often pop up in the Power House canon, like Masters at Work, Tony Rodriguez, Eddie Perez, the Melillo brothers, Jason Nevins, Scott Kinchen or Eddie Maduro. Shout out to the La Mona family in France for providing a rather obviously fitting intro track, and Hans Nieswandt, who gave the fledgling Paloma imprint a glorious unreleased track from the 90s that is just working hard. As for the outro, you have to keep in mind that Power House nights at Paloma usually go on for eight hours, and the last bit is often reserved for early morning bliss and odd ones out, and here we condensed it a bit. The Blaze acapella is blowing a kiss to our beloved crowd, we indeed were wishing you were there, and the last record is a kind of relief ending, and I cannot tell more about it than that it is a Japanese record I found in a cheapo bin and I loved it ever since.
What made this mix so memorable?
Finn: Playing music together again, and doing it where it all began, and like we always do. Of course we missed our dancers, but it felt good to realize that our dynamics can be activated in any context.
Pete: I wallowed in the memories quite a bit. Our nights together offered so many, and it all came back. Finn is a friend, and a selector capable contantly coming up with musical surprises. We swing each other up. And it felt great being able to use our setup of the delay unit, and mixing my live 909 beats with Finn’s acapellas. That combined makes it even more fun, and I think you can hear that.
Located near to its famous successor Berghain in a disused freight depot, Ostgut was open from 1998 until its lease ran out in 2003 and the location was demolished. It is telling that the name is still vital in the Berghain enterprise, and Ostgut already had a lot of key elements that are still thriving: marathon weekends with marathon DJ sets, with hard Techno played on the main floor and housier vibes on the already existing Panoramabar. And as Ostgut evolved from the male-only Snax parties, it carried the according focus on gay and fetish sex into a permanent, raw location. We asked Ostgut resident DJ André Galluzzi to guide us through the sound of the club that set the foundation for the clubbing experience Berlin became famous for in recent years.
We begin with a primetime highlight. This track guaranteed ecstasy on the floor and became a trademark for the club.
Ignacio – Virton (N.E.W.S., 1999)
It was not an unusual track, but definitely one of the naughty ones. Direct and mindblowing. I used to drop the track between 5 to 6 a.m.
Si Begg – Welcome To The Discotheque (Mosquito, 2000)
I loved to open my set with Si Begg after live acts. Because it has this incredible intro while the mood of the record was already defining for the night. This was brillant.
Martin Rev – Sparks Surgeon – Floorshow Part I A Ghetto Trax – Back 2 Da Beat DB-X – Electric Shock Blake Baxter – IR 020 B2 Random Noise Generation – Hysteria T++ – Space Break Midnight Caller – Callers’ Theme Futurhythm – Want Your Body Millsart – Inner Life (5 To 9) Millsart – Inner-Self Jeff Mills – Zenith Rebel Alliance – A1 LFO – Tied Up Container – Acclimator Ancient Methods – Kings & Pawns DJ Stingray 313 – Remote Viewing Cybersonik – Technarchy Mental Mayhem – Joey’s Riot Norman – Greenroom Robert Hood – A.M. Track Robert Hood – Alpha Suburban Knight – The Art Of Stalking Medusa Edits 1 – The Walk Nitzer Ebb – Join In The Chant Skatebård – Metal Chix Brian Harden – Play Time L’estasi Dell’oro – It Is Nothing What Nothing Is Marchant Etrian – Crystal Cars Suburban Knight – The Warning Philus -Kuvio 3 Aleksi Perälä – UK74R1405036 Sleeparchive – Null Sekunden Heatsick – Time Smudge Omar-S – Blade Runner Surgeon – Floorshow Part II B2 Surgeon – Atol H&M – Sleepchamber Missing Channel – Deadly Spell Octave One – Eniac DJ Bone – Struggle 2 Nina Anderson – Everyday Is Like Sunday Dark Comedy – Without A Sound Aaron-Carl – Tears Maurizio – Eleye
This show was a live recording in Ljubljana. A very interesting weekend. I spent time visiting the Radio Student archives and the city itself. The gig was quite wild. Very punky location. Crowd were rebels. I like rebels.
Flava D – Hold On VIP Alex Coulton – Break Pressure Joy Orbison & Boddika – In Here Four Tet + Terror Danjah – Killer Animal Youth – Sixty Four Zero KiNK – Sintezator Hissman – Nobody’s Talking Sneaky Traxx II – Bangin It Chicago Trackwerk Vol. 3 – Be Quiet DJ Disciple – Fixation Da Rebels – House Nation Under A Groove Gino Soccio – Dancer C.A.T.S. – Dancer Robert Hood – Dancer Pev & Asusu – Surge (MMM Remix) Dario Zenker – Cookin Bookin FunkinEven & Delroy Edwards – X Dungeon Acid – Astro Todd Osborn – What Is Love Asusu – Velez (A Made Up Sound Remix 1) Hodge – Renegades Pev & Kowton – Raw Code (Surgeon Remix) DJ Qu – Undescribed (Believer) Dan Trevitt – Squelch Vereker – Slain Crash Course In Science – Flying Turns Vellico – The Peace Signal Vernon Felicity – Static Character
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Although Rabih Beaini sure likes to improvise (check him performing live with his analogue setup whenever you can), he has managed to develop a puzzling signature sound that is as rough and ready as it is beautifully textured and detailed. In comparison to this album, most of 2011‘s other productions in electronic music sound like wringing a handful of mediocre ideas to death with a considerable array of gadgets, but no result. Truly individual music from a true individual.
02. Reel By Real: Surkit Chamber – The Melding (Artless)
Considering how long Martin Bonds was an active part of Detroit Techno’s history books, the actual released output was irritatingly scarce. Listening to 2010‘s retrospective on the same label, I had the feeling that he was perfectly fine with keeping his back catalogue slim but impressive. And then this came along, a collection of more recent tracks, and I just felt grateful that this lovingly curated album made public what could have been missed so easily, yet again. Employing a much wider set of references, this is the sound of Motor City transcending the paralysis of its own tradition and then some.
Admittedly some of the most determined space traveller’s recent output is not without flaws, but never enough so as to get me tired of his ongoing mission to refine his sound. Still, every single one of his releases seems to be more unique and consequent than the majority of Techno productions some are ready to dismiss him for. He has created his own universe, and he roams in it. His music has surpassed club credentials, and even if some of his concepts may be pretentious, I would never blame him for pursuing his interests and painting them with his increasingly more spaced-out sounds that are so obviously his own. Let others try to reach the point where they become their own reference. Most will be forgotten when Jeff Mills will be heading for yet another galaxy.
So many tales about the ruthless business tactics of the early Chicago House labels, and unfortunately most of them are true. I don’t even want to know how many gems have never seen the light of day because not every artist was willing and able to take a stand against that. I’m just grateful that sometimes things turn out how they should have, no matter how long it takes. This box set has not a track on it without the power to name and shame legions of clueless copycats. It is a testimony to musicians doing music because they just have to, even without anybody even having the chance to notice it. For every House afficionado still admiring the sheer beauty of their original Trax releases, they did more, in more styles, and now, at last, it can be heard.
It is almost ridiculous that Surgeon is regularly drawn into the debate about what will become of Dubstep since it embraced Techno. For certain, he does not have to worry to deliver less in a genre newly discovered than in a genre left behind. Both Dubstep and Techno owe a lot to his work as DJ and producer, and this album does not even stress that, it just shows how he keeps getting better and better with what he does, and how he will thus be ever important to what is going on.
It seemed that as soon as rumour spread about the two collaborating in a session, the album was about to be released. But it certainly does not sound like a quickfire result. It is impressively accomplished, and already after a short while in, you begin to care less about who contributed what to the proceedings. It is just what modern electronic music should sound like when two major talents get together and nothing less. Keep the continuum and post-whatever talk for those who artistically vanish trying.
07. Container: LP (Spectrum Spools)
And suddenly, among all the good ole warehouse days mimicry, be it by means of analogue equipment or software replica, appeared this album. And it blew most of the competition to bits. I still do not know much about the artist nor do I care. I just hope he continues with this considerably psychotic and no less gripping take on the sounds of way back when and transforming it into something way ahead. A fine example for that it is always better to deconstruct than to reconstruct your references. It just lasts longer.
08. Drums Off Chaos + Jens Uwe Beyer: Drums Off Chaos + Jens Uwe Beyer (Magazine)
One of the most interesting German labels around. All their releases so far do not only look great, they sound great as well. I do not have the slightest doubt that it will be this way for quite some time to come. I’m not particularly knowledgeable in the Krautrock area but enough to maintain that the label’s initial agenda to fuse the modern sound of Cologne with the vintage sound of the German experimental ‘70s is so well-executed that it not only matters but becomes something else entirely. And I trust those people to come up with surprises as well. This project is of course already convincing by the names of the people involved. Jaki Liebezeit is not one to rely on past laurels, and his drumming is as tight and complex as ever, plus it mingles perfectly with the sounds of Beyer’s synths. The generation gap is hereby closed.
I can quite understand some people having their doubts about the music of Ekoplekz. To the passing listener it might seem chaotic, unstructured, aimless even. Retrofuturism drawer opens, Ekoplekz disappears. I, however, am old enough to vividly remember the vast output of the ‘80s tape circuit and all the wonderful ideas that came with it. And the ideas of Ekoplekz are so wonderful that they merit whatever release he has in mind. Kudos to Punch Drunk for featuring someone not afraid to merge the UK progress in bass and beats with sounds lifted from a romantic take on all the library musicians and electronic sound experimentalists who never had their say. Keep soldering that DIY gear and make me happy!
10. Kid Creole & The Coconuts: I Wake Up Screaming (Strut)
Of course the Kid’s comeback could not compare to the masterpieces of his past. The Coconuts are not the same, nor is his band. But as with his cohort Coati Mundi’s recent album, the lyricist wit is still there, as are some of the songs. As if I would mind. For me August Darnell is a genius and forever will be, and just to know that he keeps on doing what he is doing is well enough for me.
Some newish techno cuts, mixed for the Italian Electronique.it podcast, now defunct.
Emika – Double Edge – Ninja Tune Skudge – Convolution (Aardvarck Remix) – Skudge Records D-Bridge – ZX81 (Shed Remix) – Fat City Recordings Ramadanman – Work Them (Swamp 81) Kode 9 – You Don’t Wash (Dub) – Studio !K7 Ikonika – Video Delays – Hyperdub Africa Hi Tech – How Does It Make You Feel – Warp Records Jared Wilson – Night Sky Jpeg – Lux Rec A Guy Called Gerald – In Ya Head – Perlon Head High – It’s A Power Thing (Power Cut) – Power House Baby Ford & Mark Broom – Bubblebath – Pure Plastic Surgeon – Floorshow Part II – Counterbalance Aux 88 – Electronic Underground – Puzzlebox
Right, we’re going to set it off with “Set It Off”. Basically with “Set It Off”, growing up in New York in the 70’s and 80’s, I grew up with my parents and my brother – my brother being a DJ since 1980, and there were a lot of musical roots in my household. I was always around music. Mostly disco and electro, stuff like that. Growing up with my parents in the 70’s, they were really big on disco and I was hearing everything from “Ten Percent” by Double Exposure to so many underground disco records, like from 76, Jimmy and the Vagabonds, or Crown Heights Affair. Old school disco. I always had roots in the family. My father also had a pretty big rock collection from the late 60’s – Sabbath, Zeppelin, psychedelic rock. That was played probably when I was really younger, but 74/75 my parents were already getting into disco at that time. The roots of the music were always there with me and I would buy records on the occasion. I remember buying Fatback Band’s “King Tim III” which was pretty much the first rap record, Michael Jackson – “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough”, “Let’s All Chant”, stuff like that. I was like 7 or 8 years old buying this stuff but I was never really into DJing at this time. My brother was the DJ. He was the one buying the records and DJing. He knew what was going on musically. I would say when I really first started to pay attention to music a lot, but I still was not a DJing, was around 83/84, and I was around 12 years old at the time and I was getting into graffiti which I was actually documenting on subway trains by photographs. I was travelling from Brooklyn to the Bronx. I was going everywhere with a camera – all four boroughs that had a subway system. The records at that time were a lot of electro stuff that was being played. A lot of freestyle like C-Bank’s “One More Shot” or “Al-Naafiysh” by Hashim. I still didn’t really know who the artists were and stuff like that, but I knew the records and heard them all the time on the radio. Around 84 I went to a break dancing club at a roller skating rink to watch a bunch of people battling, and I heard “Set It Off” for the first time. I don’t know what it was with that record but it fit all the movies I liked at that time: New York movies like The Warriors, Death Wish. It was just this dark record that was kind of like the soundtrack of New York City at the time, when New York City was just like in urban decay. On my way somewhere with my parents you would see all these abandoned building like in Berlin in 1945 in certain areas. Then taking the train to the South Bronx and seeing that…I have such a vivid memory of being on the Pelham subway line going to see one of the most famous Graffiti writers in New York called Seen, who was in the documentary Style Wars, and I befriended him when I was probably like 13. He used to airbrush t-shirts in a flea market. I don’t know why music always has a place in a moment that you can remember a certain situation. I can remember being in that flea market and then playing that track. It was just like the track of tracks. It was the soundtrack of graffiti, of New York, the rawness. When I got into techno in about 1990 and I went to trace back all the records that I’d been collecting and I would go back and listen to that record it just sounded so current. Not current to what techno was, but on the production level. When you listen to other electro records or freestyle records from that time, nothing has that 808 feel like “Set It Off” does. That production is just sick. The bassline. There’s really no other record from that time period, apart from maybe “Hip Hop Be Bop” or “Boogie Down Bronx”, that should have been the soundtrack to The Warriors. It’s just an amazing track. The irony of whole record being my favourite record is that it was produced on a label located in Ocean Avenue in Brooklyn, so that record was made probably two miles from where I lived. I guess Walter Gibbons produced Strafe, but it was made in Brooklyn. It’s a 100% Brooklyn. That record… the build up, the vocals, just everything about it…I could listen to it over and over again on repeat mode.
Would you say they produced a prototype with this? It’s a lot darker than most of the electro productions around that time.
I think it’s definitely the prototype for a lot of the future electro stuff that was coming out through the techno scene in the 90’s. Anybody making electro music at that time had to know that record. You have “Planet Rock” and you have “Clear” by Cybotron but that record just stands out for me. It’s such a better record. I love the other records but when I hear “Set It Off” the goose bumps come up. It sounds like something from a John Carpenter movie. It could be from “Assault On Precinct 13”, even if you can’t mess with that soundtrack. It is in the same mode as that. It gives the same feeling, and the same vibe and mood. Those eerie chord strings in the back and the bassline. You can’t mess with it.
> Ryuichi Sakamoto – Riot In Lagos
The next one is “Riot in Lagos” by Ryuichi Sakamoto.
This is an interesting track that Bones had turned me onto in probably sometime in the early to mid 90’s. He was refreshing my memory on records that were on when we used to go to roller skating rinks, and one of the other records was Kasso’s “Key West”. I remember he was playing all these records and I was like flabbergasted by the sounds and the music and how futuristic it was for 80’/81′. The thing was when I got into techno and I realised what electronic music was, and I’m hearing Bones and Lenny Dee – this is the 808, this is the 909 – trying to get my head around all these machines, and Bones was playing me records later on saying “these are the first 808 records, or 909 drum rhythm records”, and I never looked at the music I was listening to in the early 80’s, like Kraftwerk, as electronic music or acoustic music – I never made that difference in my head. I never sat there and thought “Oh, I like music with synthesisers”. When I heard this Sakamoto record, I kind of recalled hearing it but it didn’t really ring a bell in a big way for me. But it did ring my bell. [laughs] I was like “Whoa! What the fuck is this?” because I guess it’s got that Eastern, Asian kind of melody sound to it. That is a one of a kind record. There is nothing that sounds like that. I have never, ever heard another record ever sound like that. It cannot be copied.
It even sounded different to the sound Sakamoto was doing with Yellow Magic Orchestra.
Yeah. There is another Sakamoto record that I got a little later on, once I realised who he was, that is quite rare. Not many people know it, it’s called “Lexington Queen”. It’s amazing. It was released as a 12” and also a 45 as well. I probably should have been digging a little deeper on Sakamoto stuff, when I was doing my East kind of record shopping ten years ago, when I was looking for all this 80’s stuff. But I heard a few things by him that didn’t hit me the way those two records hit me. But “Riot In Lagos” is just a special record, what a special piece of electronic music. It’s up there with Kraftwerk.
It is pioneering electronic music, but from a very different angle.
Again, it’s got that Japanese sound to it. Whatever Japanese electronic music was in the 80’s, I don’t really know much about it, but this is a brilliant track. Read the rest of this entry »
This mix was inspired by a very memorable Macro label night we did in Paris. Peter Kruder, Stefan Goldmann and me were invited by Hardrock Striker. Of course drinks in Paris clubs were expensive and it was Halloween, so everybody with a costume had reduced admission. Which led to a whole crowd in costumes. I messed up a few mixes because I laughed so much about the guys dressed as teletubbies in the front row. See photos below.
Odd Machine – Phase Out Instra:mental – Leave It All Behind Zomby – Tarantula Stress – Down In The Dungeon Shake – Indagoo Dread & Fred – Warriors Advance Posthuman – Callisto Paul Du Lac- Blow Back Ricardo Jefferson – The Egg (Part One) Patrick Cowley & Jorge Socarras – Memory Fails Me (Oni Ayhun Remix) Mark Grusane & Mike Cole Feat. Deanna – Time & Space (Vocal) Marcello Napoletano – Space Voodoo B.D.I. – City & Industry Anthony “Shake” Shakir – Arise The Oliverwho Factory – Disco Nights Rennie Foster – Good Time Charlie Octave One – A World Divided (Jupiter II Mix) Gesloten Cirkel – When It’s Late Iamthatiam – Inri Moderat – Seamonkey (Surgeon Remix) Patrick Cowley & Jorge Socarras – Soon (KiNK Remix) Ben Klock – Ok (Kenny Larkin Remix) Optic Nerve – Origins Oni Ayhun – OAR003-B San Proper – December 10th Dan Curtin – Other Tama Sumo & Prosumer – Alien Mutts Kirk Degiorgio – Isidora Roska – Sheppard Lowtec – Angstrom Peter Kruder – After The Dawn As One – Freefall Newworldaquarium – The Force (Âme Remix) dBridge – Wonder Where Kinf Midas Sound – One Ting (Dabrye Rmx)
In discussion with Surgeon on (Who’s Afraid Of?) The Art Of Noise! by The Art Of Noise (1984).
How did you first encounter The Art Of Noise?
Difficult to remember as it was so long ago, perhaps it was seeing them perform “Close to (the Edit)” on Top of the Pops wearing those masks. That was in 1984.
What made you decide for this album? Why is it so important to you?
For me it’s a forgotten gem in the history of English electronic music. I fondly remember listening to it again and again. Read the rest of this entry »
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