entrevista a Christopher Lawrence...

Years of Hard Touring Rewarded Christopher Lawrence with a Huge Fan Base, but Also a Spinal Surgery. After a Rough Recovery, America's Trance King Has Returned with New Musical Passions.



Los Angeles?Christopher Lawrence is at the pinnacle of his career, although to make such a claim, one would have to assume there?s nowhere left to go and nothing left to accomplish. After all, the international trance jock has co-headlined every festival worth a shake, including Coachella, San Francisco?s Love Fest, Nevada?s Burning Man, Buenos Aires? South American Music Conference, and Holland?s Dance Valley festival.


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ahora alguien que se cope y traduzca un poco, que no entiendo nada, mi ignorancia me condena... :S

sigue..

He also ranks consistently near the top of the DJ polls, including No. 10 in DJ Times? America?s Best DJ poll, sponsored by Pioneer Pro DJ. (His recent issues with the U.K.?s DJ Magazine poll were, however, another matter and remain best discussed elsewhere.) As the founder and label chief of his own Pharmacy Electronic Music, Lawrence is constantly on-the-prowl for quality trance (and recently, for quality psychedelic trance, his current passion) and he?s able to release new music at will. His tunes and mixes have aired on radio shows around the globe?including Sirius Satellite Radio in the U.S. and BBC?s Radio 1 in the UK?and one glance at his tour itinerary proves that there?s not a corner of the earth this man hasn?t visited to rock a party.

What?s even more impressive, after taking into consideration the grueling years it took to rise to this level in an all-too-cutthroat and unforgiving profession, is that Lawrence is also happily married with two young children. Home is Los Angeles, and given that his job is never 9-to-5, family time is priceless.

There?s only one way to achieve this level of success, and that?s constant touring?gigging every weekend, through fatigue and illness, nonstop and relentlessly. But the years of touring, flying, late nights and standing for hours hunched over a set of decks have taken their toll on Lawrence. This past summer, his body finally gave in, he ruptured a spinal disc, and he underwent major back surgery followed by weeks of a rough recovery. Lawrence is better now and he?s returned to his frantic touring schedule. But the experience has left a mark on him.

So, in the midst of his usual madness, Christopher Lawrence spent a big chunk of his day to discuss with DJ Times his career and the recent life lessons he?s learned.

sigue..

aca arranca la entrevista. que no termian mas.........


DJ Times: This past summer, you were forced to take time off from DJing to recover from major back surgery. What happened?
Christopher Lawrence: I feel much better, but my back?s a little bit sore. It was just from years of carrying around records! My back started getting sore a couple of years ago; I was on tour in Europe, the Middle East and Moscow for two weeks, and suddenly, it was really bad. It got to a point where I couldn?t walk. I went to the doctor, and it turns out I had a ruptured disc and had to get spinal surgery. I ended up taking six weeks off.

DJ Times: All the time spent sitting on planes can?t be great for your back?
Lawrence: My surgeon said, ?Doing international flights is the worst thing you can do.? I usually fly business class, internationally, but I had to take off extra time.

DJ Times: It must help that, at least, you?re not carrying around heavy crates of vinyl?
Lawrence: I?m really grateful there are CDs. I?ve been using CDs for the last two years, but exclusively for the last year. I?m holding onto my vinyl, but I got to a point where I was carrying record bags and CD cases. After a while, I wouldn?t go to my records.

DJ Times: Are you into laptop DJing?
Lawrence: Not yet. I might end up doing the laptop thing at some point, but right now, I like the tactile feeling of choosing CDs, mixing them?

DJ Times: What?s your setup?
Lawrence: Two Pioneer CDJ-1000s, and I prefer the Xone:92 from Allen & Heath mixer?that?s it.

DJ Times: No effects units?
Lawrence: No effects units. I do a lot of re-editing of tracks. Almost every single track I play out, I re-edit at home. I chop up parts, edit, and I EQ it the way I want. If I were playing more techno, I?d be doing more effects, but with the trance and progressive house that I?m playing, I find the effects detract from the tracks themselves. For me, it?s about seamless mixing and creating flow. It?s a different style. Also, the mixers I like to use don?t have effects. I have to have two monitors, one on each side, and I always request a third CD player just to have. Occasionally, I use three CDs, but it?s mostly a backup to prepare the tracks I?m playing later. It?s very simple?there?s no vinyl at all. It?s quite sad, because turntables have been such a part of DJ culture. Most clubs have moved the turntables, so mixers are in the center, and CD players are on each side.

sigo esperando lo que sigue =(

Como no postear en este link simplemente para decir: QUE EXPERIENCIA ES VER A ESTE TIPO EN VIVO!!!

Tremendo. Uno que verdaderamente a mi gusto, vale cada centavo invertido...

Inolvidable el último Pacha, la paliza que nos pegó.
Puro talento, fineza, potencia...

La elección de temas que hace es impecable, perfecta.
Los sets que pasa te hace dar cuenta que tipo de profesional es; están totalmente ensayados, practicado, mejorados...

Mezcla estilos siempre sobre una línea conceptual reconocible...

Decir que simplemente pasa trance (y que trance es el que pasa por favor) es quedarse muy corto de oído.

Por un CL 2008 en cualquier lado que tenga más espacio que las Sardinas Pacha.

DJ Times: You?re gigging a lot outside the U.S. lately. Is there something about trance as a genre you feel has more of an international appeal, compared with other genres of dance music?
Lawrence: Yeah, trance is probably the biggest sound, worldwide. When it comes to a party that?s a single event, trance will draw the largest numbers. On any given night, there are people going to house nights, but on festivals, you can find trance on the main stage. Trance has a universal appeal. It?s got a big sound, lots of energy. When you?re in a big venue, like an outdoor stadium, it translates. It doesn?t rely on vocals, so no matter what country you?re in, everyone understands it. That?s part of the international appeal to it.

DJ Times: Your back injury was a result of prolonged stress on your spine from DJing, but was there an acute injury that pushed it over the edge?
Lawrence: I knew something was starting to go wrong, because I had pretty bad back pains. But it was, ?The show must go on!? When you?re booked to play an event and flyers are out and people are coming to see you, they don?t care how you feel or what your emotional problems are. I?ve played with food poisoning and I?ve played sick. If you travel to Sao Paolo, Brazil, you can?t just sit there and not give it a go when there?s 10,000 people there to see you! I was in pain, but my tour schedule is lined up for almost a year in advance. I would ignore the symptoms and tell myself to just go out. It?s like you?re in a car that?s accelerating and you know you?re gonna crash at some point. If I took the same six weeks off to do physical therapy, it could?ve been avoided, but I chose not to.

DJ Times: Did you feel that taking six weeks off would hurt your competitiveness?
Lawrence: Yeah, your career?s on an upswing and you don?t wanna stop and lose momentum. This industry?s very unforgiving. In the university profession, there?s something called, ?publish or perish.? In the DJ community, it?s ?tour or perish.? If you don?t tour once a year, people will forget you! It?s different from being in a band, because bands traditionally are album-driven and people buy the album, but may never see the band tour. DJ culture is more participatory. It?s about going out. It?s about the night. CDs are a souvenir of the night. You wanna capture the feeling of that night out. DJ and club culture is about going out.

DJ Times: How many shows did you have to cancel in order to recover from back surgery?
Lawrence: I took six weeks off times two or three gigs-a-week?that?s 18 gigs! It?s not like you have insurance for this. You grow into this pressure, and suddenly, you?re in the middle of it and it?s too late to do anything about it. It?s extremely stressful and it takes its toll, emotionally and physically. It takes its toll with your family. It happens around you and you don?t have a choice. You?ve got booking agents?my wife?s my manager?that?s the other thing. Every night, I think, ?I?ve gotta do my best and I need to rise to the occasion no matter what, because there?s a million people who?d love to be where I am today!? I don?t wanna let everyone down.

DJ Times: What year did you first start DJing, and where did you play?
Lawrence: I?ve been DJing since 1990. I started playing out in ?93 in San Francisco at a club called Big Heart City, doing occasional events there. I was playing raves, and it was outdoor and warehouse rave culture. The West Coast was all rave culture. It was all this industrial stuff at the head of a vacant pier. We?d go, break the chain with bolt-cutters and bring a generator and hook up the gear. We had flyers for this stuff! [Laughs] A thousand people would show up. We did it several times. There was a factory we threw parties in?but eventually, they called the cops. Until then, it was great. It was very do-it-yourself, very much a punk attitude. A lot of it was illegal, but we didn?t care. At that time, I ran a pirate radio station on Sunday evenings called ?Universal Radio? that was broadcast from a park where all the TV antennas were. I?d built a transmitter and we?d go up there and broadcast our set. We?d have someone at each entrance standing guard?

DJ Times: A necessity?
Lawrence: There was only one time the police came. [Laughs] We had everything in suitcases, and we ran everything off car batteries. The cops showed up looking for burglars, and I?m sitting there with a transmitter. [Laughs] I shut the suitcase and threw it down. We pretended to be students trying to do an experiment. [Laughs] Those were pre-Internet days. Now, you get your sound out there via Internet. It?s a double-edged sword. It?s fantastic, because anyone can do it. But from the artist?s standpoint, everyone likes to get music free now.

DJ Times: How is your label, Pharmacy, doing?
Lawrence: We?ve gone all-digital. If I do a compilation, I might do a physical CD because there?re still a few people who want something tangible with artwork. When my last CD came out, there were people at a party coming up to me with homemade copies they?d ripped illegally before it was released, asking me to autograph copies! People were like, ?Oh yeah, I downloaded it! Can you sign it?? People today who?ve grown up in the last 10 years don?t understand! It?s fine for me, because I tour a lot and that?s my main income. But all those other artists on the CD, those artists sitting in their rooms producing tracks are not getting royalties. If they can?t buy food, they?re gonna stop making music! You just hope that people will realize it?s easier to go to Beatport and pay the small fee to buy the track. It?s much safer and cleaner from Beatport; Beatport?s revolutionized the industry. I love the brick-and-mortar thing, where record shops are a communal place for hanging out with other DJs. But I?m on the road so much now, it?s just not physically possible to do. So, when I have time in an airport or hotel room, I can listen to tracks and buy them off Beatport.

DJ Times: Your latest compilation, Gatecrasher ? Live In Moscow (Ministry Of Sound), is one of your best mixes I?ve heard from you. Other than retail sites, how are you getting your music these days?
Lawrence: I?m in the fortunate position that a lot of people email me links to their music. There are tons of people out there who do promos not the traditional way; they just target easier and send you music.

DJ Times: Other than Beatport, what are your primary sources for buying music online?
Lawrence: Yes, my primary source is Beatport. I also use Juno.co.uk for physical records. What I like about Beatport is the option for a full .wav file. I won?t play MP3s out. Some stuff isn?t available as downloads, so juno.co.uk carries a lot of vinyl. Another is Psyshop.com for psychedelic trance. I get a lot of my psychedelic trance stuff from them?it?s a completely different culture from what we know as trance. They don?t release music as singles; most of their stuff?s released as compilation CDs, unmixed.

DJ Times: How would you distinguish the two?
Lawrence: Psy-trance is a whole other genre of trance that?s existed since ?95. It?s developed completely separately from the trance we know. It?s more like what acid-house is to house, what acid-trance is to trance. Most of it has got a fast-but-groovy bassline and it sounds like it?s got a 303 bassline. The psy-trance scene?s huge, but it?s grown and existed completely separate from the mainstream trance we know of. The psy-trance parties in Brazil are 40,000 people! When it?s me, Paul Van Dyk and Ferry Corsten, we get 15,000 people. But out there in the jungle, it?ll be a psy-trance party with 100,000 people! A lot of psy-trance is made by Israeli producers. The largest psy-trance artist is Infected Mushroom?they?re no longer just DJing. They have a full live show now. Then there?s [Israeli DJ/producer] Astrix [Avi Shmailov], who?s quite big right now, and he?s crossing over. The crowd in psy-trance is more underground. Psy-trance is a very sophisticated sound for a very mature audience. You?d hear it out at Burning Man. It?s not just for kids. The whole middle section of my Gatecrasher CD is psychedelic trance.

DJ Times: What physical demands of being a DJ were unforeseen when you first started DJing?
Lawrence: Hearing loss. You know, that?s an inevitable thing. I?ve got tinnitus in my left ear?it?s a constant ringing. I wear a custom earplug in my monitor ear, facing out to the loud sound. That really helps a lot. That way, I can keep the volume low in my headphone. That?s really helped. The advice I?d give is, get the custom-made earplugs, even though they cost more. They attenuate at all frequencies uniformly. The second point is, put the earplugs in before you even walk into the club. If you put them in right before you play, you?ll say you can?t hear and pull it out. Music?s important to our lives, and you wanna be able to hear when you?re 70-years old.

DJ Times: How has your booth setup evolved over the years?
Lawrence: Turntables have disappeared. Now, there?s no vinyl?but at home, I still have two turntables because I still buy vinyl. There?s still things not available as digital downloads that are only available on vinyl. I?ll buy the record and convert it from analog to digital and then burn it to CD. I don?t think we?ll go back to vinyl, ever. It?s romantic and nostalgic, but we?ll never go back. It?s just a very inefficient way of distribution and it?s a waste of materials. There could be 10 records on a shelf in Miami that nobody wants, when someone in Seattle would really love them!

DJ Times: How do you see the future of technology as it relates to the DJ?
Lawrence: I imagine there will be a time where you?ll just bring a small hard drive, like a small thumb drive. You?ll drop it into a mixer and you?ll have all your tracks loaded into the mixer and you?ll DJ like that! We?ll always want a pitch control, but that doesn?t necessarily have to be the tool that you use to line the tracks up. Technology will be there letting you warp your tracks.

DJ Times: How do you see the DJ?s future?
Lawrence: I think DJs will always be around because nobody wants to see an iPod up there. The reason you go to hear a particular DJ is to hear their sound. It?s a live experience. The DJ and crowd work off of each other to create the direction of the night. I don?t see the jukebox taking over the DJ. People will always wanna see a performance.

DJ Times: How has your sound changed over the years, and do you feel it?s important for a DJ to find a genre that he identifies with and stick to that sound for years, in order to build a reputation?
Lawrence: My sound?s matured, I like to believe! [Laughs] When I started out, everything was called ?techno,? whether it was breaks or techno or house. I used to play everything. It was a wonderful time, because you could play everything. The sound that I like became known as progressive-house/trance. That sound?s gone through many different phases, and throughout that, I?ve maintained an underground sound that?s got a constant feel through it and I just picked and grabbed what I wanted from different areas?to the point where, now, I?m more influenced by psy-trance. A year or two ago, I was more influenced by techno. I?ve never been a big fan of epic, commercial trance. As a DJ, you?re somewhat limited by what?s being made at any given time. There was a time when every producer and DJ was going for that big, commercial trance sound, and that?s when I was into techno. Then, hard-house was a big thing. Now, it?s the psy-trance and electro I?m into. You?d say those two sounds could not possibly go together, but DJs like Ferry Corsten have been a champion of that electro sound for a long time. Those electro sounds grab the audience in the beginning of my set, and I move from there wherever I wanna go.

DJ Times: You?re also the label chief of Pharmacy. Are there any aspiring young artists you?re particularly excited about right now?
Lawrence: Yeah, there are two guys I think are really good right now: One is Jay Selway. He?s in Washington, D.C., and he?s a young producer who?s doing really good tracks. Everything he makes, I?m playing. He?s done a lot of remixes for John ?00? Fleming?s label. John and I have a new track coming out called ?Beyond the Limit.? Jay remixed that. Another new artist is Magnus?he?s from Seattle and he?s got a really good sound and I expect big things from him. I?d like to say that [running a label] is a magnanimous thing to help new artists along, but it?s completely selfish, because I had a hard time finding new tracks. Over time, I?ve found all these great, new, unsigned tracks and I want them to exist and I want these guys to keep making music.

DJ Times: You played with Judge Jules at ?Judgement Sundays? at Eden in Ibiza, this past summer. How was that?
Lawrence: I?ve played there for Judge Jules for a few years now?it?s one of the best nights on the island. I played there last weekend, and people were absolutely going off! Jules has been consistent and run a good night for eight years. That party personifies Ibiza.

DJ Times: How do you feel about the health of the dance music scene here in the U.S., as compared to other parts of the world right now?
Lawrence: Surprisingly, the scene in the U.S. is healthy compared to other places. There?s always gonna be places like Holland, where it?s bigger than the U.S., and in the UK, dance is mainstream music. In the U.S., we?ll always be competing and playing R&B, hip-hop and rock music. That being said, we?ve still got a very healthy scene in San Francisco, Miami, L.A., Seattle, and New York City. There was a period of time where it was massive, but the federal government destroyed the rave scene and it took us a while to regroup. Now, I?m playing in the same cities, and even in secondary and tertiary markets. A lot of DJs and producers from other parts of the world are focusing on the U.S.

DJ Times: What?s been the highlight of your career as a DJ/producer?
Lawrence: There were certain things, like several years ago, I released my own track on Hook Recordings?they?re based in Scotland and they were my favorite label, one of the foremost trance labels. The track was called ?Navigator.? To have a track come out in the U.K. on vinyl in ?97 was a really big thing. It got reviewed in all the British magazines and I went on to do my first European date. That was a momentous thing.

DJ Times: Is there a downside to your success?
Lawrence: Any time you work in something like this, if you?re gone from your home a lot, you sacrifice things. I don?t see my family on holidays. Friends have weddings on Saturdays and Sundays, but I?m always gigging on weekends. Friends I?ve had, at some point, we?ve drifted apart. People have barbeques, go clubbing, go to the movies, go out to dinner on the weekends?but I?m not there. You do sacrifice a lot.



Bueno, sigo llego a estar extremadamente al pedo quizás traduzca el texto, de lo contrario usen Google :)

decis que buscando en google, encuentro esta misma entrevista en castellano? :!

http://www.google.com.ar/language_tools?hl=es


me refería a eso jaja, pero mejor que lo traduzca alguien si tiene ganas o tiempo.

ah, supuse, bue, veremos si pronto estas extremadamente al pedo, Ojala. y si en ese momento te dan ganas de traducir algo que quizas leamos pocos y disfrutemos mucho.

igual voy a probar con google,

el resutado es maso menos este, mmmmm.....


DJ Times: El verano pasado, que se vieron obligados a ausentarse del DJ para recuperarse de la cirugía de espalda importante. ¿Qué pasó?

Christopher Lawrence: Me siento mucho mejor, pero mi espalda? Sa poco dolor. Es sólo a partir de los años de desempeño en torno a los registros! Mi dolor de espalda comenzó a llegar hace un par de años, yo estaba de gira en Europa, el Oriente Medio y en Moscú durante dos semanas, y de repente, es realmente mala. Se llegó hasta el punto de que pudimos? T pie. Fui al médico, y resulta que tuve una rotura de disco y tuvo que recibir cirugía de la columna vertebral. Terminé teniendo seis semanas de descanso.


DJ Times: Todo el tiempo dedicado sentado en aviones puede? T ser grande para su espalda?

Lawrence: Mi cirujano dice,? Hacer los vuelos internacionales es la peor cosa que puede hacer.? Me suelen volar en business class, internacionalmente, pero tuve que sacar tiempo extra.


DJ Times: Se debe ayudar a que, por lo menos, usted? Re no lleva alrededor de las cajas fuertes de vinilo?

Lorenzo: Yo? M realmente agradecidos hay CDs. I? Se ve usando los CDs para los dos últimos años, pero exclusivamente para el último año. I? M celebración en mi vinilo, pero llegué a un punto en que yo estaba llevando bolsas y grabar CD. Después de un rato, me wouldn? T ir a mis registros.