It’s been a while so here we go.
I did an interview with Thomas Gold who recently had a couple of pretty good releases like “Marsch Marsch” on Toolroom or “Areena” on Phazing. On the 10th his newest track “AGORa” which has been supported by a lot of artists during the summer will be released on SIZE.
toblip: Hey Thomas. First of all thanks a lot for doing this interview. I’m pretty happy about it
Thomas Gold: You’re welcome, happy to be here!
toblip: Please introduce yourself and tell us how long you’re doing music right now (When/how did you start)
Thomas Gold: I’m a DJ/Producer, based in Berlin. I’m actually settled in the house/tech house genre but not limited to that; my style is also influenced a lot by minimal and progressive and also by tribal and trance music.
toblip: You’re a German DJ and producer who reached a lot during the last two years. You became a Toolroom Knights DJ, did a couple of good productions like “Shake it“ and „Everybody be somebody“ . Your latest release was „Marsch Marsch“ which is big as well. What are your influences when you’re doing a track?
Thomas Gold: I have many influences but first of all, it’s the house music itself which I always loved. I listen a lot, when I’m at home, when I go out to clubs or bars with friends or while I’m travelling. Quite often I also get my ideas and inspiration from totally different genres of music, as it was when I did ‘Marsch Marsch’ – for a long time I had the idea of doing a track with some kind of traditional marching drums in combination with house beats – and there we go…Sometimes I find new ideas when I dig deep into my sample libraries or I just sit there and play with some of my synthesizers. But I also often draw my inspiration from simply listening to music – wherever of whatever kind…
toblip: With the studio interview of FutureMusic mag you showed how you did „The Button“. How was this experience for you? I also heard you’re doing video tutorials for a German online store. How did that work out?
Thomas Gold: Yeah, working with the guys from Future music for the video was great, we all had lots of fun in my studio that day! It was my first experience of that kind, I never had done a video where I had to explain how I work, what I do with my software and how I get my sounds and tracks together.
But it was a great experience and we are about to continue this with Future Music.
And yes, I just reached an agreement with a german online store for music hard- and software. I will produce tutorial videos for some of their products (audio production soft- and hardware) which you will be able to watch online. We will start the production of the first video series end of november so stay tuned…
toblip: With „Areena“ another track you did with David Tort and David Gausa has been previewed a couple of days ago. How did that collaboration come together and what else can we expect of you in the next months?
Thomas Gold: have been in touch with my mates David & David for quite a while, we are chatting regularly, exchanging tracks and so on. One day we came up with the idea of doing a track together as we all love the same kind of house music. So I booked myself a flight to Spain and went to Barcelona to visit my buddies. We threw together some of our musical ideas we had collected before and after three days of fun and work in the studio, ‘Areena’ was done!
Currently I’m about to finish a remix for Axtone and I’m working on a couple of other exciting collaborations (will talk about those soon). Of course our next studio session with David Tort & David Gausa is being planned already so you can expect some more of our producer team as well!
toblip: Like we can see in the video you’re working with logic. What else do you need for doing your records? What is your favourite gear?
Thomas Gold: Besides Logic and a lot of software plug-ins I also use some digital and analogue outboard equipment.
As today everybody has easily access to all kind of software stuff, the sound of productions can be very similar. So in order to create my very own sound, I also invest to have good hardware. So I don´t just use the every-day Software but also some ‘special’ gear like an Universal Audio hardware compressor, the Avalon 747 Tube compressor/EQ or my analogue hardware synthesizer SE-1X (Studio Electronics). This puts me – at least I so hope ϑ- in the position to to make my productions a bit outstanding compared to the usual ‘digital software’ sound. And – I just love to tweak the ‘real’ knobs of my toys and hear the difference of the analogue gear!!
toblip: It seems that the German producers have become more and more known and respected in the house music scene during the last years. Moguai has signed to deadmau5 label mau5trap, DBN did a remix of „Tweet it“, you became part of the Toolroom Knights, just to name a few examples. How would you describe the standing of the German producers and the German scene in the whole industry?
Thomas Gold: I don’t hink that this is just a thing of now, german producers have alwas been internationally known and respected, but nowadays the german sound has really become an important part of the club music scene. I think producers here have done a lot in the past years to raise the bar for house music ‘made in germany’ – just good to see this!
toblip: You’re a in Berlin based producer and deejay. Thinking about Berlin Techno should come to everybody’s mind so how is it to live in a city with one of the biggest Techno scenes. How „big“ is house in Berlin?
Thomas Gold: Unfortunately the ‘house’ scene is not that big in Berlin – it’s more about deeper minimal, techno and techhouse sound. Berlin has it’s very own music scene which is very vivid but quite different from the rest of germany. There is an upcoming house scene, clubs are taking on this kind of music but it will just take some more time to make this more established.
But nevertheless, Berlin is a fantastic city, the music scene is so inspiring and alive, I go out to clubs to see other DJs play whenever I have time. And there’s something going on nearly every day!
toblip: What would you have become if not a musician?
Thomas Gold: Good question, haha! I used to work at the marketing department of a consumer goods company a while ago, but it didn’t really challenge me. Music is what I love and has always been what I wanted to do for life.
toblip: I’ve seen you are going to Japan in November. What was the best venue you played at?
Thomas Gold: I recently played at Pacha in Buenos Aires, that was one of my highlights this year. The club is terrific, it was totally packed and the crowd was awesome – so into the music! I just didnt realize how time went by and as I had to finish after 3.5h it was like having played for only one hour…
Another of of my favourite shows was in Brazil, in Rio De Janeiro at “The Week”. Amazing venue, thousands of people, awesome sound system and an incredible vibe! Everybody was dancing and as I stood up there in the DJ booth playing, it was hard to describe how I felt. It was just like a big long flow of music and you could not only hear, but really feel the music. That was really an amazing experience. Wicked!
toblip: 2010 comes to an end. How would you describe this year so far? What are your goals for the next months and 2011?
Thomas Gold: For me and my musical career 2010 was a musical landmark. I got signed to Toolroom Records and to Size, both my favourite labels. Then a track of mine got picked up by Dirty South for his label Phazing, so all in all this year has been amazing. I changed my production style a lot, I went a big step further concerning the quality of my productions and I made some very important and nice contacts in the club music industry.
At the moment, I’m about to finish a remix for Axtone.
For the rest of 2010, I’m planning to work on new stuff, new tracks and remixes just to be prepared for 2011!
For 2011 my personal goal is to get even better productionwise, to develop myself further and to be a part of the actual house music scene. Looking forward to that a lot!
toblip: Is there anyone out there you always wanted to do a collaboration with?
Thomas Gold: Oh, there’s not THE one but there’s lots of guys I’d just love to work with. For example it would be great to collaborate with Mark Knight or Funkagenda, I love what they do. Also Laidback Luke or Dirty South – they always have good tracks and great vocals in their productions. And there’s many others…let’ see
toblip: What are your top 5 tracks at the moment?
1- Third Party “Release”
2- Gregori Klosman – Space Banana
3- Hard Rock Sofa – Blow Up
4- Genairo Nvilla – Nvilla Anthem (Stefan Vilijn Edit)
5- Marco V – Reaver (Save The Robot Remix)
IMO, your best interview, so far ..
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