We Love (click on the picture for more)

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Ten years after he became the head booker at Ibiza’s most credible and critically important party (We Love) at the island’s most influential venue (Space), Mark Broadbent ‘s advice for landing a gig is impressively (if deceptively) simple.

“Make friends with us,” he recommends, “reach out.”

Well aware of We Love’s career boosting potential he’s equally conscious that every new booking means an established player loses out, a side of his job he admits continuing to find more than a little tricky.

“It’s a terrible thing to have to do to tell someone you’re no longer booking them and over the years I’ve dropped quite a few acts who were mainstays of our programming back in the day,” he admits.

‘You’ve got to remember that most of these people have become friends but at the end of the day you’re not doing anybody favours by just booking them for the sake of it. Everybody can tell when a booking has been made for those reasons. Still, it’s the worst part of the job and it keeps me awake at night sometimes,” he admits.

Mark Broadbent

Pursuing a policy of mixing big name ‘underground’ names (this season’s stars include Carl Craig, Claude Von Stroke and Joris Voorn) with rising talent (notably Deepgroove and  Berghain’s Marcel Dettman this season), We Love is broadly centred around techno, though Mark’s keen to avoid being pigeon-holed by genres.

“We book acts from all four corners of the globe and given that we have six rooms to program you can often find lesser know genres like dubstep, for example Appleblim – being played in the club at the same time as big room house, for example by someone like Steve Lawler,” he points out.

“Music is our passion and we hunt it out in the best venues and parties and try to replicate what we experienced through our programming here at Space. This has also helped keep our parties very cosmopolitan in terms of our customers.”

He’s also impressively unflustered about the actions of rival Balearic clubs such as Pacha who made a dramatic move this season in signing minimal/ deep type Luciano for a season of Sunday night affairs.

“After 15 years living and working on Ibiza I have found that people who like to go to Pacha will go there but on the same token, if you don’t like Pacha for one reason or another, no DJ booking is going to make you go there,” he says.

“I think maybe we have lost the odd soul to Luciano this summer but if you’re a regular customer of ours, there is no competition really.”

Space girls

Jonty Skrufff: What’s your take on 2010 so far: business as usual? Are there any significant trends you’re noticing and/ or pushing?

Mark Broadbent: “Attendance to We Love has been pretty much the same as last year, the numbers aren’t amazing but the parties have been fantastic. This summer will be a hard one again for many and the World Cup hasn’t helped but I’m sure all the main players on the island will see a big jump in numbers over the next few weeks. We don’t really do trends to be honest which is why we are still at the top of our game; keep the quality high and avoid all trends!”

Jonty Skrufff: How are the Ibiza authorities these days: towards clubs and Space in particular? Do they still mount drugs raids on clubbers approaching the club or monitor your closing times closely?

Mark Broadbent: “We have absolutely no problems with them as we stick to the rules in place. We don’t sell drugs behind the bars and we close when we are supposed to. The police here are not interested in people taking a few pills in to the clubs for their own consumption they are looking for dealers and they generally have an angle on this.”

Jonty Skrufff: Fabric owner Cameron Leslie talked this week about London nightlife being affected across the board by massive unemployment amongst the under 25s, how much do you believe Ibiza is immune to economic pressures afflicting Spain/ the rest of the world?

Mark Broadbent: “It’s not, many businesses here have been massively effected and the number of tourists this past two years has fallen by over 30% in some sectors.

Jonty Skrufff: He also talked of the need for some ‘very grown up conversations’ about DJ fees with agents/ managers (‘the reality is that, the artist fees that are being asked for don’t go hand-in-hand with dropping attendances’): are you already having the same conversations? or planning to?

Mark Broadbent: “Good luck to him, although he is in a good position as one of the only big room venues in London that acts really want to play at so maybe he stands a chance of lowering fees. We have had this conversation once with a big act that we occasionally book and were very pleasantly surprised with the answer although it’s not something I’m going to make a habit of doing and I would certainly not make a point of doing so across the whole field of acts that play for us. It is easier for us as we have only 16 weeks in which to host the parties at Space so we can plan for most eventualities and figure this into our budgets, a weekly party year round party has its own ongoing budget problems that differ from ours.”

Jonty Skrufff: You spoke to AddictedToIbiza last year who recently described San Antonio as ‘ex-pat English wasteland in the sun’ populated by ‘chavs, teenagers, washed up ravers, has-been English DJs, first-timers’: how much time do you spend in San An personally?

Mark Broadbent: “I go there for bacon from Pete the Butchers once a month in winter and there are a few very nice beaches hidden in far flung corners that way that I’ll visit occasionally in autumn. Outside of the occasional visit to Ibiza Rocks in summer I stay away from San Antonio not out of any fear of the place but there is simply no reason to go there if you live in Ibiza Town as I do.”

Jonty Skrufff: Their use of the term ‘has-been English DJs’ seems a little cruel, how difficult is it for people to stay on the island once they’ve passed their peak in career terms?

Mark Broadbent: “Ibiza is certainly a cruel island to be on if your star has dwindled. However having said that if you’re willing to get stuck in there is always work to be found. It’s ego dependent.”

Jonty Skrufff: What did you do before Space? What was your route into club culture?

Mark Broadbent: “I was a refrigeration technician back in the real world. I worked as a sub contractor for two large breweries for ten years then decided that was not what I wanted to continue doing so left for India as many do to try and find out just what it was I wanted to do with myself. I came home a year later to find the country in the grip of the first recession so there was no work in the field I came from which turned out to be actually a fucking blessing. Anyway, misadventure and good luck in the shape of (We Love chief) Darren Hughes prevailed. Darren was looking for somebody to run his affairs in Ibiza for Cream and we – myself and my wife Sarah – were looking for a job we could do for four months of the year enabling us to travel for the rest of the time. That was 12 years ago.”

Jonty Skrufff: Why aren’t you a DJ yourself?

Mark Broadbent: “I’ve always been a huge music lover so for me this job is really an extension of what I love. Programming the nights musically means I can have a certain amount of input into the whole venue. I have been asked many times to DJ at ours or at other people’s events but to be honest I could never be a performer. To stand up in front of a crowd and be judged, the thought of it makes me feel sick. I prefer to be in the background controlling things out of sight.”

Jonty Skrufff:In the AddictedToIbiza article you also recommended bringing lube (lubrication) to Ibiza why, can’t you buy it on the island?

Mark Broadbent: “Because it’s a small island and there’s only so much to go around! This comment is a little out of date now as it goes. Since I first made it – as a joke – Durex have introduced their own lube and toy arm to the company and you can now buy lube and vibrators in most of the chemists on the island. How times change. I can remember not so long ago when it was impossible to buy condoms in Spain.”

We Love happens at Space, Ibiza throughout the summer.

Jonty Skrufff (http://skrufff.com): Follow Jonty on Twitter

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DJ Mar-T

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11 years after he joined Amnesia, DJ Mar-T remains one of the Ibiza superclub’s key characters overseeing the club’s booking policy and hosting and starring in Amnesia Presents, the Friday night parties which are often their best.

Whereas in past years the likes of Manumission have starred, this year the club’s recruited heavyweight leftfield names including Richie Hawtin, Etienne d Crecy and Soulwax to perform live, while the rest of the week remains solid with the likes of Sven Vath’s Cocoon, Cream and Armin Van Buuren hosting their new regular weekly events.

Skrufff.com’s Jonty Skrufff caught up with Mar-T as he prepared for the season opener this weekend (June 12).

Cream @ Amnesia

Skrufff.com (Jonty Skrufff): starting with the new season: what are your expectations for 2010?  How much do you expect 2010 to be broadly the same as other years?

Mar-T: “Well, after last year being one of our best seasons so far it’s difficult to say, but we work always hard for improving our results and offer the people a better show , better line up in a better venue. So, I always expect a better season than the past, even more celebrating our 20^th anniversary.”

Skrufff.com: Why didn’t Amnesia open in line with Pacha and Space at the end of May?

Mar-T: “It’s connected to the history and the dates where each of us opens traditionally. We respect each other openings, and the season has been structured like this for many years. Also we prefer to concentrate our season in less weeks rather than opening and then having the first few weeks quiet with empty parties.”

Svan Vath's Cocoon

Skrufff.com: Pacha have spruced up their line-up dramatically this year (with Luciano, justice etc:  What do you make of it? How much pressure does it put on Amnesia to respond and perhaps spend more to book bigger name DJs to compete? (if any)?

Mar-T: “I think it’s good for the scene that each of us constantly develops and tries new stuff. Healthy competition is always good for the scene development and ultimately the crowd also benefits by having a wider choice of better parties. The club then grows in turn and we constantly seek new ways of improving ourselves, year after year. This season, for example we’re introducing new party concepts such as Amnesia Presents, a series of 8 events for celebrating our 20^th anniversary, featuring headliners like 2manydjs live, Laurent Garnier with his full band, Etienne de Crecy live and Richie Hawtin´s show Contact. We’re making a big effort to present these shows which people are more likely to see in a festival rather than a club: Amnesia has special features as a venue that allows us to host these kind of big events.”

Skrufff.com: I know Ibiza was broadly unaffected by the recession last year: how much do you believe the island is recession proof? Have you seen any signs that Spain’s economic woes could have an impact this year?

Mar-T: “Yes you are right, this crisis is f*** hard. But even so, last season was amazing, one of the best we’ve ever had in our history. The reason is that Amnesia’s crowd is worldwide and luckily the crisis is not that big outside Spain and people keep coming to Ibiza.”

Skrufff.com: What are they key new trends you expect to dominate Ibiza 2010 (in terms of music?

Mar-T: “Live music and that is another reason why we’re investing in live shows and why I’m presenting a new visual show this season together with my DJ set.  The dj needs to develop himself and offer something else, whether it’s a visual or live show.”

Skrufff.com: London’s Matter closed last week whereas Berlin’s club scene- and DJ scene- is thriving more than ever: how much is this being reflected in Ibiza (how much do you see the UK influence declining- if at all?)

Mar-T: “Of course the UK market influences Ibiza, but I think that this will affect other clubs that attract a higher proportion of UK clubbers. We attract a wide range of nationalities and this makes us more secure.”

People from Ibiza (MAr-T's nights)

Skrufff.com: You’re personally looking after Amnesia Presents this year: with a VERY varied bunch of headline guests: what criteria did you pick guests in? what does Paul Oakenfold have in common with Jeff Mills?

Mar-T: “What they have in common is that they are both big names in the respective scenes. Their style has nothing to do with each other at all and therefore one will play the main room and the other will play the terrace.”

Skrufff.com: How much do you expect these veteran characters to be still ‘superstar DJs’, headlining Ibiza’s biggest clubs in 10 years time; in 20? (what sets them apart from younger DJs coming up?)

Mar-T: “Well some of this deejays are part of the history and will stay like that. The history has been written by them, that is the reason why we call them “legends” . And time is only making them bigger and bigger, of course, if they keep playing good music. This is the first MUST.”

Skrufff.com: It’s 11 years since you became a resident at Amnesia: how much does it get easier? Or harder?

Mar-T: “It’s easier to understand what the crowd wants from you, harder to quit this job.  Of course keeping motivated during all this years has been the key to still enjoying it and getting nervous before playing the first record. This is something you should never loose.”

Skrufff.com: It’s All Gone Pete Tong’ was filmed partly at the club: how easy has it been to avoid slipping into that party lifestyle and losing your edge? How difficult is it coping with competition from rival DJs and promoters wanting your jobs?

Mar-T: “I´ve been always out of the party lifestyle, although I like partying sometimes, but with my friends. If you have a cool job and a cool lifestyle there will always be someone who wants your job, it’s inevitable. The key is to make your own way and never look backwards.”

Skrufff.com: How bad was the council shut down three years ago: how much did it threaten Amnesia’s survival? How much of a problem did it pose for you personally?

Mar-T: “It was a big hitch of course, but we came back stronger than ever. I don’t think it was good for the island in general and nowadays the council is realising what the clubs represent and how important they are for tourism.”

Skrufff.com: Ibiza-voice was somewhat critical in their recent review of your night (‘the mildly successful ‘People from Ibiza’ concept, now in its 8th year under Mar-T, soldiers on in the main room’): how easy is it to avoid taking criticism personally?

Mar-T: “You only attract criticism when you are doing something interesting in some way, if not nobody would care about you. So I just try to listen and analyze it. Criticism always helps me to develop.”

http://www.amnesia.es/

Jonty Skrufff (http://skrufff.com); Follow Jonty on Twitter

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Office rage: click on the picture for great office Youtube clip)

Fuck Me I’m Famous megastar DJ David Guetta revealed some of the secrets of his success in an interview with the Times this week and as well as singling out his Stakhanovite work ethic, suggested quitting drugs 20 years ago made a big difference.

“When I stopped, my career went whoomph overnight,” the Pacha Ibiza party host recalled, “None of my friends can work Monday or Tuesday, so I have two more days in my week.” (UK Times)

His appreciation of the importance of making the most of Mondays coincided with the publication a new report on dressing habit which revealed that British women take over four times as long getting ready for work on Mondays as on Fridays.

The survey of 1,000 people by UK department chain store Debenhams said women typically spend 76 minutes on Mondays trying on clothes, washing and doing make-up, declining to 19 minutes by Fridays. Men similarly took 28 minutes on Mondays and just 11 minutes by Friday.

“Make the most of looking at your work colleagues on a Monday morning,” Debenhams spokesman Ed Watson recommended, ”Because that’s as good as they’re going to get.” (Reuters)

Web portal Ehow suggests ‘there’s actually a scientific explanation behind those dreaded Monday morning blues’ (which is actually quite complicated) though the advice site offers suggestions including leaping out of bed, having a cold shower and one worded strikingly similarly to David Guetta’s top tip.

“Drink coffee or another caffeine beverage,” says Ehow, “Although it’s not healthy to drink caffeine to the point of addiction, caffeine, when used in moderation, can give your Monday mornings that much-needed oomph and alertness.”

Man goes mad in an office (he's on the right) Youtube: click on the picture

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