“There is another album coming out soon, in May or June, of international artists who are going to make remixes of our original tracks from the No Drama album,” continues Henneberg. “They bring their own style to our music; some will add vocals to our melody lines.” The artists involved in this remix album feature a tightly wound curation of like-minded musicians: DJ Pierre, Yousef, Agaric, Rick Wade, Italoboyz, Hans Nieswandt (from Whirlpool Productions), Of Norway, David Keno, Kidmammoth, Smash TV, The Micronaut, ZDS, Bruno Furlan, Commander Love and Helms all make an appearance.
No Drama – featuring traces of downbeat, trip hop, jazz and funk positioned next to club-friendly tracks alludes to a sense of euphoria, while also holding on to a more melancholy undertone. “It’s not happy,” describes Henneberg. “It’s electronic dance techno. We try to create a positive vibe for the dance floor without sounding happy; it’s also dark.”
Although they live in different cities, the two have run their own label, Voltage Musique, for 13 years. However, geographic limitations have never been a problem for The Glitz. “We found each other in the early days of the internet – at the beginning. We were in a chat room,” says Nitsch. The two were early adopters of chat rooms, finding each other through a mutual love of house and techno music. “We have been in the music scene since the ’90s. We were both DJs and we started recording together as The Glitz in 2007.”
Why did they call themselves The Glitz? “In the beginning we looked for a name and we were thinking we might become a band,” answers Nitsch. Turning themselves into a band is still on the cards, but Henneberg says there’s no rush. Right now they are approaching something in between, as they often have live musicians accompanying their DJ sets. “We are not afraid of it. We can be a band project, but we are more like a DJ hybrid. In the last three to five years people are seeing us more in the context of a band because we have instruments on stage. We are singing lyrics; we create special effects with live drums.” He says they mostly play their own material – some of it unreleased, and occasionally tracks from other artists. “Both of us are DJs in our hearts and we like to add some spice, bring in other instruments so we sound new.”
“We are influenced by different types of music,” says Nitsch. “Andreas comes from a techno, heavy metal background and Berlin techno. My influences are old school. We are DJs in our hearts. We like to play what we produce when we’re working on dance floors. The Glitz is different from song to song.” Their music is certainly eclectic. On one of the No Drama tracks, there’s the riff of an old Engelbert Humperdinck song called My Cherie Amour that is sampled and manipulated until it barely resembles the original.
When they’re doing a gig, do they ever get the urge to put the turntables on autopilot and hit the dance floor themselves? “No,” says Henneberg. “When we’re playing we don’t want to be on the dance floor. DJing is kind of a passion. Especially when you don’t know what’s coming. You’re creating a vibe. And you’re catching a vibe. The crowd is choosing the music. You have to play the right record at the right time; you have to interact. If you had a prepared DJ set, it wouldn’t work. It gets harder the bigger the event. When you’re doing a small club and you’ve only got ten metres of space and the people are ten centimetres away from your face, it’s pretty easy to read the crowd. In our genre it’s quite important to read the crowds – to create a special vibe. At big events like festivals, you can’t do that easily with a crowd of ten thousand people.”
As they prepare to hit Melbourne, the duo are equally excited for performing as they are discovering new music. “The whole Australian techno [and] electronic scene is not well known in Europe,” observes Henneberg. “There will be a lot of interesting DJs at Chi Wow Wah Town.”
BY LIZA DEZFOULI
