Alpha – mushroom.tv 003

Alphas interzone radioshow ” Alpha crazy Sounds“ is live once a week on twitch with the best sounds from the psychedelic universe.
We talking with Alpha about his roots and his history of psychedelic trance.

Alpha, A Musician, DJ, Producer, Moderator, Composer, Organizer & StarTrek Junkie

Let’s start with some information about your Radio Projects, there are some news?

„alpha’s crazy sounds“ is existing since over 17 years, starting terrestrial in my former hometown Bremen and since many years I am doing it online. In earlier times chromanova.de and since many years on babaganousha.net.

The new show is called “alpha‘s crazy sounds – recap”, recapitulation. The idea behind it is to bring the best of the past month of the psychedelic universe. Evosonic.de is mainly a techno, house and electro station. They invited me to take the part of the psychedelic trance they wanted, and I am very honoured and pleased to do that, because I was always a big fan of evosonic in the old days, when they were still on air.

How did the broadcasting start before modern times?
Years ago I did a Sunday after hour club here in Hamburg, called the Savoy, and very often, even in the summer after festivals, people were joining this club. In that time I had one of my first big „bones“, called mobile phones, a very heavy one, so sometimes for half an hour I was putting the mobile phone into the club, where the sounds were playing and they were broadcasting that.

Which style are you preferring nowadays?
After the long period of ten years DarkPsy, Hi-Tech, Psycore whatever, I also filtered out what I like at this moment. My favourite tempo now is between 170-185bpm. For example, for a longer time you can see a development by mainly young kids playing 200bpm and more, which is not a problem for me because extreme music or fast music is not the problem. BUT it can become a problem, when every track is sounding similar. Like Prog. Like Full On. Like TV.
Personally, I like a mix of the DarkPsy and Hi-tech. The heaviness and the deepness of the Dark Psy, combined with the fast tempo of Hi-tech, still being very psychedelic and having no real structures, but some things you can remember from the beginning of the track and as groovy as possible.

On the last album of -Z- (alpha & antagon) we had a 190bpm track we – or I – never did before. And it was interesting to learn that there are stops by the physics, because the faster you go, the less chance you have to develop a nice bass sound, and the bass drum, bass line. It´s even a reason in fast music, that all the basslines are sounding so high and mickey-mouse-style.

How do you create a story in your tracks, which elements do you use?
The old times were quite different, remembering me as an artist, as a musician, how to do songs with a band. In that time you had something in your mind, but not the concrete sounds like in the computer nowadays. What I learned in this scene, the first tone, the first note, everything is happening at the beginning, You can say, it is the opposite of the old school way of producing tracks and songs. There is no this big plan you have for a whole track, there might be an idea, an idea or a sound, maybe a sample only. My interest is also to bring different genres, elements of genres together. What has influenced me the most in the past is Punkrock, Hardcore and EBM/Industrial. It is not easy to be seen in the tracks, but this is a kind of leading me to something which you never would do if you would not have this background.
Talking about different floors on big festivals, what’s your opinion?
It’s very important sometimes, that you feel, that you are not alone. Yes, I like monostyle parties for your own feeling of your psyfamily, of your tribe. Yes, I like multistyle parties, but all styles together as a fair arrangement of all the subgenres we have. And finally we can be lucky, that we have developed different genres and subgenres for any hour a day, for any kind of emotion, day and night in the whole Psytrance scene. As in the old times when we also said: we are starting slow, we are going high in the nighttime, in the morning we are coming down. Since the beginning, 25 years ago, we were talking about: take the people by the hand sensitively with this style, with that mood and you can bring them to everywhere.
You are living in Hamburg since 12 years, but playing and organizing in Berlin since a longer time very often?

There are different reasons for that. One is the intense friendships, that have developed with different people of organizer groups like Cannibal Crow (r.i.p.) of the beloved Psyrowdelica (r.i.p.), the tough women mainly of the Soundviecher like Nina Elektroengel or Mad Lane, the new friends like Artchi of Quantize of Sense and many more.
If I organize a party, it‘s nice to be the guy, who keeps the flag high. BUT, if you are always paying with your artist fees for that and nobody is really attending or paying for the costs you have, it makes no sense to exploit yourself too much. So that was the reason to go with the Dark Moons – Devil’s Rejects to Berlin. Over there it is still hard, you have to struggle, you have to fight, to get the minimum for the break-even, because bigger underground scene means more, let´s say competition. Every city has it´s own problems in the scene, but for me as an outsider going to Berlin I always felt very welcome. I like the city, I lived there for many years in the 80s, and I am a bit addicted to Berlin and have the option, that more people are interested in this kind of music I am trying to represent, to support and to organize.

What do you wish for the future?

One wish I have for the whole Psytrance Community worldwide is to be a bit more conscious about things you are doing, not which drug you are taking. Conscious about your life, about your future, to combat developments like the nazi shit happening in our society. Or things like that. The ecology view of life and all that stuff. For myself I wish a bit more respect, acceptance and the gigs in countries, I´ve never been so far. Be more conscious, be more fair, be more respectful, stay psychedelic.

www.interzone-pa.com
babaganousha.net
Z.alpha.antagon on facebook
alphas.crazy.sounds on facebook
alpha on Twitch
alpha on mixcloud

„Extreme music or fast music is not the problem. But it can become a problem, when every track is sounding similar to the other. Like Prog. Like Full On. Like TV.“