i:Vibes has recently interviewed Claus Terhoeven, who is momentarily on the roll with his massive single 'What You Need'. He is also half of the renowned Cosmic Gate duo, which has recently returned in full glory with a new album, remixes etcetera. If you fancy getting to know more about Nic's interesting career, then do click in...
Early last year, Nic Chagall's very first solo single 'Monday Bar' suddenly appeared on the High Contrast label. Being a gem in its very own distinct way, it was picked up by a whole array of jocks, kickstarting Nic's solo career like no other.
It took about a year for the second single to be released, but of course that had its reasons. In the meantime, Nic was completing a brand new Cosmic Gate album together with Stefan Bossems aka Bossi, which hit the shelves in September '06. Up until now. a few single releases from this album have seen the light of day, with 'Analog Feel' being the most recent. Remix-wise, Cosmic Gate is back on track with interpretations for Armin van Buuren vs. Rank 1 and Kirsty Hawkshaw.
A combination of Nic's growing solo career and the 'return' of Cosmic Gate served as great reasons to conduct an interview. Here it is!
i:Vibes: To kick things off on the personal side of things a bit; where do your musical roots come from?
A: My interest in music already began in my childhood. My parents' love for classical music made me seeing and hearing loads of operas and classic concerts and really early I also fell in love with these melancholic and wonderful melodies. So music was always very important in my life. In the eighties, when I grew up, I got infected by club music as the Chicago House Sound and Acid House and started mixing my own tapes every day after school… again and again :) Later on, in the 90´s, I got flashed by the sound of labels like IQ or Harthouse. I think, since then I am lost in trance music. The releases these days were absolutely amazing and outstanding and influenced me very strong.
i:Vibes: You live in Germany. How would you compare the dance scene there with the scenes in other European countries?
A: That´s hard to say… when you talk about the trance scene, we have kind of hard times now here in Germany. But talking about house and electro, the scene is really big and we got loads of young talented djs and producers coming up. Comparing to this, the trance scene is a bit small right now. But that´s ok, 'cause this way the scene can recover itself from the trance-boom we had years ago and can come up with fresh and good quality stuff. When you look to the house and electro scene, it is so much influenced by trance and loads of trance stuff is influenced by electro. So the scences are not so far away from each other and that´s good, cause something fresh and new can grow.
i:Vibes: Last year, you released ‘Monday Bar’ under your own name on the High Contrast imprint, being the first solo single under your Nic Chagall guise. What exactly made you decide to ‘go solo’ on this one?
A: You know, when I started producing, I had a studio with some other guys and never found the time to do some solo stuff. I always worked together with other people… but every now and then, I thought about to do a solo production. Two years ago I built a new studio in my house and finally took my time to do my own single… and I came up with Monday bar :)
i:Vibes: How would you describe the sound that Nic Chagall produces? I.e., what do you try to ‘accomplish’ with your productions?
A: That´s not easy to categorize… for sure, it´s trance and progressive... but as I like different electronic styles and they all get mixed up right now, it´s really hard to say. As you see in the mixes for my last single What You Need or the remix, I did for Wippenberg, they are all different. So I don´t wanna do the same thing again and again. That would be really boring.
i:Vibes: Your latest release ‘What You Need’ is loaded with guitar melodies and features a great use of male vocals. When hearing it, many people refer to contemporary rock bands like Coldplay, the Killers etcetera. What or who have been your main influences in producing this track?
A: This came up step by step during the production of the track. For sure I absolutely love bands like the Killers or Coldplay. When I started producing it, I was playing a bit with this guitar sound and suddenly played this melody. First I wanted to do an instrumental track again, but then I thought, vocals would be perfect for this one. So it developed more and more… and in the end I even decided to give it a whole acoustic feel with acoustic drums etc. and luckily my record company Be Yourself also loved it :)
i:Vibes: The melancholic vocals and acoustic parts of ‘What You Need’ quite stand out from other tracks circulating nowadays. ‘Monday Bar’ also suits this style rather nicely. Do you see yourself producing non-dance tracks with similar ingredients in the near future?
A: For sure I will try to produce more stuff in this direction. The combination of rock and electronic music is absolutely exciting. But I think in the near future, my production will always have a dance-character. As for example the original mix of what you need can be played in a dj set or in the radio as well.
i:Vibes: ‘What You Need’ is co-written by Ned Bigham & Richard Walters, and features the vocals of Elliot Johns. According to their discographies, they have also worked together with Marco V on his 200V album. Is it a coincidence that both Marco and you have worked with these guys, or were you introduced to them in some sort of way?
A: Yeah… when I sent over my first instrumental demo of WYN to Be Yourself and said, I wanna put some vocals on it, they came up with the idea to make a feature with Elliot Johns. As I already loved his voice on Marco's track, I was really pleased with this idea :)
i:Vibes: The full release of WYN contains a total of four mixes, all coming from your hands. Which one is your personal favorite and why?
A: I definitely like all of them, otherwise I wouldnt have done them the way they are :) but my favourite is the original mix, as it was the first time, I made a track like this. And I really like it, that you can still play it in a club, even if it´s not a typical club track.
i:Vibes: Some interesting remixes have also appeared from your hands recently, including interpretations of Wippenberg’s ‘Promisedland’ and Perpetuous Dreamer’s ‘Sound of Goodbye’. The first one has a rather ‘minimal’ feel coming with it, especially compared with the two singles you have released until now. Why is this?
A: I like club music from trance to progressive and electro to techno. So you will find these influences in all my productions. I don´t wanna be bound to do the same again and again. When I went into the studio to do this remix for Wippenberg, I didn´t have something special in mind. I just did it the way I liked it :)
i:Vibes: It can be said that all your Nic Chagall productions have been highly successful, gaining plays from almost every trance jock out there. You must be feeling really content with what you’ve achieved. What were your expectations prior to releasing both ‘Monday Bar’ and ‘What You Need’? Were you prepared for reactions this size?
A: No, you can never be prepared to the reaction of other people :) You never know, if they feel the same as you. These productions were the first ones, where no one was sitting beside me and giving me direct feedback to every sound or arrangement. So I am really, really happy about the good feedback :)
i:Vibes: Of course, an interview with you wouldn’t really be complete without talking about Cosmic Gate as well. You and Stefan have recently released your new album ‘Earth Mover’, which features quite the different sound than the Cosmic Gate we knew years ago. First of all, what made you change your sound so radically?
A: The impression, that we changed so radically is just based on the time between the new and the last album. It´s 4 years in between and in these years a lot happened in trance music. So it was a smooth process, that will hopefully continue and let us develop and move forward all the time. When you heard us playing our dj sets over the last years, the new album is not such a surprise. We absolutely loved the hard trance sound these days, but in our opinion, it would be bad to stand still. We even didn´t recognize the process ourselves. There was no point, where we said, let us change the sound of Cosmic Gate.
i:Vibes: The ‘old’ Cosmic Gate has always been associated with hardtrance. Your previous albums ‘The Drums’ and ‘No More Sleep’ are quite good examples of this statement. Hardtrance is rarely being made anymore these days, at least not in the amounts of releases we saw in 2001-2002. Why do you think this style has gradually disappeared from the scene? It can’t be because it was unsuccessful, because as far as I know it had a lot of fans…
A: Yeah, it absolutely had. I think, that the hard trance sound on one side got harder and harder and ended up in hardstyle and on the other side got either softer or got less melody and ended up in the so-called tech-trance. But that´s a normal process. It was so successful and got so many releases, that there was an overflow and in the end an overkill and the people searched for new things.
i:Vibes: It is interesting to see, though, that some of the tracks on your new album (‘Analog Feel’ and ‘Element of Life’, for example) and your recent remixes for Armin vs. Rank 1 and Kirsty Hawkshaw do still have a distinctly ‘harsh’ feel coming with them. I wouldn’t typify them as hardtrance, but they’re definitely harder than most of the stuff out there. Do you see a different crowd response when playing out these tunes compared with more ‘mellow’ trance numbers?
A: That´s, what I wanted to say. It´s still Cosmic Gate… but in 2007 :) not with these hard trance riffs, but we still try to produce tracks with power and tension. The reaction of the crowd is really good when we play these tracks and we are more than happy with the feedback, we get for the productions. It´s cool to see so many jocks playing the tunes :) I think harder tunes and more “mellow” tunes get the same reaction, if you play them the right time.
i:Vibes: Do you still experience the influence that you had with the ‘old’ Cosmic Gate sound? For instance, do people come up to you and ask for classic CG tunes during gigs? And if so, do you play them in your sets every now and then?
A: Yeah, for sure some people ask for some of our classic tracks. But that´s no problem. They were really important for us and so every now and then we play one. Even if it´s not so easy, cause nowadays they don´t really fit into our sets. That´s why we made a new edit of Human Beings, that we played at trance energy for example.
i:Vibes: In what way does Nic Chagall differ from Cosmic Gate? Does the sound of your DJ-sets differ significantly, for instance?
A: Maybe not significantly. But it definitely differs. When I play a Nic Chagall set, I play an even wider range of trance, progressive and electro-influenced tracks. It´s the same as with my solo productions. I don´t wanna be bound by borders. I think, the more variation your set includes, the more interesting it is.
i:Vibes: A few years back, you also released a solo track under your Encee guise. Is this guise going to return any time in the future?
A: Maybe… but so far I wanna concentrate on nic chagall and I also have loads of work with cosmic gate, that there will be no time for this for sure.
i:Vibes: Can you tell us what exactly you’re up to in the studio right now? Are there any interesting projects you would like to share with us? What’s being released in the near future? I just finished a new Nic Chagall remix for Vandit and am currently working on a new Nic Chagall single. I don´t wanna have another year again between the releases, as it was with Monday Bar and What you Need :)
Also this year we wanna do a new Cosmic Gate Back2Back Mix Compilation and start working on a new Cosmic Gate artist album. So loads of things to do! :)
We would like to thank Claus for his time! Thanks also fly out to Esther at Be Yourself Music for arranging things.
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