Boys Noize Hits The Hot Seat

Boys Noize is in the midst of his European Warehaus tour, which has been inspired by the rawness of his new album, 'Mayday'. Having just released the second part of his ‘Mayday’ remixes EP today — which features remixes from Tensnake, Raito & Jensen Interceptor — we grabbed a chat with the Berliner to talk about the allure of warehouse parties, how influential the UK scene has been to his career to date and what the Boysnoize Records camp has coming up this year.

You just played one of your new Warehaus shows last night — how was it?

"Yeah, really great. There’s a new club called Pal, it’s in the heart of St Pauli [Hamburg], I played from 3am to 7am — it was a really awesome gig. It’s part of my Warehaus tour that I’m doing right now in Europe. It was a really raw club, like 700 people — so it was great. You know when you play for that long, if you play for like 4 hours, you can really create that crazy atmosphere, so I started really slow, played a lot of Industrial-inspired stuff, a lot of like new EBM-wavey stuff, techno, acid and then took them on a journey."

Do you prefer playing those longer sets?

"It depends on what the environment is like, so at a festival obviously you don’t have much time, and you know, you only have one hour to bang it out. And I really enjoy that as well. But honestly I actually prefer playing in a club — so if they give me more than 2 hours that’s great, l love to build a crazy atmosphere and really create a bond with the crowd."

How important is that connection with the crowd then?

"It’s really important, but it’s a little bit more interesting to play the stuff they don’t know and do things that aren't expecting. Doing things in the moment, you know, if you have that time you can fill out that moment, and I think really good DJs have a good feeling for moments. That’s the really exciting part for me."

How important has the UK been to your career?

"It’s the most important place, you know I started off my gigs outside of Germany, my first gig was in the UK, it was in London, and Erol Alkan, who is a dear friend of mine, we worked together and he’s been a big supporter of my music and he helped me out a lot. So yeah I’ve had many great years in the UK."

What makes the UK scene so different than, say, Germany or the US?

"Well, I think there are huge differences, generally I think the UK is a special place for music, I think it’s my favourite place because there’s a lot of cultures that have come together, that's something I miss in Berlin. For example, in Berlin you have really strong techno culture and electronic music in general. But in the UK it’s a little different; there’s a little twist to it because you know you have such a strong multi-cultural influence, you know there’s a strong black culture, there’s Indians, there’s so many different people coming together so it really makes music so much more interesting, for me at least. You're talking about grime, rap, two-step — so there’s a really cool UK scene, and I think the UK is really proud of the UK's scene, and producers are always a little bit ahead in some styles, I guess."

You’ve have been teasing some new remixes on Instagram — what can you tell us about those?

"Yeah I have just started to do some after a little break, I’ve done one for my friends from Justice, I‘ve remixed their song ‘Randy’, which I believe will be out very soon — it’s kind of a high energy disco mix. Then there’s a remix coming for one of my idols DAF (Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft) — they’re an EBM act from Germany from the 80s, they had a massive influence on early techno actually. If you ask any Berghain DJ they will probably name them as one of their main influences. And I've done a remix for Cassisus too, I actually played it out last night for the very first time."

Who should we be on the lookout for from the Boysnoize Record camp this year?

"There’s a young French producer called Raito, we’ve just released his second EP on Boysnoize Records. I’ve got some incredible feedback about his music from techno guys, from UK breaks guys — so that's really cool. He’s bringing new life to the early 90s rave-meets-techno scene. Then there’s Djedjotronic, who is working on his debut LP right now. We’re looking to release it in the fall this year. He’s been around for a while now, and he gets a lot of respect from many techno producers for his music; he’s somewhere between industrial, new wave, IDM, techno. And, finally, we’re also releasing a new SCNTST album, who’s a young producer from Germany — he’s so versatile, I think his new album is going to surprise a lot of people, it’s really melodic and laidback."

Interview by Carly Wilford on Sister Radio. 
Words by Andrew Rafter.
You can listen to the full interview and guest mix below.