Back in 1996, a great perk of being a music journalist was being woken by the postman, him (or her) being unable to fit 12" slabs of vinyl, courtesy of various record and promotion companies, through the average suburban postbox. But one of the most memorable records of 1996 left outside this reporter's door in the snow was BT and Tori Amos' Blue Skies remixed by a variety of folks including Deep Dish and Rabbit in the Moon. And an up-and-coming bloke called Paul van Dyk.
Eleven years later, Paul van Dyk is one of the world's most lauded and awarded DJs. He has been named International DJ of the Year by BPM magazine, won a Mexican Oscar for his soundtrack to the film Zurdo, and does close to 120 gigs a year, mostly overseas outside of his native (formerly East) Germany. He is playing in Seoul tonight and Tokyo tomorrow, ahead of his gig at Taipei's Luxy on Sunday night.
PHOTO: COURTESY OF THE LOOP
But for all the fame, he has not forgotten the political and cultural pulse-wave that affected the world after the Berlin Wall came down in 1989, just three years before his first release Perfect Day.
"I think we should engage with places like China. There's two different markets, with the Chinese on the one hand and the Westerners who are increasingly living there because of business," Van Dyk said by phone from Berlin. "It puts a lot of different cultures on the table. And dance music is a global phenomenon."
As the first electronic artist to be involved in the 2004 Rock the Vote campaign, which encouraged American youths to use their vote, Van Dyk demonstrates that dance music can be up there with crusty old rockers when it comes to political activism. But he doesn't just believe in swanning in to other people's countries wearing big sunglasses and moralizing. He believes that thinking globally has to be accompanied by local activism.
"Democracy starts in your own neighborhood," he said. "But then local actions can — and do — impact globally. Dance music culture reaches people's hearts, it gets into their homes, it connects them with other people across the globe. You have to get them thinking, and then they can change things in their own back yard."
As an example, Van Dyk cites his involvement in a protest action that lobbied the German government not to sell arms to China.
"It created a huge outrage," Van Dyk recalls. "People didn't want the government to sell arms that could be used against an established democracy like Taiwan. And in the end, through pressure from people on the ground, the government didn't sell weapons to China."
Though the German DJ advocates activism, he doesn't favor anarchy.
"Growing up in East Germany under the communist regime, I don't take democracy for granted," he said. "We have to re-center human beings in global capitalism. But that doesn't mean I agree with trying to break up, for example, the annual G8 meetings. For all they are, these guys are the only ones trying to put rules onto the bullshit of globalization."
Busy saving the world and entertaining, Van Dyk has to dash at the end of our interview. Suddenly he remembers we haven't discussed his new album, In Between, which goes on release in August. As loquacious as he is about politics, he is surprisingly brief when it comes to self promotion. "Jessica Sutter [from the Pussycat Dolls] is on one track. David Byrne is on another. And it's all 100 percent pure Paul van Dyk."
Review copies are not out yet, so the Taipei Times can't tell you what it's like. But we're eagerly awaiting the postman's knock.
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