To Not Break Too Much
Michael Mayer talks about his Minimal, Mobile Disco Thing

Interviewing world-renown DJs, generally speaking, means having acute skills on how to massage over-inflated egos, tame delusions of self-grandeur and from time to time, work with seriously mistaken vocational identities. However, when talking to the DJ who not only is a co-founder of Cologne’s esteemed Kompakt label (along with Wolfgang and Reinhard Voigt) but is also a co-founder of minimal techno in general, a wholly different set of adjectives refreshingly apply. Honest, natural, sincere, well mannered, hilarious and strangely passionate about the Bonn Republic, Michael Mayer not only rocks a dance floor but has a burgeoning cartography career ahead of him too it seems.

October 30 marks the release of Immer 2, his follow-up to 2002’s seminal Immer. Like his previous release, his characteristically organic, seamlessly matched beats and frequencies will lure you between moods and sounds you’ve never heard and felt before (and watch out for that closing track). A strangely emotive ride through his personal snapshot of dance music today—with gentle nods towards tomorrow—the mix, as its name in German would suggest (meaning, “always, ever”), has been slowly built to stand the test of time.

Giant Step sat down with Mayer in a strange Midtown Manhattan hotel to discuss Immer 2, dance music in general, his future teaming with labelmate Superpitcher, as Supermayer, and the myriad ways the multi-tasking man keeps himself “from being bored.”

GIANT STEP: How did you start DJing?

MICHAEL MAYER: Basically, my parents let me go to a disco party when I was 13. I was so fascinated with everything—the lights, the disco ball, the dancing—that I decided I would have to do what the DJ was doing, but just do a better job of it! I was a paperboy at the time and decided to first start with light effects. I would lock myself away and [tinker] with the lights in the house constantly. My mother would be baking a cake and then, boom! The electricity would be out. I still wish I had that edge, to be honest. I was willing to experiment with anything. Later, I made all the parties in our school…It was this sort of mobile disco thing.

GIANT STEP: When you DJ, what do you want your audience to get out of you being behind the decks?

MM: To be honest, you have to keep an eye on everything from the crowd, to the door, to the dance floor, to the bar. Whatever I do, it’s to make everybody dance. There is this trend today of the superstar DJ and I just don’t like that. It’s not what it’s about. I love to dance and you can see me dancing the whole time I’m choosing the music. You should never trust a DJ that doesn’t dance!

But, it’s not only about the peak moments to me. I love the more fragile aspects of the night as well, when things get dark and moody. I mean, it’s stupid to think that everybody should be happy all night. It’s not a good thing to try to achieve, because people have to be sad in order to know what’s happy.

GS: Uh oh. You wouldn’t happen to be born in November, would you?

MM: What? Yes. November 12th. Oh, yes (smiling), I am a Scorpio.

GS: And you sound like one…But back to the fragility of emotions?

MM: To allow all these emotions to be expressed in a club night is interesting to me. Meandering between them is a challenge.

GS: Ok, so if working the dance floor is about manipulating emotions, how does minimal techno fit into that mindset? And, how did the whole minimal thing get started with you guys?

MM: We (meaning Wolfgang and Reinhard Voigt) met at a time when we were doing different things. Wolfgang was doing his 150 bpm acid tracks and I was doing
slower New House at 100-125 bpm. Each of us appreciated what the other did, so we decided to meet in the middle and leave parts of our past behind.

We did what we did and it came only from us. We could say, “Yeah, this is Cologne techno,” and we could make that whatever we wanted it to be. We didn’t steal it from Detroit, we didn’t steal it from black people. We just stole it from our own pasts.

GS: What does it mean to be Cologne Techno, versus anywhere else in Germany?

MM: Well, you see. Berlin is this city that brings in many people from all over the world. It was a newly-[appointed] capital in a new country built on new ideals. Cologne is very close to Bonn, which was the capital of [the former West Germany also known as the Bonn Republic]. I prefer the humbleness of the Bonn Republic and its sense of history.

Because I have nary a first-hand clue what Michael is talking about, he thoughtfully takes it upon himself to draw me a very detailed map of Germany. The southwest corner of the map is the Black Forest area, where he grew up. “It is beautiful there,” he adds. The lines around it are the Rhine River, followed by dots on the western half that are Cologne and Bonn, then over to the middlish is Berlin. This is followed by a lot of passionate feedback on Berlin versus the Bonn Republic that I have a hard time following, yet appreciate nonetheless. See map below…



GS: And as for minimal techno as a whole? Would you say it was largely started by Wolfgang and yourself?

MM: Yes, in many ways I would. But 1995-6 was really a defining moment. It was really something new to reduce the essence of clubbing to the bare bones of [emotion]. There is nothing about minimal techno that is disturbing, but at the same time, it fulfils every bodily function. It was the most exciting thing to dance to without getting excited. It was like a remedy to not break too much, to dance to something monotone.

It was around then too that Maurizio [Basic Channel / Rhythm & Sound Co-Founder], Studio1 [A German Label] and Richie [Hawtin]’s Concept series came out and things really blew up.

GS: And what about Kompakt in relation to other minimal labels?

MM: Well, Kompakt isn’t just a minimal label. Minimal is only its backbone. If you compare us to other labels, we are not as purist as M-nus, we are not like Ghostly. My sister would say, all of M-nus records sound the same, but that’s just her.

In terms of how the label came to be, there are a few influences. Wolfgang is in many ways a product of the socialization of Germany in the 70s. Reinhard was into glam rock and I just sort of liked anything that could make me dance, like Kool and the Gang or whatever.

GS: What does Kompakt offer that’s different?

MM: Well, to be honest, we weren’t raised on techno the way so many label owners today are. Our techno is not just machine music.

GS: Not only are you a DJ, you also function as a part of Kompakt’s A&R and run Kompakt Distribution. How does it all fit together?

MM: Well, the whole distribution thing is because I wanted something that grounded me. If you choose to turn your hobby into your profession, you must be doubly careful about what you do. Honestly, if you’re just into DJing for the money, it’s like you’re betraying your love. You get stuck on this treadmill and within a few years you will inevitably burn out. Mainly, through all the touring and work I just keep myself from being bored.

GS: How do the dynamics between the three of you work? Is it difficult to meld together the vision of different minds?

MM: It’s a very hard process to describe, because it’s metaphysical in many ways. I mean, if you put Wolfgang and myself in two different rooms and played the same CD, we would pick out the exact same tracks. In many ways it’s also spiritual and much of the spirit of Kompakt is based around the fact that there are two half-brothers at its core.

But, to be honest—we are so lucky. There is no jealousy, no envy in our brotherhood. We can change around our functions in the label and it always works out.

GS: How are things shaping up in dance culture today?

MM: There is this whole new quality of nightlife out there now and it’s strange. This after party culture is killing the actual party, because it’s like everybody’s just waiting through a set to go to the next place which is unnerving.

GS: I would have to agree with you, but i also have to get up in the morning and write. Aside from after parties, let’s talk about Immer 2. What have we here?

Well, I guess it’s growing into a series now. With the first one, I was naïve. I felt I could do anything. I thought, “these are the tracks I’ll always love no matter how many times I play them,” but that’s changed with Immer 2.

GS: I think it’s a little more dancier than Immer. There is still a very organic sense of where the sound comes from, as though you’re not actually listening to techno, but it has a little more energy.

MM: Really? You think it’s more for dance? Well, as far as the techno-no-techno thing goes, I would say that my music’s power is in the sample. It’s a hard thing to describe. It’s not like I have classical musical terms to help me when I describe what excites me about house music. It’s more random—random pitches, random sampling, and many techniques that are indescribable by standard terms. But mainly, I want my music to move people. And in the case of this album, I took a year to choose these tracks. It was a careful process.

GS: I also love the crazy disco in the middle. But really, what is going on with the last track (Geiger- Good Evening (Supermayer Remix))? It sounds like ten different songs rolled into one.

MM: I know! Isn’t it insane? That is a track from Geiger and the lyrics are taken from Kurtis Blow’s “The Breaks.” Aksel (meaning Schaufler, aka Superpitcher) and I found the first two minutes of that track to be so magnificent and psychedelic. Then, all of a sudden, these crazy beats were cut into it and we said, “What!” We were so offended by the shift, we decided to remix it.

GS: How are things panning out with your new project with Aksel, the aptly-named “Supermayer?”

MM: Oh, it’s totally wild. We feel like kids again! We just fell in love with each other in the studio after all these years we had spent in solitude behind the computer. It’s become so playful again to make music and I love it.

GS: Often times, successful combinations are made out of opposites. Is there anything inherent in your personalities that makes things click?

MM: Hmm, well, Aksel. He is a very sleepy and slow person. I am not!



The Immer 2 Tracklist, with all its less-than-salient artists and labels:

1. Someone Else- Ploosh (Microcosm)
2. Ian Simmonds- The Dog (Musik Krause)
3. Brooks- Tell somebody about the beat (Soundslike)
4. Frank West – 2nd Booty (Astrolab)
5. Crowdpleaser- 18 years (MGLTD)
6. Justus Kohncke- Advance (Kompakt)
7. Lindstrom- Another Platform [Todd Terje Remix] (Feedility)
8. The Rice Twins- For Dan (K2)
9. SCSI 9- Morskaya (Kompakt)
10. Jesse Somfay- Lying in a bed of mist (Archipel)
11. DK7- Where’s the fun [Sten Remix] (Output)
12. Geiger- Good Evening [Supermayer Remix] (Firm)

And, for the first time in history (um, drum rolls?), Kompakt and Kompakt-MP3 (Kompakt Records’ digital store) unite for the first edition of Immer 2 with the following free digital compilation. After all, Michael Mayer can probably tell you about some good songs you might want to hear that you probably haven’t heard of:

James Din A4- Intro (Esel)
AM/PM- No matter Whether (Dreck)
Mikkel Metal- Lukon [Michael Mayer Remix] (Echocord)
Adolf Noise- Der Grundton [Michael Mayer Remix] (Freude am Tanzen)
Ada- Maps [Thomas/ Mayer Remix] (Areal)
Dorau/ Kohncke- Abermorgen (Kompakt Pop)
Terre Thaemlitz & Funk Shui- Superbonus (Mule)