Talking To: Red Rack'em
Danny Berman has been producing and DJing for over 20 years. Not afraid to play and produce across a multitude of different genres, Berman is best known as his alias Red Rack’em.
I caught up with him ahead of the second installment of his Absolute Body Control club night, Berman’s first proper foray into the world of promoting since he moved back to the UK. Why did he choose now to start throwing parties?
“I moved from Berlin to Bristol in June 2018” he explains in his living room over a cup of herbal tea. A fire burns behind him bathing his impressive record collection in a cosy glow. “Berlin's got an amazing club scene and there's lots of opportunities there, but the venues tend to do most things in house. That means it’s actually quite hard to get a club night going there unless you have quite a lot of financial muscle.
“There also wasn’t really any need to do my own club night in Berlin as there were so many great places to play. You could play a few friendly venues twice a year and have a nice little circuit”
What would you like to achieve with Absolute Body Control?
I want to start taking it around the UK, playing in larger venues and putting together lineups that I love. I know so many DJs that are amazing but they don't really have any aspirations to be famous. They're the ones who always have the best music. If you really want to be a good DJ you have to work really hard to find the music, and that's a job in itself.
You’ve got Nathan Worm and Saeph playing on February 6th, why did you choose to book them?
Saeph is a guy called Connor Scoble, who’s from Saltash in Cornwall. He started coming to see me DJ in Bristol when I moved here and then I noticed he was in the crowd at other things I was going to as well. We were obviously into the same kind of stuff so we just kind of connected. He’s young, he’s a student, he's going through his musical journey and I can relate to that. I just thought, if I'm going to start something in Bristol, I want to include him because I can remember what it was like starting out. There were a lot of closed doors and I’m really grateful to all of the people who gave me a chance 20 years ago.
Nathan Worm is from Worm Disco Club. They do events all over Bristol and they also programmed a big jazz stage at Glastonbury called the Wormhole. I met him at the final Big Chill festival in 2009 and since I’ve moved to Bristol we’ve become really good friends, we’re actually neighbours which was a lovely surprise. He's a great guy and has great taste so it was a no brainer to invite him.
Something I love about Worm Disco Club is it’s all about the music. The people that go to their nights aren't totally wasted. They're quite a polite crowd which I find refreshing. I love hedonism and everything, but I want to do a night that’s about the music rather than how cool you are.
Why do you think there's so much substance abuse in electronic music?
People with substance abuse issues will fraternise with groups where it’s not noticed. I've met thousands of DJs at gigs and it’s often mentioned quite quickly, it's completely normal and accepted. I feel uncomfortable sometimes that I have to say to people that I don't do it, but I'd rather be honest because it feels like I’m keeping myself in a safe space. I had my fair share of painful flights home after gigs so it feels great nowadays to just drink water and focus on playing the best I can.
It'd be great to be at the after party after a fun set, but hanging around with people who are wasted when you’re not can sometimes be a bit uncomfortable. I have really learned to appreciate having a lovely hotel room these days. Ah those clean white sheets….
The spiritual essence of dance music has nothing to do with drugs at all. They’re enjoyable at the time, but I find it a bit concerning that there’s a dark side to all the hedonism. It feels sad that so many people are self medicating under the guise of partying. Those few hours of joy can create a hell of a lot of misery when there's no one there on Tuesday. I think most people suffer a lot for a very short amount of intense fun, and I don’t think it’s always worth it. But it can take decades to learn that.
I’ve heard that people move to Berlin to pursue music but instead they just party and forget the reason they moved out there.
It’s true, I had a few ‘lost’ years myself. And I have seen many talented artists on a good road move there and then just disappear into the ether. You meet them in Golden Gate on a tuesday and they’re super skinny with a more gothic image and you realise why their output dried up. It becomes the norm, you're not thinking about making records anymore, you're just thinking about going to a club and getting fucked. I think everyone in Berlin goes through this stage, it's a place to forget your dreams, to just drop out. I tried to enjoy Berlin fully AND keep up my workrate on releases which led to my poor brain being a bit crushed at times.
After the ‘dream’ of Berlin, everything’s a bit of a disappointment, but that feeling does fade after a while. It's not safe to be there past a certain point for some people. It's an amazing place, but a lot of people can't handle it after a few years. I miss it like hell but I’m also relieved I made it out just about intact.
What were some key things you learnt about music during your time in Berlin?
I really, really improved and developed as a DJ out there because I was playing nearly every month. I probably played too much in Berlin in some ways, but it was great. Playing from 6-9am regularly at venues like Griessemuhle and About Blank was the stuff of dreams.
I learned how to play bigger rooms there. If you're touring, it's a brand new gig every time, whereas in Berlin I played some of those venues 10 or 15 times. You know the booth, you know the mixer, you know the sound system, you know what the crowd in each place is like.
It was great for me as a DJ, but I did change. I lost my soulfulness at points. When I moved there I was very UK and mixed musically, but there was a point where I was playing a lot in Berlin and I was basically banging out house and techno because that was what was required. I've always been more comfortable just doing what I feel, so moving back to the UK has really shaken me up again musically. It feels like I have got back to my roots. Especially being in Bristol as I lived here in 1997 and never expected to return.
What did you learn on a more personal level in Berlin?
It sounds like a cliche, but I learned the joy of being alone. I moved there with no friends circle in place and had to start from scratch. I really gained a lot of confidence from moving there. It was so exciting to start again and have this Aladdin's cave of dance music experiences constantly available on your doorstep.
In Bristol, I struggle a bit because it's not big enough for me, there aren’t enough options, but that’s made me work really hard on music as there’s not really much else to do. In Berlin, I was hanging out all day in Mitte drinking lattes and eating 1 euro pizza slices and thinking “I'll do that remix next week”. The UK is way more expensive, but that means I’ve got to make more money, so it's motivating
Last year you toured Asia for four weeks, how was that?
It was my third time touring Asia, but this one was a big one because it was 10 shows and I was travelling around India for the first time. I had the time of my life! Playing in India, South Korea, Vietnam, Hong Kong and China was such an amazing experience. Everywhere has its own personality and culture. Everyone I met was so nice and I felt so grateful to be there. Playing super underground house music at 6am at The Observatory in Ho Chi Minh or banging out molten, cascading techno at Tag in Chengdu was beyond my wildest hopes. I can’t wait to get back out there.
What was amazing about that tour was every party that I played felt local. In Delhi, for example, the whole crowd was just Indian people. That's my dream, to go and play for locals, to take what I do and give it to people as far away from me as possible.
You also toured America late last year. What was it like going to Chicago and Detroit, two cities with such rich dance music history?
Oh man it was mad. I remember being in Chicago and looking across Lake Michigan with my mate Roger, pointing to where Detroit was across the water. It was like the lake of genre because here is house music and then over there is techno. Maybe somewhere in the middle is tech house haha. Chicago was so great - I ate deep dish pizza, went digging at Groove Distribution and played at the legendary Smart Bar. Michael Serafini from Gramaphone was there which added a bit of pressure but I won him over by playing ‘Manhood’ by Victor Duplaix. It was super fun.
I met up with so many great people in Detroit. Josh from TV Lounge was such a warm host, top guy. I had a great catch up with Rick Wade who I met in 2008 in London, and then I bumped into again in Tokyo in 2010, so it was great to meet him on his home turf. Kevin Reynolds took me out for some amazing food, he’s a real foodie. I finally met Norm Talley, he's such a nice person. He took me round the city and showed me the sights. Hearing Omar S on the car speakers when they were doing a call was quite surreal. Scott Grooves came to my gig at TV Lounge and gave me one of his 808 t-shirts as a gift. I bought his records in 1996 so it was quite a moment for me to have legends like him and Norm coming to support my first gig in Detroit. Thanks guys! Shouts to David and Melissa from Motor City Wine for the hospitality too.
I also reconnected with Marcus Hunter (drums) and James Shelton (keys) who I met in 2007 when they were playing with Dwele and Amp Fiddler in Nottingham, and I was the local support DJ. They are insanely talented musicians, so we hit the studio which Marcus shares with Big T who’s the musical director of the Four Tops. I had the supremely surreal moment of recording vocals on my own with Alex the lead singer of the Four Tops on my final day. It was such a spiritual experience. I was way beyond my comfort zone but I learned so much and I felt like I was 18 again in the studio for the first time!
Norm took me to this ace record store called People's Records and he picked me out some records to listen to and I bought nearly all of them, they were all brilliant. I came back from that tour with 60 or 70 Records and I did it all in my hand luggage which was a challenge but I made it. Somehow.
I would love to live in Detroit. It would be such an amazing musical experience for me. I kind of feel like that’s my destiny. When they talk about Detroit love, it's not a cliche. I know I got a slightly rose tinted view of it, but you can see why the music is so good from Detroit when you’re there. It’s steeped in rich musical culture. It felt like I was coming home.
Absolute Body Control is at Cosies! on February 6th. Find the Facebook event here.
Photography by Sean Delahay