Interview: A-LUV

•BEATSMEDIA:
The world-renown club, SANKEYS in Manchester, was recently voted by readers of DJ Magazine as the winner of its annual “Best Clubs” poll. That’s quite a feat, considering that entries were open to clubs from around the world. What’s your relationship with the club, and how did your residency come to be?

•A-LUV:
Well actually, this is my first time in London, if you can believe it! I’ve been to Ibiza, all over Italy, the Netherlands, Philippines, and Mexico, but this is my first time to London. A while ago, I had the honor of meeting [Sankeys Manchester owner] David Vincent, and he and I just completely vibed right off-the-bat. We just clicked! David is hands-down one of the most respected, credible and passionate guys in this business, and we just connected. I’ve been in the club business as a DJ or promotions director in New York since I was 14-years-old, which was in 1988. Literally every major, important club in New York in the last two decades, I was involved in either as a resident DJ or as a promotions director. I suppose you could say that David and I are sort of like kindred spirits, but in a trans-Atlantic way.

•BEATSMEDIA:
Tell me about your history in New York’s clubland? I think a lot of people over in the UK may look upon New York’s clubbing – and more generally, music of all genres including hip-hop and rock – scene as being somewhat legendary. I have more than a few friends who used to fly from London to New York during Sasha and John Digweed’s years as residents there just to see them play, and then fly home at the end of the weekend.

•A-LUV:
You know, the saying is really true. What Frank Sinatra said about New York: “If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.” It’s really true, because New York is the toughest town in the world. But, if I had my choice of living and working in any place on earth, there would be no other place I’d rather be than in New York.

•BEATSMEDIA:
Coming up as a DJ in New York, where were some of the clubs you played as resident?

•A-LUV:
Oh, man. I’ve played at the Tunnel, Limelight, Palladium, Sound Factory, Roxy, you name it. I’ve also built up a following over the years of 500, 600 core people who always come to see me play, and that’s no matter what else is going on in New York. Because, there is always something else going on in New York, no matter what night of the week it is! On a weekend night I can draw as many as 3,000 people anywhere in NYC. I throw a lot of parties and I have a great crew, and together, we really know how to rock a party and make sure people have a good time. We’re not egotistical about it. I’ll be up there fist-pumping and acting the fool as much as anyone else on the dancefloor. I’m just not a pretentious guy. I want everyone to have fun, I want everyone to dance. I feel like before 9/11, clubs were all about the music. And after 9/11, those clubs have been all about what celebrities are seen at the club, or what the most fashionable place is to go. The clubs have completely become something else other than what they were supposed to be. Clubs are supposed to be a place where you go to dance and just lose yourself in the music! It’s not supposed to be a place where you’re worried that you can’t make your rent this month because you over-extended your credit card buying overpriced bottles that you did not even enjoy drinking. What happened to going out and sweating on a dancefloor?

•BEATSMEDIA:
Working so long in the club business in a city as unforgiving as New York, did you ever feel burnt out?

•A-LUV:
Yes! I think that’s bound to happen if you do anything for a long enough time, and if you lose the feeling of what you got into the thing in the first place. After September 11th, I took a few years off from the club business altogether, just left it for a while. Clubs up to that point had been very good to me, and very good to my family – I supported my whole family, my mother and my father, by working in clubs – but after 9/11, everything just stopped. And it all stopped at once. It was like someone just turned a switch and nobody went out any more. I lost a lot of money after 9/11, because I was still investing as much money into running and operating my club for the weeks after the attack, but no one was going out. So, money was being spent without any customers coming in. I decided that, as much as I loved house music, I couldn’t leave my family in that predicament, so I went on another path completely and I have a very successful business right now with five attorneys working for me full-time.

•BEATSMEDIA:
Did you intend to return to clubland? What brought you back?

•A-LUV:
For sure. Before I took a hiatus from the nightlife industry, I had promised myself that if [the club] business ever picked up again, I would return, because I love dance music and it’s in my blood. I never got into deejaying because I wanted to make a big name for myself or whatever. I only ever deejayed because I love this music so much and I cannot imagine living without it! That is not me being dramatic. It’s true. If I never earned a dime deejaying, I would still DJ until the day I died. There is something so life-affirming about throwing a great party and having people smiling and just letting loose and coming up and slapping you on the back because they’re happy and having a great time. It’s the human connection we all crave.

•BEATSMEDIA:
What were some of the clubs you worked at in the latter days of clubbing?

•A-LUV:
Most recently, I have played at Pacha and Mansion. I’ve also thrown a lot of parties at spaces that were more like special events, and over the years and with lots of hard work, we built a solid following of party people in New York.

•BEATSMEDIA:
So, to your residency at Sankeys in Manchester. Do you feel any pressure?

•A-LUV:
You know what? I’ve always felt that, over here [in the UK], people just get electronic music a lot more. I feel like, 80% of the people go out over here [in the UK] because of the music, and the other 20% of the people maybe go because it’s where the cool people hang out or where they think they should go. Whereas in the States, I feel as though 80% of the people go out because it’s the trendy place to go, and only 20% of the people are going for the music. It’s the exact opposite. So, in that regard, I don’t feel nervous at all. David and his team have done an absolutely incredible job of really welcoming me and making me feel at home. I’m playing at Sankeys in Manchester on July 31st, and then I’ll be back again to play in October and again in January, with more dates to follow. I’m really excited to get behind that booth in that legendary room! You won’t be able to get me to stop. [laughs]

•BEATSMEDIA:
What is this we hear about a Sankeys opening up in New York City? What’s your involvement with that, if any?

•A-LUV:
I will definitely be very involved in the new Sankeys opening in New York City! I’ll have a very hands-on creative say as to the music programming, vibe, crowd we let in there, and so forth. It’s really exactly the thing that New York needs at this moment. Ever since Sound Factory closed and since 9/11, there have been no clubs in New York that have been about the music. We aim to bring that back in a big, big way. It will not be an obnoxious door policy where just because you spent a lot of money and put down your credit card and bought three bottles, you get to cut the line and go inside ahead of everyone else who’s been waiting. No. If my doorman decides you’re not getting in, you’re not getting in. We want people who are there for the music, and we are going to have some very big-name DJs on the program, but it’s not just about putting a huge name DJ on the flyer and that’s it. We will create an entire atmosphere with dancers and acrobatics and a very welcoming décor, and of course, the sickest soundsystem around. We intend to build a party, where, people don’t feel like, “Oh my God, I have to spend how much to get into this club tonight?” We want the people who are so hell-bent on having a good time and who appreciate what we’re offering them, that they will scrape together nickels and dimes and every last dollar they have because the simply must get into Sankeys tonight. We want that crowd. That makes for a much better party.

•BEATSMEDIA:
Seeing the story that The Guardian published recently about Fabric’s financial woes and surmising that, perhaps, DJs with astronomical fees were at least in part to blame for a club’s economic strains….it seems that you’ve hit on a nerve.

•A-LUV:
Listen, I’ve worked in clubs for 22 years. I respect what the big-name DJs are doing, I really do. They have a value and some of these bigger guys are real artists, in the real sense of the word. But they have to understand: if you overcharge the clubs again and again to the point of being greedy, then there will be no more clubs left to buy your services in the future. I would say, try to be a little less greedy and try to work with the promoters and owners if they truly believe in your music and are offering a very special vibe in their club that maybe the next club down the street isn’t offering. If I’m a club owner and I’m paying a DJ $15,000 to play one night, but the next club down the street is offering that same DJ $30,000, it’s going to be very difficult for me to compete on that same level. You shouldn’t be just about the money all of the time. I get that DJs are trying to make a living; the clubs have been very good to me and to my mother and father, and my father is still alive. But I’m just saying, if that DJ would really rather play at a smaller club offering a little less money, but that club fills its room with clubbers who are really savvy and knowledgeable about music, wouldn’t you rather work with the owner of the more credible club and take less money because you really feel the crowd there understands you? If you put the clubs out of business, there will be no more venues to pay those huge DJ fees anymore. There needs to be some balance, that’s all I’m saying.

•BEATSMEDIA:
But wouldn’t you agree that some of those high-priced DJs have worked many years in the business making far less money, and that they’re worth their prices now? Aren’t they entitled to earn as much money as they possibly can?

•A-LUV:
For those DJs – who are also producers, because you really need to produce music – who are packing a huge room and people are paying high ticket prices because they are really there to see that specific DJ, yes. I think they’re worth it and that is an amazing accomplishment. But I’m just saying that….just because you got paid $50,000 for a gig, don’t be so unyielding and be like, “My price is $50,000 for every gig! Take it or leave it!” Be a little flexible and look at the size of the room you’re playing. Be balanced. Make your money, but remember that we should support club culture and not just rape it.

•BEATSMEDIA:
Who were some of the DJs and producers you admired, coming up as a DJ in the early days in New York?

•A-LUV:
Well, in the late-80’s and early-‘90’s, I definitely was influenced by Danny Tenaglia, Carl Cox, Victor Calderone, Todd Terry, Jonathan Peters. Back in those days, for sure. I still really love Carl Cox, he is absolutely the greatest. I am a real tech, tech-house kind of guy, so I will always love Carl Cox. Nowadays, it’s very hard to answer that question because I know so many of these guys personally, that it’s hard to only think of them from a musical, objective point-of-view.

•BEATSMEDIA:
You must have some really crazy anecdotes about your clubbing days in New York. Is there anything that you care to share with us?

•A-LUV:
Not in print! [laughs] Oh my God, I can think of so many crazy stories, you would not believe it. I was never a big trance guy, but when I was resident DJ at Sound Factory, Richard [Grant, the owner] would sit next to me while I was spinning, and he would go, “No! Change that devil music!” [laughs] If ever there were a record that wasn’t a trance record or that he did not like, he would do this. I remember, because he was sitting next to me, I would play trance records while he was there. But not just any trance; I would choose and select the best trance records available. I’m a vinyl guy, so I would have some really unheard of, incredible vinyl records. Then, as soon as Richard would leave after 4:00am, 4:30am, I would put on my really tech-y, tech-house records and the club would be jammed! [laughs] Those were good times.

•BEATSMEDIA:
You don’t still play vinyl these days, I must assume?

•A-LUV:
I still own more than 10,000 vinyl records, I have no idea how many I own, but traveling is tough with vinyl obviously, so I’m a Serato and Ableton guy. I came up in the age where we really had to beat match and we wasted a lot of time looking for the next record, then cueing it up, putting the old record back in its sleeve and back into the crate, then looking for the next record…..nowadays, just what I’m able to do with the time that is saved, I am really re-editing and remixing live on-the-fly! It’s amazing what the technology has allowed us to do, and I was really resistant towards the whole CD shift when the [Pioneer CDJs] first came out. Later I was like, “Why am I up here killing myself?” I knew how to beat match, but deejaying is a singular experience nowadays, and when you come see me DJ, chances are that you’ve never heard that exact tune played that exact way before.

•BEATSMEDIA:
What sounds are you into, besides not being really a trance guy?

•A-LUV:
Because I’m a New Yorker, I love that really drummy, tribal, bass-heavy, driving sound. Very drummy, very percussive. It’s hot. Hard. Bangin’. But, depending on the crowd and on the set and on the place in the set at any given time, I might play a record where you think, hey, that’s a trance track! But when I’m playing it within the set, it could be a really proggy house track. It’s really hard for me to put into words.

•BEATSMEDIA:
What do you love about New York crowds?

•A-LUV:
Especially this core group that always comes to see me – if they stay until 4:00am and then go see Danny [Tenaglia], that’s cool, because they still came to see me, first. I love that people are just determined to have a good time, the core clubbers, as I call them. In January of this year when we had that gigantic snow storm and we had a ton of snow and everything shut down, I put on a party at The Loft. We didn’t expect anybody to show up because the snow was so bad. School and offices were closed and there were no cars on the road. Every street was deserted and covered in snow, except for the snow ploughs. So we decided to do the party anyway, not expecting anyone to come. By 1:00am, there were like 700 people in the place, and it was going off! We stayed….and I played…..for 36 hours straight. I think I took a one-hour break…

•BEATSMEDIA:
You deejayed for 36 hours non-stop? How is that possible?

•A-LUV:
I didn’t even realize how much time had passed! I was just having such a great time. It’s really because of those people who were there. There were so determined to party and have a good time that they made me want to keep going! It was crazy. [laughs] I never drank so many Red Bulls in my life. [laughs] That was definitely “a moment,” that night.

•BEATSMEDIA:
Name some original A-LUV productions we should check out?

•A-LUV:
“Formosa” is one of my biggest tracks; John Digweed loved that one. That one I did with my production partner, Dave Rosario and Mulattos. Also my remix, “Intimacy” has gotten a lot of love from DJs especially Matt Darey. He has been hammering that tune on his Nocturnal radio show forever! Another track of mine is called “Saudade,” which I also did with Dave. I’ve also just completed a hot new single with Tamara Wallace, that I’m going to release in advance of my full-length studio album, and this one’s called “Show You A Life.” It’s a big, bomb tune that’s been getting a strong reaction when I play it out with remixes from some of the top producers in the world. We’ll be releasing that one in September, and the full album in early-2011. I have plans for a lot more production work in the coming months and we’re already working on a big party for [Winter Music] Conference for 2011. The party we did last year with my label Dirty Beats was a big success. There’s the Sankeys dates in Manchester which I’m really excited about, and then the new Sankeys when it opens in New York. There’s so much positive energy going about right now, and it’s got me very excited for the future.

Source: BeatsMedia