Interview With Pig&Dan!

 Igor Tchkotua and Dan Duncan aka Pig&Dan have been leading names in the techno spectrum for well over a decade now. Ever since their partnership came about in 1999, the Spanish duo have been responsible for producing music’s biggest adventures and have effortlessly emulated the entire experience on the dance floor. With releases on Cocoon Recordings, Soma, Bedrock, Terminal M and Plus 8, the duo have also donned the role of label bosses with their very own ELEVATE imprint.

The duo have toured around the world with appearances at major festivals and clubs and as Dan of the illustrious duo heads to Mumbai to headline ‘Sleepless’ by Ankytrixx & Friends Entertainment(AFE), we caught up with the act for an exclusive interview to talk about their beginnings, their latest Mexico EP and much more. Read on.

TBB: You two have been performing as a duo for more than 15 years now. How has the journey been so far?

Pig&Dan: Incredible and dynamic. We’ve had such a fantastic journey so far and are excited what’s around that musical corner. We are based on the Spanish island of Mallorca where Igor was born but that was part of our challenge and advantage.

On the whole it’s no easy task to try to stick out enough or to be recognised when living on a tiny island where there’s no dance music scene whatsoever. Saying that it was kind of to our advantage because we weren’t influenced by trends like if you are when you live in a major city which is vibing on a certain sound or trend.

 

TBB: Your Mexico EP marked your debut on Adam Beyer’s Drumcode label. Can you tell us a little more about that?

P&D: The title says it all, we recorded the main track when staying at a dear friend of ours in Mexico. He brought loads of synths from his hire company which he has in Mexico City.

We set up Thai crazy studio in his living room a small beautiful town two hours outside of the main city. We were spoiled with Guacamole and incredible hospitality and this in turn inspired us to come up this rather out there record.

We recorded it al love and played by hand on Moog synths. Mexico the title track was made in a mater of minutes because it just happened there and then with me (Dan) playing the pets and Pig on the knobs of the synth twisting the sound all in real time with no connection to any kind of commuter accept audio in.

TBB: Talking about your record label, it has been almost four years since you launched ELEVATE. What was your main motive behind it and how has it been able to push boundaries till now?

P&D: It’s all about supporting people we feel need to be ward out there. I like to think we have a strong enough following for folk to trust our judgement and to open themselves to so called newcomers with open arms.

ELEVATE is about elevating us as people with the enjoyment of music. We hope we are pushing the right envelopes and people are feeling the label is worth supporting.

TBB: Any artists from your label fans should look out for?

P&D: Absolutely,

Aitor Ronda

Etai Tarazi

LAAT

Rob Hes

Uakoz & Alex Lentini

and the list goes on….

TBB: 2016 witnessed the release of your fourth studio album Modular Baptism which saw you return back to your dance floor roots. How do you guys transition between producing deeper and heavier tunes?

P&D: We truly just wrote what’s comes to us. We don’t design music or decide where we are going before hand, we let it flow and experiment. Often what we start with doesn’t even end up in the end product star agent enough. We love challenging ourselves musically and we felt this album showed a lot of different sides to our sound all be it under the techno umbrella.

TBB: Given Dan had been a drum n’ bass producer for 10 years, has that influenced your sound, making it stand out from other techno acts?

P&D: Of course it’s had a massive influence our music but I can’t claim it makes it stand out. That I’ll leave to the listener to decide.

P&D: Not really we will do what we do. Feed off the crowd and see if we can entice them all to join our ride together. All sonically orgasm at the same points : )

TBB: What can we expect from you guys for the rest of 2016? Any collaborations or EPs in the near future?

P&D: We’ve got a lot coming up, first off we are remixing heroes UNDERWORLD and also Kollektiv Turmstrasse.

As far as Collaberations go we’re very proud to announce that we are together with Adam Beyer, Solomun, ANNA, HOSH and in the next couple of weeks we release our collaberation with Monika Kruse on Terminal M…

TBB: You have played in India before? What are your favourite memories from the country?

P&D: India for me is extremely special because of its vast history in music. I love enjoying music with the people of India because of their true ability to get right into it as its deep set in the roots. I adore India and it’s people !!!

P&D:

1. Julian Jeweil “Orbit” [ELEVATE]

2. DAST (Italy) “Hypnotise” [ELEVATE]

3. Luca Agnelli “Turbo” [ELEVATE]