Always on the hunt from fresh music to play in my DJ sets, I find myself rediscovering some old favorites all the time and being reminded of their immense talent. There are very few artists who seem to keep up their momentum up by making solid releases time after time. I can safely say that Vinyl Speed Adjust from the Romania capital of Bucharest always seem to get it right. True masters of the Romanian sound I constantly find myself putting their records in my bag for pretty much all of my gigs.
When people hear about the Berlin based techno club Berghain, they automatically make a connection with techno and hedonism. However many might not know that apart from being a club they also have a very successful record label called Ostgut Ton. The label has produced high quality techno releases for over 10 years and has become a staple for many techno DJs around the world. The label named after the original club that would birth Berghain is an outlet where the club residents can present their artistic vision.
Every DJ has an artist who inspires them to do what they do and for me that artist is Ellen Allien. The Berlin based queen of techno has been on the scene since the early 90s and there is not one person in the techno scene that doesn’t know her name. Ellen’s music spoke to me as a young boy growing up in a city where techno wasn’t popular and I just happened to stumble onto her by accident at the time. She became the driving force behind the beginning stages of my passion for underground electronic music.
As a techno DJ I’m constantly on the hunt for new gems to play at my upcoming gigs. Right before my upcoming label party here in Berlin I stumbled onto “Attack At Titan” from EarToGround founder Gareth Wild.
This week I’ve chosen a lovely techno track from Matrixxman and Echologist that takes me back to the feeling that originally sparked my interest. The track funnily enough is called “Mainframe” and it certainly makes me feel like I’m stuck inside a computer but I really don’t mind being stuck here because it’s so interesting and fun. I hope your imagination will also run wild with this one because it reminds me of my youth and what lead me to become a DJ in the first place. Turn it up loud!
A few years ago I happened to stumble across the music of Evigt Mörker a techno producer based in Sweden. I instantly fell in love as soon as I heard his music, one thing that is important for me is that the music really takes me on a journey and gets my imagination running wild. Evigt’s music does just that, he has a techno sound like no other, the music sweeps you away into another world that is full of color and beautiful melodies.
When I am a grandma one day I won’t tell my kids that I walked miles in the snow to get to school (I grew up in the desert so that would be a flat out lie). I will, however, tell them about the time I walked to Berghain alone to see one of my favorite DJs (Fort Romeau) at 3 in the morning, . I’ll then tell them that he didn’t go on until 9a which meant I had to entertain my drunk sleepy self for another 6 hours.