Interview with Lani

Rock´n´Rolling Psytrance from Belgium

Author: Sideffect
Date: May 30, 2007
Views: 7472

LANI INTERVIEW (psynews.org)

Artists: Tim Kaelen & Tom Moons
By: Sideffect



Sideffect: Before to speak about music, can you give us some personal info of yourself in order to know you better? (Name, age, nationality, studies, hobbies or passion…)

Lani: We are Tim Kaelen (29) and Tom Moons (30) , and we are both born and raised in Belgium , Tim was in regular life a computer engineer and Tom an electrician but our hobbies where always related to music , Tim was programming everything that made noise and Tom was playing on everything that did that amazing thing ..... i think we both dedicated our lives to music even before we realized it ourselves ....

Sideffect: How and when did the Lani project really start producing? For which reasons did you originally choose to produce psychedelic trance music instead of another genre?

Lani: Well we started to produce somewhere around 2001 , Tom was dj-ing for some years in the PSYCHEDELIC scene and all of the sudden when audio came in the computer world the feeling disappeared from the trance , at least that’s what we felt back in the days , and we met at a trance party , we came together and… boom.. from the first rehearsal we knew it was special. We also used all our money to put up a real live act , we loved computers in those days but they weren´t as suited for a live act as now , and Tim came up with AKAI samplers and Tom brought in guitars and synths , it took us a while to get the sound there but the real feeling on stage was there from the first second and that was exactly what we were looking for ....

Sideffect: Your two first releases, were both released on KAIROO Records . How did happen, at that time, the contact with KAIROO Records?

Lani: Around this time the only psychedelic trance shop in Belgium was closing its doors and Sven (the shop manager) and Tom decided to start up a record store to support the scene and provide ourselves from the black gold called vinyl, it was pretty hard to find back then , with nothing there we also decided to put up a platform for New Belgian artists for releasing their records , the first act we produced was Lani , and because of the success in Belgium for Lani, Sven had to handle the shop all alone and decided to get some help from his friend Bart. Pretty rough times if you realize that everybody downloaded music, but we said to ourselves that the music industry was at one of the worst points in history so it could only get better ....

Sideffect: Let´s talk about your first and high quality album, `Our way to the sun´, released back in 2004. It got a very positive reception and was much appreciated by the fans and the goa community. How do you explain yourself this success? How much time did you spend to produce it? And finally, something that remains a mystery for all of us: who did create this wonderful and well-inspired album cover?

Lani: We worked on our first album from 2001 till 2004 but it was more of a learning process for sounds and ideas , if you know that Tom could only use the internet and Word in those days and for Tim trance went very musical, we had to educate ourselves as much as possible , being the first act in a country with global ambitions we worked about 18 hours a day , sometimes we even did shifts in the studio so that it was in use 24/7, looking back at it it sounds a bit nuts, but there \'s always somebody out there working harder we thought ....in the end of the production we met Xerox a well known artist from Israel and he supported us with some tips , but it was still a learning process in production , the fact is though that `our way to the sun´ was straight and pure from the heart no influences what so ever .... and it was as you said very well received in the oldskool scene and in our country too ....

Sideffect: What kind of equipment do you use for your productions?

Lani: Most of the ideas start on the computer, we’re using 2 Pentium 4’s now, both equipped with logic 5.5 and the usual plug-ins. We then start adding stuff with hardware : Korg Triton , Nord Modular G2, Access Virus Indigo 2, Alesis Andromeda, Yamaha AN1X, Ibanez and Washburn guitars and Roland V-Drum. For the live-act we also use the Akai MPC4000, MPC2500 and the Z4, giving us a total of 1 GB of RAM sampling space, but we can always reload during the live-act when that’s not enough. The mixer we use is a Midas Venice 32 channel. Echo Indigo I/O and RME Hammerfall soundcards and T.C. Electronics Fireworx, D2, M-one and Triple-C outboard gear.

Sideffect: Did you feel any pressure, being the first Belgian goa artist to release a full album ? How did you experience that ?

Lani: It was great to be the first, for sure it was an amazing experience, people supported us a lot also because we were djs for a long time and we felt like we finally contributed to music in general. The scene in Belgium was amazingly supportive and also from the german side, especially the south, we got a lot of support . Finishing a first album was for our parents and family also a sign that we actually were working on our project instead of using substances of a strange kind to enlighten the future, so getting them to support us helped us in a positive direction for the future ...



Sideffect: How do you describe and define yourself your style and your almost `scientific´ approach of your music? In which genre do you classify them?

Lani: We like to call our style ROCK’ n’ ROLL trance , because we jam on stage for many hours, do remixes from everything we have loaded in the samplers and we also have a new drummer who is certainly a huge addition to the live aspect. In the live even a track from 135 bpm can blow the roof off the building because we can built it as strong as we like. But also off stage Lani is Rock’n’roll all the way , we love to party and hang out with friends, for us music is also about meeting people and staying after the gig to have some fun and enjoy life…

Sideffect: Concerning now your future projects, a question that your fans are burning to ask you: when is your 3rd album approximately going to see the light? Did you already finish some tracks? What kind of genre will it be? and what about your 2nd one .....???

Lani: The second one was released in April 2006 and was called: `The reincarnation of jhonny looloo and the seven cosmic sisters´. The album was very well received and we even had the chance to put it on vinyl too, our first LP which meant a lot to us!! we played thru Europe and got interest , the people got more confident about our sound and the production , internationally seen this was a great success for us , we also did a Remix from the gothic classic `temple of love´ from the sisters of mercy which we secretly released only on vinyl in those days it actually a cover because we played all the riffs ourselves and all no samples except for ofra haza s beautiful voice (RIP) this together with our second album got us going for gigs all over Europe and also at the soulclipse festival in Turkey ....

The 3 rd album hasn’t really got a set release date yet… We are working on it now but we learned a lot and got new influences like elektro , bossa nova , samba , rock , and the discovery of funk soul and a little jazz , Tom has been travelling thru brazil the country of groove and rythm and learned a lot there , also Tim built in this time a new Studio , fully equiped with new monitors and very very sound accurate acoustics , the genre will be the Lani genre, we do something else, our style , we don’t know ourselves yet but it will be more extreme , the tempo and the music and everything also the sound of course , and we really don’t know yet what is going to happen but it will be very special and new sound , no more compromises on any level .....

We are planning a compilation somewhere before the summer of 2007 which will contain some new Lani tracks. These tracks are already finished and we don’t want to keep our fans waiting, so we release them on a compilation and on vinyl. These tracks are more dancefloor orientated and have proven dancefloor filler quality ;)


Sideffect: What are your favorite psychedelic trance groups or tracks? And why? Is there a particular artist you would like to collaborate with?

Tom: The guys at Spun Records are pleasing me the most on the dancefloor , the quality and the fun factor is very important for them and I really enjoy having fun on a party , also their new direction with elektro influences inspired me a lot, besides that I really look forward to the new Xerox and illumination album `the beast within´ , Mfg has Always been one of the masters for me , their new album is called `Message from god´ , check it out people , if you dare ..... we where there in 1996 and were here now and they can tell stories and scare the shit out of you ... we also made a remix with LANI to my personal number one hit of all times BIOCANDY from Chi-Ad… I hear he´s also working on something new…

Tim : I was always a big fan of the Hommega sound, tight production and dancefloor fillers. Astrix has always been one of my favourite musicians, very subtle, he definitely is one of the best. I’m also a big fan of protoculture, easy flowing, yet very effective on the dancefloor, respect. The main reason they are my favorite artists is because of the level of production, top class, and definitely a huge step forward for electronic music, this sound is the future, no doubt.

Sideffect: What other kind of electronic /non-electronic music do you like listening to? Any particular artists?

Lani: We listen to all kind of music , we like TOOL a lot, but also Jack Johnson , Donovan Frankerreiter (more soft but very funky guitars ) Underworld, Metallica, Dj marko @La Rocca and progressive trance (Tom also dj´s as Jack Bauer with gigs coming up at international festivals like Waldfrieden) Tom really loves to put vinyl out there and the quality stays on vinyl better, the music released on vinyl is always top quality .... we could say that Tim is a Gearfreak and Tom is a vinyl junk hehe .... Tim listens a lot to downtempo music and is a big fan of the early days electronic musicians like µ-ziq (check it out, really great music), Orbital, Plasticman, Leftfield, Depeche Mode, … He also likes to listen to bands that combine electronics with rock music like Garbage, Goose and even the new stuff from Madonna (yeah, Madonna, but veeeeery innovative music)…


Sideffect: What´s your feeling about the actual trance scene? Are you confident about the hypothetic goa resurrection?

First of all we think that goa has evolved in to a more understandable form of electronic music, you have the progressive side, the full-on side and the dark side and goa seems to be a thing from the past. Some cling on to it, but it is slowly fading away, having few adepts, trying to keep the vibe alive. We think the scene right now is exploring its boundaries and you can hear influences from psytrance in other kinds of music, it’s the sound of the future, electronic music has always been inspired by the kind of synthesizers that were made, but nowadays everybody can own a fully equipped studio by just using a computer with the right software, you don´t need a lot of $$$ to make music. Psytrance is the first music style that makes full use of the computer and is therefore light years ahead of all other electronic music genres. In the near future more and more music styles will be influenced by this kind of music.


Sideffect: At the same time, do you think personally that you can bring something new to this musical genre? What kind of evolution will happen, according to you, to the psychedelic music?

Lani: Well, people should play more live or call what they do something else, because people expect a live act, sometimes pay a lot of entrance for it and see most of the time nothing but darkness on stage, for the trancers this is cool but for new people this is boring, so the scene is only getting smaller in the end and gets less support and is maybe heading to a downfall, we would love to see some more acts play real live acts like us or Son Kite and some out there are entertaining the crowd for every cent they paid for .... At least try to put on a show on stage…

Sideffect: And last question, what would you like to tell to your fans?

Lani: Thanx for all the support over the last 5 years and we hope to see you soon at a bar somewhere in the universe, for fun, beers and an occasional Jagermeister hehehe........ Keep op rocking!!!

Sideffect: Thanks a lot for this interview and all those interesting answers. And, of course, good luck for your upcoming projects!

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