"Now it is your work to get that germenglish into a real existing language. If you feel that I totally missed the point on some questions, just tell me and I will elaborate."
Thus disclaimed Martin Damm yesterday in a follow-up e-mail regarding our international fireside chat that happened this week - 14 years after the last time I interviewed the man.
Let me be frank straight off the bat here: I love Martin. We've been mates since 1995, when I first rang him in Germany out of the blue, from Melbourne, with a copy of one of Force Inc.'s Rauschen compilations in my hand, and he agreed to an interview without a moment's hesitation.
I was calling Martin because he made the coolest acid music I'd heard, under the alias of Biochip C, for Force Inc. and DJ Ungle Fever. He also had an array of other aliases, from The Speed Freak to Subsonic 808, that tweaked sounds as diverse as disco house, happy hardcore, and the real, genuine gabber hardcore.
So when it came to organizing our first IF? warehouse rave party back in Melbourne with an international drawcard (Omniglobe 2 - which also happened to be our last big rave party!) in February 1996, Martin was the guy I invited over to perform live.
We also had him play at Club Filter - Melbourne's top techno club at the time - that same week, and he was dropping tunes at 200bpm with the express intention of clearing the dancefloor.
Anyway, we've stayed spasmodically in touch over the years since, and when I got all nostalgic recently and resurrected my interest in acid and the TB-303 - after dismissing it years ago - and hacked together a vaguely old skool acid tune under a pretentious alias (Psyborg-9), I asked Martin to do a Biochip C remix for the release.
His mix is an acid flashback killer, but it also embraces completely new nuances and directions, making this nothing near a dinosaur remix but something fun, bubbling and cool instead.
So, without ado, enamoured with the mix and mulling over the distant past, I flung a few desperate questions his way, and this what my German buddy had to report:
How did you get inspired to start making music?
"I've always been interested in music. I had a classical piano-education from age 4 to12;
after that I learned to play the guitar, but was always interested in electronic music and sounds. In 1988 I bought my first electronic instrument (a Casio FZ-1 16-bit sampler) and in 1990 I had my first release."
You've been producing music and interacting within the music industry for a long time. What keeps you motivated, and what integral changes have you noticed over the years?
"I don't get any motivation from the music industry nowadays, but from my DJ gigs. The changes the music industry has undergone in the last years (like the digital marketing) are not yet finalized. Still a lot of things have to change, and especially the GEMA (organisation for copyright in Germany) need to adopt their business to the new millennium. They still think and work in old skool ways, which are actually hindering the artists more than helping any creativity."
What gear/software are you making most use of in the studio at the moment?
"Mostly software nowadays. I sold most of the hardware I was collecting in the '90s, but I kept the Roland x0x series and some other "specials". I stopped producing music at the end of 1998 because I'd 'heard it all, seen it all', and I was bored with the (in general) techno scene. The hardware I had used before was over-used, so not appealing anymore. What made me start producing again (in 2001) were the new possibilities when producing entirely on the computer."
Which part of your studio is the most vital facet?
"Well, my studio looks like a true nerd room. You can find action figures of all types
there, starting with Dr Channard from Hellraiser II, Ash from Army of Darkness, Gizmo,
Ryo-ohki from Tenchi Muyo, numerous skulls, and lots of stuff. I guess it's these childish surroundings that make me want to play with and tweak around with sounds..."
What food/drinks keep you fueled throughout production time?
"Hmmm... coffee, cigarettes and ganja?"
Which current crop of artists and labels are grabbing your attention, and why so?
"To be honest, none. I'm doing my own thing, mostly in the hardcore scene, and there are not many artists who really inspire me. Nowadays it's hard to keep an overview on the things going on. Everyone seems to release tracks via digital distribution, and getting an overwiew is not as easy as going to a record store back in the '90s was."
Here's the mandatory inane question: If you were pressed into a corner and forced to confess under great duress, how would you define the sounds/styles you're currently making?
"That would be Cycore. Yeah, it is the term I use to describe my hardcore productions.
I like small elements in the tracks, tiny edits, and lots of elements happening at the same time, so that the listener can find new things every time he listens to the tracks. With my techno productions I'm not that detailed, but I always aim at using lots of different elements in my tracks."
The first time I interviewed you, way back in 1995, you said: "if I want to do Biochip C. now, for example, I have a certain style and I have some limits that I won't cross with that concept." Is this still the case with Biochip C a decade and a half on?
"Well, let's see: Biochip C started with breakbeats and acid in the early '90s, did some techno and house, later electro and "strange techno" and is back now with doing acid again. I guess the concept of this project is quite....flexible..."
In that same interview you also quipped that "I won't get too hard and I won't get too ambient, and of course I won't get too trancey, because all trancers are my enemies! (we both laugh). Let's put it this way: I want to do different things but in no way will I do trance stuff." Does the antipathy towards trance continue to this day?
"Ha-Ha, I said 'enemies'....Ha-Ha-Ha... What a '90s thing... Well, does it tell you enough when I mention that when I'm booked for outdoor festivals to playing hardcore, I spend most of my time (except for my set) in the Goa areas? When i mentioned "trance" in the '90s I was referring to the typical Frankfurt trance, with cheesy melodies and gated pads. I still do not like that much, but tracks with a trancy-repetitive effect (without the cheese) can really be good."
You've worked extensively in the Biochip C, name, of course, but also under aliases like Subsonic 808, Search & Destroy, 909 Disco Babes, Chicks With Dicks, The Speed Freak, Steel, and DJ Fistfuck, etc, etc. Which aliase(s) are you continuing to use these days?
Only The Speed Freak, my main project for hardcore, and Biochip C for techno stuff are still used - and sometimes Biobreaks, for drum & bass-like stuff."
You've also run labels like Anodyne, Ozone, and Napalm. What's afoot with these?
"I've parked all my '90s labels, but am running 3 labels for Audiogenic (France) these days: Absurd Audio for hardcore, Off Bits for techno, and Subconnexion for drum & bass.
I've been thinking about relaunching some of my old labels, but somehow it feels wrong to me. They were part of the '90s with their sound, their artwork, their everything. For
a relaunch they would have to undergo changes, which might (in the end) not
be good. Look at the relaunch of Mokum or DJ Ungle Fever; both labels failed
big time and should have better remained a part of music history rather than forcing
them into a relaunch."
What new Martin Damm releases can we look out for?
"New Speed Freak records on Absurd Audio, plus some Biochip stuff on Off Bits and Industrial Strength."
You have a huge history, having released your music on vinyl and CD, as well as releasing 12-inches through various labels like Force Inc., DJ Ungle Fever, Analog Records, Mille Plateaux, Shockwave Recordings, Mokum, Anodyne and Industrial Strength. CDs seem to be a disappearing facet of the electronic music industry, and a fair amount of people are cutting back on vinyl production these days because they say it just doesn't make back the money invested. How do you feel about this? Do you agree?
"As much as I do not like that, I have to agree. The times are hard for vinyl sales.
Being a DJ, I was able to avoid using CD-decks so far, but I see my chances of not using them disappear in the near future. Currently I'm thinking about leaving out the whole CD-thing and becoming a notebook-DJ... but still, I prefer vinyl."
Is vinyl dead? Or just becoming more of a select option?
"It is becoming a select option as long as labels still have the money to produce vinyl at all. I will stick with it for as long as possible."
You have a decent, growing presence on online digital carriers. What do you make of the digital download phenomenon?
"To be honest, I never cared much about that. I don't buy tracks online, as I want to be able to hold something in my hands for the money I have spent - yes, I am old skool in that way. Also, on my royalty statements, I can see that the money made by online sales is still nothing compared to the vinyl I sell. Of course, this is the future, but if I have to stick with online sales entirely, I'd die of hunger in the first months. On our upcoming website, cycore.de, I will offer nearly all of my old productions as digital downloads, but that is just a side-project for our "real" vinyl shop."
Back to rthat interview in '95, you said: "It's strange, because when I started [in 1990] we sold more copies of each record than we do now, because there were not so many labels and it was easier to sell more. But that's okay - it's better now." Do you feel the same way in 2009, with the proliferation of digital labels?
"I'm a DJ, raised with vinyl. Seen for the DJ point, digital labels are (in my area of music) of no importance. Of course, it is good and fantastic and whatever that digital labels are easy and cheap to handle, but most of the digital labels lack quality-control; in my point of view it is kind'a essential that a label owner has to invest money and take a risk, because then he cannot afford releasing shitty productions. Nowadays the web is flooded with them, and none of the DJs I know take the time to listen through the output of digital labels, but goes for vinyl or CD."
What do you think of the Japanese producers like Captain Funk, Toshiyuki Yasuda, Co-Fusion, HIFANA, DJ Warp, Shufflemaster, Merzbow, Alone Together, Gadget Cassette, et al? Do any of these people stand out for you, and why do you think the Japanese scene is so vibrant and charismatic?
"I only know Merzbow from your list, and I have quite a collection of his stuff here. What I like about the Japanese audience in general is that people are very open for everything. They can deal with all the music you play for them, and they obviously have fun with it. That is very different in Germany - here it's hard to motivate the audience at all. I'm working with artists from the underground hardcore scene in Japan, and every time they book me the parties are fantastic. The hardcore scene there seems to be mixed very much with the cosplay-scene, so we always have dozens of colourful people
in the audience..." (laughs).
Have you heard any of the music coming out of Australia?
"The only person i meet quite regularly nowadays is Mark N. from Nasenbluten. In my opinion, he is the best DJ of all, and a really nice person, too."
Finally, how would you define your remix you've done for us, in a nutshell?
"At first an element of a track has to 'jump at me', so that I want to make
a remix of it. In our case it was the acid-line. I took this element, jammed with the software, and then there was the remix. I don't like forcing a track or remix into a certain direction, but prefer jamming and seeing where the track wants to go. This time it turned into a trancey thingy, gripping you by the balls and not letting you go until it is over."
