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“I’m almost ashamed to be known as a DJ”: Dave Clarke criticizes current dance music industry
For techno veteran Dave Clarke, the modern DJ world has taken a turn he’s not fully embracing. In a recent interview with Music Radar, the iconic ’90s figure lamented what he sees as too much focus on flamboyant performances rather than skilled DJing and good music.
For ’90s techno figurehead Dave Clarke, however, being a DJ now is a significantly different experience from how it was back in the day – and not necessarily for the better. Speaking to Music Radar around the 30th-anniversary reissue of his seminal Archive One album and Red EP series, the ever-quotable Clarke described a shift in the perception of how people view DJs in recent years.
“I’ve gone through phases in my life of being really proud to be a DJ, I’m sort of in a phase now where I’m almost ashamed to be known as a DJ,” Clarke tells Music Radar. “There’s so much light on stage and they’re all dancing – I’ve got nothing against people dancing but it’s just that the performance is more important than the music. We’re sort of in a strange era where there are way too many people that call themselves DJs.“
However, Clarke is optimistic that this wave of style-over-substance showmanship will inevitably course correct, much like how the new wave emerged from the punk rock explosion of the 80s. “You’ll end up with what happened after punk, which was new wave, which is sort of arty and more interesting with more depth. At least that’s what I hope.”
Elsewhere in the interview, Clarke describes the studio gear and the challenges involved in producing techno in the mid-’90s, as well as relating his philosophy for tackling remixes. Check out the complete interview down below.
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