Making it early to try and catch Reji (who I remember missing all those years ago and later regretting it) on the final day. No regrets this time, and even though it was nigh on unbearably hot—the sublime set kept the sizzle on.

Bringing some of the dub love that the Skrillex loving Mumbaikar was waiting for was Bay Beat Collective who played a fun set!

Moving past, Vachan brought a few people his side from the bigger stage where Shaan was at his i-have-only-one-gear set. And this point, you could sense people on edge, in a good way, waiting for the explosion.

And explode they did, Sultan and Ned Shepard brought out the big vocal guns, with a set that we’ve come to know really well with a few new additions, but largely—melodic and warm. They even ended with a ‘Million Stars’ (surprise, surprise…). But the crowd was in it—and it was sad for Clement (surprisingly good) who had to contend with a scattered crowd.

Enter Paul Thomas (who is very happy seeing many more people than 4 from the Sunburn Afterburn fiasco from Goa) with a vocal, house mood—very signature him, and signature tight.

Pearl was sublime with her familiar sounding set. A dark, brooding, and ultimately enchanting set glittering with big basslines, smooth symphonies and anyone who drops Prydz’s mix of ‘Personal Jesus’ knows what they’re doing. Fine, fine music.

At this point we just introspect and wonder how good it would have been if all three days had looked like this. It was filling up really fast (OK it’s a Sunday) and the entire vibe has finally been transported from Goa here.

It’s actually Sunburn again!

Bringing in the massive names everybody was looking forward to…let’s talk about Gareth first, because hey—he’s got the big stage, the bigger crowd, the bigger effects, the bigger build up—but was he the biggest act? Almost.

Keeping a high tempo, high electro and big trance-house sound going, opening with ‘Tokyo’ and taking the sweat-drenched crowd through other favourites like ‘Children’ to ‘Smells like Teen Spirit’ to ‘Zombienation’ to ‘On a Good Day’. It was popular and it was catching on like wildfire.

Yet yet, there was a man on the other side, who was absolutely blitzing the small stage—the sound system was for once, limiting the kind of boom he was and is capable of it. It’s a pity John Dahlback had to contend on Electra. But we’ll make do, for what was the penultimate (by 10 minutes) set and easily—the best.

The smooth ‘Pyramid’ to the dirty ‘Hells Bells’ to the BIG ‘Atom’ to the infectious ‘Paradise’ to ‘Toulouse’, it was pure electro-bigroom. It was mixing to SHM levels of perfection, it was flow that kept everyone dancing for 2 straight hours—non stop, it was song selection from the whammed out top 100 house tunes. It was perfection.

Coming back, Gareth ended emotionally charged with a BIG mix of ‘Big Sky’ with Audrey Gallagher’s haunting voice and finally his blockbuster ‘Sanctuary’—big white streamers, one or two people crying.

It was Sunburn all over again.

Beautiful end.

The Highs

•CryOGas!! Cooling white smoke that blinded you and provided much respite from the heat.

•The sheer effort some DJs made on Day 2 and Day 3.

•The smooth entry and exit and infrastructure. 

•Comfortable matted wooden flooring (though the terrible reverb on them on less populated sets was awful) which is much more conducive to longer dancing hours than sand.

•Umpteen bars!

The Lows

•All highs and no mids and lows sound on Day 1.

•Media having to pick up a daily pass every day (though the sweet ladies at the media room took little time to sort this out)

Photo credits: Nitesh Square Photography & Sanya Sagar for Sunburn Festival.

The early segment of the day was light, with much tighter sound, better sets and some of that old Sunburn vibe returning.

Vipul Angirish, Rohit Barker (who sounded exactly like Nik Chinapa throught out on the mic), Jitter and Brute Force (Shane and Tuhin this time sounding superb) were all customary nice acts. The one that really caught our eyes (and ears!) were the guys from Wireframez.

A cameo of sorts that blitzed in with live vocals and the amazing bassist going on all sorts of breakbeat and dub that was unbelievably fresh. Too bad it stayed just for a meagre 30 minutes.

Arjun started a delicious deep house routine on a slightly turned down Electra. Extremely good levels on both stages today, some of the teething problems going down. Perhaps the only point of bother was the repetition of visuals—come on, shouldn’t a guy of Immersive’s stature come with a slightly bigger repository of stuff to show on his beautifully hi-res (we mean hi-res here, unlike the vanilla 4x3 forgettables from Sunburn past) and those LED strips making the sun’s rays—the setup was outstanding—just that it got boring to see the same globe spin in pieces or Beautiful Destruction or the Mandela+Gandhi+others facewarp.

Coming back to the music, Shapeshifters took their solo appearance and dropped some classic Defected sounds with the now-obvious-strategy of going with the hits. You had ‘Rolling In The Deep’, a sick mashup of ‘Good Feeling’ and the ultra sexy ‘Night Like This’ by Trent Cantrelle. Tight, still loud but not deafening and extremely satisfying.

Fergie started a tech-ish start that soon converted into a bigroom free-for-all with ‘Flash’, ‘Where’s Your Head At?’, ‘Sweet Disposition’ and ‘Le7els’ and every single track you could name on your top10 house essentials currently.

But this wasn’t just any crowd-huggy set, it was laced with CDJ work that was far subtler than a CD player DJ and the synth pads, and effects, the ubiquity of high-passes, everything was built to bring the place down. It was a classic case of a DJ slightly moulding his sound and game to come out eventually as a winner.

On the other side at the big Helia, a massive crowd has been pulled in and people were actually suing their Saturday Nights well.

Skazi with his electric violinist and keyboard player descended down with a hit-and-miss hellfire of a show. Which had all the raw testosterone filled energy of a heavy metal concert, but the confusion of a Skazi one. With reggae and dub sampling filling the brilliant psy riffs topped with some excellent live guitaring by the man himself—it was evident they were having too much a ball to care about the here-and-there nature of the set.

Again, the crowd went ballistic so it isn’t much of a point to complain, unless you came there for something more raw psytrancey.

So we went back, fairly more satisfied, much more content with the kind of calories we’d burnt, and how little we felt deaf. This laid it up nicely for a grand prix finish on the last day.

Photo credits: Nitesh Square Photography & Sanya Sagar; Sunburn Festival

Walking into the searing—yes extremely hot and un-danceable conditions of a typical late Bombay afternoon, you realize something’s amiss. Is it people? Of course there’s not even a 100 right now, is it the big names? Nawed and Lost Stories are big in their own right. Is it the sound? There are over twice the number of speakers than at Goa. Is it the visuals? They’ve got Immersive and he has done a pretty nice job to make a sun out of LED strips. Is it the infrastructure? It’s the fastest go-in-and-out time for any Sunburn ever.

Then what was it?

On Day 1, Sunburn Summerfest Mumbai looked a tad bit thanda. Almost everyone’s in a pair of jeans and shoes. Not many people can give two hoots about the rousing progressive house beauty that Nawed souped up. It was sad to see five people (mostly Percept Family) dance about in front of such a stellar set. Heat or not.

Anish Sood—once again the right place-right sound man with sultry deep house on Electra—the smaller stage was managing its own little audience.

Lone ranger Rishab (Lost Stories) then came in with a confused and meant-to-please set that was fun mostly, but had some odd mashup like the ‘We Will Rock You’ married to ‘Epic’. But they did manage to bring the cheer to a massive Helia (the bigger stage). Numbers like ‘Coming Home’ and a superb mashup of Zedd’s ‘Shave it’ with some Indian vocal sampling.

Mat Zo—who seems to look as young as he did while releasing Exodus. Bringing in a really loud setup (totally drowned the mids) and belted house biggie after house biggie on something short of an aerial bombing squad. It wasn’t too clear who was messing up—but the subtle melodies of a Mat Zo set were the eventual martyrs to the big sound ho-hum.

‘Mozart’ and ‘Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger’ kept proceedings interesting though.

Finally the biggies. Pleasurekraft took proceedings on a similar deep level but more energetic and definitely more keen to entertain, romping quite a warm yet immersive dance experience.

Back to Helia and finally some of the Parle Gujjuboys and Bens crawled in amongst a few of the Sunburn faithful (yes they still exist) to see a set of frenzied psy-uplifting-dubstep-breaks-pop filled Europeans belt out loud psytrance with everything you could imagine to make a non-EDM crowd dance. And credit where its due, purists will always be miniscule, gotta play for the majority.

You had ‘Zombie Nation’ and ‘Sweet Dreams’ and ‘Shiny (goddamned) disco balls’ and even SHM’s ‘One’ mashed in ‘Funk Soul Brother’. It was as universal as they could make it and still have high octane psy stance.

The day left us asking a lot of questions. Like where was the Sunburn spirit? Do people make the spirit? If yes then why weren’t a heavy amount later doing it? Why were all the DJs on an experimental trip with several stop-and-go mixing, where outros were left hanging and orchestral and elaborate intros were given non-mixed entries? Was this marketing overkill?

We’d just have to wait for day 2 for some answers.

Pleasurekraft’s first time in India. What are you most looking forward to?

Yes it’s not only the first time I’m playing in India; it’s the first time I have ever been to India at all. So everything will be so new to me.  I am really curious to see how the dance scene is there as I think no matter where in the world you go, music is such a universal thing that it’s always interesting to see how different cultures embrace different musical genres. Also, I love Indian food so looking forward to trying a lot of the traditional dishes that you just can’t get the same way outside of India! 

Your personal favourite track of all the ones you’ve made together would be?

This is a loaded question because during the production phase of a track we listen to these tracks so many times that it’s hard to listen to them for just pleasure outside the studio setting once they’re complete. Anyway, I think Kalle’s  favourites are the “La La Land” remix for Green Velvet and the “Antidote” remix for Style of Eye.  For me, I’d say “Zooloo” remixed and “Anubis”. Notice neither one of us would put “Carny” nor “Tarantula” up there because sometimes what resonates with fans isn’t necessarily what is closest to the artists’ heart. 

Your music has underlying hints of melancholy. What’s the story behind that?

Yeah, a lot of people say there is an undercurrent of darkness or melancholy in all the tracks. I think that that’s just something that comes naturally to us - neither one of us are into super happy poppy things usually because those things have the least amount of depth and after a few listens, get stale.  I think Kalle and I as people generally have a pretty dark sense of humour, and we find beauty in darkness or things that other people might find disturbing on a surface level, and I think that just works itself out in the music.

3 new artists you’ve discovered and have on loop?

Hard to name only 3 artists but I’ll try!

The Weeknd from Toronto, Canada.  Incredible 21-year-old singer/songwriter whose music I can best be described as ethereal electronic R&B.  He put out 3 albums on his website for free download last year and all of them are brilliant. Such a unique artist that everyone who just appreciates great music should be aware of.

On the electronic side, I would say Samuel Dan who has been doing some amazing things on great imprints like Dirtybird/Trapez and most recently his EP on Suara, which is just incredible. I just love artists with their own distinct style, and Samuel has it in spades.

Third – I would say upcoming producer out of Slovenia named Mike Vale - who just has a knack for making great floor friendly peak time tech house tunes that are just so fun to drop. His recent remix of our track “Anubis” is a great example of what I mean.

I’m assuming you get this often, where did the name Pleasurekraft come from?

Yeah, everyone asks us that! It’s from an episode of the American TV series “Dexter” where Michael C Hall (the actor that plays Dexter) refers to his boat as a “pleasure craft” and as soon as I heard it the light went off in my head and that was that. Put the two words together and since both our names start with a “K” it was a perfect fit. The fact that it is also ambiguously sexual in nature only made it that much better.

Most iconic electronic producer of all time would be-?

Most iconic electronic producer of all time? That is such a heavy question. Obviously I can’t give an objective answer to that but I can say for me personally, when I first moved to the States from Iran as a little kid and went through my uncle’s vast vinyl collection and stumbled on Jean-Michel Jarre’s “Oxygen” - there was no turning back. The entire album is on my iPod to this day and has never gotten old. He was a pioneer for sure so for me that would be my answer.

Party capital of the world according to you would be-?

Party capitals! Kalle would probably say Berlin and I would say Barcelona.  But certainly there are a lot of places still left to visit so lets leave that question open-ended for a bit longer!

Plans for the summer? Studio/ gigs? A bit of both?

Lots of things in the work this year including TWO new originals featuring Green Velvet on vocals - the first of which is already done and should be out late spring/early summer called “Skeleton Key”.  We also collaborated with Belocca  on a track called “Murdered Out” that is all set for release as well as a remix we did for duo Nervo girls that we are really excited about.  Then touring touring touring!

Pleasurekraft will be playing 3 dates in India. Be sure to catch them at one of these gigs:

: 6th April 2012 : Sunburn Summerfest : Mumbai :

: 7th April 2012 : Guvment : New Delhi :

: 8th April 2012 : Pebbles : Bangalore :

After a massive set at Sunburn 2011 that saw at least 20,000 people go nuts, Adam Walder aka Funkagenda will return to India this week, playing four club gigs across the country. Be sure the catch this brilliant producer in your city!

: 23rd February 2012 : Royalty : Mumbai :

: 24th February 2012 : Kitty Su : New Delhi :

: 25th February 2012 : F Bar : Bangalore :

: 26th February 2012 : 1 Lounge : Pune : 

Italian DJ and producer, Alex Kenji will be making his Indian debut this weekend. You’re most likely to know him for his recent hit “Pressure” featuring dance music’s most popular female vocalist, Nadia Ali. Kenji will be playing the following venues:

: 17th February 2012 : Blue Frog  : Mumbai :

: 18th February 2012 : Blue Frog : New Delhi : 

: 19th February 2012 : Club Shock : Pune :

So Paul van Dyk comes over to Mumbai and guess what? It’s not at a certain club that generally hosts the big gigs. It’s at Hard Rock Café. I haven’t been there since the Sean Kingston circus and I promised myself—no big gigs after the Yves la Rock debacle. But hey, this is the place that hosted AvB for the first time—and that was a massive gig.

Walking into Nawed Khan playing Jerome Isma-ae’s ‘Reunion’ and suddenly with the ceiling-suspended speakers, the generally appalling sound was pretty tight. Okay. That’s a great start. Nawed went on to drop favourites like ‘A Million Stars’ and ‘Sun and Moon’ (we can’t resist that one can we?), amongst some excellent progressive. He is absolutely a gem of a DJ and you will never walk away from his brilliance.

Moving on, at about 23:05, PvD walks into what is probably the fastest opener-to-main-act turnaround I have ever seen. Barely 5 seconds, and Nawed shuts the music, and PvD begins. No announcements, no hoopla, just runs into a 2-Mac setup and boom!

I think he began with a mash-up of so many tracks we weren’t getting anything, but we couldn’t be blamed to have got it wrong, there was so much happening. Whammed out classic trance stabs, new-age MS54-ean flanger synths. It was big.

Moving on a few tracks later, the gorgeous ‘For an Angel’ comes in and a lot of people seem to recognize it. Brings back such memories.

Going to his favourite’s excellent vocals—the inimitable Johnny McDaid with ‘You Are Everywhere’, it’s such a haunting song. Makes you goosebump-y.

Cosmic Gate’s ‘The Theme’ sifts in the set, with the grand piano breakdown and a sickeningly classic trance synth lead that is neurotic. And the drop is so massive, everyone just explodes.

The 2009 classic ‘Let Go’ then props in and has everyone singing. Suddenly, Tiesto’s ‘Traffic’ takes the nostalgia on overdrive and creates havoc in the club.

But by now, the sound rears its ugly head, for most of the final 45-50 minutes, PvD is going to continually turn the volume down in a not so subtle way because every time he wants to take it high—it’s jarring. So perceptibly jarring and distorted that you begin thinking your home 5W speakers are going to do more justice to the legend.

He then goes onto play more favourites like his famous ‘Sunday’ remix (remember Sunburn?), and ‘Time Of Our Lives’ with more haunting Johnny McDaid to complete the craziness of the night.

If you discounted the horrendous sound towards the end (how can you?) this was one of the best gigs around in an experiential way. A good turnout, not so crowded that it becomes a bhelpuri mela (like every gig around), good drinks and food and such an amazing set from both Nawed and PvD.

It’s a pleasure to seem him even after all these years. The music is hard, uplifting, a few vocals up and there—but predominantly classic sounds, great mixing and newfound energy.

Paul Van Dyk toured India courtesy of Submerge Music. Submerge is the largest importer and exporter of dance music in India.  

British musician, composer and producer, Nitin Sawhney will be making his long awaited (and overdue) Indian debut early next month. Sawhney who’s currently scoring Mira Nair’s next will be launching his ninth studio album, Last Days of Meaning on this mini tour. Accompanying him live are vocalists Nicki Wells and Rahel and Ashwin (flute).

: 3rd February 2012 : Blue Frog : New Delhi :

: 4th February 2012 : Sulafest : Nasik :

: 5th February 2012 : Blue Frog : Mumbai :

Listen to ‘The Devil and the Midnight” off Last Days of Meaning. 

And so came the last day, our calves and hamstrings outworked—not because we danced so much, but because we walked so much. From the two-wheeler parking to the venue, ground A to B to A to B to A to B…you get the point.

A long, extended stay at the Litli (till 1600) saw stellar gigs from Ankytrixx and Raveoholic. Moving onto the bigger stages- Karan Third Eye and John 00 Fleming sorted their regular pairing with high BPM fun. There’s such a loyalist audience John enjoys—it’s amazing.

On the other side Jayant Luthra (preceded by his duo with Clement) let loose some luscious progressive and deep sounds. One of the more serene sets of the fest. Ground B saw Lost Stories rip another one of their bigroom-y sets, absolutely LOUD on the Coollu’s blaring system. Nikhil Chinapa on neighbour Cubezoid was working a serious classic tribal and prog routine with Shovell…so much fun.

Coming back to the Coollu, Marco V let loose a massive outthrust of really loud bigroom and tech trance numbers, big driving energy got even more folks this side. Infected Mushroom on A had their live set going on with everything from psy to breaks to those excellent drums and their signature huge light-up Mushroom dolls added to their grandeur on the stage as they started rather well, though Amit Duvdevani’s vocals left a lot to be desired.

Albin on the other side came with more bigroom and electro—dirtier and grungier, as he jumped and danced and showed what good DJ’s ought to be like—ALIVE.

Finally we ran off to Ground B—zero puff left in our lungs as Funkagenda controlled the hell out of the Cubezoid in one of his best sets—totally nailed what such a huge crowd demanded with his House.

Axwell then came in, with 3D visuals (good gimmick but the repetitive nature of visuals got boring and you had to be dead centre to truly enjoy them) and all. Very similar set to the Madison Square Garden one that SHM played but well what do you know—the fiends lapped every bit of his awesome mashup-ability.

Right from ‘Antidote’ to ‘Miami 2 Ibiza’ to ‘Calling’ to the mental mashup of Heart is King+Losing My religion+Punk that was downright sick on the opener. Axwell was packed and thank god its the Cubezoid (only place that could’ve handled him) though again the sound was patchy — He nailed it nevertheless. On the other side Coldharbour fans were kept warm — with Markus Schulz fans going gaga on the Coollu. Moguai brought and electrifying house gig on Muah while Basher followed it similarly. And Mad Maxx took Infected’s psy routine to another level.

Mat Zo in the Afterburn was a stellar gig and probably the best in the noctural version of fest.

Sunburn this year was bigger but at some point its got too big. And maybe some of us purists will find it hard to come to terms with the amount of newbies and non-musical crowds hording in but that’s axiomatic of something is such a big brand. You’ll always bring great artists Sunburn but just make sure they’ve got sound to match their finesse in the coming years.

Photo credit: Sunburn Festival; Vidhi Gandhi

Is there any better way to start the New Year than with new music? That certainly seems to be the thought behind Peter Cat Recording Co’s latest album ‘Wall of Want’, released exactly a year after their un-ignorable offering ‘Sinema’.

While the band describes their new record as “A lo-fi collection of old tape experiments, self destructing loops, brief laptop recordings and just echo noise” and “mostly unlistenable”, there’s more to this release than just demos and what seem to sound as filler-material on the first listen.

The production is as raw as it gets, but what PCRC lose out in recording quality, they make up for in strong song-writing. The opening instrumental ‘Krypton’ seems to be a haunting piece, which is followed by ‘Servants’. The 3 minute track is washy vocals and a simple acoustic tune, but vocalist Suryakant Sawhney makes it memorable for even that. On ‘A Glass or Two’, the band takes inspiration from Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Eyes Wide Shut’ for an indie folk tune reminiscent of Neutral Milk Hotel.

Strangely, there’s only a single track – ‘Love Demons’ – that has its demo version on this album. The rest of them can only be estimated as early recordings and rough ideas. This version is another dark psychedelic haze. ‘After Dinner’ is the first of the looped compositions, breaking into fuzzy guitars from Anindya ‘Andy’ Shanker and almost inaudible vocals from Sawhney. ‘And a Now’ is another outtake drowned in a fuzz-faced loop.

The band may have closed free downloads, but they leave another offer open to listeners – to “feel free to use any audio for samples or scores”. ‘Barbarossa’ is the best example, starting with a sinister bass line from Rohan Kulshreshtha with the rest taking the form fit for a yesteryear Bollywood score.

‘You are the Sea’ comes across as the sweetest song on the album, a wistful song. This is followed by the operatic piece set to a reverb-heavy loop in ‘Burn You’. When something as positive as the previous track leaks into a moaning, wailing one, you begin to think PCRC had set out to compile ‘Wall of Want’ with a song for every mood.

Well, at least one half of the emotion spectrum.

And Day 2 hath arrived. Another day of tiring, sand-pounding which started with the annoying nature of the ground which finally hit upon me. If you look at the website, you’re expecting a lagoon and you get a badly landscaped portion of the beach.

It has always been a tad shoddy and rarely will you see perfect sand—but the entrance to ground B had no exposed wires, twigs and branches propping out. Saw a few people get nice gashes out of that. ‘Positives’ out of that were that at least the First Aid worked well. Back to the music. Shaan brought another lively set so early on while the likes of Nawed (excellent as usual), Audiogramme (nice debut), Helium Project and Dheeraj Sareen (smooth as butter) took early proceedings in the right BPM and the right spirit.

Rae+Shovell then brought out such sick beats, PHAT as anything out there, you didn’t need Rae’ hotness, the music was burning all over. We ran to check to out Perfect Stranger and Style of Eye as Mark Storie and Prok & Fitch brought the quintessential Toolroom tech-house + prog routine that was just a wee bit miss-able when you heard ground B’s biggies.

Perfect Stranger let loose a barrage of beautiful trance while Style of Eye- well what can I say? This guy is an absolute maniac, not many people caught him—but if you missed him—you missed what it’s like to be hit by a hurricane. If you’re a regular on a bigroom-loving house blog, you just knew his set, from his delectable ‘Levels+Toulouse’ mashup to ‘Convoi’ to ‘Kick Out The Epic Motherfucker’ to ‘Antidote’—he was just off the hook, the sound system was making love to him and to the few of us who were there—BIGROOM came, and so did we.

A little in our pants.

Norman Doray then took centre-stage  and whammed a typical big energy house routine.

Back at Ground A, Pearl had unleashed a lusciously energetic, driving and dark coterie—probably my favourite set of her (and I have a lot to choose from). The sound system was abhorrent shit with ZERO mids on, totally distorted the highs and as they say in Hindi, “awaaz fatt rahi hai!”.  Big disservice to such a good set. Above and Beyond were a tad late as they tried to fix the sound, to no avail. It sounded distorted.

But that wasn’t the only problem. The Illa stage (pittance of area now being brutally exposed) was now packed to the rafters. And if you were ahead, nincompoops by the bucketful could not help sardine-can you, or bulldoze you as so many people just kept moving sideways, either in front or ahead. Are you there to listen to the music or move constantly? Anyone who begs to differ or says, “Dude there were so many people, did you expect a parade march?” should view Swedish House Mafia’s set at Madison Square Garden recently on Dec the 16th or any big gig across the planet and you’d see that they’re packed to the rafters but still everyone had space to dance and do whatever they pleased. It’s not a venue issue—it’s a people one.

Above and Beyond however tried their best despite the turdish sound. ‘Sun and Moon’, ‘Thing Called Love’ had everyone singing—though the Maor Levi mashup of Breaking Tides+2night (Prydz!) was the highlight reel of the set on the opening.

Tocadisco on the Muah was going equally bonkers in his white jeans, white shoes, white tee and blingy headphones avatar. A true livewire, his crowd interaction is maddening and coupled with his rumbling tech and proggy—that stage was alive and how. Micheal Woods took it forward and his one hour cameo was equally bouncy with great bigroom.

On ground B, Skazi was visibly annoyed with his sound too and constantly chided the technician as he threatened to come there and fix it—badly distorted sound, sometimes ruining the beautiful guitar synths he’s so well known for.

And Pete Tong—well…I wonder why he’d want to close a day on the brilliant Cubezoid with a deep, mid to no-tempo set that just wouldn’t pick up. Anyone who listens to BBC Radio 1 and expected ‘Open Your Eyes’ would be pretty disappointed.

So tired, we crawled our way to the AfterDark at Butter where people paying 1300 INR were being ushered in on a pseudo-red carpet while fully paid VIP ticketholders were being pigsty-ed as we cramped and fought our way into seeing Pete Gooding with a nice smooth tech house routine while Sanjay Dutta brought the house down with a massive classic trance set. So beautiful and mesmerising.

So it comes, again and again, bigger and bigger.

Sunburn has been this ¬ever-growing monster in terms of size and scale, and those going each year see increased co-revellers—more than anything else.

This year’s officially claimed figure stood at a handsome 1 lac. Yes, 1 lac revellers because of which the grounds were now increased by 2/3rds  in size and now 7 stages adorned the fesitval site. Tell that to my legs that, that is good. The walk from Ground A (which still disappoints) to Ground B (Open, super-well planned and so conducive to such a big festival) was excruciating through endless sand. Somehow the stages on B looked better, had their acoustics sharper—and just the amount of space there, the fact that the ground was mostly flat made it a beautiful experience.

Ground A on the other hand had bad programming for Day 1 and 2 as the main acts were placed there—filling the place to the brim, a brim it already couldn’t handle since last year. It’s also sloping upwards towards the DJ—on an incline—basically means best of luck trying to get even a glimmer of the artist.

But if you for a minute ignore Ground A, this is probably the best planned Sunburn ever. The fact that so many turned up, and you could easily get inside (Except Day 1 and fair enough) at most times, could slip through from ground to ground with minimum fuss (just excessive yet necessary frisking) and there wasn’t a sense of chaos like Day 3 last year. It was smooth—background smooth.

Moving on to the music, Anil Chawla and Dale Anderson began a long set on the Litli Stage (last year’s Bar Stage with a big butterfly) and the smooth house proceedings grabbed onto the early birds as the festival wore a sober (literally no drinks served as of yet!) look as finally the big stages opened up with Anish Sood who brought out the funk and the perfect mood setting for the afternoon set on the Illa Stage (Last year’s Caterpillar stage with a little pizzazz and this year’s Defected in the House Stage). On the other hand at the Muah stage (A massive frog with big lips and three screens—and the ToolRoom Knights Stage) saw Ajit Pai work on his regular time, routine and tight prog house set up. Over on Ground B however—Boombaba was taking the house down on the Coollu stage (A superb mascot recreation with the psy-Owl rising grand behind the artists) with his psy/tech routine while Praveen Achary took a mature prog tech routine on the Cubezoid (3 cubes ala Deadmau5’s setup with projections on it)—best stage by far in terms of clean, minimalistic design.

Back to the Illa, ATFC+Shovell took a typical Defected house feel with Shovell adding those amazing percussions into minimal and deep house—pity the stage wore off and people ran away to Brute Force who was dropping his happy go lucky sound on the Muah and Liquid Soul started a rousing uplifting+psy set on Coollu, which saw many fans. Jalebee Cartel took the Cubezoid in a thick-bassline’d tech house routine which was tight. Petri Dish Project saw a superb live set at Groovedelic (which like the Arro stage on Ground A was beautiful with its purple streamer-gazebo look, real serene!).

Replacing ATFC at the bare-looking Illa, Simon Dunmore came and the massive DJ from the UK brought out the classic WHAM! House with huge basslines and synths brought some of the crowd back. Shovell now getting real aggressive. Jerome Isma-ae then brought his German tech prog feel to Muah for probably the best set of the day. ‘Reunion’, ‘Personal Jesus’, ‘Rapture’ and many others LIT the place up. It was tight, hard and driving—a true force of a set.

On the other side Ma Faiza created a mini storm on the Coollu while the fickle crowd brought out another insulting turnout for Nic Fanciulli—a true tech house legend who frankly at a 6:30 festival set (where everyone was looking for instant gratification) was a little out of place. His set was dark, brooding and amazing—just very few to watch.

Gabriel and Dresden then packed the Muah to the rafters with their hard electro+trance routine with everything from ‘Beautiful Things’ to ‘Sex is on Fire’, a proper new trance set with all the dubstep, breaks, electro and tech elements that you’d expect to find in a Myon and Shane 54 set. Junior Jack and Kid Crème at the Illa kept the Dunmore heavy bigroom house feel and continued while Laughing Buddha saw the Carl Coxian behemoth take the psy BPM right up—filling his stage.

Spartaque on the techier Cubezoid brought out the big guns and some of the lost crowd for an excellent techno routine. Hard—no nonsense, and sick.

Pretty satisfying day on the first, so to say. However—tell that to Paul Thomas who played an excellent routine to a combined total of 3 people at Red Square for one of the four venues for the AfterDark.

While we didn’t see Teso and Living Room, unfortunately—Butter was still where the entire crowd thronged…first timers…

Photo credit: Sunburn Festival

Sunburn in Mumbai- a seeming ‘un-possibility’ that happened to magically appear in the midst  of the Racecourse at Mahalaxmi and boy did it almost look the same or what? Nearly ten thousand Avicii-maniacs thronged the open air space for one of the biggest names to grace the country.

The evening started with Shaan, who’s improved on his mixing but for some reason just banged it from the word go. It was fun, but with yet another person who was going to come and bring the house down—it did end up tiring a few folks.

Miss Nine popped in soon after for another banging ‘opener’, dropping massive hits like the Fedde le Grand mix of Coldplay’s ‘Paradise’ and ‘Crush on You’. She took the festival mood from the word go and dropped bigroomer after bigroomer, and the five odd ‘k’ who’d come in early were treated to some instant dancing. For a quite longish set and a fickle audience — she gripped ‘em tight by the balls.

Soon after—near the 20:20 mark, in comes the prodigious one-year-and-I’m-top-of-the-world Swede.

The now packed ground wears the near exact look of what the beaches of Goa will look like in a few days time. Though we hope the visuals will change as a few screens conked and the seemingly last minute low-opacity ‘I love Percept’ additions to the actual visuals did not look appealing — one bit.

Back to the music, ‘Fade into Darkness’ brought every vocal chord out first-up and watching that is some sight. Doesn’t happen too often at EDM gigs of this scale — and it looks beautiful.

Mood suddenly lifts a track or two later as ‘Kick out the Epic Motherfucker’ from Dada Life brings the dirty electro in the set and the predominantly kiddo crowd lap it up. It continued with Dirty South and Thomas Gold’s ‘Alive’ in Kate Elsworth’s opiate voice and the singing chords came out again.

The sound got bigger with Avicii’s mash of ‘Coming Home’ with ‘Flash’, the trumpet-chained bass line going perfect after lyrical drops. The singing continued and the bar continued wearing an empty look as Nadia Ali’s ‘Pressure’ plonked in. Almost everyone seemed to know every track he played tonight—doesn’t happen too often.

Next up came ‘Bromance + I Found U’ and boy did the crowd explode. Manic air-piano-ing. The set suddenly stops and he drops ‘Swede Dreams’—it’s a little off-putting to see a DJ of his prominence do that.

And then comes his biggest hit of the year ‘Levels’ and I frankly don’t understand why this fairly decent melody is so catchy, it’s fairly generic in most ways. But it has a rather satisfying effect on the crowd, who absolutely blitz their minds within.

The gig in many ways was a success, considering the amount of ‘public’ that turned up, but the entry lines were shoddily managed and bottlenecked and screens going off can’t be excused. The set was more to please than anything and while we know Avicii’s underground productions are far more pleasing to the ears—he came to do a job and did that pretty well.

Photo credit: Sunburn Festival

Tell us a bit about your relationship with your manager Ash…

Ash and I first met back in 2008. I had been producing for a while then and and put up some tracks on different blogs and Youtube. He took me under his wings and we’ve really grown together since then. My father refers to him as my second dad, which is true in many ways, haha. But he’s my friend, brother, mentor etc. We have developed a really close relationship both in business and personal life.

Last year, you were playing an afternoon set at the Hilltop Arena of Electric Zoo Festival and I was privileged enough to experience it. A year later, you’re headlining major festivals around the world. Tell us a bit about your phenomenal rise to fame and how BIG this past year has been for you.

This year has been really amazing! So many things have happened, things I couldn’t imagine would happen when I started to produce. The ones I can thank for this opportunity and this very rise are my fans and management.

Of all your shows, travels, new festivals and clubs, which has been your favorite or most memorable gig of 2011? And of all the cities you have visited, which one parties the hardest?

That is a tough question, I’ve had so many great memories and experiences this year.  One of the most memorable gigs so far must be At Night and Pacha NYC’s gig at Governors Island in July, the crowd dancing to the Manhattan skyline was an incredible sight.

LEVELS! So many big DJs have been supporting it in their sets and almost every individual in the crowd sings along to it. Prior to its release, the track had been doing rounds on the internet for a while. Why did you wait so long to release it?

We wanted to go with a deal that felt right for me and Ash. Universal and Island together with Interscope really was something we wanted, and going back and forth a couple of times we could finally agree on a deal we were all happy with. We got a great commitment and that is ultimately what we needed. It didn’t stop people who really wanted it to find it somehow though! ;)

Over the last year, the Avicii sound has become distinctly recognizable within the growing EDM scene, with its feel-­‐good vibe and uplifting synths. What have been your influences and inspirations that lead to the production of this unique sound?

I don’t know what really lead to finding my sound. My father listened a lot to Ray Charles and a lot of 60’s rock when I grew up and that definitely influenced me a lot. I like to try and take certain scales and rhythms not usually used in house music and try to adapt them to fit into EDM and my kind of big room happy melodic tones. I mean everybody knows right now that Ash has helped me develop the sound since day one and we’re not done yet. We’re still trying to keep it fresh and exciting and feel a responsibility for this now more than ever.

What is your view on the recent DJ Mag Poll?

I’m really happy and surprised about the result. It’s a real honor to be among the top tens! I owe it to all my fans. <3

Can we expect any new Avicii releases this year or will we have resort to youtube quality previews till 2012?

Levels was my last release of 2011. Stay tuned for early 2012, I’ve a couple of things I can’t wait to get out there! Among that a proper big vocal version of Levels.

Your monthly podcast “LE7ELS” is only 4 episodes old and has already received an immensely positive response around the world. Tell us a bit about it and your future plans for it.

The podcast is made by Ash and I, and it’s basically a mix of tracks we think are really good. We mix new tracks with some older classics and discuss different topics. We don’t really have any future master plan for it, we’re open minded and want as much feedback as we can get from the listeners in order to make it better from episode to episode. It’s just a genuine look into our everyday life and attitude to the business.

One DJ that has always inspired you?

That question is really hard, there are so many good DJ’s and producers out there, but the Swedish House Mafia and Eric Prydz have always inspired me and they are the reason to why I started produce.

Are you looking forward to playing the Sunburn gigs this December? Have you heard anything about the dance music scene in India?

Yes! I can’t wait to see India and the Sunburn festival. I’ve heard so many great things about Sunburn and India so it will be awesome to finally see it!

Sometimes you wonder why there’s only one woman DJ on the DJMag Top100, and sometimes you don’t. At the risk of being sexist, there’s very few that go beyond a pretty face.

Miss Nine is someone with the potential to go beyond being that pretty face. With 925 Digital, she’s seeking to bring out a smoother brand of house that works pretty well on the dancefloor. And with her compilation, Around the World,  she brings out 13 of her label and her own work into one fairly enjoyable—and rather light compendium.

Kicking off with two similarly deep progressive tracks in Gesiete – Solar Vibes and Proluctors – Rain of Roses (Miss Nine remix) the set starts with a midtempo, high-on-melody tone with typical Anjunadeep and Jaytech-esque sounds. You’re not really moving at this point, just slowly grooving, a step or two at a time. With Mplay – M-Theory she keeps the melodic nature of the opening tracks alive with a slightly edgier riff on the bassline, a little pace-y on the BPM counter as well, as you feel the set pick up a tad. Trademark synth stabs meet a really fresh, mystical tribal vocal clipping momentarily and boy—does it come alive.

The 8th Note vs. Willian Clark – To Be (Miss Nine remix) comes in with the first sign of vocals and even though the vocals are cheesy, the lyrics insipid and totally unnecessary—the track by itself would be a charmer in a dub mix. Such an infectious tribal-drum on the bassline with bouncy drops makes it great to inject some power on the set.

Giese & Mike Kelly – My Brain (Miss Nine remix) and Eddie M – Midnight Blue (Miss Nine remix) bring a sort of regression to the set with similar sounding trouse sounds, and even though Midnight Blue has a scintillating lead synth—the rather drab bassline doesn’t do this segment any justice.

The mood suddenly changes with Bitrocka feat. Sushi – Give me the Love (Miss Nine remix) with 80s-style vocals that brings a pop-house feel but a thick kickdrum and thicker bassline make this very sing-able. Sushi is also quite mellifluous.

Eddy5 – Rush In brings in a techy/synthpop edge to the bassline which is very different from the entire set, though perfect placement again sparkles and brings a nice trough to set. The trough moves higher with Miss Nine – Nevertheless ((Miss Nine 2011 remix) which is the highlight of the set. A classic driving bassline, big—really big—you may think you’ve heard it before—but it just works.

A bigroom number in Dalysovich – Alice in Houseland comes in and keeps the energy going. It even has a funny Dirty Dutch/Chuckie kind of flanger that makes you wonder what it’s doing at that BPM. High Rollers feat. Keylas – Now or Never (Hy2rogen remix) brings in a funky side of her trouse sound that is now pervading the fag end of this set and David Puentez – Harmonia (Miss Nine remix) has a nice off-beat bassline that kind of cuts through the shades of monotony that fill in around this segment.

The set ends with Guitro—Daybreak and it’s a silky track that has a slower BPM but makes up for it with lots of interesting layers going on the sidechained bassline. Cools the set down ably and completes the entire 1+ hour soiree with Miss Nine’s sound.

It defines her succinctly and you can be assured of typifying a light, progressive house array with enough melody to keep you interested for more than one hearing.

Around The World releases on the 28th of December 2011. All major online retailers will stock CDs + digital copies of the compilation.

There’s an unusually fresh approach to songwriting for a 19-year-old. His take on issues such as politics, love and money is slightly warped, in that he chooses to adopt personas to tell a story. More than that, there’s a glut of varied genres that Harsha Iyer picks out in ‘Curious Toys’, be it spaced-out shoegaze, baroque rock, and even epic, arena rock at times.

A contemporary to fellow Chennai artist Kishore Krishna (Adam and the Fish eyed Poets), Iyer has a experimental, post-punk disposition as well. The only difference is with regard to the latter’s lyrical exploration of more everyday emotions and topics on the album, not that it’s an entirely bad thing.

As long as I’m wagging my finger/shaking my head, I would say spellings and grammar typos in the lyrics booklet may be looked upon with something that needs improvement. But given his age, this is excusable I suppose. Album closer ‘Usefull Somewhere’ is one case in point, although it is a delightfully fuzz-filled song.

Another common argument leveled against his kind (solo artists) is of letting their voice get the most importance on songs. While that stands true even on ‘Curious Toys’, Iyer’s wail-like croon is mostly bearable on all tracks.

Warm fuzzy tones add to the psychedelic side of this album, with ‘Not Yet Dead’ being a quizzical mix of the positivist coupled with the drowning, desolate guitar tones of negativity. Iyer’s vocals are reminiscent of Deerhunter/Atlas Sound’s Bradford Cox on this standout track.

On the other end, there are tracks where Iyer doesn’t ponder, but parties. ‘Toys’ can be the soundtrack to a wild night out. ‘Fear’ attempts to be scary, but finds itself not exactly leaning towards that mood by the end. There’s the strangest side to experimentation that Iyer gets to, with a score that seems set for a fairytale with orchestral arrangements in ‘On the Edge’.

Coming back to his use of personas, on ‘No Say’, the subject is a (presumably) fictitious woman. But on tracks such as ‘Money’ (which is a vividly painted picture of a court trial), ‘I Find You Boring’ and ‘Overcautious’, you can clearly tell Iyer is talking about the company he once kept.

‘Curious Toys’ is just the beginning, according to Iyer, with the blueprint for a second album already underway. We can’t expect the music to be vastly mature, but we can expect much, much more experimentation from the Chennai youngster.

Harsha Iyer – Curious Toys can be downloaded for free from: http://harsha-iyer.bandcamp.com/

The folks over at the Swedish Institute have been fairly active this time of the year since the past two years. They first brought Swedish popstar Meja to the country, followed by Katatonia at IIT-B’s Mood Indigo fest and this year they’re hosting a Jazz gig in Mumbai.

The performance features two Swedish Jazz bands- Jan Lundgren Trio and Tonbruket.

Date: 7th December 2011, 19:30 onwards

Venue: St.Andrews Auditorium, Bandra, Mumbai

Entry : FREE

You’ve been DJ’ing since 15 years now. How has the journey been so far and where did it begin?

I started to make little parties with my friends when I was 16 or 17 years old and a lot has changed since I started. I used to love and play vinyl and cherish every track that I had. Today it’s more of a consumer article and less people care about it. But for me it will always be very important.

Tech/ Prog is making major inroads as compared to say, Trouse, but is still less mainstream than bigroom. How would you envisage it going forward?

I was never a big fan of Trance. I like more edgy music and I’m no friend of easy melodies.

Which artists inspire you (doesn’t have to be electronic)?

Artists that are unique and go a different way inspire me. Someone that risks something to present something new even if nobody likes it in the beginning. I think it’s so boring to just do the same thing.

What’s a typical day in the life of Tocadisco like? Do you spend a lot of time in the studio when you’re not playing shows?

A regular day starts around 11 am. Contract, lawyers, meetings, taxes, invoices - all that bulls**t. Then I go to the studio and everything is fine! LOL, I hate doing other things, prefer making music.

Festivals you absolutely love playing at?

10 Days Off and I Love Techno in Belgium are amazing festivals.

Tell me a little about the new album-¬‐ the making of it etc. The promo video says it’s free because you wanted to give something back to your fans for their support through the years-¬ that’s a great gesture! What can we look forward to in this record?

There is also a MiniMix that shows every track for one minute- it’s a mixture of different kinds of club tunes, some with weird samples and some are hard electro. There are 9 tracks - very versatile, like all my albums. I love to explore and do things differently.

Of all the DJs that play the same style as you, are there any of your peers you love listening to?

I’ve actually never heard anybody play the same style as me. I mean I play at all kinds of clubs and festivals, from deep underground to big main stage sounds. Most DJs can either play the one or the other. I wish there were more DJs like me! Then I could go out more. LOL.

Your first time in India this December! Are you excited? Have you heard anything about the dance music scene/ Sunburn from other DJs?

I’ve heard about Sunburn. They say it’s good and has grown big. I’m very excited about coming to India! I have never been there but I’ve been a fan of Indian music for a long time. I used to play Jazz and 60/70ties Soul and Funk and there were a lot of tracks that used sitar. I wish I could play it- it’s just amazing.

Do you like to travel (when you’re not playing shows i.e)? If yes, where do you usually go on holiday? Mountains or beach?!

I like to travel but I’ve traveled so much these past few years that I’m happy to stay home. My wife and I went to the Maldives to make holidays. It’s amazing there. She is Brazilian. Brazil also has a lot of cool beaches. I like the ones in Florianopolis!

Do you have any favourite tunes from your personal catalog (one’s you’ve produced/ remixed)?

So many! I have thousands of tracks. It’s difficult to name one.

One artist you haven’t collaborated with yet but would love to?

I would like to do something with or for Lenny Kravitz or Jamiroquai.

Any young, up and coming DJs/ producers you support and recommend we listen to?

Nicky Romero will be big and a kid from my label TOCA45 - “OuiWack”

Anything else you’d like to share? 

Can’t wait to come to India! My wife will be accompanying me. I hope to have a great time there. See you soon!

Get your copy of FR3E HERE!

Bouncing with a typically upbeat vocal-friendly and super enjoyable opener was Nikhil Chinapa with a new array of tech and prog and funky and everything he likes. He’s got one of the finest knacks for picking such fun in every track he plays—you can almost draw spikes in the air every time a song changes.

Around the 12 am mark, Richard comes in with his affable smile and immediately announces his customary love for the country and the set takes a very Indian pick up with ‘Lost Stories - All Good Things (Prayag & Rishab Intro Mix)’ with roving flutes and brooding build up, it can’t get more India than this.

Somehow he lays ‘Axwell vs Thomas Gold feat. Adele- Blow Up In The Deep (Axwell Bootleg)’ and that changes the mood in one track’s time, the crowd erupts at the mere sliver of Adele’s voice.

He takes a hard(ish) uplifting route there on, banging high-trance-stabs tracks straight from ISOS and around, taking the set graph to an immediate steep curve. The peak time arrives early and he gets through 3-4 uplifters albeit very high on melody, as piano synths feature regularly.

And suddenly in comes the vivacious and caffeine-bouncy voice and all of Julie Thompson who is seemingly very very charged up.

She plugs in a couple of tracks quickly and Richard goes and socializes, and you know what—for something as tough as a trance singer to go live, she does a pretty tight job. Her octaves on the higher notes are brilliant and in the falsetto she’s nearly flawless. As soon as she begins to croon to ‘Tiesto Pres Allure Feat Julie Thompson - Somewhere Inside Of Me’, it’s just ethereal.

Durand plops himself back to the decks and dances away as a few more non-vocals serrate the set at this point. It seems he is establishing a Julie does vocals and I do non pattern but just then—he throws in a few good vocals like ‘These Shoulders’ for good measure and brings the crowd back.

Julie comes back for another cameo, this time, visibly more energetic (if that’s possible!).

Durand then goes even higher with tunes like ‘Ferry Corsten - Punk (Arty Rock-n-Rolla mix)’ or Armin and Ferry’s ‘Brute’ collab and peak time suddenly is three quarters of this set. With the announcement of another 30 minutes in the set, the pressure is cranked to the maximum and he finishes it with the classic ‘Make-The-Indians-Or-Any-Damn-Nationality’ go bonkers track in ‘In and Out of Love/On Off’ and its obvious everyone recognizes it—everyone loves it.

Durand’s mixing gets better every time you see him and so does his flow, and why he’s so underrated seems to baffle me, he’s a proper Dutch version of Gareth Emery to say the least and his track selection is just liquid fun. His sound is so catholic anyone can walk into a gig and enjoy themselves, EDM-snobs (if we exist at all) can take a hike.

Photo credit: Kartikey Shiva

Since Germany has such a diverse electronic music scene and you’re based in Berlin, let me start by asking you how you ventured into the dance music scene in your home country?

Well,I´m just privately part of it as it´s totally different from the rest of the music scene in Europe. Berlin is quite underground but of course it´s great to be here as it´s a very creative, inspiring city that never sleeps. Apart from some big music labels and of course Beatport., there’s also a number of cool music software companies based in the city - like Native Instruments, Ableton and lots of smaller innovative firms like Sugar Bytes for example. So all in all a great and exciting city to live in and many things to explore! If you have the time for it :-)

You are a part of the excellent ToolRoom Records repertoire. Can you tell me what a typical Toolroom Knights party experience is like for you, as a DJ?

Great vibes and good music! It´s kind of like a big family throwing a party and just having a good time!

Is there any one festival you love playing at and would do it over and over again?

There isn’t really just ONE, there are so many good festivals happening at the moment! This year’s highlights for me were to play Creamfields, Electric Daisy Carnival and of course Escape from Wonderland where I played last weekend at the Size Matters stage - this was just insane…I can’t wait to play one of those again!

Are there any modern day Djs that inspire you? If yes, who are they and why do they inspire you?

For me, Axwell is one of the most inspiring producers. I love how he makes his music, he has a very musical approach and his tracks are always banging! As a DJ I get a lot of inspiration from Steve Angello, I’ve watched him playing a lot of shows (when I played gigs with him) - I love how he drives the crowd!

Record of 2011?

Actually I don’t like to pick my own tracks, but those were really “my” 2011 ones…the remix I did with Axwell on “Blow Up” (Hard Rock Sofa & St Brothers) and my track with Dirty South “Alive”.

Are you looking forward to playing at Storm Festival? Have you heard anything about the Indian EDM scene before?

Yes, I’m looking forward and I’m quite excited! I have been to India only once before but it was a great experience and I could see that the people were really into the music, so I can’t wait to finally get back and explore a bit more of how the EDM scene is there!

What is your opinion on the annual DJ Mag poll? Necessary? Unnecessary? Or are you indifferent to it?

I think it’s a nice thing to have but it’s not THAT essential. It’s just a part of the whole EDM scene, it’s been there now for quite a while, many people are looking at it and there’s a lot of discussion about it. In my opinion it’s nice to have it but you shouldn’t get too serious about it.

5 things you must have with you on tour?

1. my technical stuff like USB sticks, my little portable keyboard, laptop, iphone

2. ear plugs

3. aspirin

4. sleeping pills for the plane

5. instant coffee (so I can make myself espresso whenever I fancy it, lol)

Where do YOU party? Djs are always making the world party, but it’d be nice to know what you guys do and where ya’ll go to have a good time.

I’m a big fan of Watergate Club in Berlin and I love to go to ‘Bar Tausend’ to have a nice drink and to listen to some cool and groovy music! Other places I go are the ‘Solar Lounge’, and of course those open-air electro/techno parties spread all over Berlin during summer.

Have you been spending much time in the studio? What can fans expect in the coming months?

Yeah, I’ve been in the studio in the past weeks and months whenever I had time in between all the touring and there’s a lot of new stuff coming! I just got back from Los Angeles where I finished a new track together with Dirty South, I will have my own track “Sing2Me” release on Axtone soon and there is some other stuff and remixes coming up.

Are you a complete geek when it comes to technology? What gear can you absolutely not live without?

I wouldn’t say I’m a geek - I love to have my music production gear around me but rather as I make music with it than getting too much into the technical details! I couldn’t live without my laptop - for me it’s my whole studio and I have to take it with me wherever I go.

What according to you, is the best thing about being a DJ?

I think it’s about getting an immediate feedback from people when you play music to them. Seeing a crowd in front of you, having fun and jumping to your tracks is so exciting! There is nothing better than that, there is so much energy in that!

Your favourite dance music labels would be…?

Axtone and Size

Where did your stage name, Thomas Gold come from?

My second name really is Thomas, so that was one thing. As I was looking for some catchy, easy-to-spell name, I thought Thomas Gold would sound nice.

Any young, new talent you’ve discovered and would recommend we listen to?

Alesso and Arty

 —  — 

Thomas Gold will be playing three dates in India.

: 9th November 2011 : Miami, Marriott : Pune :

: 10th November 2011 : China House : Mumbai :

: 11th November 2011 : Storm Festival : Napoklu, Coorg :

Many thanks to Submerge for this interview. Follow them @submergemusic .