Introducing: Wehbba

Introducing: Wehbba

7 April, 2011 | 3.30AM

• Written by: Beatportal
• Filed under: Music News: tronic, wehbba

São Paulo’s Rodolfo Abrao Wehbba—better known simply as Wehbba—has spent the last five years becoming one of Brazil’s most interesting producers, turning up everywhere from Renaissance and Bedrock to Get Physical and Primate. From the determined techno of his early releases to the deeper, subtler strains of his more recent releases, Wehbba hasn’t stopped experimenting or evolving.

Following his Full Circle LP last year, Christian Smith’s Tronic now releases Wehbba Remixed, an eight-track collection of reworks from the album featuring Christian Smith, 2000 And One, Carlo Lio, D-Nox & Beckers, Joseph Capriati, Psycatron, Peter Horrevorts, and Samuel L. Session.

We caught up with Wehbba to find out how he got his start in the Brazilian dance-music scene of a decade ago, and what keeps him so versatile today. Read on for an in-depth interview with an artist who’s clearly got his priorities in the right place.

Hi Wehbba, thanks for talking to Beatportal. So it’s winter now down in Brazil; does that mean you’ll be heading north for the festival season up here, or will you stay in Brazil?

I can tell you that Brazil barely has a winter, but things do slow down a little bit down here, so I might be spending a couple of months around Europe this summer. It all depends on my schedule though—I’ve recently moved back to Brazil (I was living in Czech Republic for almost four years), so I’m enjoying staying here as much as possible lately.

You really do get around! Apparently, you were a dentist, an English teacher and a Jiu Jitsu fighter before you started DJing; how and where did you discover electronic dance music—was it in Brazil or Australia?

I fell in love with electronic music when I spent a few months living in Australia about 14 years ago, but it was when I came back that I started buying records. All of the stuff I did kinda happened at the same time, as they were all part-time activities, except for the dentist thing. But being self-employed has its perks, so I could arrange my schedule at the practice according to my DJ schedule, and also my early studio sessions schedule as well. At that time, everything was new to me, so it took me a few years to realize that the only thing I really should be doing was dealing with music. I had always been crazy about the house music sounds, but at some point I got into techno in a not-so-healthy manner, kinda like an addiction—but, thankfully, over the years I managed to balance everything much better. I can say I’m back to my “roots,” but haven’t recovered from the “addiction” quite yet.

How did you make the jump from being a clubber to becoming a DJ/producer? Did you have any help learning, or did you teach yourself?

I used to have a mixer on which I recorded my band’s rehearsals when I was a teenager, and after I started buying my records, I started using that mixer at private parties with some friends, mixing two DiscMans and eventually turntables, but not professional ones, just some old ones from my grandfather. After a while I decided to reach out for some help, as I didn’t have enough money to buy me a pair of turntables and a DJ mixer, so a friend recommended me a school where I could practice on that equipment. When I felt ready, I started going out more and giving away some mixed CDs until I finally got a spot as a non-official resident DJ on a popular pub/club in São Paulo at the time, called Botechno.

From then on, everything seemed to just go with the flow, and producing was my next goal. It wasn’t really usual at the time (about 9 or 10 years ago) to be a producer in Brazil; there were very few of them, considering the size of our country. Since I had a good knowledge of the studio workflow from my past as a musician, I decided to research new technologies. The whole digital audio workstation concept was booming, and I jumped straight on that boat and never looked back. From the very few Brazilian producers active at that time, I only really looked up to one or two, like Renato Cohen and maybe Xerxes (XRS Land). I didn’t know them personally at the time, so I had to find information elsewhere, and learned mostly by trial and error. I’m glad nowadays that I never learned from anybody else everything that I know, because that made me who I am, although it took me much longer to reach musical maturity.

What was the Sao Paulo scene like when you were starting out? Which clubs were you playing, and what types of music? How were the crowds?

The Sao Paulo scene was really booming at that time; I feel like it was the best era of our scene. There were a lot of amazing clubs running great electronic music parties all week long, and the big festivals had just started happening here. Like I said, I started out playing house music at a sort of pub called Botechno, and even in a small place that didn’t look like a club at all, you could have a long evening with some serious club music going on, with an amazing vibe. At some point they would even close the doors so the sound could be louder, and many people would just stay there and not even bother going to a club afterwards.

If you did choose to go out, the main clubs at the time were Lov.e, Manga Rosa, U-Turn, Club, A Loca, Overnight, and a few others which I didn’t attend. The parties used to advance way into the weekend mornings, and it wasn’t rare that a Friday night at Manga Rosa would extend until noon on Saturday. The music was also really interesting: you could hear house, techno and trance in the same evening, and it felt just right, everybody was open minded, maybe even a little naive. There were plenty of drum ‘n’ bass parties too (which are now unfortunately basically non-existent in Brazil).

It was also like this at outdoor parties, and I used to love it, was much more fun. Can’t say I’d still feel that way nowadays, but that moment felt sort of magical to me. The crowds were wild, eager to listen to new music, and also to listen to what they were used to from their favorite DJs, and when they did, they showed their appreciation, believe me. I don’t think I’ve seen anything like this anywhere in the world lately, no matter how amazing the crowd is. It was really special. Most big names that played here back then will vouch for me on this.

So what’s the scene in Sao Paulo like today?

Sao Paulo has gone through rough times, musically speaking, over the past five years. I moved out of here simply because I couldn’t put up with the way things were developing at the time I left. It was the early days of that electro-house craze that took over the whole country and established Brazil as a mostly commercial music country. I’d barely come back to perform while I was gone, and most great artists from here also started playing much more abroad and even in other cities than here. But since last year, I’ve noticed a big change. Clubs like D-Edge and Clash have been firmly defending quality music as opposed to the commercial nonsense that prevails throughout the country in smaller cities, and I think their work has been paying off. Many of the bigger acts around the globe come to Sao Paulo to perform at either one of the two clubs. The huge psychedelic trance festivals that are a major part of the market in Brazil also started opening up their lineups to other styles. Last year I played at the main one, called XXXPerience, which even had a Minus (!) stage, and had on the lineup some big boys like Sasha, Dubfire, Calvin Harris, etc..

All this has contributed to the improvement of musical quality over most clubs, and the public is finally starting to enjoy (and recognize) quality music again.

You started out making some pretty tough techno, but your releases have become a little deeper and housier over the years. What accounts for the shift?

I actually started out with lounge music and pretty chilled tech-house, as I mentioned before, having some local releases on small labels. At some point I just got addicted to techno, and this was also the time when I had international recognition. It was fun for a while to work on that sort of music, but after a couple of years I got sick of the same repeated messy percussion patterns on most tracks. I needed to express myself in other ways, in music that could accept my musicality, so I basically went back to where I started, and it just feels like it’s always been like this to me. I’m not saying I don’t enjoy making techno, I love it and I still do it, I just like to try new things and mix styles to get a result with which I’ll be happier for longer.

Could you tell us a little about your studio setup? What kind of gear are you using? Your sound is pretty diverse—are you often changing things up in the studio, trying out new approaches?

I have just set up my new studio in São Paulo together with Christian Smith, who also lives here. We both have the same approach to making music: we like speed and flexibility, so we decided to go almost all-digital when choosing the new gear. We have now Ableton Live for composing and creating and Steinberg Cubase for recording and post-production in general (mixing, mastering); no outboard processors, just the computer, MIDI controllers and our little “puppy” Tetra, the analog synth by Dave Smith, the one piece of gear that is not computer-based. I also have the UAD and the Liquid Mix DSP interfaces to process the sound as I would on outboards processors, and I just love them. The one thing I go crazy with is the virtual synths. This might explain the “diversity” in my sound: I have tons of them, and most of my ideas for music come from exploring each synth in depth nowadays.

Tell us a little about your new remixes collection on Tronic. How did that come together, and what are your thoughts on the mixes?

I am very proud of the package we managed to put together. It took a lot of work to find the right people to do it, simply because it had to be done right. Back with Full Circle I took care of the whole album process, from composing to engineering and mastering, so we had to be really careful to find the right people to give their interpretations of my hard work. At first we had Samuel L Session flawlessly remixing the first single off the album, which was a great starting point, and instead of rushing things and getting average remixes for a couple of other singles, we opted for releasing the other remixes in one go, after the album. All of the guys we picked have worked with me, Christian or Tronic at some level, and after it was finished it feels to me like a family getting together for lunch on a Sunday. It just fits. All the remixes are amazing, there is no filler, everybody did their best, and did exactly what anybody would expect them to do, and I’m really, really thankful for that.

Finally, what’s up with 82 Recordings, and what upcoming releases from you should people be watching for?

82 Recordings is hibernating, I have been way too busy in the studio and touring, so it’s impossible for me to handle it as I should. Hopefully in the near future I can start planning releases again, but I can’t say much at this point. I have just done a huge batch of remixes for Samuel L Session, Christian Smith, Funk D’Void, Robert Babicz, Coyu & Uner, Broombeck, Mihalis Safras, Peter Horrevorts, Ramon Tapia and Oliver Klein, so I’m taking a break now from remixing and focusing on writing new original music. I have a few releases lined up until the summer, on labels like Tronic, Bedrock, 100% Pure and such, but the year is just really starting for me now—so expect many more releases in the second half of the year.

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