The Kool Kids

The Kool Kids hebben de eer gehad om bij Rauw een exclusief interview met held en grootmeester Erol Alkan te houden. Tijdens Rauw besprak de Engelsman zijn visie op het afgelopen decennium, het succes van zijn samenwerking met Boys Noize, de plannen met zijn label, zijn forum en nog meer!

How’s it to be back at Rauw?
It’s nice. I really think Joost is a credit to Amsterdam. He’s the promoter, who’s brought many people of the same musical spectrum to Holland. If he wasn’t here, I don’t know who would do that job. He has put me here in 2003 for the first time. I have played here now like 10-11 times or so.

What were the most influences for you in the past decade?
The main influences for me where a part from old music, stuff I discovered like a lot of Krautrock and Psychedelic music. The hybrid of music that came between UK, New York, Berlin and Detroit. You had in the UK Trash and Optimo, in New York you had DFA, in Berlin you had International Gigolo and stuff like that. All those things came together and made a family. Because I was involved in that slipstream, it came as something that was very influential. It’s not just your friends making records, but also networks of people. A very special time.

What do you think 2010 and so forth will bring?
I don’t like to try to predict what will happen. You just have to keep your eyes open and try to discover things. You don’t know what will happen. You really have to wait to be surprised, excited and inspired by something. More to think that it’s going to be Disco, Dubstep, House or Techno. It takes just one person to do something that’s going to inspire you. I’m hearing records that are made by people that were from Dubstep or Indie or House, and they’re all doing something special. I’m just trying to bring these things together, into something that will make sense and inspire people for the next step. It’s not good to say that one sound or person or country will do something that influences everyone else. It now changes more fast than ever.

What will 2010 bring for you personally?
The music that I’ve discovered, that I genuinely love, I’ve been fortunate enough to been involved into. I’m releasing a record by a guy called Connan Mockasin, who has made the best album that I’ve heard in a long time. I’ve been very lucky to introduce him. That’s something that is in my world, and something that’s in front of me. Outside of that I don’t know what will come, I’m waiting for something to come, something that has excitement.

You don’t have any plans?
I already have made music with Alex (Boys Noize), I’m making a Beyond The Wizards Sleeve album. I’m making some original music for my own. My thing is, I don’t want to feel like “I need to go make an album or a record and deliver it”. For me it’s, if you make one great track, and put it out, it’s one great track. Don’t get caught into something that “you have to make a single, a single and then an album”. It’s not like that any more. Now that we’ve released Waves and Death Suite, that’s something alone. That has happened, some kind of effect or influence. Not something that will get you into a campaign or routine.

That’s why you don’t like to make own productions?
I do make my own productions, but it’s a funny thing. The reason for me that nothing comes out as Erol Alkan is a psychological thing. I don’t know who Erol Alkan is. I don’t want to make copies. I’m making a Beyond the Wizards Sleeve album at the moment which is just live instrumentation and songs with lyrics, words and stuff. I play bass and guitar, keyboards. I do vocals. I play drums. Different things. But I don’t know what it is that I need to do that is just me, that I feel enough to be me. I should just release a record and that’s what it is, but when you’re not in that way of thinking then you just don’t do that.

How big do you think the success is from Waves, your first collaboration with Boys Noize?
We did Death Suite in 4 hours, for fun, and Waves took a month. We were working for something else and we thought like “let’s just do something”. Waves took 28 different versions until it was right. I really love that track and I think it has something to it, that’s something more than just a club track. That’s really important for me to be involved in. I want to make music that works in a club, but also works somewhere else.

Is that also why you let Gonzales make a different version?
Yeah. Originally we said we weren’t get any remixes, but I’m a big fan of Gonzales and I put on his piano gigs in London in 2004 I think it was, with Trash. And there was something with the original that worked with him and it came out really cool. If we couldn’t get a remix that wasn’t interesting, we wouldn’t get a remix at all. I don’t want to get into that thing where you make a track and then a hundred people make a remix of it. I don’t have a problem with that, because sometimes amazing remixes happen. But for me it’s like, you give something that you’ve worked really hard on for the label that you love into somebody else’s hand and you hope he gives it back to you that’s inspiring. And if you do just club remixes it’s a smaller margin. If you put it out to someone that you think is going to do something original then you might have a chance to get the same back.

Perhaps also an instrumental guitar version from Waves, as Goose played before you during Soulwaxmas in Paris?
It’s an option. What we did there is just a fun thing we did for the party.

Some questions from the Erol forum: Where do you do your hair? What’s the deal with it?
I don’t know. It’s strange. At the moment I work, I wake up, take a shower and don’t look at my hair. Ask them to tell me what to do. I want to grow it long, but I don’t know what to do. I’m looking for fashion tips on my forum.

What do you think of the bashing against certain artists that’s going on?
The internet and people bashing people on the internet for me is bullshit. Going on the internet and saying “this person sucks” or whatever, doesn’t mean anything. It’s just words. To me, if someone came to my face and said shit to me, then fine. Whatever happens, happens. There are people who are targets, and people who’re picking on them. The internet is the same as a school playground. If you want to believe it and want to be part of it, it’s the same thing. For example, Steve Aoki who I know gets criticism. But I’ve met the guy. And every time I met the guy, he’s a very pleasant person. And that’s what I know of him. If he makes music like this or that it’s as relevant as if someone who I don’t even know, makes music. Your relationship with people is based on how you know them personally. That’s the problem I have with the internet or society as a whole.
It says more about the person you are than what they are. It’s more about how you wish to behave in front on people. It’s just people picking on people.

Do you read your forum?
I sometimes read it, when I have time. And sometimes someone asks a question “can you help me with it?”. And sometimes there’s some stuff you think “I don’t understand what the f*ck you’re going on about”. But that’s what it is. You can’t take it personally.

It doesn’t affect you?
No, even if someone came on the internet and said like: “You suck, you’re the worst DJ in the world, and your hair is shit”. I don’t give a f*ck. It’s doesn’t change how you feel about yourself, based on one person. If it is, you’ve got really low self-esteem.

Question from Shadow Dancer: If animals didn’t have a face, would you eat them?
I’m a pescatarian not a vegatarian. I don’t eat chicken or beef or pork, but I eat fish. It’s the problem I have with things. I can’t eat anything that has a face. Anything that has a personality I can’t eat.

How’s your label going? You have your first album release…
I love the record. It’s just beautiful psychedelic record. I listen to it all the time, I love it. He’s just a genius, but I don’t want to suck his dick too much.

What else do you got in store for us?
We’ve got Collens album, a guy called Babe Terror from Brazil, he just makes music acapalla. And after that we’ve got the Late Of The Pier single Best In Class.

What about your own productions?
Well, I actually played loads tonight. I just make music and if its a club record, it’s a club record.

And you’re going to release them on your own label?
I don’t know which label I will release it on yet.

What are your favorite tracks at the moment?
Well, the Connan Mockasin album that I love. I love the Villa remix of Music Go Music. I love the new Swiss record. I love the new ZZT.

What’s the title?
Zaphrica/Zafrica.

Thanks a lot for the interview!