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DJ Mag Top100 DJs
6
Paul van Dyk
1

"2010 started kind of rough," says Paul Van Dyk, surprisingly, when we call to congratulate him on yet another top 10 placing. "We restructured our company and we have a complete new team now. I have to say I'm really happy with the changes that have happened so all in all, it has been a really positive year."
Such upheaval no doubt reflects that it was also the year that Paul's label Vandit celebrated its tenth anniversary, with the DJ embarking on a huge round of touring that began back in March at the Winter Music Conference.
"We took over Space for the whole weekend," he recalls. "It was great. And we started a joint venture together with Armin, so Vandit and Armada are basically working together, which is something that will enable us to release more electronic music."
The collaboration creates an unstoppable trance juggernaut, utilising economies of scale for their marketing advantage and hooking Paul up with the Top 100's most popular winner ever to create the kind of label leverage most DJ can only dream of.
"At the same time, we don't have anything to do with any Armada artists and Armada doesn't have anything to do with our artists," Paul adds, pointing out that both labels will retain their unique character.

A dark shadow over the year, however, was the death of 21 people at the Love Parade, an event which Paul regularly played at when it was still an expression of international peace and understanding through dance music.
"I don't know if people are aware, but over the last five or six years, the Love Parade was handled by people who didn't come from the scene," he tells us sadly. "Basically, the brand was sold to a fitness chain who used it as a marketing tool to target people who go out and party. These people were obviously not capable of putting on such a big event."
The tragedy inspired 'Remember Love', Paul's collaboration with Paul Oakenfold and Armin Van Buuren. "A lot of the credit goes to Paul Oakenfold. He made the initial phone calls. We've all been there together, so we all thought, 'let's do something'. We were really happy with the tune and obviously released it. It's really in the spirit of the old Love Parade, of electronic music and coming together, having a great time and being there for each other."

Despite this, and mixing the hugely successful triple CD 'Gatecrasher Anthems', it's been a relatively quiet year for Paul's output.
"But I'm in the middle of writing, composing and producing music for my next artist album, which will be out next year. I'm really proud of every track so far, and from a personal standing, I believe this is going to be the best album that I've ever done."
And what is the secret to his continued success? "The secret is not trying," he tells DJmag calmly. "We love what we do, we love the music we release, every bit of it, and this comes across. This is how we keep fresh. We have our antennas on high alert all the time."
So expect to hear plenty more from Mr PVD over the next coming decade, too.