We Are Modeselektor Page #2

I could look more objectively at the result,

at what a party can do to young people,

what it did to me.

We did some live acts then as well.

Didn't prepare anything,

just go, take the machines,

any sequence and off you go.

People were happy,

I was happy, too and I think

it was still terribly boring.

Basti however was great,

you could dance with it

and it was really balanced.

He had breaks too,

where the music was quiet

and there were just strings.

And from my side that was rather envy:

How does he do it,

that's what I wanted to know,

but he didn't really respond.

So. The morning after:

The only survivor of the party

and the only one who

at least does some work.

The rest f***ed off again.

I know that I was here twice.

Then the whole thing moved

and this nave boys-shed-construction

site-Techno-mixture developed

into some type of hype

and it inspired lots of people

and there were more parties,

in the potato silo amongst others,

where it was really dusty

and you couldn't stay in long.

Then there were parties in the Z1,

the cement plant one,

in an old coal-pulveriser

where it was also incredibly dirty

and then it became more official, and bigger

and then some money was invested

and the whole thing moved

to the Kulturhaus in Rdersdorf.

Here we organized the bigger raves

in Rdersdorf from 1994 onwards

- the really official ones.

There were lots of people involved,

and lots of people in the end

means obscure accounting.

We had to pay tax for example.

Until then:
What?

Nobody ever did it before.

And it worked for a while,

was quite nice,

but then a certain greediness

from certain people set in,

and the group split.

It stopped fairly soon afterwards.

I think in late 1995

we had the last party here.

So basically, it kept going for 1 years.

Before I started getting into music seriously

I also did other things,

like skateboarding and spraying graffiti.

I also went to school in Berlin.

But when I witnessed

the first Techno parties here,

that touched me somehow,

it did something with me.

It was so overwhelming that after

that point there was nothing else for me.

Gernot and I always

went to the parties together,

then spent the time separately

and in the end went home together.

That's how it always went.

It was fascinating to experience

this new type of music

basically around the corner,

kind of in the middle of the forest

and Gernot was always crazier about it

than me or other people and wanted to

experience it with every fibre of his body.

Our Gernot could not yet walk properly

when he started to bang

his wooden toys in a rhythm

and sing really like a jazz-musician:

'There was a man,

who poo-pooed in his bed. '

In different kind of rhythms

and he was still very small then.

We thought that he was going to be a musician

- even the minister said during his christening:

'He'll be a great musician!' -

so we send him to piano lessons:

Big fiasco.

In about 3rd or 4th class I was

proud owner of a Technotronic tape,

I went to bed with it

and woke up to it in the morning.

I was listening to it non-stop

and after some Techno socialisation

and underground parties where Szary was too,

I started to get more into it

and basically had my first

DJ gigs at home in my bedroom.

I think Gernot's parents always said:

'Just do it. '

His Dad is a scientist,

he always sat downstairs in his office

and Gernot was playing music upstairs

and that was alright.

I think they rather encouraged him

to do what he really wanted to do.

My father once threatened me with

a wooden slat because I made so much noise.

He was working in his study,

he always had to write a lot,

and I had the music really loud in my room...

Something was being built in the staircase

and there were these slats,

and Dad got really angry

and stood there with a slat, all distraught.

What surprised my parents I think was,

that after weeks of slaving away on building sites

while I was still in school and on summer holidays

I just bought a record player with the money.

And the next summer holidays

I did the same to buy a second one.

That was a bit hard to understand.

And then I had these two record players

but no money left to buy records.

I had about 40 records,

I still remember that,

and I always put them up in a way that

I can see them all and I knew them by heart.

Then I saw in videos

that the Scratch DJs put labels on them,

but I didn't know why, but I still put

labels on my records too, because it looked cool,

and then I understood what they were for.

Szary was DJing in the Z1 at that time

and also played his own tracks

that he produced back then

and Gernot admired that,

but Gernot was nobody

who just took for granted:

'He is the DJ now and... '

This type of looking up

to someone he never did,

he was rather interested in:

How do I get there,

I want to do that too,

and what's the fastest way to get there.

After school I had absolutely no idea

what I wanted to do,

To be honest I kind of screwed up in school

due to too many out of school activities:

Techno.

Then I decided to go to Berlin to university

of applied sciences for social pedagogy

and to do a degree as

child care teacher for five years.

The cool thing there was

that it was full of guys like me

who didn't really know

what to do with their lives,

but most of them were musicians.

That's where I met the most musicians

and people interested in music.

Amongst others I met Gordon there

who also works for us, for Monkeytown

and goes on tour as well,

and with him I had a band called Illuminati,

that was my first band before Modeselektor,

I already knew Szary then.

I don't actually know

anything about computers.

With Gernot it was obvious that he had something

to do with music when he came there,

or rather we both had

something to do with music,

so it became a topic quite soon.

And since we did a lot together,

not just at school,

it was also a subject matter

it was always present.

We are in Brest.

Pukkelpop.

In Belgium.

In Austria.

PITCH Festival.

Bloc Festival.

Somewhere in Brittany.

Zagreb.

Amsterdam.

Denmark. Roskilde.

Down with that, down.

Today a big concert in Eberswalde-Finow

with Major Lazer and A-Trak.

Mexico.

Guadalajara.

Guadalajara.

Guadalajara.

Bagdad.

Such a Modeselektor track

often sounds quite simple.

And that's why they make such

an impact in the live version,

because it's clear music,

that's to the point.

And that is the highest quality

music can have in this kind of context.

Somehow we are the band of course,

but we do have a pretty equal

footed relationship with the crew.

We talk about the tracklists together,

and they really have become our friends.

You get to know each other really well on tour.

You are very close all the time,

and very often in extreme situations.

Are we allowed to smoke here?

She said we don't have to put the seatbelts on.

It's not that bad.

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