SVANAPAPER » Montreal

Tiga: More than just an ordinary Montreal DJ/producer

Dorothy T. — Thu, 07 Nov 2013 15:36:55 +0000

Tiga James Sontag is a man with fingers in many EDM pies. Inspired by the rave culture in Goa, India, he was exposed to in his earlier years, Tiga was influential in establishing the underground EDM club scene in his native Montreal. After running an also influential record store, he now manages other DJs and producers, hosts a show on BBC Radio 6 called “My Name is Tiga” and his own career as a DJ/producer is stronger than ever. Oh, and heś also a one-time film star. SVANAPAPER got the chance to sit down with the pie-poking man himself for a quick chat before his memorable set at Unknown Festival a while back.

Known for his unique sound that combines camp electro with an almost bleak techno streak, and of course the matching 80s metrosexual aesthetic, Tiga is a quiet and polite individual in person. In a career spanning two decades, Tiga has worked with many and varied DJs and producers, and thats where our conversation starts. Tiga pauses for a moment and says thoughtfully, “well I think they’re always friends, or at least they become friends”. Unlike many successful producers, Tiga sees collaboration as an opportunity for greater fame or fortune. Instead, he picks collaborators from who he gets a positive vibe, a sense of potential friendship working well as a professional and personal team. Key to this is whether their respective styles complement each other, something Tiga has found with long term collaborator, Jesper Dahlback. “We’ve worked together so long were like a married couple – he knows what I want, I know what he wants”.

Despite such a loyal, long term partnership, Tiga stresses that he doesn’t like to work with the same people too much, but is always looking for new inspirations “…that get me excited, bring back that feeling of being a little kid”. Keeping up with the latest sounds and artists pushing the boundaries of electronic music is normal fare when running your own underground record label (Tiga’s Turbo Recordings has released music from the likes of Boys Noize, Gesaffelstein, ZZT and Brodinski) but this sounds a bit like a throwaway line, so I press him for specifics. What is getting him excited right now, his current inspiration? “It’s a puzzle I’m trying to solve, how to make big dancey electro that doesn’t sound obnoxious, and infuse it with a bit of techno.”

Tiga’s certainly on the way to achieving that with his latest single ‘Let’s Go Dancing’. It’s a collaboration between himself and Matthew Dear aka Audion, who also helped out on ‘Plush’, the 2012 single from his eponymous ‘Tiga Non Stop’ Mix CD. Reminiscent of Kraftwerk’s Autobahn, ‘Dancing’ overlays Tiga’s quintessential deadpan lyric delivery with an analogue synth and techno-pop soundscape. Not that punters needed any encouragement to dance during his uniquely slick set, Tiga spun ‘Let’s Go Dancing’ a couple of times during his slot at Unknown.

Performing on the Pool Stage at the inaugural Unknown Festival in Rovinj, Croatia, Tiga was an interesting choice by the organisers, whose previous individual endeavours include Field Day, The Warehouse Project and Hideout Festival. Tiga didnt fit neatly either of the UK-centric or party-pop leanings of the lineup, but was all about the music itself. With a panel at this years Amsterdam Dance Event discussing the negative effects of the commercialisation of dance music, and a discography prioritising quality and experimentation over quantity, Tiga is a DJś DJ and in it for the long haul. [Beka]

You can catch Tiga in Australia this November:

Fri 22nd – The Imperial, Sydney
Sat 23rd (Day) – Royal Melbourne Hotel, Melbourne
Sat 23rd (Night) – The Met, Brisbane
Sun 24th – Strawberry Fields Festival, Melbourne

The Next Big Thing (No.25) : Suuns

Alcander Alonzo — Sat, 03 Aug 2013 04:56:51 +0000

When Glastonbury 2013 was about to kick off, We went through pages of NME Magazine then we checked out some recommended new bands that you’ve got to see for this year’s Glasto. There were MSMR, Temples, the Strypes, and some other names that we have featured for #TheNextBigThing. Then we found Suuns, Montreal’s neo-psychedelic band who have been touring around Europe and performing in the world’s finest music festival.

Suuns were originally formed in 2006. It was Ben Shemie (vocals/guitar) and Joe Yarmush (bass) who started creating the music. They were actually just hooking up to create some tunes and then it led to write a few songs. Later then, Liam O’Neill (drums) and Max Hendry (keyboard) joined the duo to complete the formation of the band. Four years later, the band did a debut album via BreakGlass Studio. The debut is produced by Jace Lasek and it got praised by New York Times. In 2011, Suuns were busy to do their debut performances in some festivals like SXSW, Primavera, and being here-there-and everywhere for Canadian music festivals. And in 2012, Suuns signed with Secretly Canadian, the band started topping off the materials for their second album, ‘Images Du Futur’.

It took four years for the band to create their debut, Zeroes QC. The first album is full of krautwork, erratic guitar riffs and a bit of moody space-prog. Suuns claimed that their debut is just their documented music that they have to release. Being with no label at that time, the band things the materials were not really self-aware. For ‘Images Du Futur’, the band believe it is much sleeker, even Pitchfork is comparing their work with Radiohead and Velvet Underground. This album also gives out a thick sense of neo-psychedelic and darker ambiance, as you can hear in ‘Eddie’s Dream’.

Suuns’ latest work has been compared with some the best names in the industry and their music was labelled by some music journalists as the mini version of Clinic. They are even being told that they lack of originality on their music, but Shemie told Outofordermag.com “I think every band gets compared to other bands, especially when no one’s heard of you… And the Clinic one is the one that comes up the most, and I think that has a large part to do with the way that I sing.” Regarding their comparison with Clinic. The band’s name is taken from Tai words that means ‘Zero’, we definitely know that Suuns are not a new comer, and even though their name means Zero, we are sure they will be giving us more than zero through their music.

The Next Big Thing (No.19) : Half Moon Run

Alcander Alonzo — Sat, 22 Jun 2013 07:48:30 +0000

As we all know, when you are asked about the music in Canada, the first thing that will cross your mind might be Justin Bieber. That could be such a first world problem or first canadian’s problem, because Canada has so many great musicians like Arcade Fire, Feist, Purity Ring or the quirk Grimes. To enrich the list, that’s why we are about to bring up this week’s The Next Big Thing! We’ve got Half Moon Run, they are a Canadian folk trio from Montreal. The band consist of Devon Portielje (vocals, guitar, and percussion), Conner Molander (vocals, guitar, and keyboard), and Dylan Phillips (vocals, drums, and keyboard).

The band have been making music for about two years and the name ‘Half Moon Run’ was inspired by the name that represent the three of them, “The name means different things to us all the time, and we hope that our fans feel the same way. On the most basic level, ‘half moon run’ is of three words that we like hearing next to each other.”said Devon on the band’s name. Half Moon Run have released their debut album, titled ‘Dark Eyes’. The debut received great critics from magazines like NME and Spin. And the same thing also went to their debut single, ‘Full Circle’. Eventhough the band are mostly inspired by folk and electronic music, the band themselves describe them more into indie pop as well. In creating the album, the songwriting process is a collective way, where the bands bounce off some ideas and try to harmonize each other. One of the most interesting critics to Half Moon Run is, their music is compared to Radiohead, on this matter, Dylan responded “We feel that for sure that our influences come through in our sound, but we have many influences and I think we are all conscious that our sound is something unique. That has always kind of been the requirement for ourselves, we never write to imitate something”. And another interesting fact about the band is eventhough they don’t sound like they’ll clash off your speaker, they are a huge fan of Sepultura!

Half Moon Run’s work in harmonizing their music should be given an ‘A’. The balance that they produce is such a great satisfy to the music listeners, especially if you’re a fan of Fleet Foxes or Local Natives. The trio’s music displays a great virtue of how an indie rock-folk almost done amazingly. They have opened for Metric and Mumford and Sons, soon or later, they’ll get their own spotlight and blow up the catchiness harmony.