steve: Hello Tomas, you have released some vinyl on Bpitch Control, the numbers 71 and 78. How do you define your style?
Tomas: To the core, Minimal (in a maximized way), Simple, Repetitive, Loud, Unintelligent and hopefully Funky. Music for the stomach and the bodyparts just below, if you get my drift :), not really for the head.
steve: This explanation sounds really good and makes hungry for new stuff from you. For people, who think the same: Do some releases from you follow and when?
Tomas: Yeah, I have another 12", "BAS" (bpc088), coming on BPitch Control in May. The A-side, "Bass Come Down", is pure party-music for the summer season while the B-side, "Numb", is kind of minimal Berlin-funk, I guess. On these tracks I've messed with some vocals from two other swedish guys, Sophie Rimheden (Mitek/Mille Plateaux) and Dibaba (Glasgow Underground).
I will release some fresh tracks on next compilation from Average Records (www.average.se), a label I run with some friends. Theme for this comp: Ugly music for ugly people. Out soon on a VERY limited scale.
I also have a track on a comp called Birth of Industrial Cool, out now from (swedish label) 23hZ pleazure.org/ic1. Artists included are Hakan Lidbo, Andreas Tilliander, Scanner, Rechenzentrum and a lot of others. The musicians all got access to a bunch of sounds sampled at a sugar refinery, and used these sounds to make the tracks on the comp. No distribution for this record in Germany yet, but who knows what will happen?
steve: Okay, that`s a lot of information, our DJs should recognized that.
This tracks will be released in the future, but how long do you produce and do you prefer hard- or software? With what machines do you work mostly?
Tomas: I've been making music for as long as I can remember, but more seriously for the last 4-5 years. Nowadays I very seldom use any outboard. I usually make all sounds in my computer (a very standard and rather dated PC. I still run Win98SE cause it's really reliable. I haven't got the guts to upgrade. If it works, don't fix it.) with various (old) programs and mix them down through my cheap external mixer and some cheap external multieffects, to keep a live feel to the music. I have a minimal setup, not only cause I can't afford a lot of fancy equipment. I find that if your setup is minimal you have to cream every last drop of power out of what you've got. Abuse your gear and you will be greatly rewarded! If you got too many options you don't know where to start. It also means that when I play out I can easily bring my whole studio.
steve: Do you also make liveacts or DJ-sets? Do you play in Germany?
Tomas: Well, I CAN mix two records together pretty decently, but I wouldn't call myself a DJ. There are so many good DJs who are not getting any recognition so it would be kind of wrong for me to do DJ sets. I'm not qualified just on the basis of having released a few 12". I have done some livesets here in Sweden, but in fact basically there is no scene here for my kind of music. Germany seems so much better. I have played live in Berlin a few times, at OstGut, PolarTV and more recently for the BPitchControl party at Maria am Ostbanhof on New Years Eve 2003, together with Ellen Allien, Sasha Funke, Housemeister, Modeselektor, Andrea Parker and some other good people. I really like Berlin. A nice laidback, come-as-you-are vibe. Trashy but in a good way :) I also did a set at Fabric in London a few years ago. They have an amazing sound system and a very nice green laser.
steve: What was the funniest and the worsest situation at these events? Can you remember one?
Tomas: Luckily I haven't had any real disasters at live gigs. My computer hasn't crashed (yet...) When I played at Fabric in London the bass was so heavy my friends complained their eyes were vibrating so they couldn't focus :) Yeah!
At the BPitch party at Maria in Berlin people kept falling over my monitors and some even fell off stage during my set. I almost did too.
steve: I think, you had already a lot of fun at the named parties but how came Techno or Techno-parties in your life? Is there a special song or an artist, who had influenced you?
Tomas: My first and foremost hero is of course Elvis :)
I started going to (and arranging) parties in the early nineties. For me, it really started when the british indie-pop-scene crossed over to dance, with bands like Stone Roses, Primal Scream, S:t Etienne and Beloved. What I liked most about that period was the diversity of music at parties. You could mix music of all styles and tempos. As long as the music was good the party was good in those days. But soon everything got really narrowminded, and still is I guess. Like when you go to a "proper" house-club you just know every track you hear will sound the same, and when you go to a "proper" techno-party all you are going to hear is 140 BPM looped-up compressor-techno. Why don't try a soulful housey accapella on top of a knuckle-hard techno tool. Maybe it will sound amazing? Just an idea.
steve: Can you imagine, in which direction the whole techno movement will go in the future.
Tomas: Hopefully labels will start to take notice of the fact that a lot of really talented musicians and producers are out there, instead of just continuing to release yet another record with guys who made some really cutting edge traxx way back. It's like I can never understand why people are so devoted to David Bowie. Let's be honest, this guy hasn't made one single decent track in the last 20 years. Why is it still big news whenever he release a new lousy record? I understand it's easier for a label to play it safe and release records with household names, but how will the truly visionary and forward-thinkin music break through if noone will present it to the public? Then of course there's the question of the crisis in the recording industry. I heard the other day that yet another one of the big distributors in the UK was bankrupt. I think the solution is pretty simple: Stop releasing mediocre music! Good just ain't good enough. Records don't sell themselves that way anymore. When money is tight, people listen before they buy.
So what will be the next big leap forwards? I guess we won't know until we hear it.
steve: Okay, I think, your thoughts are the best possibility to finish this interview in an intellectual way :-) Is there still anything to say?
Tomas: Rhythm is a universal language. Let the music do the talking!
