martes 28 julio de 2009, 08:33
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 | Senior Member NC3: Miembro | | Miembro desde: 03 enero 2008 Ubicación: Parana | |
| DJ T. - Crossing the T’s
After the release of his 2005 debut, a heavily influential assault of disco samples and high-octane funk entitled “Boogie Playground”, T continued DJ’ing and A&R work, all the while yearning to create a follow-up album. Although it took four years for game-changer “The Inner Jukebox” to hit shelves, the deep house effort was worth the wait. I went to meet Thomas at his home in Berlin, where we sat and chatted frankly about all the things that can delay an album from coming out.
A lot has changed in the time since “Boogie Playground” was released. What have you been up to?
Well, the original plan was to release the follow up to “Boogie Playground” one and a half years later. But then, things started to get really successful for Booka Shade, and Arno was going to be my engineer. He kept saying we can do it in two months, or three months, but in the end I said to him “could it be that this is not going to happen?”, and he said “Yeah, it seems so…” So then, I started to search for new engineers and that was two years ago. It took me two years to find somebody, and in the end this was Thomas (Schumacher).
Why did it take so long? You didn’t have someone else in mind?
The whole of last year was spent jumping through studios, meeting different producers, seeing if we could work together, then: “is there time to do an album?” Just trying to realise what I had in mind. There was actually a whole half year that I spent with one producer, and in the end, much too late, we realised it was not coming together, both on a musical and a personal level. That was really hard for me. It was a hard process to come to that point again.
I suppose it affected your inspiration too.Well, there was this time – 2004/2005 -- where everything was possible again. There were so many different influences coming back -- disco, funk, Italo, Chicago -- and then you could mix it with everything you know, and you would get these brilliant producers like Metro Area bringing back some kind of old school music, and this was such a good period for me, when I was inspired so much by all of this stuff and doing “Boogie Playground”. Also as a DJ with 25 years in music, I feel it’s really good to combine classics from 20 years ago with modern stuff. And then, minimal techno kind of came in through the back door, and suddenly it was very limited, so there were these one or two formulas and at the same time, not so many good records were coming out any more that bought together these styles. Things kind of got very sterile, and then it was no longer my kind of thing anymore.
Time for something new again. To be honest I was actually expecting a resurgence of [interest in] house music in 2007, but it didn’t really start until 2008.And now it is definitely here! Yeah, everything is house again, and minimal and following formulas seem to have been forgotten. Looking back over the last twenty years, I get the impression that it’s getting more limited in the last four or five years. These mechanisms that lead to the result that the young crowd is following some protagonists and some formulas to such an extreme -- this wasn’t my impression before.
So in this period when you were looking for someone to work with, were you working on musical ideas yourself?
Not really. I like to be able to make my own musical layouts, and to go all ready to the engineer with my own ideas, in the form of layouts.
You mean like the structure and progression of a track? Just to be able to work with Ableton or other software, on a level. Like sampling my own stuff and just doing basic ideas. I just didn’t find the time to get into the techniques. So it’s still a process where I can only try to play music and bring along my samples, as the music is 80 percent sample-based.
Samples from records? Samples from records, from the last 25 years. That was really extreme on “Boogie Playground”, which was almost 100% sample based. You can’t produce such an aesthetic, if you use only new plug ins. It’s simply impossible. Sometimes only samples from 20-year-old records can sound like this. There are a really small number of producers who are able to produce, and make the music sound like 20 years before. It’s a really tough job. You really have to be a genius to know where to get your sounds. For the second album, when we were starting, it was clear to me that the basic atmosphere should be house, but not much more than that.
But with less samples? Yes, less samples. I wanted it to sound, in terms of drum programming, more contemporary, but still citing elements of styles that really influenced me. And that’s also the meaning of “The Inner Jukebox”. Because that’s the process when I go in the studio, I just can’t produce without citing old stuff. It’s just what happens naturally. It’s the same when I am DJ’ing, I couldn’t DJ for four hours without playing some classics. I just can’t. Maybe it’s just somewhat in me, like a mission, something I feel I have to do, showing where the music is coming from. So with this album, it’s more showing classic house sounds from the ‘90s.
“Boogie Playground” is very immediate, where as “The Inner Jukebox” reveals itself over time. It’s significantly different. Was it a conscious decision to make the music deeper?
Well, maybe “Boogie Playground” was…catchier… and maybe “The Inner Jukebox” is more in your face in terms of functionality. It was clear though that yes, this album had a much deeper atmosphere. But on the other side, the sounds are much more voluminous.
Were you road testing the tracks? What kind of feedback were you getting? Mainly in terms of the drums sounding as contemporary as possible. Because what I didn’t do before was to use such strong sub bass. I was constantly testing how things were working on the dance floor. We could always readjust tiny details. I had a long break [from DJ’ing] in Asia and then we started working on the album in October 2008.
So things came together quickly after you found someone to work with? Well some people can make an album in 4 weeks, and other people take over a year. Everybody has their own way. I knew when I was working with Walter in the studio, that my time was extremely limited, so when we started “Boogie Playground”, I knew more or less that I would have 12-15 hours for each track, and the strange thing was that I didn’t really feel any pressure. I was already used to working with him.
How was it different working with Thomas Schumacher?
Well he was still limited in terms of time, but not so limited. More limited than I wished, but in the end it was good because I work well under pressure. Maybe it’s not too good to have too much room to experiment.
Do you prefer to work with a producer, or would you prefer to work alone? You mean if I had the choice? Definitely. Hahah!
Does it frustrate because you can’t? Well, maybe I shouldn’t say “definitely” because there are so many good aspects in this experience. To be with somebody for such a long time is a kind of marriage for a while, you know, like two lovers. So when you start working with someone it takes time. I mean we had only worked together on one song, for two or three days.
So there were still some difficulties? You go through so many crises. At times it was really hard, for both of us, but in the end we really worked to understand each other, and to take back the ego in the right moment, and to find this chemistry, that you have to find.
It actually took us nearly two months. Even near the end, five weeks from the deadline he was freaking out when he had the feeling that we had still not found the language, he couldn’t see that it was coming together. There was too much stuff and he couldn’t see the red line. When we went through the last crisis talking about it really intensely, about all of the issues, trying to define what we wanted, taking away what we didn’t need, and then suddenly it clicked, and it was there -- this language. In the end it was really magical, there was not even one hour where we didn’t feel like we couldn’t communicate. You learn a lot you know, in terms of compromises.
And do you think you’ll work together again in the future? Yeah, definitely. I mean, I hope, because he has to focus on his own stuff. He was in a transitional period of his own, redefining his own style. I was really lucky that he found this time to make the album with me. Fuente - Home / Music / Features / DJ T. - Crossing the T?s - Electronic Beats  |
