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Features Introducing NEM3SI$’s new label Infinite Resistance! Mindbenderz talk ‘Lord of the Rings’ and fishing, as well as the creation of their new album ‘Celestial Gateway’! Iono-Music artists One Function, Eliyahu, Invisible Reality and Dual Vision talk Robert Miles, kids, dogs and vinyl, while we chat about their current releases! Luke&Flex talk influences, the Irish rave scene, why Flex wears a mask and Play Hard, their new EP out now on Onhcet Repbulik Xtreme! Lyktum expands on his new album ‘Home’ – talking about his love of storytelling, creating new harmonies and the concept behind his musical works. Pan talks getting caught short crossing the Sahara, acid eyeballs and tells us Trance is the Answer, plus shares his thoughts on his latest release 'Beyond the Horizon' - all from a beach in Spain! Miss C chats about living with the KLF, DJing in a huge cat’s mouth, training her brain and the upcoming super-duper Superfreq Grande party at LDN East this Saturday, 16th September! NEM3SI$ - I Live for the Night – talks superficiality, psychopaths, and bittersweet success, ahead of a plethora of evocative, emotional, and passionate upcoming melodic techno releases! Psy-Sisters Spring Blast Off! We talk to DJ competition winner ROEN along with other super talents on the lineup! Blasting towards summer festivals with Bahar Canca ahead of Psy-Sisters Spring Blast! Shyisma talks parties, UFO's, and Shotokan Karate ahead of his upcoming album 'Particles' on Iono-Music! SOME1 talks family, acid, stage fright and wolves - ahead of his upcoming album release ‘Voyager’ on Iono-Music in February 2023! The Transmission Crew tell all and talk about their first London event on 24th February 2023! NIXIRO talks body, mind and music production ahead of his release 'Planet Impulse' on Static Movement's label - Sol Music! Turning the world into a fairy tale with Ivy Orth ahead of Tribal Village’s 10th Birthday Anniversary Presents: The World Lounge Project The Psy-Sisters chat about music, achievements, aspirations and the 10-Year Anniversary Party - 18/12/22! A decade of dance music with Daniel Lesden Earth Needs a Rebirth! Discussions with Psy-Trance Artist Numayma Taking a Journey Through Time with Domino New Techno Rising Star DKLUB talks about his debut release White Rock on Onhcet Republik! PAN expands on many things including his new album 'Hyperbolic Oxymoron' due for release on the 14th April 2022 on PsyWorld Records! Psibindi talks all things music including her new collaborative EP 'Sentient Rays' on Aphid Records, her band Sentience Machine and 10 years of Psy-Sisters!

One PHATT Party: Pierre Pienaar live in Johannesburg Reported by SunnyAli / Submitted 11-05-08 18:04 With ManicJim – event host and organiser If you’re looking for classic, deep melodic trance blending the newest, freshest sounds into fat, uplifting tracks, then PHATT, aka Pierre Pienaar, is exactly what you need. This shy, quietly spoken Namibian guy has built a formidable reputation as a talented, prolific producer with his finger on the pulse of the dancefloor. He’s known for killer tracks like Eternal and Worlds Apart, released under the PHATT alias, and Industrializm and Global Panic under his own name, and for his long time friendship and collaborations with Alf Bamford, better known as Technikal, but his work over the years has also so impressed London-based hard trance label Nukleuz that it made him label manager for its trance-focused Green label. He’s now one of trance’s most in demand names, but in between a chocka production timetable and the day job he still finds time to play gigs in South Africa and visited Johannesburg to headline at Johannesburg’s most recent ManicFrenzy party at the Lemon8 club. ManicFrenzy Productions is one of South Africa’s most pioneering dance events teams, founded and run by DJ and promoter ManicJim, and it lives to put on events that will push and grow the trance and hard dance scene across the country. The PHATT party brought Martin McHale, a giant in South Africa’s dance industry and owner of Club 330 in Durban – Frantic’s South African affiliate club – to play alongside Cape Town’s legendary artist, promoter and club owner, Jason 47. Never one to miss an opportunity like this, HarderFaster.net sent SunniAli to the club to chat with PHATT and event manager Jim about what the future holds. PIERRE – You’re Nukleuz Green’s label manager – how did this all come about? Well, I’d done a lot of stuff for Nukleuz before getting to this, and they just approached me and asked if this was something I would be interested in doing. And of course, I jumped at the opportunity!! I’ve been head of Nukleuz Green for about a year now, but before that I did a lot of remixes for them and it’s been going really well there. It’s a great team, a lot of good guys to work with, and they give you a lot of space to be creative, which is great. What does a job like this entail? Well, obviously the production side of things, but also A & R (Artists and Repertoire) management which means I’ve got to listen to a lot of demos, get in new artists, and try to promote them. There’s a lot of PR, a lot of promotion. So how many demos do you listen to a week – and how many do you have to listen to before you hear a really good one? Well, I listen to all of them – and I try to reply to everyone. We get a lot – we get around 60 to 70 demos a week. I try to take one day a week and listen to everything, and it’s tough because there’s a lot of good tracks but you’re listening out for that extra something you need to sell, because it’s a hard market now. So, from that 60 or so in a week, we will probably sign one per week if we’re lucky, we do about four or so tracks a month if it’s a good month. And what do you want to do with the label next? Basically what we want to do now is bring back more of the old school trance sound – you know, the big euphoric riffs, the stuff people liked that made trance big. We also want to bring in a few alternative mixes, be a bit creative. But we’ve got the big platform of Nukleuz to push anything, really, so we’re open to anything. Production is something DJs often find a struggle – what’s your advice for someone starting out? The essential is to just pretty much keep at it the whole time! There’s nothing like one sure way to make a track or one sure way to learn, you have to learn yourself. Was it trial and error for you, then? Absolutely – I’ve been producing since I was about 14 or so, and it’s just about going with the flow and getting better. Even now with every track I make, I learn more and more. Some people say trance is dying out – what’s your view? Trance is definitely coming back in a big way – with last year’s Shaun Tyas releases, and big riff trance coming back in, it’s looking good. Our sales at Nukeuz have been doing well and Ministry of Sound has been licensing our stuff for its compilations, so trance is definitely coming back in. You release under various different aliases – can you tell me a bit about each of these? It’s mainly to keep things fresh and interesting – you can get bland just doing the same thing. A while ago, I did a load of PHATT tracks and you end up getting bored of your own sound! So I then started producing tracks under my own name, which is more uplifting trance and then moved on to this new Melodia stuff which is more a crossover of house, trance and whatever I can find really! Top tips of any new DJs that you think are going to get noticed in 2008? I think Jason Van Wyk is really good, and especially for a South African producer at his age I think he’s a really hot tip. There’s quite a few – Michael Dow is really good, but there’s just so many its hard to pick some out. And finally – South Africa is a relatively small dance market – is there any possibility of you making the move to London to pursue this career? Yes, I’ve thought about it – it’d make my life a lot easier, especially with DJ gigs! For the moment though I’m settled in Namibia. It’s one of those things I’ll always keep open and who knows? AND JIM – what took you from DJing into the event management side of things? Well, it’s a long story but it was really when I went over to the UK, I found I learnt a lot from the production of the events I went to there, especially the Frantic club nights. I decided I wanted to bring that back to South Africa and show people what it is to put on parties properly. Your events are really trying to grow South Africa’s hard dance scene – what message do you want to send out to the people who turned up tonight? I would just love them to tell all their friends, everyone they know, what Manicfrenzy is all about, and what we’re capable of as an events producer. I want to get the name out there in order to build on tonight’s event and continue to put on some of the best events in the country. Harderfaster.net is working hard right now to grow the dance and hard dance scene here in South Africa – what do you really want to do next to do the same and bring the UK dance scene right back to South Africa? That’s a very difficult question, because the hard house scene in South Africa is very quiet at the moment. I’m not sure what the way forwards is, but I’m planning to sit down and brainstorm it and work closely with a lot of professionals in the industry to see the best thing to do. Ultimately I would love to bring Frantic to South Africa, show Frantic what I can do and put on a Frantic SA event, to bring the vitality of the whole UK hard dance scene straight back here. Fantastic! And what about you, do you have any big goals for 2008? Frantic South Africa! Tonight’s event is a Nukleuz event in partnership with Durban’s Club 330, but I’m keen to do a Tidy Trax party next, and am looking at bringing Lee Haslam over from the UK for it. Hopefully after that we’ll do a brilliant Frantic SA party. Photos courtesy of the HarderFaster archive. Not to be reproduced without permission. Share this :: : : : Follow HarderFaster :: Other Features By SunnyAli: Darude's whirlwind decade No sleep for Rachel Auburn In the Presence of Carl Nicholson Frantic Timeless 8 – totally worth ruining Valentine's Day for... It's like Origami, but with power tools..... One Awsum Xmas Party reviewed The views and opinions expressed in this review are strictly those of the author only for which HarderFaster will not be held responsible or liable. Comments: From: HouseGuy on 15th May 2008 10:20.38 Brilliant writeup to a top event, if you like it hard and you missed this one...dont miss the next one!

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