Markus Suckut Interview

Markus Suckut appears this Saturday 28th as part of the Blakksheep Showcase alongside Sam Paganini, Sasha Carassi, Johannes Heil, Simo Lorenz and more. Tickets and full info here.

A member of the Rekids family, his take on dark, functional techno is second to none, a fact demonstrated on his EXILE label, which he runs with fellow Blakksheep Johannes Heil.

Having also recently resurrected his own SCKT label and launched yet another, Tales of The Machines, we thought it was time to discover more.

Can you tell us about EXILE, the label that you run with Johannes Heil. When and why did you two decide to work together? How far do you go back?

"Johannes and myself met for the first time during summer 2013, if I remember right. I was playing in a club near to his home and he showed up. We decided that I would stay a few days, hang around and maybe go to the studio – which turned out into a very close friendship directly. We both produced the Dreiheit release on Figure together, and later when we had the feeling that Figure was going into a direction we don't want to support anymore we simply decided to found EXILE. In the beginning it was just a platform to release both our music, which we made during our sessions at Johannes studio, but at the end of last year we decided to welcome close friends to the label also. Next release will be EXILE004 by our Swedish mate Mikael Jonasson."

Does your partnership extend to DJing or is it confined to the studio?

"Johannes and I are in the studio together, because Johannes just plays live. We do EXILE nights, of course, so Johannes plays live and I DJ, but we have some ideas in mind how we could do something together in the future. Let's see how this will turn out."

You run your own label too, SCKT, which you just revived after two years without a release. Why did you take a break and what can we expect from it going forward?

"Yes, finally and I am so glad to be back with SCKT. There was mainly one reason. My former distribution ran out of money and they were not able to pay out anymore – so I lost a lot of money after releasing SCKT03 and SCKT03R. I was kinda shocked when I received the news, and I decided to take my time to search for a new distribution. I guess it was worth it, and I am so glad that I didn't rush with the decision. I want to release more on SCKT now, I have already finished SCKT05. So you can expect more deep tool techno from me with black and white artwork."

You've then also launched Tales of The Machines! Can you tell us about this and how it differs from SCKT?

"Tales of the Machines is a label for recorded hardware live jams, it's more rough and about catching moments. I already had that idea in my mind for a long time, and after I moved with my studio into another room it became real. I was too lazy to reconnect everything at once, so I just took a few different hardware machines, connected them and pressed record. It was a lot of fun doing it this way, because normally when I am in the studio it takes longer to finish something and my computer is in the centre of the session. On Tales of the Machines I won't release under Markus Suckut and I will also release music from friends. SCKT will stay for myself, as this was the idea behind from the beginning."

Both your own labels are vinyl only. Is that your preferred format?

"To be honest, music just released digital is not worth a penny to me. I mean what do you have? Just bits and bytes, nothing to show your kids later. I started learning DJing with vinyl and I love the format. You have artwork and something to hold in your hand. When you buy vinyl you support everyone behind the scene: distribution, designers, label and the artist. Everything I play except promos is bought on vinyl and digitalised on my own. So most of the time I just play with USB sticks, but sometimes I bring vinyl also – for example, at places where I've played already and I know that you are able to play vinyl at that venue."

We love your Rekids release from the end of last year. Two of the tracks revolve around breakbeats. Was that something that you were listening to when you first got into electronic music around 1999? Can you tell us a bit about how you started out?

"Thank you! Well, I listen to a lot of old school hip-hop from the '90s when I go by bike or by car. Also, I like 'The Children Of The E' from Radio Slave a lot. I guess that was kind of an influence for that release when Matt asked me if I wanted to join the Rekids family."

Johannes put out an album at the end of last year. Does that mean it's your turn next?

"Well, we are talking about that already."

Are there anymore releases on the horizon that you'd like to mention?

"I've just finished a new EP for Rekids and for SCKT, so you should watch out for that. Of course, the first Tales of the Machines release is on the horizon too."

Six flights in one weekend with no sleep. What are your survival tips on how to cope with the weekend of a gigging DJ?

"I try to catch some sleep on the plane, for sure, and I always bring some Dextro Energy with me for playing, it helps a lot on long weekends."

What are three tracks that give a taster of what you'll be playing at Egg...

Mikael Jonasson – 'EXILE004 A'