Heart-shaped Talk with 9West

Thessalonikian Tikis & George or better known as 9West is a longstanding DJ and producer duo since the late ‘90s. They already released on some fine imprints like Dessous, Liebe*Detail and Music gewinnt Freunde amongst others and their debut album Heart Shaped Moon just saw the light of day recently via renowned Klik Records. We caught 9West for a brief EDHID chat. Enjoy!

Hi Tikis and George! When was your first contact with music what role did it take during your adolescence?
Hi there! From the early years of our childhood we both had significant contact and interaction with music. In high school years we started out by playing with experimental and rock bands. In early 90’s along with the appearance of electronic music in our country, we were excited and we started collecting and play vinyl around 1995. Few years later, we bought our first musical equiptment resulting in our first release in early ‘00s.

Would you underline a special club at which you learnt the craft of DJing, i.e. bending an arc of suspense over the night?
All of our so called ‘training’ was totally underground in private parties with our friends. Of course, we can always name some of our local clubs and bars that support us and give us the chance to prove ourselves such as Decadance, Fix club, Alisida, Elvis Bar, Loft club amongst others.

Comparing your DJing and live performances, do both have a common sound aesthetic
Both have the same origins and thus a common sound aesthetic and of course in both cases our aim is to pull a feeling via a concept of our music with the resources at hand.

How about your respective roles together in the studio? Do you have a favourite analogue gear that you use at every production?
We have established a common ground when it comes to produce music and thus it’s easy for us to work together on the same project (even from distance). We are using mostly Groovebox at this time and Oran compressor.

You released your debut album Heart Shaped Moon on Greek label Klik Records. What made you feel that the timing is right for a long-player and what sound aesthetic did you aim for?
After seven years of hard and long working hours and mainly releasing tracks in Summer 2013, we decided to create a more concrete work. In this album we wanted coherence, not just a gathering of tracks. We planned our theme by shaping the atmosphere in our studio in such a manner so as to get our aimed sound aesthetic. For the same reason, we used the same drum sets and adjustments; we maintained a general setting in the bass and some of our basic sounds during the whole album.

Do you prefer the creative process of working alone or would you like to do more collaboration in future?
Collaboration is usually very interesting since it is a way to express another artist’s idea from your point of view or to hear your work from a different aspect.

How did the economic situation in Greece affect the underground music scene. Do you think that external limitations benefit the creativity of people involved?
The history has shown that in times of economic crisis many creative ways of expression have flourished, in many situations when you have nothing to lose, you simply let yourself free to what you mostly love and if there is a respective talent then no limitations exist. 

How important is social media and video for music promotion nowadays?
Nowadays in particular social media is part of our lives, and are definitely a powerful way to promote your music. However, live performances are those that make the difference in the end when it comes to promote your music along with your own feeling.

What’s next for 9West?
We have some live acts scheduled and we are now working for our next album and on some new remixes. We are also running a new project called ‘Tesla noise’ in order to express different ideas from 9West. In this project we mainly focus on experimenting more with techno.

9 West on Soundcloud