Bart B More is on the way up. 1,5 years after his first release the Dutch prodigy is touring the world while releasing a new remix or track more or less once a week. Additionally he recently grabed two spots for best new track on Pete Tong show. Friday he played for the first time in Sweden so we decided to grab him by the head-phones, buy him a brunch and conduct a rather innofficial interview. He was up for it.
Welcome to Sweden!
Thanks man. It’s my first time here and yesterday’s gig was fantastic! What I really loved about the club (Babel) is that all the people were dancing like crazy and enjoying themselves not caring a bit about who watches them. Just having fun on their own and partying to 110%. I loved it.
Your background is a bit of a mystery and there is not much info neither on your myspace nor at wikipedia. What’s the story behind Bart B More?
Well, I come from quite a big family: 3 brothers, 2 sisters. It all started about ten years ago….I was like 15 – 16 something. My brother brought me some of those oldschool house mixtapes. And instantly I got completely hooked on the typical heavy, powerfull basslines. And after that, it just span off. I started to play at smaller parties first and then gradually producing my own tracks. Honestly in the beginning I was a bit scared to play my productions out, ’cause I was worried they wouldn’t work on the dancefloor. But it turned out fine! Since a year and a half I produce quite a lot and the gigs have been raining in lately. I’m touring the Europe right now. Living the high life…Getting free brunches. Huh huh huh huh huh.
Tell us about a general process of how you make a new track?
I get lot’s of influences listening to other genres than house. Lots of jazzy stuff for instance. Sometimes you seat around playing with small jazz sample and coming up with ideas or playing some cords on the keyboard. It’s great for inspiration to listen to other types of music.
But sometimes I just sit down and produce a track from scratch. It may even take just one day to produce a new tune if I’m lucky. But it can also take as much as four weeks. Honestly sometimes you find the right sound just by coincidence.
And the equipment?
I have a midi-keyboard and mostly use Reason. Reason 4. It’s a Swedish software right?
Yeah man.
Cool, great software, please make a note for developers that they should add VST-support and audio editing. If they would add these two things, it would be the best program ever! So basically I just make all the instrumentals in Reason and then load it over into Ableton Live to put the vocals on.
I’m trying to learn Logic as well, but there is lots of pressure on me from all the big artists asking for remixes so I don’t really have enough time to learn new software. It´s more convenient for me to just fall back on Reason.
Foto: Jesper Berg
I don’t mind people downloading my Mp3 for free. For me, music is a way to get myself out there and promote myself. To be able to play at bigger clubs and bigger events. I mainly see it as a promotional tool, the more people that get my music, the better. I earn more on Dj gigs than on record sales. Like 60-40.
Are you able to live off your music?
Yeah, these days for sure. I used to study marketing and actually have only one year left. But then I started to get such a huge amount of remix requests, so I decided to work with music full time.
Maybe this is a scary question. Can you see yourself producing and Djing still in 10 or 20 years?
Yeah that’s one scary question. Huh huh huh huh.
Well, I’m doing it 100% procent now. You gotta keep producing to stay on top. I can’t just stop and relax. I’m really going for it. Right now I want to produce as much music as possible cause I really love doing this. We will see what happens in a few years.
You got some crazy stuff occurring during any of you gigs that you’de like to share?
Nothing major really. Well… you always get these really strange requests. Requests can be very annoying, since as a Dj you want to do your best all the time and not be interrupted… on the other hand, you should always have time for your crowd, I always try to answer them polite.
And once I was playing at a party with some live sexshows in front of my DJ booth. It’s weird, suddenly, nobody is paying any attention to the Dj anymore.
Biggest influences?
Another big question? Huh Huh Huh. Daft punk of course. Those guys are so creative. For instance bringing in all those sample from completely different music styles to create their own sound. And the same time I really admire their marketing skills. You know, wearing those crazy helmets. Suddenly disappearing for almost five years, making all the kids on the dancefloor speculate whether the Dj is playing a new Daft Punk track or not. And then…boom coming back instantly by dropping a new killer album.
And! I have to get some credits to Laidback Luke! For starting with the techno scene and then bridging the gap between techno and house. I actually were I am right now partly thanks to him. A couple of years ago I sent him my demo and he really loved it. We started to hang out and started to go with him to lots of his gigs, learning from him, watching him working the crowd. LBL is always up for a party.
Bart B More is a cool name?
Once again Laid Back behind this one. When I saw the name, I immediately liked it. It’s really cool. It’s funny, I have some Baltimore influences in my music, and a l
otta people think the name is based on the Baltimore sound. Sometimes I get emails and myspace messages people saying “really cool remix you did on this and that track”. So the track is named B-More Remix, and they think it is me! Huh huh! So I just write “thank you very much”
Big up! You got the Essential New Tune by Pete Tong.
Twice!
Yeah, congrats. How did that feel?
Really good! It gave my career a real boost, because first my own track ‘So it Goes’ and then a month later my remix of ‘Freak’ got it. That’s when people really started to notice my music, because it’s one thing to get it once, but you gotta keep up the good quality so people see you’re not a one hit wonder.
Like Peter André.
Exactly. I don’t wanna be in the same line as Peter André.
Except for his abs, everyone want abs like his.
Huh huh! Yeah, Actually add him as a major influence.
How does the future look for Bart B More?
Very promising, I hope. It’s already been a quite a rollercoaster ride. It’s only since two years my productions have been picked up so well. It was only two years since I didn’t play out so much, and recently I went to Australia. I’m really trying to become a better DJ and producer. Actually Future Music wanted to make the ‘in the studio with…’ with me, but I’m moving in with my girlfriend at the moment, so temporarily I’m producing music at my parents’ house.
That’s great, man! You should bring Future Music there and have your mom come up and bring them milk and cookies, just to see the look on their faces.
Haha! Well you see all these big artists like Angello sitting in their fancy studios, so I’m not really at ease with sitting at my parents’ house.
Thanks a lot for this, mate. Appriciate it!
Thank you!
Rumours go that a brand new Bart B More mixtape together with some previously unreleased Bart B More Bootlegs will see the light of day on some dodgy music blog called House Music With Love. But who believes rumours anyway?
Thanks to Staffan for organizing the Backlash event and to Jesper Berg for photos.
