DJ T. dusts off his disco ball

DJ T. dusts off his disco ball

19 December, 2011 | 8.57AM

• Written by: Beatportal
• Filed under: Music News: disco, dj t., get physical

Berlin’s DJ T. is worried about an endangered species, but his isn’t your typical environmentalist’s concern. Not unless you consider the deluge of summery, Ibiza-themed compilations a sign of global warming. The Berlin DJ and Get Physical co-founder is concerned that the traditional genre compilation is dying off, crowded out of the marketplace by an endless stream of comps devoted only to the season’s biggest hits.

His conservation effort pays off this month in the form of DJ T. Presents United Under The Ball – 30 Years Of Disco, a 43-track compilation on Get Physical that brings together the likes of Alexander Robotnick and Azari & III, and Arthur Russell’s Loose Joints and Morgan Geist’s Storm Queen.

Rather than a portrait of what disco was in its heyday, DJ T.’s collection of tracks offers a kind of time-lapse snapshot of disco’s influence across three decades of dance music, with a particular focus on the fertile terrain that lies between today’s deep house and so-called “nu disco.” There are the classics, of course, like Loose Joints’ “Is It All Over My Face?” and Alexander Robotnick’s “Problemes D’Amour”; there are also more recent reworkings of iconic tunes, like Newcleus’ “Jam On It (A Chicken Lips Drum Deluxe!)” remix, and Joakim’s edit of the Max Berlin classic “Elle & Moi.”

The collection includes a few exclusive cuts as well, including DJ T.’s remix of Tensnake’s early “Around The House,” a new edit of T.’s tune “Philly,” an unreleased Catz ‘n Dogz remix of his “Dis,” and unreleased tracks from Mexico’s Robbie Akabal and Damian Uzabiaga.

We caught up with DJ T. over Skype, as he finished off the last leg of a three-month European tour, to find out more; read on for the interview.

How did you get the idea for the compilation?

The first impulse was just, hey—this format, the tasteful genre or style compilation has died out, especially digitally. So I thought somebody has to put together a nice style compilation with a big selection, showing a wide range of the genre it’s about, and showing the longest possible period the tracks were released, something like a 30-year timeframe.

I thought for the first compilation, what could be the nicest subject, and I came to disco, because that’s a subject I can’t remember any compilations of in the last few years. It’s something I was always digging for. Of course, when you look at the tracklist, it’s not all 100% pure disco, in its purest form. There’s a lot of stuff that is deep house with a strong disco influence, or a strong disco flavor. The main time of the genre was between 1975 and ‘83, possibly, when disco slowly turned into Hi-NRG, and this new, a bit faster, a bit harder genre was coming up. Of course you still have people who are releasing disco in its purest form. But disco is fusioning with a lot of other styles.

Since most of the compilation focuses on more recent music, much of which is typically classed as “house,” what is it that defines the spirit of disco to you?

When I was doing the research for the tracklist, I was aware that there are a lot of tracks that for some people, they would maybe say this is deep house. But for me disco is a certain feeling in a track that depends upon the use of certain elements. Certain percussion, certain melodies, certain grooves that directly give me this disco feeling, that directly remind me of the original era. It’s hard to explain in words. I think that’s probably a subjective thing.

In the last year there have been a lot more people doing disco edits…

There’s definitely a renaissance in the genre, yeah.

And that seems to be part of a deeper, ongoing fusion between disco and house aesthetics.

I would say disco is merging at its ends. It’s merging with this music, sometimes called “indie dance,” that’s originally coming from guitar-based independent music, that’s morphing into a clubbier style. There’s certainly a grey zone between these two genres, and on the other end it’s merging with deep house. A lot of people call all this new house that was so popular this year, and is popular in all these readers’ polls, from all these labels like Hot Creations and No. 19 and Lower East, a lot of people call this disco or disco-ish house, but I would actually call it R&B-influenced house. It’s really a matter of definition.

When you were coming up as a music listener and a DJ, what were some of the compilations that were important to you?

I was just remembering yesterday the first track that really mattered to me in my life. This was this really cheesy disco track from Baccara called “Yes Sir I Can Boogie.” This was from 1977. I was 8 years old, and I was asking my mother, “Hey, what’s this song on the radio? I really like that song, I’d really like you to buy me the single.” And what she did, she bought me a disco compilation on vinyl called Dance Mania with this track on it. So this was the start of my vinyl collection. Of course, I couldn’t spend so much money in the first two or three years, but after this first compilation it really inspired me, and it was the most important thing at that moment in my life, to have this compilation. I asked my parents to buy me more, and this was the start of my archiving mania and the start of my vinyl collection and the start of my passion for vinyl.

Later, in the ‘90s, the genre compilation became very important when you were interested in one style. Or if a style compilation was put together by a certain DJ, and you knew, hey, I know this DJ is a good reference for me because I like what he’s playing and charting—when a certain DJ was putting together a compilation of a certain genre, it was clear that this is something that would matter to me, and where I would find some hidden gems.

I guess, in the last years, with the loss of the physical sound carrier, and with the whole new situation with the internet, that changed.

Will this be the first in a series of new compilations?

Yes. Yesterday I sent 100 tracks for the new subject.

Any hints as to what it will be?

Yeah, it will be called The House That Jack Built. All stuff that’s somehow jacking. Of course a lot of Chicago stuff.

You’ve been in North America for three months now, what are your impressions? Is this tour different from earlier tours in terms of the crowds you’re seeing?

The the more often I tour America, the more I like it. Before I started touring properly, especially in the U.S., I had this image of this huge country, especially these world metropoles like New York, with this big history in terms of clubbing and nightlife, and then when I first discovered the scenes in the last years I thought, oh my God, what happened to all these scenes? They’re so marginal compared to the size of the cities, and they have all these restrictions and repression from the authorities. Sometimes they have to close at 2am, what a crappy situation, what a tough situation also for the promoters.

Especially the last two years, I have a feeling there’s a complete new generation growing. New York is a good example. There’s a new underground growing. It’s not so much about clubs that book a weekly program, like so many clubs in Europe do. It’s more about the underground that’s happening in off locations and private locations and with small crowds, but nevertheless really vital and colorful and really enthusiastic.

I have the feeling that, in North America as well as South America, the crowds are much more open-minded and more enthusiastic than in many places in Europe. The people are much more thankful for DJs coming over and playing the new stuff from Europe. That’s something I really like about the scenes here. And how I’m welcomed, how happy the people are to get a night with a DJ from Germany or Europe. And how they care and how informed they are, how deeply they dig. During this tour, I especially enjoyed playing the smaller scenes in the U.S.  I had so much fun in Denver, I met so many nice people.

South America is different. There you have, to my surprise, sometimes a bigger infrastructure. You have more festivals, more clubs, bigger crowds. Sometimes I come to these places, like Lima for example, and I’m really surprised how professional the promoters are and how big the scenes are. I can remember when I came first to Lima just three years ago as a no-name. I’d never been there, and the promoter had organized an old theater, and it was just me and one local, and there were 1200 people there. This would never happen in North America. Never, never.

You and the other Get Physical artists have played Ciudad Juarez, Mexico many times in the past; did you play there on this trip?

Yeah, just last weekend.

How was that?

I mean, you know of course about the situation in Juarez. The last time, when I arrived to my gig, they told me that the day before, 40 people were killed in the city in one day. I’m not one of the guys to be afraid so much, because I think stuff can happen everywhere in the world. These huge cities with millions of people, when we see the stuff in the European media, when you read all this media writing about this war that the cartels have amongst each other, and with the government , it seems like the whole city is a constant war zone, but that is definitely not the case. You can walk or drive through the city for days without seeing a hint of anything that’s related to the war. Of course it’s a bit more dangerous than other cities, but I don’t care so much; I really like to support these people there.

• (0) Comments
• (947) Views
• Get DJ T.'s United Under The Ball on Beatport