10 Questions 2 – Re.Kod

01. Hi Re.kod and thanks so much for taking the time out to chat with us. Can you tell our readers about your music history, do you have formal training, maybe something many people don’t know about you?

It’s been a long way of 30 years of electronic music. I started listening to electronic music during the ’80s with sounds from Kraftwerk to Jarre and Depeche Mode. The following years found me on the dance floor with rave feelings and at the beginning of 1990, I started DJing. My sounds were mostly influenced by techno and that was when I started producing and releasing music. I never followed any particular formal training; I’m taught musician motivated by love, passion, and work. I always remember myself experimenting in the studio with sounds and patterns besides techno. To me, electronica is a genre where an artist is freer, without patterns and you can let yourself experiment as much as you want cause its fields are limitless.

02. What are some of your most lasting memories involved in the scene?

It’s super difficult to focus on short moments with 30 years of involvement in this scene. I have been involved in the techno scene in many different ways while DJing, Producing, promoting events, label management, etc. There have definitely been some moments that affected my personality in a good way and my spirit, like the first Parisian raves from Pat Cash or Fantom, also Mozinor where I had the chance to play for the last one. Also, the feeling I was getting every time I was discovering new music from new artists, like Underground Resistance who clearly inspired me, new labels like Warp that really gave influenced my basis for electronica or labels like raster noton later in the 00s. Then it’s the party people I met during parties I organized for 20 years with my wife Virginie and friends EL.UE and Play parties, this crowd always supported me and pushed me to express myself. The creation of my main label Skryptöm, many collaborations with friends like Maxime Dangles, Scan X, and all the skryptöm artists. And the last collaboration and friendship with the label WIC the brothers lodjewik Thijs (Ludowic) and Joost, it’s a huge pleasure to work with them as they are super open-minded to everything, they love to experiment with new things and gave me a ‘home’ were a good release by experimental music. I’m pretty sure I have forgotten to mention so many other things but these were the moments in life so far that inspired and defined me and helped me become who I am today.

03. Where do you see the techno scene in 10 years? Do you think it’s evolving in a healthy state or has it become stagnant?

Music always does circles, during the 2010s the ’90s came back in ’90s, ’70s came back, during the ’00s, ’80s came back, so if we are following that logic, during the 2020s, 2000s will come back under a minimal and electro way but with some modernity inside maybe? But to be honest, it would be boring for me, as I’m really passionate about searching for experimental things, discovering new things, I love to be surprised.
For example, I’m really bored when someone today is trying to make music reproducing the music we used to play around 1993 but in the worst possible version of it.
Of course, there is another part in the techno scene that is really interesting these days but it’s not highlighted at the moment cause people prefer to go through the easy way or bad copying, so I’m waiting for the next trend. I’m patient and wait for the things I prefer, maybe in the next wave.
So there is not really stagnation but some evolutions, sometimes good sometimes bad, you have to choose what you want, but when you are an artist you firstly have to be yourself and not doing the things just to be known, you have to express yourself and spread some messages, free messages under your creation. Sometimes your messages are put in highlights sometimes not, that’s the law.

04. Where do you most enjoying playing? At home in France or on tour at crowded festivals or the more intimate clubs?

In each country something is interesting to see, listening and enjoying. My best memories would be probably in Japan, or in Israel in the middle of the desert close to the death sea. Maybe in China too, I had the chance to do a couple of Asian tours with my friend Oscar from Seven Management and it’s always been a pleasure to meet Asian people cause they are really nice. Recently I played in Morocco and it was crazy, I was invited to do a label night, Skryptöm collective, in Casablanca for a week and we met many people there, collaborating with a multi-instrumentalist and a singer for a live show that you can listen to my Re.kod Soundcloud. Uff, it was magical. So I’m lucky to be able to travel in many different countries and live special experiences with great people. That makes it even more difficult for me to focus only on a few crowds and festivals cause on every gig I am having a unique experience sometimes good less good but always unique. I’m also really lucky to live in France where the electronic music scene has evolved a lot in the last couple of years.

05. Do you prefer to play live/DJ or is it all about music production?

I love both. They are two different approaches to sharing music; I can’t choose one against the other cause it’s complimentary.

06. Tell us some of the proudest moments of your career to date?

I have no pride, I’m considering myself more as a lucky guy that I’m doing what I love more than being someone special. I’m proud of all the people who are saving lives especially these days for example, but pride is not adapt to music I think, music is a chance, and even more so when you are lucky to do it as your job.
So I have been lucky to live moments like the first raves, magical moments, the first times, and the explosion of the techno scene, but you know what?
I’m super lucky to still live this music every day. I’m also lucky to have played many times at Astropolis, at the Rex club, to organize and promote el.ue and play so many parties. I am happy and lucky to have released tracks on Cocoon, Soma, Fcom, and many other crazy labels with my latest release on WIC recordings. These days I started a new project with a club and an institute with some studios, classrooms for master classes around techno, and a radio studio inside, and the global project is NEXUS that will be fully complete within 2020, so I’m also lucky for this, it’s a lot of chance

07. What music genres do you listen to when you’re at home?

When we are all together with my family at home, we are listening more to my wife’s or my son’s music. I feel lucky because they both love good music, my wife is more into the sound of French hip-hop like abdal malik or classic music. I also love classic music, sometimes I am listening to in my car, I’m really not a specialist around it but I love it. My young son is more into electronic sound, he loves the music from my heroes Thom Yorke, his favorite album is the last Thom Yorke solo one but he also loves Apparat sounds, he is super open-minded and he is only 9 years old. I never really pushed him into it but he discovered it alone which made me proud.

08. Normally we would ask you what parties and festivals should we not miss this year? But unfortunately with the Corona Virus that’s happening right now, we ask you how are you doing and how are your family and friends doing in these hard times and how do you deal with all canceled gigs for the upcoming weeks?

I’m lucky because I live in the countryside, and all our neighbors are super cool, so we are still having talks in the distance while we are in our garden gates so we still have some social exchanges. As we are in the countryside we can have some walks around a home in the field and forest without meeting anybody. So I could say that we only come across other people during shopping. I do miss partying and clubs and family visits to museums and at the parks but we are super lucky to have a house with gardens etc, but this also makes me think every day of the people who live in the cities, at the apartment and I have a lot of respect and compassion for them. 

Financially I am still ok but I am not sure if I will need to find another job 6 months from now. But as I told you, in the beginning, I’m lucky because I still can do what I love, I can continue to work at the studio and prepare all the things for the future. Let’s see what will happen and stay positive, creative, I think now there is the need to build a new future, a new era, a new world. 

When I created this album and gave that 2 names « sketches from a new era » or « esquisse du nouveau monde » I didn’t expect anything about this, it was summer 2019 when I found these titles and everything was like the world we knew. I was more thinking about the ecology, the planet we live, I couldn’t imagine that the planet we were destroying could revive after such a big dangerous virus like the coronavirus. We had forgotten that nature always had the upper hand and was sending us messages that the end is close and we need to act fast so we can protect it.

09. Do you have any does or don’ts regarding tips for aspiring producers sending music to Skryptöm?

Be sincere, do what you really feel, don’t do what others already did but work on what you really have on who you really are. Sometimes it’s easy, sometimes it’s hard especially if you try to follow the trends and you are not 100% into it. Be patient and continue to deliver with sincerity.

10. Lastly, what are your plans for the rest of 2020?

My album on Dutch label WIC recordings under my Re.Kod alias came out April 3rd and it’s called Sketch From A New Era. It features 13 new tracks including two collabs with Gaspar Claus and one with LudoWic and it will be available in Digital and on a double CD. I also have another album under my alias Electric Rescue that’s arriving on May 29th on my imprint Skryptom entitled Esquisse du Nouveau Monde as well as many EPs on different labels. I am also working on the Nexus project, the big complex club + cultural center that I work on these days close to Paris. Many scheduled releases on my label Skryptöm with forthcoming ones from Alys, Giselh, Dyspal, Paul Nazca.

https://facebook.com/rekodmusic

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