Ewan Pearson, DJ, remixer & producer par excellence, plays the final Shock of the Summer in Dublin’s Kennedy’s on June 27th. In advance of what will no doubt be a very special night, he answered some questions for the good folks at Analogue.

For the uninitiated, how would you describe your sound?

That’s a job for PR people, journalists and bloggers and other pundits. I’m the last person you should ask.

Your methods are much more cerebral than many might expect of an international DJ. How do you reconcile your intellectual approach with the mindless hedonism of the dancefloor?

I don’t think I’m more cerebral. I’m interested in talking around some of these things we do, and wonder about them, sometimes privately and sometimes publicly. That’s not so weird is it? And hedonism and intellect aren’t mutually exclusive. They’re both vital parts of life. The head is just another part of the body after all.

How do you feel living in Berlin has changed your work?

I don’t think it’s affected my work in terms of what I make, apart from maybe that I’m generally happier all round and that might feed into what I do, I guess.

I was quite taken with your blog post entitled “The Supreme Overlord of Dance Decrees,” where you encourage producers to “throw away everything you think is not genuinely going to add something to the world.” Is this a viable option for everyone?

Well, that piece was half a goad and half a joke as manifestos should be. I do think we should probably all try and make fewer things and make them better. Al [Usher] and I are putting out one Partial Arts single a year at the moment and trying to make it a damn good one each time.

You are quite vocal in your condemnation for illegal downloading. Can you see a viable solution to the problem, or are the days of small artists and labels getting by well and truly past?

I don’t think there is a solution. The cat is out of the bag and musicians are going to have to rely on playing live, or working in cafes or living off trustfunds or something. But I think that we shouldn’t ever stop pointing out to people that what they are doing is actually stealing other people’s hard work, and that it’s wrong. What’s more that if they’re independent music fans they’re hurting the thing that they purport to love by sharing it. In the end to me it’s about whether you’re always taking, or whether you’re putting something back. In that sense we need to have a more folk model, where fans feel like they’re contributing to the scene they love by supporting the people that help make it.

With blogs giving out free tracks every other day, it’s almost impossible for DJs to constantly stay ahead of the clubbing public. How do you bypass this challenge?

It’s about how you put it together; it’s not just about having this or that track. And it’s about the experience of hearing it in a club, with all the other people and the sound system, not just coming out of your laptop speakers.

With a global recession looming, where do you see the future of dance music, both in terms of record buying public, and clubbing?

People never stop wanting to go out and lose themselves; in fact during recession they probably want to do it more and more.

In such a climate one might imagine that DJs might cut back on their schedules, but it appears that the superstar DJs of this world are still booked for nearly every night over the summer months. Is this a question of bringing their music to as many people as possible, or getting as much as they can out of the scene before the bubble bursts?

Erm, that’s kind of a cynical question isn’t it? I can’t answer for everyone; I can only say that most of the people I know play because they are genuinely passionate and love what they do and want to do it as much as possible. So to imply that if people play a lot they’re only motivated by money is kind of insulting isn’t it? They’re entitled to make a living from it too aren’t they? Or can you only be pure of heart if you do it for free? Personally, I try not to be away playing all the time as I want to have some normal life too. I know people that play too much and damage their personal lives and their health in the process.

What DJs and producers inspire you?

Ivan Smagghe, Andrew Weatherall, Joakim, Matt Edwards [Radioslave], Carl Craig.

You had two significant releases last year; a collection of your remixes and a Fabric mix CD. How did you decide which remixes to include on Piece Work?

I just tried to whittle down 6 years of mixes into most of my favourites, and ones that would work together on a CD. I could have happily made it a triple CD though.

What is your approach when you’re given a track to remix?

Just to think really carefully about what the music and the artist would benefit from; to try and be sympathetic to what’s there. Not to throw the baby out with the bathwater. I’m quite picky with what I choose to do, and if I know I can’t add something useful to it then I always say no.

You blogged in detail about each track on the Fabric mix. Were there any constraints imposed by the label?

Constraints on my selection or constraints on my writing? Neither. Fabric were great to work with and cleared everything I wanted to put on there. The rest was just a question of making 15 or 16 tracks work well together.

The mix closes with a memorable juxtaposition of tracks, as Aril Brikha’s Berghain sits alongside Carl Craig’s reworking of Beanfield’s Tides. Was this a question of just playing the two records together, or did it require more delicate studio work?

I’m absolutely honest and have always been clear that I put the mix together using a computer. But I discovered the mixes from DJing in clubs in front of people – that combination I found at a gig in Cookies in Berlin a couple of months before doing the mix. They are in the same key at the same tempo so you can try it live yourself. It’s great when you discover records that go well together like that – you can see me sometimes scribbling in a notebook at a gig – that means I’ve just found two things that work really well in key together and I want to make a note of them.

How much of your own production do you incorporate into your sets?

I’m usually quite shy of playing my own stuff until I’ve heard someone else do so.

You refer to yourself as a librarian trapped in a DJ’s body. Is there any part of you that regrets leaving the academic world behind?

Regret is too strong a word. I definitely made the right choice I think. But I miss the reading and the writing. That’s why I still do the blog and write the column for Groove and so forth.

Even now, it can be difficult for people to take seriously the idea of an academic study of clubbing and its associated proclivities. How did people respond to your publication Discographies: Dance Music, Culture, and the Politics of Sound?

People have been really positive; the book sold out its print run and has been translated into two foreign language editions – Korean and Spanish. I was a bit scared when I wrote it, but that’s because there is an unfortunate tendency in the UK for people to distrust or diss anyone that dares to take popular culture seriously. That kind of anti-intellectualism doesn’t exist on the continent at all. And things have only got worse since we wrote it; music journalism is in quite an awful state now. When I started reading the NME as a kid it had lots of lots of passionate, intelligent critical writing about music in it. Look at it now. A comic.

What, if anything, do you have planned for your set at Shock in Dublin?

I never plan; but the last gig I played for them was ace. Loved the crowd and I can’t wait to come back.

Aidan Hanratty
Email this author | All posts by Aidan Hanratty

Similar Posts