2012 has seen Nic and Bossi touring last year’s ‘Wake Your Mind’ album globally. Playing over 140 shows this year, it’s a wonder they can pinpoint their favourites. “The whole of the last 12 months has been one never-ending highlight for us,” the Top 100 regulars say. “There are two ‘Wake Your Mind’ concerts that stick out because we’ve been totally overwhelmed. One in Johannesburg in South Africa, and one in Melbourne, Australia. The amount of people plus the energy was completely off the hook.”
Style: “EDM.” Best known for: “‘Wake Your Mind’.” Tune of 2012: “‘Be Your Sound’.” Breakthrough DJ/producer of 2012: “Orjan Nilsen.”
Now US-based, the German duo’s momentum looks set to continue with more shows coming up and a deluxe edition of the album set for release. “One more single from the album is still to come, while new tracks are lined up already,” they tell us. “So we will be keeping busy.” IAN ROULLIER
If you were a superhero, what would your superpower be? “To beam — that would mean less time at airports and on planes!” Should you play to the crowd or for yourself? “Sure, a DJ needs to feed the crowd, but we think it is always important to try and give something new and unexpected.” What does EDM mean to you? “For the last 20 years EDM has been the centre of our daily lives. It’s nearly as natural to have EDM music around us as it is to eat and breathe!” Should celebrities be DJs? “Sure thing, we are always up for a good laugh!” Have you ever been thrown off the decks? “Not really, but we had to leave a venue when the crowd was breaking through fences and security lines and flooding the venue! There was a real riot feeling.” Are you a DJ if you don’t beat match? “The right track selec- tion is most important. Good beat matching should be important for every club DJ. Using a laptop or sequencer to do this isn’t really satisfying or cool in our eyes.” Where’s the next dance music capital? “Ibiza and Las Vegas are both investing big numbers to remain No.1. New super venues will be ready next season and the competition will get even stronger.”
PORTER ROBINSON
HE might only just be out of school, and he might be seen as one of the figureheads of the new EDM ‘craze’, but that’s not stopping Porter Robinson from evolving his own way. Already he is keen to move on from the quick mixing, hands-in-the-air style sets he was doing in 2011, replacing them with a more nuanced mixing style and more genuinely emotional strain of music. “I get more pleasure mixing in obscure, weirder references like Aphex Twin,” he says on the phone from home during a rare period of down time in a year of near- constant touring. “People don’t complain and it’s fun for me, it’s way better than smashing their heads every few seconds.“ AS well as DJing on a number of his own tours around the States and further afield, including a trip to Hull to record a live Essential Mix for Radio 1, Porter’s also unleashed ‘Language’, a glossy electro
Style: “Electro.” Best known for: “2012 single ‘Language’.” Tune of 2012: “‘Internet Friends’.” Breakthrough DJ/producer of 2012: “Flosstradamus.”
anthem that topped innumerable charts. It was the first sign of a new sonic direction for the star. “My focus now is beauty and making you feel something. The whole intense, high-energy rage thing is easy and boring. What I’m doing right now has nothing to do with dubstep.” ONE thing Porter does share with his US dubstep brethren is a penchant for big shows. “On the recent Language Tour we took a VJ and a light director, but I wanted something classy and powerful so I handpicked tumblr-style net art to be displayed. It’s a weird hipster aesthetic I’m super fond of.” THE next months will see Porter head out on tour again, with pal Zedd, and will also see the release of his debut album, which he describes as “more focused on goosebumps and the euphoric”. KRISTAN J CARYL
40 56
HIGHEST CLIMBER
If you were a superhero, what would your superpower be? “If I were a superhero, I’d probably want to be able to do ‘bend- ing’.” Should you play to the crowd or for yourself? “I think that’s a false dichotomy; the answer is compromise. An artist’s integrity should always come first, and you shouldn’t pander. “ What does EDM mean to you? “DJ-oriented dance music, I guess.” Should celebrities be DJs? “Celebrities probably should not appropriate DJ culture for their own success, no.” Have you ever been thrown off the decks? “Haha, at my fourth show. They asked me to get off early because all the glitchy electro was really weirding out the crowd.” Are you a DJ if you don’t beat match? ”Yeah, sure, but who cares what’s a DJ? Let’s just show audiences a good time, ok? This is supposed to be fun!” Where’s the next dance music capital? “I couldn’t answer that.”