DAFT BUT GOOD

BOOKINGS: 

UK/EU/ROW
dave.blackgrove@teamwass.com
cecilia.chan@teamwass.com

N/S America
dhoffman@teamwass.com
bmiller@teamwass.com

MGMT: lfsystem@littleempiremusic.com

PRESS: lfsystem@infectiouspr.com

https://lfsystem.lnk.to/hungryforlove

Radio LoRa 97.5 MHz – Unabhängig, widerständig, einzigartig

Radio LoRa setzt sich als politisches Lokalradio bereits seit 35 Jahren für eine offene und emanzipatorische Gesellschaft ein. Radio LoRa ist selbstverwaltet und achtet auf die Repräsentation von MigrantInnen und Geschlechtergerechtigkeit auf allen Ebenen des Radiobetriebs.

300 engagierte SendungsmacherInnen senden 24 Stunden am Tag aus dem Kreis 4 in Zürich: Sie spielen musikalische Perlen abseits des Mainstreams, berichten über das Weltgeschehen aus den unterschiedlichsten Perspektiven und informieren über alles, was in Zürich gerade läuft.
Das Programm von LoRa ist ein legendärer Dschungel: Wenn 300 Sendungsmachende rund 160 verschiedene Sendungen in 20 Sprachen produzieren, tönt keine Stunde wie die andere. LoRa ist so bunt und vielfältig wie die Meinungen, Kulturen und Musik der Menschen in Zürich.

For Rune Reilly Kölsch, Kompakt has become a great label to call home. In 2013 the German imprint celebrated 20 years of record releases at the cutting edge of electronic music, championed in June by one of the most genre re-defining albums and personal music projects for an era: Kölsch’s landmark long player, ‘1977’.

A melodic autobiography on black wax, the Kölsch project has seen 36/37-year-old Rune take stock of a diverse and successful production career and draw upon his own personal beginnings: a nostalgia for childhood, family, friends and the confusion of applying his split-cultural heritage to what it means to think of ‘home’. As Rune freely admits, “being half Irish, half German and living in Denmark – it was all one big messy period of my life.” 

Born to hippie parents in the freetown of Christiania (a commune-like autonomous borough of the Danish capital Copenhagen) his childhood was spent surrounded by creativity. His mother was an artist whose family had roots in German politics and his father a singer songwriter who travelled through Asia playing music in the early 70's. Kölsch, however, did miss out on building friendships and found solace in making up “this imaginary world that I would spend days in,” before the family moved to Germany – a period of memories, relations and characters from which ‘1977’ derives its titles.

For Rune, the tracks he began building from 2010 took in this personal reflection, his being “completely locked in to reminiscing about what shaped me as a kid and into the individual that I am now” – contemplating his unique past to form the brickwork of ‘1977’, one of the most future-facing techno albums of recent years.

Influenced by hip hop, pop and the incredible legacy of Jeff Mills and Derrick May, Rune started producing in 1995, embarking on a string of success stories. In 2003 he released the multi-million selling, saxophone-infused ‘Calabria’, that saw collaboration requests pouring in from artists as diverse as Nicki Minaj, Shakira and Flo Rida. He then set up Tattoorecs – releasing pioneering underground tracks with no titles, just tattoos for artwork, that garnered critical acclaim and support from minimal and techno trailblazers such as Sven Väth, Richie Hawtin, Magda, Tiefschwarz and Ricardo Villalobos.

This appreciation of the complete musical spectrum has gifted Rune with a devotion to groove and melodics and with it the dexterity to input real creative change to the genres he reveres, not least his beloved techno. “2010 was the year of the ketamine house wave, where the music was 118 bpm and everything was extremely boring”, reflects Rune. “I wanted some melodic techno, some energy back in this scene. People needed the energy to express themselves and go crazy for a bit.”

This notion faced opposition, even from within Rune’s close circles. But it was Kompakt founder Michael Mayer who had the insight to see what Kölsch was trying to achieve. Rune’s conviction that vibrations and melodics are the key to human response had tipped the balance, underlined by his experience as a hip hop DJ where he “needed something to catch me and drag me in. And that’s what techno should do!” Here too he drew on his love of Jeff Mills and Derrick May, recalling how “they used to make mistakes all the time. It would be a big mash of all kinds of stuff, but at least something was happening. That’s what I was missing and that’s what I’m trying to change with the Kölsch project.”

The result is ‘1977’, a personal collection of dancefloor destroyers that are continuing to send clubs and festivals across the globe into melodic supernova. Take this video of Kölsch’s set at Belgium’s I Love Techno festival, one of Rune’s 2013 highlights, where “people were doing sit downs, singing along to all the tracks”. Watch it. It puts the hairs up on the back of your neck. “The response was overwhelming,” said Rune in a recent interview with Mixmag (who named Kölsch as one of their ‘Stars Of 2013’), as “when you think about it, it was just a bunch of childhood memories with a kickdrum underneath.” 

Elsewhere he’s ripped up the airways with an acclaimed Essential Mix for Pete Tong on BBC Radio 1, delivered his incendiary soundscape to Singapore’s world-renowned ZoukOut Festival, boomed his live show through the heaving basement of London’s XOYO and played the hallowed Space Terrace – in his words “a boyhood dream since I started going to Ibiza in 1999. That was what I wanted from life!” So opening Amnesia in 2014 with Joris Voorn will be a bonus then...

While these are reasons enough to keep the beaming smile beneath Kölsch’s trademark black fedora, his humility remains just as striking. While tracks like ‘Goldfisch’ have taken pivotal positions in the set lists of world class DJs from across the dance music spectrum – traversing the underground with Seth Troxler, while simultaneously providing credible new euphoric highs for the likes of Axwell – Rune remains joyously down to earth. All despite producing, with ‘1977’, an album that has crossed as many cultural and musical boundaries as his own childhood past.

From the face-twisting melodic drive of ‘Opa’ and ‘Bappedekkel’, to the chord-surfing piano groove of ‘Der Alte’ and the euphoric crescendos of ‘Lorely’, ‘Oma’ and ‘All That Matters’ (all hits in different countries), the fact remains that whether in your living room, on the dancefloors of the world’s greatest parties, or simply in your headphones on your way home, Kölsch’s ‘1977’ has re-defined techno and become an achievement that speaks for itself. 

Words: Phil Dudman – Clubs & Live Music Editor, Mixmag


A lot has happened in the last 20 years of dance music, but one constant has been Get Physical right at the sharp end of the scene. The label has become a globally recognised symbol of quality, renowned for its always varied and vital house output. Forming the backbone of the label's vast catalogue is the influential in-house DJ mix series, Body Language. It is a snapshot of exactly where the underground is at and has been assembled by tastemakers such as Azari & III, Catz ‘N Dogz, Dixon, DJ Hell, Francesco Tristano, Nôze and of course label-founders Booka Shade, DJ T., and M.A.N.D.Y..

Next to that there has been a constant stream of innovative, dance-floor ready singles, crossover club classics, seminal remixes and a number of standout artist albums. The label has always stayed true to its house roots, but with a rich array of influences taken from the worlds of disco, deep, tech and melodic house. Along the way, Get Physical´s core artists have been joined by red hot new talents including Alinka, Thandi Draai, PAUZA, Yulia Niko, Birds Of Mind, CIOZ and Monkey Safari. There have also been carefully considered forays into thriving house music scenes in Africa, Brazil, Cuba, Croatia and India: dedicated compilations and EPs have highlighted those region's most exciting new talents and given them a global platform. 

The name says it all: Get Physical tracks could hardly be more moving and corporeal. It was true in 2002, and it will be true in 2022 and beyond. To celebrate the occasion, the label will reissue some of its most classic tracks, host special anniversary events and release a new range of merchandise in collaboration with Australian brand One Teaspoon. Get Physical has already made a huge contribution to the history of contemporary house music, but rest assured the German label still has plenty more to say.

remabookings@gmail.com My Debut Album, Rave & Roses out now.

Sandra Torroni is following