Our next talent in our TGMS Future Stars series comes from Cologne. A city with a great atmosphere and club scene. We already had several great artists over from Cologne. Tilman is here to be part of this nice group of artists and add his mark with his very nice Deep House journey.
Connect with Tilman on Soundcloud | Facebook
Where are you from and what makes that place special?
I’m from Cologne, Germany. Born in a small town right beside cologne, I’m now living here for more than 3 years and just love the city and the people. The people are very open-minded and nice to each other, what you also see and feel when you are around in the vibrant nightlife of cologne. There are a lot of things to do in Cologne, especially in the summer, when everybody is going outside chasing the sun. Fortunately, we got a couple of nice clubs playing good deep house, techhouse & techno in Cologne. Also in summer, there are often very nice open-air parties.
Where does your passion for electronic music come from?
I love electronic music because you can see that people can forget everything for a moment when dancing to their favourite music. The possibility to hypnotize people and give them a short moment to just live and be in the music for this moment is something which electronic music makes possible in my opinion. I find it very special, even if you compare it with parties where you just hear the charts and other mainstream music.
For a couple of years, I went to parties myself, of course, I had some of these moments on festivals/in clubs as well and in my imagination, there is nothing more fulfilling than giving other people these moments of joy through mixing the right music in the right situation.
Tell us about what first got you started into electronic music?
Speaking about going out to electronic music, I’m very thankful that a good friend showed us the club Odonien in cologne like 5-6 years ago. It was mindblowing to see a club like this when I was just 18 and didn’t thought about parties like this – good music, amazing venue including decoration and so nice vibe and people – even existing. Since then, most of the time we went out to electronic music the most of the time, also visited some nice festivals like “Wilde Möhre” near Berlin, “Katzensprung” near Cologne or the “Zugvögel Festival” on Tenerife.
About a year ago, in May 2018, a friend of mine offered me to borrow his dj controller because the walls in his apartment were so thin, that the neighbours came complaining all the time. So it was quite a happy coincidence, that I started mixing myself. Because I started a long time ago being interested in the artists behind the music, it was very exciting, to play my favourite tracks together from now. Because I had some DJ friends for longer who offered me to give me their music as well, I was developing my skills quicker than I thought, so an old friend offered me to play in the Artheater lounge in Cologne in October. That was the first gig in my life and it was truly amazing, even if it was just a lounge to play in. I’m very thankful for getting these opportunities in life.
How would you describe your sound and style?
I feel that I’m still in the process to find ‘my style’, and I’m thinking that it will maybe always change a bit from one point to another. As I like to mix many different genres, starting from downtempo over deep house, techhouse to techno, it is hard to describe it with exact words, but I try to reach a point where the music is atmospheric and groovy, but still driving and impulsive. I don’t like it when electronic music gets to monotone and like it when the track is changing and has different elements. The most important thing for me is, to feel the vibe on the dancefloor and play just what the people need at this moment. Of course, thats not always easy according to different events, venues, playtimes and situations.
But as I said I think im still finding kind of my style in that time I try not just to focus too much on just one genre and just having fun while playing. Because I do like both, some nice baseline rolling techhouse, for example in a beach bar, a lounge, and some hypnotizing atmospheric but still most of the time impulsive melodic techno when playing on a floor.
What can we expect from the mix you made us?
The mix I made is consisting of some tracks I really liked in this time. It’s great when you start hearing a set and as soon as you even recognized you already deep into it and if the whole set feels like a journey. For me, the opening track is something very decisive in this case, because it determines whether the listener smoothes into the set or not. I picked a track by Yamil, who I followed for long now and who does produce amazing and very different tracks! Of course, I also like to mix techhouse if there’s the right time for it, but on a dancefloor, I really like to get the people dreaming and dancing, which is possible through more progressive sounds and also melodic and atmospheric parts in between.
I also picked a track from Township Rebellion called “monocloque”. The German duo was a big reason for me getting deeper into electronic music when hearing sets of them the first time. For me, they are also kind of revolutionist of a new understanding of melodic techno. I like to call it “wabertechno”, which means more or less shifting and floating techno.
For me, it is definitely a big dream to produce my own tracks one day.
What is your source for finding great tracks for your set?
For finding tracks I use different ways, sometimes digging through the labels on Beatport, sometimes hearing Soundcloud sets and shazam the tracks afterwards, and also sometimes using Spotify. I always search for music which would move myself over the dancefloor. Of course, I try to find music which is not already very popular and got played a hundred times on the dancefloors – but as there are so many great artists and producers out there if you dig deep enough you always find unknown and great music.
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