Hailing from London, Kolonie are a DJ producer duo that have exploded onto the progressive trance and progressive house scene over the last year. Their most recent performances for prestigious events such as the sold out 36,000 capacity A State Of Trance Festival in Utrecht, their frequent performances at the Gallery in London and a new residency for the new international events brand Government have put them firmly on the map as one of the fastest rising stars of their genre. Their music is an unmistakable hybrid sound that captures emotive vocal samples, perfectly placed dynamic percussion, beautiful uplifting melodies, luscious chord progressions, all gelled sonically over a low-slung bassline, thus creating a very classy and cutting-edge future progressive style. Kolonie’s sound fits perfectly between both the progressive trance and progressive house genres, making them an ideal warm up act for a large trance event and a fresh addition to any progressive event or festival. As producers, they are most recognized for original works such as Celestial Highway, Olympus and Torn Vision. Their musical presence has dominated the world’s most reputable charts and DJ playlists worldwide with constant support from Above and Beyond, Cosmic Gate and Armin Van Burren to name just a few.. With regular releases on the world’s most reputable progressive labels such as ZeroThree, Enhanced and Statement, the duo is clearly at the top of their game, and with more original studio productions and remixes on the way, and international tours being programmed, the future looks very bright for this fresh and exciting act. [Taken from their facebook about page]
If you wish to know who Kolonie are and how their career has developed until now plus more depth on their top tune Moments on Zerothree then you better read the following lines. You will not regret investing some moments to read this interview with Kolonie.
Interview is written and conducted by Dimitris Kechagias, music journalist and radio host on 1mix radio
Interview is written and conducted by Dimitris Kechagias, music journalist and radio host on 1mix radio
Dimitris: When did you start your involvement with electronic dance music and which music style you are more affiliated with and why?
Kolonie: I think we both first fell in love as teenagers. Initially for Kane this was Trance, Shane also liked Trance but would have to say his first love was probably UK Garage! Since then I think it’s safe to say both of us love all versions of house.
We first started producing Deep House, with a bit of Tech (all under a different alias), but we always enjoyed music with a lot of passion and musical elements so really it was more Nu-disco than deep house. From here our sound slowly evolved and found ourselves making progressive house.
So then along came Kolonie. It still has elements of old school trance in there and the vocal chops of UKG which just emulates from us growing up and it is what we would call the Kolonie "sound".
Dimitris: Did you had the opportunity to attend any kind of music production course or are u completely self taught? Do you consider that is essential for any artist to complete any production course?
Kolonie: Shane studied music at school, Kane went on a very basic 6 week initial production course, but overall I’d say the main chunk of it is self-taught. Any music knowledge is helpful and the more the better. We both wish we were better at physically playing an instrument because this element definitely slows us down in the studio, but we are improving and learning all the time and I think that’s the main thing.
Dimitris: In which label was your first ever release and how did you manage to attract the attention of the label?
Kolonie: First EVER release, mine (Shane) was under Baroque records, if I'm honest I just emailed them and hoped for the best. But this was back in 2010 I think. Then as a duo, I think was Sonny Wharton’s Wharton records.
Dimitris: Please pick for us your Top 5 tracks that you have produced and you consider them as being highly important for the progress of your career.
Kolonie:
1. Long & Harris - Close to 89
2. Long & Harris - By My Side
3.Kolonie - December
4. Kolonie - Torn Vision
5. Kolonie bootleg - The 1975 somebody else
These were either the first tracks we signed under the certain alias’ or tracks that I would say defined our sound or was almost the catalyst to what the sound would evolve into.
Dimitris: Let's focus on your release Moments that is part of Unified vol.10 on Zerothree. From where did you got the inspiration for the track and what kind of music influences is including?
Kolonie: The latest track was almost an evolution from Torn Vision. For us that’s one of our favourite tracks we have produced and we try to use that as a bench mark going forward for a rolling dance worthy prog tune that we want to continue producing.
Tracks we listen to that you possibly could compare would be Grum, Pryda, Ilan bluestone... to name a few
Dimitris: How long it took you to produce it and was an easy or difficult process?If you have faced any difficulties please tell us about them and how did you resolved them?
Kolonie: This one came together relatively easy, if only they all did haha. The main concept came together in a day - albeit a long one. Then we probably spent another full day in total just tightening the mix and improving some bits here and there.
I think the best tracks do seem to just fall together and are almost effortless. We both believe on sitting on a track and going back to it on fresh ears. One positive of being in a duo is that one of us can pick up things the other may not and as long as you are both on the same page musically, I think this will usually end on making a better track!
Dimitris: Which was the biggest challenge that you faced during the production of this superb track?
Kolonie: Ensuring the beer fridge is topped up!! Haha
Probably trying too hard, adding too many sounds that don’t need to be there. Keeping it so it sounds full and interesting but stripped back enough to make it sound great for the dance floor!
Dimitris: Can you describe to us the steps that you went through the production of this track and of any other track?
Kolonie: Usually get some drums together, we usually use the same drum samples, few different here and there obviously but we have almost built up our own mini-sample pack. We dig sounds out of there so when you listen to the tracks you are easily able to identify, “yup, that’s a Kolonie track”
Then try and lay down a bassline, some chords and just keep trying to move forward. Sometimes everything can all change if you end up coming up with a great hook and it doesn’t fit with certain elements, we just try and stay open minded and happy to keep trying different things and in the end hopefully it will all full together nicely.
Dimitris: When the track finished did the label accepted it as it was produced or did the label recommend you to do some changes or fix certain things?
Kolonie: Ha, Jamie from ZeroThree will always find something – quite rightly. I think this time it was “those are pussy hats” and initially the track lacked some low end, so we spent some more time on the baseline and just ensuring the kick and bass sat together a big nicer.
Dimitris: Is this track an original composition or is it based on a template from another track produced from you or another producer?
Kolonie: Just an Original
Dimitris: Please describe to us the studio that you have produced Moments? What is your favourite hardware and software set up? Do you have in mind any new gear that you wish to get in order to raise the quality of your production?
Kolonie: Less really is more in our case. We have our go to synths such as spire, hive, Z3ta sylenth to name a few. We don't use any hardware whatsoever, and to be honest I think this would probably slow us down. We use some of the fab filter range along with Waves, the lexicon for reverbs and that's pretty much it. We would say its definitely enough to get the job done and to be honest we prefer having less plugins, get to know them better so when we are producing we aren’t just trying to learn your way round them and can just dive right in!
Dimitris: Do you master the track yourself or the mastering is task for the record label? Do you understand mastering as being essential?
Kolonie: We do a initial master, but usually prefer it if a third party has a listen to the track. We think its good to have another ear listen to it, if you have been listening to a track over and over it can get easy to miss things, or just generally be too close to the track. They will listen to the mix, usually its fine but always great to get feedback and that way ensure the master is as good as it can be!
Dimitris: There is a growing trend of vinyl coming back for good. Would you like to see this track released on vinyl or any other of your future tracks? Do you prefer digital files or vinyl?
Kolonie: We love Vinyl, and there is something special about having a physical copy. We still both have our turntables, but I honestly don’t remember the last time I bought vinyl. I would love to have it on vinyl but just because of sentimental reasons, by the time we started DJing everything was digital anyway and to be honest I'm not sure I could be bothered to drag around a case of vinyl. I've only done it once and my handle broke on my vinyl case, I had to awkwardly carry it round Hoxton – a lot of agg considering you just need a USB!
Dimitris: Do you have any future releases planned and when will be released?
Kolonie: We have a fair few tunes planned roughly every 4-6 weeks until June. But many more tracks in the pipeline to finish off and sign up along with a few collabs as well!
Dimitris: Please note down your favourite Top 5 tracks at this moment!
Kolonie:
Moments, :-)
Ilan Bluestone – Cosmic Feeling feat. Giuseppe de Luca
Flynthe & Chewie - Osaka
Tinlicker – About You
Matt Fax – Ignition
Dimitris: Can you talk a bit about your recent DJ gigs and those coming in the next few months?
Kolonie: Yes! We had A state of Trance in Utrecht 23rd February.
Ministry Of Sound London 1st March
Invisible Wind Factory Liverpool 16th March
Ministry of Sound 12th April
and a few more that we are just waiting on confirmation.
Dimitris: Best piece of advice you got in relation to your career so far and best tip you learnt recently to make your tracks better....
Kolonie: The best advice we ever got was from Andy Mac Dougall. He told us this a few years ago and it’s really stuck with us and helped!
In production, speed and always moving forward. When producing you don’t want anything to slow you down. Having templates set up, samples and sounds organised properly can really help. When in the creation and writing phase, you don’t want anything to slow you down once you’re really in the zone. You don’t want to lose that idea or that flow that you can get locked into. You want to be quick enough to almost keep laying parts of the track down as you go, rather than listening to the same part over and over again - that’s when you get stuck in a rut. Everyone hits a brick wall in the studio, even the very best producers - say we are working on a baseline and can't seem to nail it, after a period of time we will forget about it and move on then come back to it at a later stage., This tactic definitely helps speed up things and gets you to a stage where you can start arranging a track. Sometimes we may have a 16 bar loop, know full well it needs a lot of work but lay down a basic arrangement to then see what’s missing and go back to it.
Dimitris: In 2018 the electronic music talent AVICII died and this has alerted several artists to become more health conscious. Are there any lessons to learn as an artist out from this sad event?
Kolonie: We were both generally gutted and really sad on hearing the news about Avicii. When we first started putting tracks out there he was putting out some HUGE tunes. He was the same age as us so was always someone we ended up looking up to. He was truly inspirational and to think he was at a level where we could only dream to be, and yet he was clearly so unhappy and needed help made it all the more heart breaking. I think everyone in general is more mental health conscious now, its covered a lot more in the media and hopefully it means (especially in men) that people will be more inclined to open up and get help if they are struggling!
Dimitris: Can you give us your best travel tips in order to survive the long travelling hours?
Kolonie: haha, were not yet at the stage of a touring DJ, hopefully we can answer this question in 18 months time when we've racked up a few more air miles
Dimitris: There is a big movement for revival of classic tracks and as a result of this retro events have boomed with music policy of solely classic tracks. What is your opinion about events or stages only with classics and can you choose for us your absolute 3 favourite classics?
Kolonie: I think its great, we have each been to a couple classic trance and house events and have loved the novelty of them. (Kane) My all time favourites have to include
Chicane - Saltwater
Three Drives - Greece 2000,
we would love the opportunity remix something like, Des Mitchel - Welcome to the dance (now that's a classic)
Thanks to Kolonie for their fantastic answers.
Thanks to Greg Sawyer at Additive Music PR for organising this interview.
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