Taking a break from an incredibly hectic touring schedule, renowned duo Monkey Safari are with us today. Catching up with the illustrious pair, we got a chance to talk a little bit about their travelling life, some new music and how they work in the studio. Read the full interview below!
WWD: Nice to have you here. How are you? How was your weekend?
Great, we played the Renaissance Festival in Sao Paulo and had a really good time there.
WWD: You’re touring at lot at the moment. Does it make it easier to travel as brothers?
Yes, for sure. Traveling together make it much easier. Waiting is a essential part of touring and waiting together is much better than alone. 😉
WWD: How do you manage all your tasks? Touring, running a label, producing music, hosting events. How do avoid getting stressed by all this?
We do what we love so it’s positive stress. Usually, we split up the tasks between us and we’re also getting support from our agency.
WWD: You firmly established the label Hommage over the past years. What’s the most important thing for you as label owners? How do you discover new artists? Do you still listen to demos?
We like to release music we’re really into and we love to work on a great product together with the artists. We’re not really searching for new acts. Things “just happened” in the past. But yes, we also listen to demos and sometimes there is something we like.
WWD: What can we expect on Hommage in the near future?
We will release our next single called “Shelter” at the end of September. Later this year, we are planning to release an EP from Reboot with a more dubby sound. Then there’s another release from Avidus and some stuff we can’t talk about yet.
WWD: We think your album ‚Odyssey‘ which came out at the end of last year is a great club/dance release! Tell us about the creative process. Is the process different compared to a listening album? Did you have a specific concept in mind? How do you both work in the studio?
The whole development of the album went over 3 years and we worked in many different ways to come to this point. The album is something like a mix of the past years. It’s kind of like a “club album” and the difference to a “listening album” is definitely that it was possible for us to test a lot of the tracks during our shows and get a direct feedback from the crowd. This helped a lot. We don’t work together in the studio all the time but we talk a lot about the direction or sound design of a track.
WWD: You collaborated with amazing artists like Carl Cox, Hernan Cattaneo, Tensnake, and many more for the ‚Odyssey Remixes‘ releases. Why did you choose the remixers? Why did you decide to split it into 3 parts?
We made a list of our favorite artists at the moment and when we finished the album we send it over to all the guys to get some feedback. The response was so big that we decided to split the whole remix album into 3 to give every track a little bit more space.
WWD: You have launched the event series ‘W/LD’ this summer. Where did this idea come from? And who will be the next guests?
We talked a lot about creating our own event(s) for a couple of years now, but never had a good concept we were really into. I don’t know where this idea came from but it fits very well and it describes our sound and musical direction in a good way. For the summer closing in September in Berlin we invited John Digweed who’s joining us at IPSE and we’re looking forward to this night a lot!
WWD: What’s your favourite place to hang out?
At the beach.
WWD: As experts in touring – give us your recommendation what to eat when travelling!
Sushi and vegetables are always a good option when you have a stressful touring schedule. It’s not so heavy but gives you a lot energy for the day.
WWD: Do you have some insider information for us on upcoming releases from you? Is there even more to come in 2018?
As mentioned earlier, at the end of September, the ‚Shelter‘ single comes out. We also have a few surprises up our sleeves for the end of the year, but we’re not allowed to talk about it yet. 🙂
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