Doing Things His Way _ Interview With David Meiser

A conversation with the formidable David Meiser..

DOING THINGS HIS WAY _ DAVID MEISER

By Colin Kraan

Anyone listening to techno these days has maybe noticed or come across the name of David Meiser, German by his artist name but Spanish by birth. His march into the top of the charts in the techno world is remarkable because Meiser, according to himself, doesn’t really care about being a top dj. No, Meiser focuses on producing the music he likes so much and getting a unique sound.

‘It’s all going well at the moment but I’m not worried about becoming a big name. I just want to focus on my music and making better and better music, thereby upgrading my level as a producer. I don’t really care even about dj-ing, I love being at the studio at the moment. I feel like I have to show my potential there as I think it is there where everything happens. And I’m successful in that way now because I get recognition from some major labels. And of course, if the chance is there to have my breakthrough I don’t want to miss the chance.’

Dave Clarke

The story of Meiser began two years ago when top dj’s like Dave Clarke and Black Asteroid started to play Meiser’s tracks on their radio shows and in their sets.

‘Yeah things went very quickly the last two years. I was moving the music I made to the internet and sent my first track ‘The Thinker’ and other music of myself to Dave Clarke for his White Noise Radio show. I was really surprised to hear him playing my tracks immediately after that in his show. Same for Bryan Black (Black Asteroid, ed.) who played my first tracks in his sets. After this happened I immediately started to get the attention from labels and other artists and that opened a window for me to release more. This also resulted in very interesting collaborations like the one with Bryan Black to release ‘Who Controls’. This track was even charted by Dave Clarke as one of the best techno tracks of 2013. And the funny thing is that I never had or have contact with Dave. You send tracks to him but you never get an answer. But then the next week you hear your tracks again on his radio show. This process has some magic itself.’

Meiser grew up in Zaragoza, a city with almost 1 million inhabitants, but with hardly any good techno clubs..

‘I still live in Zaragoza and was born there. There’s only one small techno club here, Reset Club. Young people are almost literally fighting to play there. The famous club Florida 135 is not far from here but they stopped booking industrial techno artists, they now focus more on house and tech house for very young people, which is a bit a shame. It’s more about partying there now and not really about the music anymore.’

Two Loves

Despite the lack of techno in his hometown, Meiser was determined to make music by himself after hearing the industrial sounds of Spanish techno legends Oscar Mulero and Christian Wünsch back in the older days. But he was especially influenced by all time legends Dave Clarke, Jeff Mills and Oliver Ho.

‘Dave Clarke was my biggest influence regarding dj-ing, just because of his technique and his use of effects. But the producer in me was heavily influenced by Jeff Mills, because of his hypnotic sounds, his instant mixing, the way he creates layers of sounds, the loops he makes and the purity and strength of his music as a result of that. And last but not least I have to mention Oliver Ho, who influenced me a lot when he was involved in the Metaphysical Project.’

Although techno is Meisers biggest musical love, it was not his first love, musically speaking. Before Meiser started producing techno, he played in a hip hop band.

‘Yes I had my own hip hop band before I became a techno guy. But we weren’t really professional. We made some promotional tracks but these tracks were really “raw”. At that time we didn’t have productions skills, just revolutionary lyrics. I did that between my 18th and 22nd , the same time in which I discovered techno and started playing vinyl. But I’m still listening to hip hop. Hip hop gives me the lyrics and expression with words that techno doesn’t have. That’s why I often put voices in my tracks, although it’s obviously not the same.’