High Fidelity: Octave One "The Remixers Of Revisited" Playlist

There is personality to every city’s techno output - from Berlin to London, New York to Chicago each name stands for a sub genre of the well loved beat. Octave One are examples of this phenomenon, carrying the musical and soulful nature of their home city’s style and where it all started - Detroit. They made their own mark in this world through their releases on their own imprint 430 West Recordings, primarily a launch pad for their own production they have now reached to some of the friends they made along the way to mark the label’s 20th anniversary, inviting them to remix their extensive back catalogue of works.

The project’s entitled ‘Revisited: Here, There and Beyond’ and is due for release early next year. They’re kicking off the celebratory tour in Farringdon this weekend, so, we asked the prolific Burden brothers to select the tracks that for them represent the signature sound of the artists involved in this remarkable project. From Glasgow’s Vince Watson to Stockholm’s Cari Lekebusch they all offer something vital and distinct to the four four landscape, you can listen to their selections in the player below and read on for verbal insights into this exciting forthcoming release.

Stream: Octave One "The Remixers of Revisited" Playlist



Can you explain to us about these choices - where these artists who have been early influences in your music, friends you’ve made through your career, people whose music you see as important?
We are very privileged to have a great group of outstanding producers to contribute their work as remixers on our anniversary album. For this list, we wanted to put together some of their signature works, tracks we thought represented each one as an artist. The list of remixers is really a list mostly of artists we have had the fortune of sharing the lineup with at clubs or festivals throughout the years. Those we have seen and admired for their DJ or live work. Usually this would bring us to researching their productions, and their productions made us their fans.

Have any of them surprised you with what they delivered compared what you expected?
It is always hard to hear other producers interpret your work. That is really why we have not had many remixes done of our tracks before. We have not done very many remixes as well for the same reason. You, as an artist create a work based on what you feel within yourself and you have to open yourself up to someone else's version of it. It's not always a pleasant journey. We were very happily surprised with the remixes as they started coming in. We knew we had put together a great list of producers when we started rethinking some of the original tracks and admiring many of the progressions and new productions we were hearing. It really came together well as a project.

What was behind your decision and inspiration to put together this compilation?
We wanted to do something special for our 20 year anniversary. 20 years of programming drum machines and synthesizers, making a few tracks and many friends along the way. We wanted it to be more than just a compilation and were very conscience of the fact that we had not had many remixes of our music done through the years. This seemed like a perfect occasion to break the trend and open ourselves up to someone else's musical interpretation.

How did you decide which artist would release each track? Was it your choice or theirs?
The pairing of artist to track was a decision that was destined for minds greater than ours. We let each remixer choose the track they wanted to rework. What was surprising was that many of them had specific tracks they did not want to remix and didn't want anyone else to remix. Tracks they felt should never be touched as they held the originals in such high regard. These reactions were very unexpected and quite humbling.

What’s next for 430 West?
We have just rereleased one of our best know works on vinyl "Blackwater". It was long overdue for a rerelease and it's being received as if it's a new record again. It has inspired us to work on new vocal track that we are very much liking at the moment called "New Life". We hope to debut it at the Winter Music Conference next year. Of course "Revisited: Here, There, and Beyond" shall see it's full release this January.

Tracklist:

Planetary Assault Systems - Mod
Alter Ego - Rocker
Los Hermanos - Birth Of 3000
Sandwell District - Falling The Same Way
Aril Brikha - Groove La Chord
Cari Lekebusch - Motions of Energy
Alexander Kowalski - Lock me up
Ken Ishii - Awakening
Vince Watson - Everything Changes