Bojan Boskovic (Exit Festival founder, Serbia); The Key Questions
Skrufff Editor-in-chief Jonty Skrufff is also the international representative for the Sochi Winter Music Conference, which takes place next weekend in Russia (February 9-12)
Bojan (click for more)
Bojan Boskovic is a one of the key characters in Serbia’s recent much troubled history, having co-founded Exit Festival – the festival which started as a student protest but turned into one of Europe’s most critically rated- and successful- music festivals.
Droog’s Andrei Osyka: From LA With Love (SWMC) (Interview)
Andrei Osyka (click for more on Culprit)
One of the more prominent and international events taking place at next weekend’s Sochi Music Winter Conference 2012 will be the showcase of LA’s stellar label — Culprit.
The showcase will feature Ukrainian expat Andrei Osyka, leader of the mighty Droog collective and label owner of acclaimed underground tech-house label Culprit. Also releasing on the likes of Crosstown Rebels, the trio of Andrei and fellow Droogs Brett Griffin, and Justin Sloe have held residencies at LA’s Avalon as well as touring the world spinning events including Sonar and Miami’s Winter Conference.
Dancetrippin Live DJ mix
Click on the picture to listen to the new mix on demand
Acapellas by Marlon Brandon, Bonnie Raitt
- Jet Project: Alright (Snatch Records) 6.07
- Mark Holmes – Coming Home (MUM) 12.13
- Solo: The Flea Circus (Kling Klong) 17.39
- Red Snapper: Jack (V2) 23.47
- Harvey Mackay: Want You (Soma Records) 28.58
- Zenbi; Double Trouble (Great Stuff): 32.49
- Graphics: Mama Grizzlies (Made To Play) 39.43
- Mick Finesse: Sex Machinas (Perc Trax) 44.49
- Aeroplane: Storm Queen: (Jamie Jones RMX) (Defected) 49.50
- Dosem: Tales Of Tomorrow (Tronic) 54.39
- Meda: Curtain Call (Neverending Records) 59.39
- Rockers Revenge: Walking on sunshine (Jonty Skrufff Vocal RMX) (white label)
click on the picture for instant listening
Russia’s Special Case: The Concept is Simple- Dance Music for Orgies (interview)
Special Case (Roustam stage left)
“Basically Russia is a large country with tremendous resources and almost unlimited opportunities. If the majority of the club industry stops striving for the lowest possible denominator with which to earn money, we will have a music scene to rival that of any other big electronic scene in the world.”
Growing up listening to Mid-western house and rave techno as he divided his time between Detroit and Moscow, Roustam Mirzoev received an impeccable grounding in electronic music, honed his knowledge still further after he opened a record shop in St Petersburg.
Promoting parties in Russia along the way, as a DJ he became well known for spinning acclaimed back 2 back sets with many of his headline guests such as Matt Tolfrey, Clive Henry, Valentino Kanzyani, culminating in him dipping his own toes in production in 2010.
“I recorded a track called ‘round:about’ just before Kazantip of 2010 with some gear I got for my birthday and sent it to a lot of my DJ friends just for fun,” Roustam recalls.
“To me I considered the track as already a great success and the highest point in my (then-non existent) musical career when Rhadoo played it with [a:rpia:r] one morning at Kazantip, during what was probably the most amazing Z-session ever,” he smiles.
“Honestly I thought that would be the pinnacle of my music career and I was happy with it.”
“Then to my surprise I came home to find an email from (Droog producer) Andrei Osyka, which included a video of him playing the track at LA’s Avalon and the place just exploding. He wanted to sign it to Culprit immediately, which was more than I’d ever hoped for, for my first real production.”
Long-term friend Arram Mantana also loved the track, introduced him to fellow Russian producer Tripmastaz and a mutual passion for each other’s music led to the trio teaming up as Special Case.
“I knew Arram from way back in the day when he used to buy records from me at my record shop in St.Petersburg and we’d stayed in touch ever since,” Roustam recalls.
“Anyway they made a great track with Tripmastaz which became Aurum — I knew immediately it was going to be a hit and would fit perfectly with the Culprit sound.”
“So I sent it to Andrei and he also loved it right away. After some deliberations (doing a split EP, etc) we just decided that we’re going to start our own brand new thing and to see how our three very different styles and creative approaches to music production and DJjng would turn out. The rest is as they say history.”
18 months on, they’ve released a follow up single with Tiefschwarz’ Souvenir Records and continue to work closely with Andrei Osyka and his label Culprit, performing together next weekend at Culprit’s label showcase at the Sochi Winter Music Conference (Saturday February 11). Musically, Roustam personally leans towards a ‘more minimal, reduced sound’, though Special Case he points out is different.
‘The concept for Special Case is simple,” he chuckles, “We make dance music for orgies.”
Resident Advisor, Mixmag, DJ Mag, DanceTrippin & Ralph Simon @ Sochi 2012
Sochi's Day time panels
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Sochi Winter Music Conference (SWMC) have unveiled final details of the international panelists and speakers attending this year’s upcoming event which takes places in the Russian Black Sea resort of Sochi between February 9 and 12.
Mobile entertainment strategist Ralph Simon, who advises leading tech companies as well as pop stars including Madonna, U2 and Lady Gaga, will be delivering a keynote presentation while Swedish avant-garde performers Six Drummers will be showcasing their everything-but-the-kitchen-sick audio/visual unconventional art.
Joining them are international editors from DJ Magazine, Mixmag, Resident Advisor and tv web company DanceTrippin as well as Amsterdam Dance Event boss Richard Zijlma and Exit Festival founder Bojan Boskovic. Plus previously announced synch experts from Sony Playstation, Pitch & Sync and Anger Music as well as the DJ agencies Bullitt and Elite Music Management.
Kazantip (Da Fresh) video
Da Fresh does a more commercial remix than usual but the video footage is great/
Super footage from Kazantip this year, a special event, one that we at Skrufff highly recommend.
Jonty Skrufff Joins Russia’s Sochi Winter Music Conference
Jonty Skrufff & ADE chief Richard Zijlma @ SWMC 2011
Skrufff Media chief Jonty Skrufff has teamed up with Sochi Winter Music Conference (SWMC) to become a moderator, consultant and European representative for the fast growing Russian nightlife and networking event.
The Berlin based British DJ/ producer and Amsterdam Dance Event (ADE) consultant will be helping SWMC to expand its international programme, developing panel concepts and selecting speakers for the annual mid-winter conference.
“I attended SWMC this year and as well as enjoying the parties and social side enormously was most impressed with the organisation and in particular the enthusiasm of delegates,” said Jonty.
“I’m delighted to be joining the SWMC team and will be doing my best to help internationalise what’s already a superb networking event for anyone involved in doing business in Russian nightlife.”
300 delegates and 1,300 guests attended the very first SWMC in 2005, with numbers swelling to 1 500 delegates, and 7,500 guest this February, attracted by its three days and nights of panels and seminars and parties throughout the Black Sea resort.
The city itself is renowned amongst Russians for being the country’s most celebrated and chic holiday resorts, blessed with an unusually mild Mediterranean style winter. It’s also rapidly becoming even more recognised for its status as the new home of the Russian Grand Prix and the Winter Olympics, both of which take place in 2014.
SWMC chief Mike Spirit & DJ Nastia
“More and more Russian producers and DJs are crossing over internationally and the nightlife scene there already rivals and surpasses many other countries,” Jonty continued.
“I DJed in Moscow in April for the first time and was blown away by the atmosphere and sheer qualities of the clubs,” said Jonty. “Somewhere like Arma 17, for example, is as good a superclub as Berghain in Berlin, if not better, and is certainly far superior to anything the UK has to offer. And it’s just one of several in the city attracting thousands of revellers.”
“There’s enormous potential for both the Russian scene and SWMC to develop more domestically and internationally and I’ll be doing my best to help facilitate that process.”
Sochi Winter Music Conference 2012 happens in February 2012: more details to follow shortly.
Jonty Skrufff & DJ Nastia
Seb Mortimer (Skrufff.com)
10 Years of Skrufff: Hans Peter Kuenzler Interviews Jonty Skrufff
Live at the Roxy, Prague, Czech Republic, 2007
As well as writing a bestselling Michael Jackson biography and another book about Michael Jackson fans, Hans Peter Kuenzler is a leading London ‘stringer’ or foreign correspondent/ music journalist, writing about music and the arts for print media and radio in Switzerland, Germany, UK and other countries.
Hans asked Jonty Skrufff a typically imaginative and indeed tough bunch of questions recently for a feature he was doing about dream jobs.
Hans Peter (click for more)
http://www.hanspeterkuenzler.com
Hans Peter Kuenzler: Was being a DJ a dream job for you before you started?
Jonty Skrufff; “Actually, no I’d never considered it and was totally happy being a clubber/ journalist until a sequence of serendipitous events transformed my life in the summer of 2004 (involving, variously, Exit festival, Serbian podium dancing girls, Ibiza, statuesque models, Judge Jules, London’s (then) hipster club du jour Golf Sale, the much missed Alex Silverfish (RIP) and S Express’ Mark Moore.) Not necessarily in that order.”
1st night nerves at London's 333 Club
Hans Peter Kuenzler: Did it become a dream job once you had become one?
Jonty Skrufff; “From the very first moment, yes, I was totally, irrevocably hooked. It was at London’s 333 on a Sunday night, Alex Silverfish was DJing, with a shaking hand I picked up the stylus (in those days DJs still played vinyl) and put it at the beginning Of Justice’s Never Be Alone (still then an obscure Gigolo release). The opening chords rang out, the crowd roared and that was it. I ROCKED it. OH MY GOD!”
Hans Peter Kuenzler: Why did you change from being a journalist to being a DJ?
Jonty Skrufff; “I refer to my last answer; OH MY GOD! Though actually I remain a journalist- the two roles have a fantastic synergy.”
Live at Buddah Club, Mauritius (February 2011)
Sochi Winter Music Conference: Russia Rocks! (Review)
SMWC official site
(pictures courtesy of Nightparty.ru)
“Insane. There’s no other word to describe that country. That expression ‘From Russia with Love’ also now has a totally different meaning for me too.”
Six years after 300 delegates and 1,300 guests attended the very first Sochi Winter Music Conference (SWMC), numbers have swelled to 1 500 delegates, and 7,500 guests including Soundcloud new business manager Nils Westerlund.
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Nils, a Berlin based 20-something Swede whose floppy fringe haircut, designer spectacles and carefully ruffled understated attire apparently means he looks EXACTLY like a Moscow hipster, admits he’s thoroughly enjoyed the 3 day/ 3 night event.
“How much do I think Russians deserve their ‘crazy’ reputation? They do in full,” he says, “Vodka instead of water, I think that should explain most of it,” he laughs.
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Googling ‘Russia, business etiquette and vodka’ suggests he’s right, with one site (suite101.com) advising ‘vodka is properly drunk in one gulp’ and another (worldwide-tax.com) recommending ‘do not under any circumstances present vodka as a gift as this is interpreted as a reflection on the poor quality of the contents of your host’s drinks cabinet’.
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Mike Spirit and DJ Nastia
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SWMC co-producer (and champion vodka drinker) Mike Spirit is not so sure.
“Why do we drink so much vodka? It’s because Russians aren’t allowed to smoke like the Dutch so we drink instead,” he laughs. “If we could smoke legally, then the Sochi conference will become more similar to ADE.”
His reference to ADE (the Amsterdam Dance Event) is appropriate, as both events combine a daytime program of clubbing related panels and seminars and a nighttime smorgasbord of all night parties and each attracts A List DJs, music business types and party mad revelers. Unlike ADE though, SMWC’s clientele is currently mainly domestic though with Nils from Soundcloud and myself and Richard Ziljma from ADE invited along this year, Mike stresses the plan is to become a lot more international in future years.
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ADE chief Richard Zijlma pauses for thought...
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“We’re attracting more delegates and presenting more and more interesting reports, lectures, round-table discussions is increasing too. It’s also funny to see when public discussion can suddenly turn into real business agreements,” he notes.
