Exclusive Interview: Digitalism

Here is another HOME exclusive interview, this time with Digitalism! They talk about remixing Depeche Mode, their new album “Idealism”, and much more!

You guys have gone from two guys who met in a record store a few years back to now being considered “the next superstars of dance music”, are you feeling the pressure or has it been a pretty natural experience so far?

Since we started, things grew pretty natural around us. We slid into everything bit by bit, although it seems quite a fast development indeed. At the beginning, we did the music for ourselves because we were quite bored by the vinyl output, and we were looking for something that kicks us to play in our DJ sets. Then a friend came up with the idea of sending the songs around, and we landed on the Parisian label Kistuné. The whole vibe with the label was very family-styled and comfortable, so we got used to playing internationally and with playing live on stage. After some time, as our profile grew, we felt like we want to release a whole A-Z about Digitalism into the world, which would eventually be the album “Idealism”, and last year a major label joined the whole team. It was good to grow into everything slowly but surely, and that we always only did things that we wanted and not what others wanted.

Are you starting to tire of all the Daft Punk references yet? Is that bound to happen being on a French label like Kitsune?

No it’s fine. We consider it as a certain view that people have about us: Daft were one of very few electronic bands that made it into the radio. That’s what we wanted to achieve as well, because we didn’t just want to do music for DJs or frequent clubbers only. If people who usually listen to radio music like our sound as well, than we don’t complain about that of course!

You once said that Kraftwerk were not an influence on you, coming from Germany some may feel that is a little blasphemous, but do you feel you have bands that are a direct influence or do you tend to absorb all the music you listen to and move forward?

There are no direct influences. We’ve been listening to lots of different genres while growing up. We had years of Hip Hop or Euro Dance and Rave, of UK emo rock or disco music. When we then started doing music, the result was a sound that covers many different musical aspects, being somehow crossover, but in the next step very homogenic. It’s some kind of a Digitalism sound, electronic, indie, spacey. Futuristic and analogue at the same time, like Jedi powers: Set in space, but very mystical. Well, and Kraftwerk did have a technical influence (apart from “Radioactivity” being in our shelves), as they developed some of the gear we have at our studio.

Do you think of Depeche Mode as an influential band to you or are they more apart of an over all sound/genre you admire?

We love them for being very atmospheric, epic, dark and wavy. They had lots of cool melodies, and we love melodies as well. Like their music, we learned about ours that it’s about excitement as well as full of melancholic romance.

Recently Depeche Mode have looked pretty deep into Berlin’s minimal techno scene for remixes, what were you thinking when you, a band from Hamburg, were approached to remix a band like Depeche?

We immediately said “yes” when we’d been asked to do a remix. We’re more into their older songs and “Never Let Me Down Again” is a classic. We just were a bit unsure if they’d approve our remix, ‘cause it was pretty different to the original.

What do you guys think of the whole “Nu Rave” scene? Will it implode from being so trendy or do you think it has some staying power?

“Nu Rave” is all about a scene, a culture, not about new music. It’s about recycling the party culture from 15 years ago and it’s about excitement, a positive mood and some kind of a movement as well. People tend to tag us being “nu rave”, but we try to stay out of there. We’re good friends with the likes of The Klaxons or Simian Mobile Disco, but at the end we’re from Hamburg in Germany, that’s all. We think like with other waves, “Nu Rave” will start to become less interesting as soon as there’s the next one. It has always been like that, hasn’t it?

Aside from you, Depeche also had Boys Noize remix as well. Do you think of it as a look forward and seeing the genre as a solid thing or do you think it was jumping in on the hot sound? Maybe a combination of both perhaps?

This current sound is definitely hot, it feels like freshly created by scientists in sound laboratories. Of course music will move on and the main stream of club sound will alter again. But Depeche show that they look and care what is going on in the electronic music scene, and that’s a very good thing.

In an interview recently you mentioned you were not fans of the term “Electro” and said Depeche were an Electro band in the 80’s. What do you think of their later records and do you follow them much? Also, what is it about the “Electro” term that turns you off?

Yeah, Depeche were, and many others. We used to follow Depeche all the years, in a lose way, like we followed lots of artists; they also did really good stuff later, in the 1990’s and now. “Walking In My Shoes” generates goose bumps. The songs all had this (dark) atmosphere that grabs you, this is what we’d call electro. Like Gary Newman for instance. You can feel the synthesizers and drums, and you know alls been used wisely. “Electro” was a real scene with own rules and attitudes. Nowadays, people just call everything “Electro” that’s electronic. The term itself is holy, but it’s being used too much, if it’s for House, Hip Hop or sometimes Rock, all is said to be Electro. This is what turns us off about it. We prefer to call everything that’s electronic electronic.

Of all the new remixes Depeche commissioned recently, your remix of “Never Let Me Down” was picked to be included as the b-side on the limited “Martyr” 7” single. How do you feel having your remix included on such a rare Depeche collectable?

It’s a very big honour. We hope also the Depeche fans not going to clubs or being involved in electronic music that much could enjoy our remix.

Live at the “I Love Techno Festival” 2006

Was remixing a song as massive as “Never Let Me Down Again” pretty intimidating? Also, did the remix come out the way you wanted or is there something you would change looking back?

We’d never want to change anything as soon as it leaves our studio. We ourselves really liked it from the beginning of the work in the studio until we passed it over to Mute Records. The fact that it was “Never Let Me Down Again” didn’t really put extra pressure upon us, it was more that we had to look a bit longer for something we could transform it into. We always tend to turn remixed songs into our own Digitalism songs, so it was clear that we’d change the song a lot during remixing. We just hoped that the band themselves would be ok with it. And they were!

Have you had much feedback from the Depeche Mode fans?

The most came from Digitalism fans that are Depeche fans as well of course. But the Depeche fans followed soon after. Some still had to get to know about us.

Your reworking of The Cure’s “Fire In Cairo”, “Digitalism In Cairo”, was all over the place last year. How did that come about and how were you able to include it on your new album ‘Idealism’?

We sat around in the studio, now two years ago, and were listening to the “Boys Don’t Cry” LP again, then rediscovered “Fire In Cairo”. We loved the vibe and the idea of spelling the song’s title in the chorus. To make it playable for us during DJ sets, we sampled it and built some music around it, made an edit. It turned out to be quite huge and fun later on, and as The Cure’s wavy/punky way suits Digitalism anyway, we thought about making it an own track. We re-played and re-sang everything, so it was not a sample anymore (we built our own), then started talking to The Cure and their publishing. They were ok with it and cleared it, so this is how it landed on our album.

The lead single off the album is the song “Pogo” and it was co-written with Kim Moyes of The Presets, how did that collaboration come about?

That was a funny story: Two years ago we played in Montreal for New Years Eve and a friend from there had a demo of The Presets’ “Down Down Down”. We really wanted to have that track and asked our management to contact them about it. They vice versa turned out to be huge fans of us and instantly wanted us to remix the song. A year later we went on tour with them through Australia and became best friends. Since then, we always freak out when we see each other somewhere on the globe.

Aside from remixing Depeche, you have remixed for bands like Cut Copy, The Presets, and Klaxons to name a few… how do you feel about having your songs remixed? Didn’t Soulwax get their hands on “Pogo”?

It’s quite new for us that our music is being remixed, because so far we always had too many own versions of our songs, so there were no remixers from outside of our studio. This changed now as we are more on the road and also because we got into thinking about who could get his hands on what. That’s an exciting thing. We always work with friends of ours though, we’re not friends of the typical “industrial style remix package”.

As for Soulwax, the “Pogo” 12” having been released so far didn’t contain a Soulwax mix, but we love rumours.

Are you guys pretty excited to get the new album, “Idealism”, out now?

We feel like we’ve born something, yes. We always wanted to finish a complete first statement about the Digitalism Universe, and now people can get an insight with the help of our album. It took some more time than we wanted, but we only started concentrating on it end of last year, so it wasn’t really too long. Before that we were too distracted by touring and other productions. We’re really happy with the album and how it is, we hope everyone out there too.

Digitalism’s “Idealism” out now!

It looks like you have a very busy summer coming up with playing shows and Djing, what else can we look forward to from Digitalism?

We’re working on a new bigger live show and definitely tour a lot, which will be lots of fun for us we reckon. There are lots of festivals ahead, and little visits to other continents. Then there are the single releases that we prepare, as well as some possible upcoming remixes, but we can’t really tell yet.

For more info on Digitalism, please visit:

www.myspace.com/digitalism
www.thedigitalism.com

Interview by Glen. (C) HOME. Do not steal this article without giving full credit and a link! Photos appear courtesy of Digitalism.