Dont Ask's Podcast

First of all, we’d like to kick this piece off with an enormous ‘thank-you’. For all of the support we’ve received from everyone throughout the last year and for everyone who has stuck with us and chipped in simply for the fun of it, we’re incredibly grateful. Cheers.

The end of our first year also marks the beginning of a new chapter for Don’t Ask!. After serious thought we relocate to a Friday night, begin our brand new podcast/interview series and welcome our first international artist from the epicentre of many of the house music moves being felt across the globe, Berlin.

Ambitious, tireless and ferociously dedicated; three traits accredited to Don’t Ask!’s first Birthday special guest and part of the reason behind his increasing success.

Make no mistake, it’s been a phenomenal year for Chris Lattner, as it has for us, but the journey has had its fair share of twists, turns and tales to tell.

We checked in to see how things were going…

1) Where do your musical routes lie and how did you get involved in dance music?

In 1986 a few of us were attending a dance school. After a while, as expected the youths at the time got slightly pissed off that on the Friday night dance, the DJ played music only for the older generation. Luckily, the owner of the place was a friend of my father and I knew he had an unused room. So, I asked him if I could do a bit of a ‘teen disco’ for the younger kids. So we did. There I started playing euro-dance like Snap and electronic music from Depeche Mode although there were no transitions like today. The youth disco was a huge success and half a year later we took up the bigger room, usually occupied by the adults and they went into the small one.
One year later I bought my first pair of Technics turntables. Now I could concentrate on mixing and other skills which have stayed with me right through my career.
In 1989 I went to the first Acid House Parties in Hannover and one year later we organized the first techno parties called "Tekkno over Hannover".
Hmm, I think that’s about the whole story really; the rest is party party party.

2) You’ve had a successful string of releases on Einmaleins-Musik, Moon Harbour and Loco Dice’s ‘The Lab’ compilation, what else can we expect from you this year?

Quite a lot I hope! I’ve worked hard over the past months. First of all there will be "Memory EP" with Bearweasel, and Justin Drake (Peace Division) remixes on Luna Records. It’s a new UK label and it will be their first release at the end of August/beginning of September. Two more of my EPs will be released later this year. One on my ‘home’ label Einmaleins-Musik called "Deep as hell" and a second one on UK Label Fear of Flying but I’m still not decided on the name yet; we’ll see.
Then I’ve also got some remixes coming soon. The long awaited "we play house remix" I made for the Jazz Band Tahloula on Danish imprint Tartelet Records, a remix I did for Audiofly’s Hit Track "Sweeter than" on Supernature, a remix for Margovan’s track "From the beginning" on UK label Phobic Records and last but not least on Fear of Flying a remix for Pawas.

3) Tell us a little bit about your own night over in Berlin and your thoughts on the city many in England believe to be the Mecca of all things techno.

I lived 5 years in Berlin and moved to Potsdam (50 km from Berlin) in March as the city was too much for me. I think I’ll disappoint some people now, but in my opinion Berlin is not as interesting as people think. Of course we have very good clubs like Panorama Bar / Berghain, Watergate, Arena Club and Weekend, but you will notice if you do a club-tour in one night, the same music is played in each of them. If you stay longer and do a tour for a whole month you will notice that the same music is played the whole month in every club. So I got bored very soon and I didn’t go out so much. Also it’s quite difficult to have a good party because if you go out in a club in Berlin it’s like a business meeting; one sentence about the weather and then the next about business.
But for friends of mine who don’t live here and come as tourists it’s always a great experience. So, if people want to see what techno is about, come to Berlin and get wasted for a whole weekend because the party never stops.

4) You have been playing clubs and partying since the 1990’s, how has the scene changed for you?

This is a difficult question and it’s hard not to say "everything was better in the past". The scene changed for sure but it’s not easy to say what has changed exactly without trivializing.
I try to pick some points... The major changing is the breakup of styles. In the early years you were able to listen to all kinds of electronic music on one party, even within a single DJ set. Now you have all these styles and each style of electronic music has its own crowd.
Then the scene changed with the drugs. When Ketamine and Cocaine took over from speed and ecstasy the face of the crowd changed immediately. Along with this the music also changed; less happy, more tool-ish.

5) With your tracks getting a lot of support from the likes of Ricardo Villalobos, Loco Dice and Laurent Garnier, you must be doing something right! What’s your studio set up like?

Ha. Studio? I don’t have a real studio. Most of my music is made just on my Macbook with Ableton Live and tons of samples, even without monitoring, just AKG 271 MKII headphones. Sorry if I disappoint some one now.
I even make my final mixes on headphones. Just for a double check I’ll go to a friend who has a sound card and monitoring but usually I don’t change too much.

6) What other DJ's and producers are you respecting at the moment?

It’s difficult at the moment as the music is so similar; mine included. I think the productions of Gorge (8 Bit) sound always very good. Then there is Andre Rozzo who is the master of grooves for me, his Grooves are perfect! I think it’s very sad that Peace Division stopped making music together as their productions were always great but both are doing solo stuff now and I’m very curious what Justin Drake is doing with my track "Memory" on Luna Records. A huge influence on me to start making music was Mathias Kaden. The way he used native sounds and ethnic percussion was very inspiring for me even if I cannot listen to any bongo/conga or native chant anymore. At present I respect the work of Spanish producer Affkt as he is very good in using live percussion in dance tracks that they sound very live played. Personally, I would not do that but it’s a nice kind of freshness in house music.

7) What plans do you have for the rest of 2009?

After doing all my homework making music, I think that it’s time now to play. I will travel a lot and perform for people who want to hear my definition of party music.

8) I've heard a few rumours that you're quite partial to getting out the fancy dress costumes every now and then? What’s your favourite outfit?

What? Who told you? I think it was in the past. It was back in the early nineties when we dressed like idiots. I used to see people with vacuum cleaners on their backs; no joke. We also wore some fancy stuff like white gloves, dust masks and funny hats. But I am too old for that kind of stuff now so my favourite outfit is t-shirt and jeans.

9) And finally what can Preston clubbers expect from your forthcoming U.K debut?

I think they can expect house music all night long. Energetic, happy and exciting with some silent moments within the set. I am looking forward to see what the crowd in Preston is all about. I hear they’re a really wild bunch.

You can catch Chris alongside Ruthit & Calor and the Don’t Ask! residents at the Don’t Ask! First Birthday on September 18th 2009.