Claptone: ‘I want them to experience a proper escape from reality’
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07.11.2022

Claptone: ‘I want them to experience a proper escape from reality’

Claptone
Words by Christine Lan

Revered German artist Claptone is an inimitable figure. With his Venetian-inspired black top hat, golden plague doctor-style beaked mask and white magician-type gloves, the depth and breadth of meaning that emanates from both his striking aesthetic and captivating sonic universe is undeniably compelling.

The enigmatic electronic music producer isn’t really one person at all, but multiple DJs who perform under the same masked moniker. It’s an intentionally mysterious aesthetic that illuminates the interweaving of history and culture, social traditions and identity, power structures, humanity and nature, and is open to interpretation. This is because Claptone, as a singular identity, wants audiences to bring their own ideas and perspectives to the participatory and connective experience. 

Read Melbourne’s most comprehensive range of music features and interviews here.

Claptone’s sonic world of house music is expansive, deep, colourful, spell-binding and atmospheric. For him, the experience of taking his music and art to different cultures across Asia, Europe and America has been the most transformative aspect.

“It’s such an enlightening experience, to be honest, to be out with the people at the parties and events,” says Claptone. “It shows me that the world should be one, but it’s divided in nationalities, hatred, disrespect and cliches. The people I attract with the music are peaceful, clever, easy to be friends with and great to talk to. It’s also the environment of the music that makes them that way. But to me it always paints the picture that the world can be like that, and it’s a bit sad that it’s not like that. I’ve played everywhere and it’s always great. I could unite the planet. I should maybe do that and be the first person to do that through my music.”

Awarded the highest house DJ position in DJ Mag’s celebrated Top 100 DJs Poll, the music of Claptone illuminates the endless possibilities of sound and music. Alongside his own mind-expanding studio work, the DJ has already created brilliant remixes for influential artists and bands, including New Order, Gorillaz, Depeche Mode, Faithless, Dua Lipa and Elton John. 

Claptone

“When Elton John and Dua Lipa knock on your door and ask you to remix their song – there’s nothing better in life for me because I appreciate their work so much,” says Claptone. “It’s the same with Depeche Mode or New Order. The other way around too – I had the honour of the Pet Shop Boys remix ‘Queen of Ice’. To me, that was mind-blowing that they would remix a song of mine and we’re going to put that out on vinyl for Black Friday Record Store Day in November. 

“That’s the best part of the job – to be so close to your musical idols and be able to collaborate with them or at least work on their compositions and bring them to my dancefloor, but also other DJs’ dancefloors and translate their music to what’s happening now. It’s so exciting to work for these legends and have legends remix you and just be intervened with the almighty realm of music.”

Claptone’s monumental season of performing ‘The Masquerade’ at the world’s most exciting club, Pacha, in Ibiza was particularly memorable. “The season in Ibiza was super amazing,” Claptone enthuses. “It was 22 weeks of every Saturday – the Masquerade at Pacha Ibiza. I still have withdrawals, to be honest, because it was so good and when you’re used to it every Saturday, you’re like “I’m missing something”. The layout of the club is great; they have amazing dancers and performers, and we came up with great costumer designers.”

Claptone will bring his magnificent ‘The Masquerade’ River Day Party to St Kilda on the 19th of November, which harnesses an amazing event concept to acrobats and an incredible range of performers, including guests Late Nite Tuff Guy, Torren Foote, Casey Leaver and Sasha Fern. 

“I want to give the people a proper journey with music that kind of fits together, but is not always the same,” says Claptone. 

“I want them to experience a proper escape from reality where they choose to wear a mask or just be enlightened by performances of masked performers, doing fire-eating or dancing – something that’s out of the box and you might not expect at a party like that.”

“And for people who decide to not come with a mask, we also hand out masks at the masquerade, so they can then get a mask if they’re quick enough and gain the experience of perceiving the world through a mask. It’s hard to predict what I’ll play, but it’s always connected to the Ibiza and tracks over the years – the remixes and classic Claptone tracks in different versions and brand-new house music.”

The masterful electronic music producer has collaborated with a diverse range of vocalists and artists, including Peter, Bjorn and John, Seal, Laura Bettinson, Barry Manilow and Nathan Nicholson. “To me, voices are always inspiring because I just write musical ideas and melodies and when I send them to a vocalist or I have a vocalist sing on them, it opens new ideas for me,” says Claptone. “Mostly I write new melodies to their vocal lines later on and again that’s so inspiring that I scrap everything that I had before and just do new music to that. As long as they’re not generic – they need to be unique and strong.”

Claptone describes house music as a state of mind. To him, his debut studio album Charmer (2015) brought the mystical; Fantast (2018) was more concerned with nature and escapism; and Closer (2021) articulated the joys and pains of being human, and the quest to find one’s soul. 

“If we’re honest, we find ourselves in communicating with others or at least we find out more about ourselves when we talk with others,” Claptone muses. “For me I think it’s a journey out of the shadows of basically being a bit more shy and being a bit more mystic to talking more directly with people.” 

Claptone

To Claptone, his music is also a performance art project and demonstrative of his love of visual mood pieces and short film storytelling. “I have specific ideas of how visuals need to look for my show that extend to the performers for ‘The Masquerade’,” says Claptone. “I have a word in designing or giving ideas for the costumes. Everything resolves around the mask and there’s always a visual connection to the mask and a strong visual element that I need to find new ideas around and I enjoy that.”

His incessant passion for new ideas is palpable. Claptone had been in the studio for numerous hours up until our zoom meeting before travelling to his sold-out performances, which include Amsterdam, Mexico City and Chile. “The focus is to bring Masquerade to other countries,” says Claptone. “The idea was to cover the summer in Ibiza and build up the brand even more and it was really successful. I’ll also be in London where I have the Halloween Masquerade, and in Argentina with Fat Boy Slim with 18,000 people, so I think it’s the biggest Masquerade ever done and I’m super excited about it. 

“I did a masquerade there before and it was amazing,” Claptone enthuses about this previous Australian tour. “The memories are great and still in my mind. I really miss the country – it’s such a beautiful country you guys have. It’s a shame I can’t stay for long – only a weekend this time, but hopefully I’ll be back for a bit longer next year. The main plan is to really bring the Masquerade out until the end of the year and also next year and come back to Ibiza and do another season there.”

Claptone will bring The Masquerade to the Riva in St Kilda as part of ALWAYS LIVE on November 19. Buy tickets here.