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Oriole

(Oriolus oriolus)


    info


DJ Mag

Dominik Eulberg im Interview mit "Dj Mag" (eng.)


You grew up in Westerwald, a very rural region in Germany. Tell us something
about your childhood: emotions and feelings, visions, thoughts, hobbies.

I was lucky enough to grow up with nature in my childhood. I was outdoors
from the early morning to the evening, I virtually lived in the woods and
on the greens.
There I did my homework. It was a merry time... I learned a lot about life,
what was important and what was not.
My only hobby was to characterise animals, plants and to cultivate biotopes.
I was not interested in music till I got 14 years old.

I know that you grew up practically with no television and technology around
you. How did you and how do you feel about this? Do you think is this a
better way to grow up?

As a child it sometimes got on my nerves that I did not have a TV, hence I
could not talk about shows on TV with my friends in school.
Looking back on it I am very grateful for it.
Life without superficial entertainment forced me to create entertainment for
my own.
Through that I learned to understand nature as a well for inspiration.
To appreciate it as unchallenged gift, to know that you would need not much
more to be happy than a trip into nature.
It developed a kind of independence where money was not important. On the
other side it helped be to train my creativity.
On TV a telly –Tubby show is a telly tubby show. In the woods a piece of
wood can be a boot, an airplane, or a even a car...
On top of that, to live in nature leads to stronger development of emotions
and feelings..little can be killed off.

I suppose that in a region like Westerwald in the 80’s the electronic and
experimental music did not arrive as easily as today. How did you approach
to electronic music?

Indeed, at the beginning of the 90ies there was no real Techno scene here. The
first time I came in contact with electronic music was in 1992 when I heard
trax on a Ghetto-Blaster from mates of the neighberhoo.
It was a radio show on HR3 Clubnight by Sven Väth which was playing.

* And what did you like about this kind of music?
When I heard the music it really swept me off my feet! This was a total new
world which opened up for me.
I felt like an astronaut landing on a new planet. The music was the contrary
to my life with nature.
Since I am a scientific person, who always is interested to understand as
much as possible, did I buy myself my first synthesizer..in order to discover
the secrets how tones were generated by electricity.
From that time on..I was hooked on that music.


* What kind of music did you listen to when you was a child and in what ways
has your childhood and your city influenced your music taste?

As a child I really did not listen to any music, an exception were radio
plays. Electronic music itself generated the interests for the world of
tones. Since I grew up between the metro poles of Cologne and Frankfurt where
I drove to buy my records, both cities influenced my style. On the one side,
(the side of Frankfurt) ,it was the trancy note and the drive as it was
celebrated in the Omen, on the other side it was the more minimal style of
the Cologne branch of Delirium record store , later called Kompakt
record store with labels such as Profan and and Studio1. I think both of
these influence you will still acknowledge today in my music.

* In the 90’s you moved to Bonn to study at university...from the
countryside to the city. Which aspects of each of these two places and two
ways of life have impressed you most?

The life in the city was a new experience for me I don't want to miss. It was
a time in which I recognise that the life in the country side made even more
sense, was more substantial for me.
The noise in the city is irretated me immensely. To buy a crate of water
it sometimes took me half an hour. On the countryside it is a matter
of 2
minutes and everybody knows me here.
On the country side I have a much higher standard of living.

* Why did you choose to study ecological geography?
As I realised in my childhood nature was the most sound and non
materialistic key to fortune, it was my deepest wish to hand off these ideas
to fellow men.
We are all a part of nature. On top I wanted to study an occupation where I
was as much as outdoors as possible to experience the seasons with an
awareness.

* Electronic music is a way of abstract and emotional music: rarely there
are words and complex lyrics, but mainly voices, melodies, synthetic sounds.
It's a kind of steamy dream, it's all about emotions: what do you think is
the connection between electronic music and our inner dimension? Is it a
kind of exploration of the unconscious? Is it a new way of making music, or
there were already similar music currents in the past?

Nature is not only inspiration for my own music, but music is nature.
Today we know, that when making music the oldest part of our brain, the
cerebrum is most active. Instead when we talk there is only a much
younger cerebral lobe involved.
Our voice allows us to climb up to 3 three or four octaves, to speak we only
need one.
Patients with an apoplectic stroke often are not able to speak any more but
instead can play music.
These all are signs that men made music before he developed speech. Emotions
and feelings were communicated by melody produced in the largely, similar of
how animal do it today.
To put it in more simple words, Sadness was communicated in minor, happy
ness in mayor.
Today we make use of a highly complex language and use most modern means of
communication as mobile, e-mails internet but still understand these
messages.
This tonal long term memory till today is the reason why some music makes us
happy others makes us sad.
This perception is located in our genes, as has people understand these
messages who never had contact to western civilisation.
Another example for our evolutionary long term memory of tones, is when one
scratches with a fork on a plate or when choke breaks too bits and pieces on
a black board.
It raises hackles and a feeling of un easiness. The reason for that is that
when men were living in woods and savannah, an species of ape existed, what
in case of danger expelled sound that is similar to the scratching on a
plate. Men are conditioned to avoid danger and prepare an escape.
Also the feeling and the joy for rhythms is something which lives on in all
of us. So you will find in all cultures, often independent for each other,
cultures that devote themselves to a 4/4 beat.
The love in these beats derives from the time in the womb when we are for
the first time confronted with a steady heartbeat.
If these genuine relics are trigger by acoustic or electronic amenities if
of secondary importance.

* The electronic music world has changed a lot during recent years. Now we
can find this kind of music even outside the clubs, for example in theatres,
museums and fashion shows. Is this a scene still in progress, or is it a
world already came to light, no longer underground? What do you think about?

Well, the whole techno culture had to bleed quite a lot. Did it originate
from a rebellious moment in time, has it today lost the rave gear-dusk mask
in favour of a suit and cravat.
In early days the most rebel and the “opposite” people were listening to
techno, today the petty bourgeois is listening to this music. Everywhere you
can listen to techno here. In the TV, the football stadion, the coffee
shops, the monumental car stereos of the kids..
This sadly reflects in the music of now. Today everybody does techno,
because one can make money with it. The market is flooded. Look at Beatport
Top 100 you find very little artistic music there.
It all is about money. The worst thing is that the young approaching
generation, that is now developing their taste, they are thinking that this
music is the ultimate, because it is in the Top 100.
Then some times later this virus makes its way into their brains that tells
them this music is really good. Men is a creature habit. What fuels the
vicious circle is the constant fear of many established DJs to loose their
status. Sooner or later they start to play such cheap music because they
think all people are requesting this kind of music. The the even older DJ
say to themselves, if they play that kind of music now, it is not that bad
and start to play it as way and so and on..



* What is art for you and what is the connection between today's art
crossbreeding and the music?

Art for me is when you are successful to inspire and move people with
something that can not be copied because it is unique. In the digital age
the boundaries of different art forms are crumbling.
Visual support to the music is found in the internet through videos. Through
better technical possibilities music can be visualised and stimulated even
better. N think of the LED walls in Watergate and Harry Klein's 360 degree
video walls.

* What are people looking for today in electronic music?
That is always a difficult one to answer. Me personally , I long for more
energetic music and emotional melodies after the wave of really boring retro
house music.

Where is today's art going? Are we looking for something new, or are we just
'renewing' the past?

Renaissance towards well known grounds are conmen. The development of art
therefore never takes on a linear path. But there will always be artists
that go different ways and therefore will introduce new genres. The human
being is a curious one that always looks for progress.

* You said that for you there are a lot of parallels between nature and the
electronic sound: everything has a rhythm, for example. Your countryman
Nietzsche in ‘Die Geburt der Tragödie aus dem Geiste der Musik’ wrote that
rhythm is one of the most important aspects of life, the logos of the nature
is about both the world and the soul of man, expressing completely the flow
of life and its movement. Rhythm is an aspect of the whole universe, by it
body and soul find the harmony and the equilibrium in motion. What do you
think about?

I have a similar opinion. First of all there is a rhythm. For example, the
four seasons, the rotation periods of planets, the death or birth of planets
...all of it , . Are we out in nature for a while we witness some kind of
transcendental condition, a unbelievable deep and pure feeling of happiness.
Because rhythm is something ethnic, we perceive a deep joy and satisfaction
to move for hours to the same rhythm. Our body also rewards us with endorphin
and dopamine for doing so.

* And what about the mystical connection between the nature and the man?
We are all a part of nature. Just some thousand years ago, we were nomads
following the simple task of finding enough food. Although today we live
behind pieces of glass and sometimes wonder how good a walk at the fresh air
can be, we stay highly developed animals that need the relation to nature.

* You work also as a park ranger part-time, I read because you want to show
to people the beauty and value of nature, the beauty of our world. Do you
see this as a kind of mission?

Nature is for me the most simple key to happiness and if I am declamatory
with my words..... to a better world. I simply enjoy to share my happiness
with other fellow men. Maybe I have inherited some educational qualities,
since my father, my grandfather and grand grand father were teachers. To
introduce people to the beauty of nature is something very important for
me..
One con only appreciate what one sees and loves. One sees only what ones
knows. Only when people acknowledge that a wood is not just a piece of
dirt with a couple of trees, but a system consisting out of many small
wonders,,,they will realise the value of it.
When I worked as a park ranger it fulfilled me with joy to see the joy in
the faces of the people when I told them about wonders and what you can
learn about them.
Today I perceive it as a great gift when I can give the listeners of my
music also a part of my private insight into nature and enjoy when people
send me mails in which they tell me they have rediscovered the
attractiveness of nature for themselves.

* I know your main inspiration is nature for sure, but are there any artists
that inspire your productions and in general what you do with their lives,
even out of the musical context? What skills should an artist have to
impress you?

Inspiring artists for myself are always artist that do not behave like”
business men, who copy trends to make money but those that have to make
music because their inner self voice tells them to. I believe you can hear
and feel this in their music. I also like the idea when artist are active
in other genres or topics are interested to upgrade their knowledge. I
think there about artist such as Jesse Somfay and Nathan Fake or some time
ago the Aphex Twin. These are artists that have to do their research to
discover new grounds instead of jumping on the accelerating bandwagon.

I think that for a DJ or a producer of electronic music knowledge is
essential, because electronic music is a music of visions, imagination and
sometimes a return to the past. An artist should be able to tap into all
branches of knowledge. What do you think about?

I have a similar opinion. As a good artist you have to be an all rounder.
You have to be a composer to express your feelings in melodies and a good
producer to be able to create a matching sounds cape. You also have to be a
clear cut person that that can deal with all the hype.

* A great techno artist is always dreaming. His world is full of visions.
What are yours? In what ways do you approach to the reality and in what ways
the reality inspires you? What turns your thoughts into music and what would
you communicate whit your sound?


My vision of live is one that is build on self consciousness. A life in
which i am aware of what happens in nature hence my environment. As for
example the change of the seasons.
The fluctuation of bird races and the smell of plants. Since we live today
in a hectic world in which everything is based on pace, is the possibility
to take your time a rare one und becomes a desire. The desire for these
magic moments often then is included in my work .

* Today electronic music is influenced by various genres of music, there is
a great eclecticism, a non-stop exchange with other artistic fields. Do you
think that this is an advance in the context? How do you think this will
evolve?

I like the idea of barriers in music to crumble. Men is always tempted to
pigeonhole things, because he likes his environment neat and in a certain
order, this provides him with safety.
Also myself is often asked what genre my music stands for. For me this is a
silly question. Good music should express a pure feeling that can be
received and understood. Music that gives comfort or makes one happy or
animates to dance. I think that music is an ancient device of communication
will show much stronger in the future.

* What is your relationship with the world of today? What are things that
allow you to hope, despite the significant social and political decay we are
going through?

There are a lot of problems such as over population, climate change, lack of
water, but men had to cope with much more severe circumstances in the past
like doe example: ice ages, famine,
Epidemic plagues. I am an optimist and i am pretty sure that manhood with
also manage to tackle these obstacles. The human being is sadly a verify easy
going one, who acts always when it is almost five to twelve.

* Do you think today man is still the centre of artistic activities,
something like Humanism, or are we privileging other aspects, which might be
expected to affect most the public?

It is a fact that the capitalistic system accounts for envyness,
egoism, greed..but was that not always the case? I think due to the internet
we are living in an enlightened world and that humanism is therefore on the
agenda. I think for example about Egypt where with the help of the internet
a ramshackle humanistic system is on the way to be reformed. The higher
developed a country is the more humanistic treats you find, as for example
in Sweden or Denmark, who have a fantastic social system. But there will be
always black sheep.

* What do you think of the current musical scene? What are the weak points
of clubbing and of electronic music?

When I started to write music in the early 90ies I was inspired by records
that featured beautiful melodies and subtle arrangements as on EYE-Q or by
artist such as Aphex Twin or CJ Bolland.
There were heavy emotions ruling the songs. This music sounds in many cases
more futuristic than what we get today. Today many use the same sounds
Such as 808 and 909 and add silly vocal samples as if that was the hot shit
of the moment..This is really boring.
We live in the year 2011 and the technological opportunities offer so much
more. Techno o music has become very superfluous. In the digital age the
consumer sucks thousands of tracks that have to directly make everything
happen. There is very little music which has been done with love for the
details, because you have to deliver DJ food to be at the top.
The artist has too little time to do his research to go his won way. This
quite tragic.

* In recent years technology has made great strides and every year it goes
faster. Does this thing scare you? Don’t you think that one day the
technology will dominate art, overpowering it?

No, the contrary is the case..i am happy about every technical progress, since
it is just a tool.
One has to learn and practise with them to be able to really use them, to
see the advantages in them.
The mobile phone is a brilliant inventions, but if its stands for permanent
reach ability which steals one time to think, then I don't like it.
With many things we still have to learn how to deal with them.
X rays for examples, In the beginning we even used them in shoe shops to see
if shoes were fitting! This was a painful experience. Today we know who to
deal with them and it is fantastic.

* You worked for great artists like Roman Flügel, Tiefschwarz, DJ Hell, Hot
Chip, Extrawelt, Minilogue... Do you think that the collaboration with other
people is important for a personal and artistic growth? Is this a way to
understand and pick different aspects of reality and put them in your works?

For me the work with other artist is important because it force one to go
different ways.
I am always selecting the people I remix very thourogh full, only when I see a
similarity..it makes sense for me. When you make you way into foreign
waters you can easily get lost.

* What artists do you follow now with a great interest?
Artists as Jon Hopkins, Bibio, Pantha Du Prince or Clark. But also like
purest techno like Ben Klock or Marcel Dettmann are writing.

* I read that one day you will leave the music world, why? Do you think that
this is not your vocation?

I will always make music since the motivation is intrinsic.
Even if there was no interest for my music I would do it as I do it, since it
is a therapy for me.
In it I can deal with my feelings and let them free.
Every time I have finished a piece of music it gives me a great deal of
satisfaction.
DJ life instead is very unhealthy, the permanent journeys, the long nights..
This is certainly something I will reduce in the future.
I will then spend more time with nature , music for film and other creative
genres.

* What are your future projects?
I am sitting at another album right now..and I will do some remixes. Since 3
years I am occupied with an ambient-electronica album... aside of the techno
madness. Which i am working now without any deadlines.
When it will be released is not clear yet.

Thank you