Booka Shade Interview There are with no doubt one of the greatest duets of the european dance scene! Their second LP titled «Movements» became a triumph establsihing the Berlin duo as one fo the hottest electronic bands today. Walter Merziger and Arno Kammermeier are Booka Shade and they enjoy it.

 So How many years you work together guys?

Walter: 24 years!

24 years?? How is this possible?

Walter: This what I also wonder! (laughs) My relationship with Arno is the longest after the one with my family. Longer even than the one with my wife.

Arno: The truth is that indeed these are many years. We have met at school and we instanlty became close. Our interest for music was common, so we have created a school band. Of course we have never imagined that after 24 years the band still continues to exist.

 I have read on your biography that even though in the beginning you were mostly interested to trance you have decided to swift your musical direction. So?

Arno: The reason we wanted to get away from trance was that actually we wanted to escape from something that we were stuck in for many years and we were by then bored of it. We felt that through trance we were lossing the soulful and melodic part of the music we really need Walter: Also we waned to experiment with new sounds and with things that were totally unknown to us. We wanted to escape from the easy way we were working for so long!

All your tracks with Get Psysical give me the impression that you follow a certain path, even though they differ on the sound. Is any certain purpose behind this? Walter: I wouldn’t say that we actually seek into this but the way you put it I think it is very posittive when someone understands that this sound comes from Booka Shade. It means that it has identity in fact. Arno: I think that this is connected to our music taught. It is connected to the melancholy and the vibe of the music of the 80’s. There is no musician who was born a musician. He heard things through his life, and the ones that actually touched and influence him, he has in fact showed them in his sound.

If I unerstand correct you talk for music references which actually have marked your sound.

Arno: exactly! Especially “Movements” is an album full of these. Disco, pop, dub and many more. Often we have been asked to determine our style of music and honestly we do not know what to answer. It is a blend of thousand things and as a joke I always say that our music style Electro scient fiction! (laughs) Walter: I will give you a simple example which will help to understand what we mean. I have been in the past in the studio, trying desperately to create a track which will have common things with one track of chicken lips which I really adore. I did not want to copy it, I just wanted to make a track that would give me the sane enotions. Everybody gets influenced from an artist or from a song from time to time. I do not think it is bad.

You mentioned the Chicken Lips and you shocked me as one of their oldest track the “He Not In” is one of my favourites! Walter: This is unbelievable ! ( laughs ) The “He Not In” was the track i was trying to sample ( laughs ). I did not mentioned the title because I thought you wouldn’t recognise it.! Really unbelievable!

Yes it is! I listen to it on a daily basis. I read recently an interview from DJ T in which he said that his favourite Get Physical album is the “Children of Love” from Fuckpony. Which is your Get Physical album or track generally?

Arno: Indeed the “Children of Love” is Thomas favourite album he keeps saying that. Now speaking about my references it is difficult. In order for a track or album to get released on Get physical it means automatically that I like it. I can distinguish though “Tonight” from M.A.N.D.Y which is especially atmosperic as well the latest work from Lopazz.. Walter: From my side I would say that I love the “Les Djinns” of Djuma Soundsystem which has the biggest sales on Beatport.

 You mentioned Beatport and now I am forced to ask what is your opinion about the distribution of music via the net.

Walter: I honestly do not thing that Internet is doing any harm to music. On the contrary, I believe that it helps. Lets be realistic! We live in the era of My Space, the blogs and the You Tube. The world evolves and we have to do the same. For the time being the internet sales do not affect the vinyls. There is no change to the number of vinyls we used to sell than now. The vinyl lover will still buy it. He will go to the record shop to hang around, to see people and to buy the music he likes. From other side, judging also from my self, If I hear something I like, I download it instantly because I do not have much time to spend on the record shop. Arno: I totally agree with Walter. The only bad thing with Internet is that it denies you the direct contact with the product. It denies you the artwork and to have something in your hands. Of course now you can find the artwork on digital format but it is not the same. The emotional contact is lost. I also believe that it is wrong when for example when you download an album from I-tunes you then get extra tracks that you can not find anywhere else. I believe that the whole procedure should work the other way round! You should be able to get these extra tracks and material with the normal CD or vinyl.

You are right! That would be a very good motive for the people to buy vinyls or cd’s. I also want to ask you what makes the German people to be so close to the electronic music, when the same music is an underground choice to other countries.

Arno: I assume that this is a subject of artistic culture. Germany is a country that is strongly connected with technology and the electronic culture. The whole country is tied with an industrial point of view on everything. Thing that Kraftwerk which define electronic music have been introduced to the crowd 35 years ago as robots! So is it possible not to be in our blood the electronic content? 2 weeks ago, I was eating on a restaurant and I was listening to Ricardo Villalobos. I go to the shopping mall and I listen to “Body Language”. Eectronic music is on the daily life of the German’s.

This is something that will hardly happen in Greece! So tell us your future plans. Walter: We have finished our new single which will be released on May while we also work for the album which will be released on September. Also Get Physical is having its 5th birthday so we are preparing a double anniversary with all the artists of the label which will be a nice surprise and it will be also released on May.

So happy birthday and good luck to everything you do!

Thanks so much!! We thank you too Sophia!

*Many thanks to Sophia & to The city Vibe electronic portal for their kind approval to present this interview