Hey Felix Raphael, thanks for joining us! How’s things with you?
Hey guys thank you for the invitation and have a little chat. Having live back to normal again and some sunny festivals, feels pretty good at the moment after having such long time in the studio. Bringing the music on stage.
You were thrown into the music world at an early age, how did this benefit you when starting your career?
In general I think you’re never too old to start and there is always room for improvement but of course starting early is not a bad thing.
You don’t limit yourself to just DJ/Producing, by using your own vocals and live performances, how important has this been for you?
As my musical background depends a lot on playing instruments and singing it has always been a matter of time to stop dj and start playing live and involve my musical roots.
How do you feel your sound has progressed over the years?
Coming from the singer songwriter genre to electronic music obviously progressed or changed a lot but to be honest I stopped dedicating my music to one specific genre. I like to call it electronic crossover. Technically of course I think a made some steps to have more and more quality outcome with every session I have.
You began your label YION with friends, what inspired the idea and how has the journey been so far?
We decided to start our new label to be more independent and able to have the full control of the whole process: Artworks, graphics, bios and of course music. All in all creating something new and on your own was always interesting for us doing that with other talented artist who are also friends can sometimes be challenging but in the end you have a nice way to work and be together and creating something even more personal. We are all very happy with the development of the label having some of the most influential artists releasing on YION and getting that much early support from the platforms in less then a year is really satisfying.
What future plans do you have for the label?
First and foremost keeping the quality of the art is the most important thing for us. Managing the label is kind of a weird thing because before I was always on the artist side of releasing music since having YION I got to know the other side of the business and of course it is a lot of stuff to explore and especially learn. I think it is very important to get a more detailed perspective of the whole business. My personal plan for YION is to release the most of my own music on the label to have my fingerprint on it even more. And of course influence the sound of the label with that.
You collaborated with Peer Kusiv on ‘Hold You’ which is now being remixed by Yubik. Talk to us about the original and how the remix came about for this?
I was in contact with Peer Kusiv through our publisher and as we both tend to make melancholic and melodic music we decided to try something out and this is how Hold You was born. We both have been huge supporters of Yubik’s music over the years and thought he could bring the track even more on the dance floors then the original. And as tunic and myself have been in contact before I have requested him to do a remix for it.
What are the differences between collaborations and producing tracks on your own?
For me producing tracks on my own is more stable and faster because obviously I don’t have to talk things through within the process. Collaborations on the other hand can be super powerful when sharing different talents and skills but can also be very demanding when you are not on the same vibe and then you try and try and try but it doesn’t work out.
With the label and your own music, do you have much down time to reflect?
The issue with having a job that you used to have as a hobby makes it hard to take regular breaks even more if you work with friends and you want to support everyone. It is really important to be structured, which is not the easiest for me to be honest.
What else is coming up for you & the label in 2022?
I don’t want to reveal too much on the music side but we extended our team and will also focus on higher quality videos and also start on event in the near future.
Buy link for Yubik remix: https://yion.lnk.to/hold