- Tactile techno from the maestro.
- Skee Mask is one of dance music's greatest crossover stories of the past decade, with new albums greeted with the attention usually reserved for an Aphex Twin or a Caribou. ("Loved seeing this on r/indieheads," said one Reddit user, on the release of the 2021 LP Pool.) It's not hard to understand why: on albums like Compro, he blends well-worn dance music tropes with incredible, detailed soundscapes and spine-tingling melodies. And on his 12-inches, he brings that sensibility to the dance floor, with an approach probably best described as articulate. Even on his most ambient of tracks, everything is in its right place. Along with founders the Zenker Brothers, his music outlines everything that makes Munich outfit Ilian Tape one of the best techno labels going.
On the decks, it's kind of a different story. It might surprise you if you only know his albums, but Skee Mask is an incredible DJ, balancing his predilection for hip-hop and UK-informed sounds with laser-focused techno. He can adapt to all sorts of situations—check out this incredible recording of him DJing with four of the best grime and drum & bass MCs in the business—and on his RA Podcast he focuses on the techno side of things, with nearly two hours of pacey techno and creative mixing, with dips into acid, electro, garage and more. It's a party-starting mix from a genuine star, perfect for getting through the holiday doldrums or pre-gaming your NYE plans. Like Skee Mask's best records, it's something to enjoy in any number of settings.
What have you been up to recently?
Enjoying the winter through mostly staying at home, digging music online and trying to work on new releases / ideas. I'm glad that a few remixes I made came out this year alongside the double ISS release.
How and where was the mix recorded, and can you tell us the idea behind the mix?
It was recorded a few days ago at home in Bavaria, in my bedroom studio on two Pioneer XDJ-800s, a DJM-600 mixer and one Technics SL1210-MK2 turntable. I tried to combine some of my favorite dance records into a fluid mix of sounds which could work in a club setting. I guess this set was more focused on house and techno, but I definitely had to put a few breaky ones in there as well. The idea behind the mix is basically retaining some kind of groove throughout the mix.
What's one club, venue or party that had the most impact on you as a DJ and producer?
It's tricky to name an absolute favourite, because there are quite a lot of clubs / venues that I really love visiting or playing for. Same with parties, this year there were loads of highly inspiring back-to-back sessions. To name an example, in June for the Pollerwiesen afterparty at Tresor West in Dortmund. Victor spontaneously asked me to join his set after we already played back-to-back at the actual festival before. The sound system, staff and room was great and it made us play how we wanted to. So we started at midnight and warmed up with a lot of deep cuts that are normally hard to include in my usual club sets. After four hours we had a nice journey from 110 up to 140 BPM and Stranger started playing.
I was quite knocked out after playing two sets in a row that day and would have gone to sleep, but after hearing him on the decks it was clear that leaving wasn't an option. He killed it that night and we couldn't stop dancing. So at some point I gained enough confidence to randomly ask him if he would be up to play the last hour together with me, as I still had some unplayed tracks in mind. Amazingly he liked the idea and it turned out to be a perfect tryout. When the lights came on we immediately started talking about properly repeating this and now we got an all night long show planned at OHM in February. That's just one of many great back-to-back moments for me and I have to thank Victor and Stranger for their calmness and spontaneity that night.
As a producer, you're renowned for hazy, rhythmic soundscapes. How would you say your approach to DJing mirrors (or doesn't) that sound?
To be fair it mostly doesn't mirror it, but it always depends on the gig I'm playing. If i feel that there might be someone in the crowd who's aware of my productions I'll try to at least include that vibe into my set. The music I play is basically the reason why my productions exist, even if it's not that obvious sometimes.
You were one of the first prominent artists in electronic music to speak up about Spotify's management and the streaming paradigm in general. Do you think anything has changed since, or do you have hope that the system will be able to change at all?
There's just no bigger interest in the awareness about this topic, which I can understand until a certain point. My view on Spotify might seem too intense, but my life depends on music and I probably spend more time with it than anything else. And if it wasn't for the general meaning of streaming, I would never been able to dig that deep into so many different worlds of music. I loved that it was and still is freely accessible to everyone, including some communities that naturally grew around it. Like the use of a comment section, where people would write a lot of interesting thoughts, information or anecdotes sometimes. If thriving music streaming services like Spotify would go into that direction, where it's actually about letting people connect more dots than the ones that fit within their financial greed, it would definitely have an impact.
What are you up to next?
I'll definitely record a lot more mixes, also constantly recording jams in the studio. Early next year there's a new Ilian Tape Skee Series four-tracker coming out, one of them can be heard in the mix. Some collab projects are still in progress and hopefully they're also gonna pop up in the following months.