Q – DJ, Producer, Label boss and now club owner, that’s a pretty impressive list of titles to hold successfully. Are you an incredibly astute businessman or has it been the power of your music and the label that have given you the ability to run your own club?

When I read this it looks very busy and huge. It is sometimes not so easy to bring it all together, that’s true, but managing is everything. I have great partner who takes care of the label work. We have two people who work for us in the office and they work for the label and the club. I run the club with my sister. She is the third part. She takes care of the bar, logistical stuff and she is there every weekend. So I have enough time to produce music. Sometimes there is period I wish I have most of the time! Then I also play almost every weekend. Everything we have done was step by step. The club was part of our history. We started with parties about 7 years ago called “DIY”.

Q – Can you tell us what led you to opening “Ego” your club in Hamburg?

Myself and my label partner Adriano started 7 years ago our own monthly party in Hamburg called “DIY”. During the parties our wish and dream to have our own club was always there and it was the logical next step. Two years ago we had the chance to rent this club and we took the chance. We are very happy and thankful for the way the people love the club and how well it’s run. Sure, we have a very good friendship with lot of artists and most of them only want to play at our club, it was nice when Gadi Mizrahi and Nicolas Jaar wrote in Dj Mag that we are one of the top 3 clubs in the world for them. That’s fantastic when you hear this from artists you really love and respect.

Q – Most people’s knowledge of the German scene will be that of the Berlin club scene. Berlin is culturally quite unique in terms of German cities, do you think your Hamburg base has helped you cut out your own path separate from the influences of Berlin?

Berlin is the biggest and most important city in the world in electronic music. Not only in Germany. Before we had our club, Hamburg had a good nightlife scene for years and was one of the most important cities in house music.. we were not the first, but because we are known from the label Hamburg becomes more known in Germany and outside of Germany. So it’s fantastic to know and that people from all over the Europe come to visit our club ego because they heard so many good things about it and that they stay for the weekend to visit the city. I played a couple of weeks ago at the Warung beach club and I meet there a group of people who will come to New Year at our club to celebrate with us. That is so beautiful.

Q – Whats the vibe at Ego? Being based Hamburg I imagine you are a lot less impacted by the easy jet set of Berlin clubbing?

It’s warm, cosy, familiar and when you are inside the club time goes so fast, it’s 10 in the morning before you know it, the best thing is to come and check it out for yourself.

Q – You have a very strong identity as a label and consequently as an agency, touring night etc. Do you think it’s important for people to have a very clear and defined idea of what you are to achieve success as a label?

I don’t know the recipe for success is for a label. You can only do what you do and hope that there are people outside that like what you do. But it helps, when you know what don’t want. In our case, I think the people respect that we all grew together from the beginning with Stimming and H.O.S.H. and later with all these other great artists who became part of the diynamic team. Also that our spectrum is so open minded and not the same style. We always try to do what we like to do and not what is the hype of the moment.

Q – You have just launched 2DIY4, an offshoot of Diynamic. Your first release being the Love Recycled EP, a collection of bootlegs sampled from some fairly well known Motown and 80′s soul classics. The whole re-edit thing seems to a pretty fast track way to get your label noticed these days. Isn’t there an issue with publishing and recording rights? How do you deal with that, is it simply a case of trying your luck?

It was always our plan to launch a second label with more playgrounds and how do you know that we don’t clear the rights? But that is not the point, I made the tracks in a time when I was making edits for my sets, I needed a break between the remix work, so when I made these tracks the first idea was to do it only on vinyl. Then we thought about giving it away for free but I’m not a fan of free downloads. You can’t stop the illegal downloads, these people will always do it, they will never stop but I don’t want to support that when I give music away for free, this gives the impression music has no worth anymore. Then we had the idea to create a website where you can download the tracks and pay a donation, in the end we said, ok, only vinyl but we got so many requests for digital that we decided to do also digital in the normal distribution way.

Q – Can we expect more bootlegs from 2DIY4?

The second release is out now and similar to the concept of the first love recycled EP. But the third will be a release of a new indie/pop band we have signed.

Q – Would you have any kind of issue with producers sampling your own music?

I think it is different to sample older stuff from different genres or house and techno from ten to twenty years ago. But if someone samples stuff that is not so old and is from the same genre, it is a bit strange and uninspired.

Q – How difficult do you think it is for independent dance music labels starting up now?

In one way I think nowadays it’s not so easy but on the other hand people always want and need fresh new labels. That will never change. In the end, good music will go his own way and more and more people will listen to it. It is much easier to share music via facebook or youtube in recent years.

Q – You are five years in with Diynamic, how do you see the label growing from here musically?

We all grow from release to release, we are still hungry for new ideas and for new inspiration. It is like, OK we are here now, so let’s move to the next step, where ever it is.

Q – What studio projects do you have of your own in the pipeline?

The next Diynamic release will be a track from me and Stimming. Also we have an EP forthcoming on Supernature and Rejected plus remix’s for Digitalism, Crazy P and DJ T.

Via burlingtonproject.co.uk