RA.342 Matthew Dekay

  • Published
    Dec 17, 2012
  • Filesize
    82 MB
  • Length
    01:11:41
  • All day he dreams.
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  • Dutch producer Matthew Dekay came to prominence during the early- to mid-'00s as purveyor of club-ready progressive house. His tracks betrayed a melodic sensibility that came from his background as a trained classical musician. Dekay released a string of 12-inches on labels like Deep Records and Electronic Elements during this time, never staying put on one imprint for too long. And then nothing. "I lost that special feeling with the music," he said in past, explaining his three year absence from music production. When he did finally return it was with a new studio partner in tow—Lee Burridge. The pair scored a dance floor hit with the rolling house grooves of "Wongel" for Cécille, but it was with the formation of their new party concept and imprint, All Day I Dream, that they really found their voice. "Beautiful, melancholic, gorgeous house music," is how Burridge explained the idea to us last year. ADID parties were set up at carefully selected outdoor spaces in Brooklyn and LA, while the label came good on its promise with standout tearjerkers "Fur Die Liebe" and "Lost in a Moment." The All Day I Dream aesthetic shines brightly on RA.342, 71 minutes of, well, beautiful, melancholic, gorgeous house music. What have you been up to recently? I've been trying to finish some new music for All Day I Dream with Lee Burridge, which will hopefully see daylight early 2013. It's been harder for Lee and I to find time to do this because of our busier tour schedules and the fast growing success of our All Day I Dream parties in the US. How and where was the mix recorded? The final mix was recorded at home, but it went through a lot of trial and error stages on flights, in hotel-rooms and airports before I was ready to put the pieces of the puzzle together that made it complete. Can you tell us about the idea behind the mix? The theme as you might expect is All Day I Dream. My intention was to collect music that could contribute to an overall story. I treated it more like a compilation CD but without the hassle of having to ask labels for permission to license tracks. Obviously today's climate has changed quite a bit and branded compilation CDs barely exist anymore. I feel nowadays it's more about putting quickly assembled DJ mixes online to showcase new tracks rather than focusing on the actual story of a mix as a whole. I guess the iPod generation has made the listener's priority more about skipping through and spotting one or two new promo tracks they haven't heard, followed by every DJ's favourite comment, "TRACK ID!!!" Hah. I want to be clear this mix is not made for those people. Call me old fashioned but I kind of want to stand up for the artists and DJs who try and take the listener on a little journey. So rather than it just being a collection of promos I have received recently, I tried to find tunes that I really love and hopefully will still love as much in the years to come. The story begins with dreamy, emotional, comforting music and continues to slowly build towards a very intense moment. It's a representation of how I imagine life to be with a reminder that it will all be OK in the end! Did you have any particularly memorable All Day I Dream parties this year? I think the most memorable All Day I Dream moment is still the BPM Festival in Mexico at the beginning of this year. It was kind of a milestone for me because it was the first All Day I Dream Lee and I played together. Up until that point it was difficult for me to join because of other gig commitments. Everything was in sync that day and to me it was a very spiritual moment where I actually realized I had finally found what I'd been looking for in my musical career. What is the best set of conditions for this particular concept? I'd like to start with daytime, outside in a scenic location, sun, blue sky (preferably with one little cloud hanging above the venue!) and a great soundsystem. I think the concept behind All Day I Dream is that it's much more about the vibe people bring to the party not just Lee and I playing emotional electronic music. I've played many parties, but I can honestly say that I have never seen so many smiling faces all at once as I have at All Day I Dream. What are you up to next? In the next couple of months I will be focusing more on my solo production work for several labels, including Get Weird. I have a few remixes to finish. One is a record by Tim Green for Get Weird and another one for a really cool band called Super700. After that I'm finally going to start working on my live act which I'm really excited about. It's been a long time in the planning. I'm also in talks with a few clubs in Berlin about starting a new regular label night for Get Weird.
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