Forumist Sessions: Dodi Palese

Label owner (Engrave Ltd & What Ever Not), producer and DJ Dodi Palese brings us this old-school oozing and wonderfully dragging take on techno. We took the opportunity to ask him a bit about the techno circuit today and his future endavours.

 

 

So I sense a lot of lovely old-school vibes in your sound and elsewhere as well. Is this something we will hear more of and do you see other trends emerging in techno right now?

Sure, I’m always looking back at the past as I’m always looking for interesting tracks. And, of course, I listen to new music too. I think you can also find this jumping between the sound of the past and present in my productions. Personally i consider this approach a way of not losing contact with the roots of the music I love and at the same time it helps me to avoid getting stuck in the same sonorities.

How’s life as label owner these days?

It’s very exciting for sure, actually there is a big amount of labels on the market and this means that you need to really do your best to give something special to the people and get attention. The constant search for the quality of the products is our main focus. Together with my partners Musumeci and Dan Mela we are constantly talking about all the details concerning all our releases on Engrave Ltd and What Ever Not. We do our best to have great releases. Very often a good release can be forgotten in 24h so you need to take care of every single aspect. Quality is not only the music itself but also how much you think about the whole concept you want to communicate to your audience. It seems like a very basic marketing rule but we are talking about music, so passion is behind every single one of our moves. It’s not merely a strategy, it’s about how much we love the music we share through our media.

The DJ profession is more accessible and popular than ever. Do you have any tips & tricks for struggling DJ:s out there?

Work hard and follow your instincts, these are the best tips that I feel I can give. Whoever thinks that DJing is a quick way to make money while doing nothing is seriously wrong. It’s important to take an honest good look at yourself to understand how strong your passion is for this kind of job. The question is, what are you ready to do or to lose in order to reach your goal? I think that’s a really important point. The risk here is to just lose precious time of your life.

Tell me a little bit about the mixtape.

What i can say? I normally play music that speaks to me. It’s not about being the latest fashion or the old school hero. It’s more the feeling of the moment expressed by some of the tracks i’m in love with. I hope you like it.

What are your plans up ahead?

This year i have been releasing a good amount of music, i was very prolific and I’m still working on new tracks but i think my next ep will come out in 2016. I’m more focused on the upcoming release of our labels. We already have three projects in the pipeline from new artists on Engrave Ltd. ‘Groove Squared’ with remixes by Musumeci and myself, ‘A45’ which includes a Tobias remix and ‘Paride Pavone’ which will feature a Lucretio remix. On the What Ever Not side there’s the upcoming Dan Mela feat. Lady Blacktronika EP with a crispy remix by Alex Israel.

Dodi’s is current with the new Spirals EP, released on his Engrave LTD imprint.