He has edited DJ magazine, worked for BBC Radio 1 on the after hours show The Blue Room. He has made artist albums for Warp and Distinctive Records. He has made compilations for Playboy, Ministry of Sound, EMI Classical and Trojan Records. His music has appeared on many compilations including the big ones, Cafe Del Mar and Hotel Costes. His music has been featured Sex And The City, Nip Tuck, House and many other TV shows.

Gustav Bagge from R.fm caught up with Chris Coco to find out what he’s working on and score an exclusive mix with some of his favorite tracks from all times.

Chris Coco Mixtape R.fm X The Forumist by Theforumist.Com on Mixcloud

Tell us about more about the mix

I tried to make a potted history, but the ingredients wouldn’t fit in the pot. So it’s gone freeform. It’s about saying things with music that can’t be put into words. It’s about ambience and atmosphere. It’s about music that makes a film in your head and music made for films that makes you cry. It’s about laughing and dancing and loving and that best of all feelings after the party is over when the atmosphere lingers. About a sense of history while searching for something new. It’s about endings and beginnings but more beginnings than endings.

You are one of the most influential figures in online electronic music radio. Could you elaborate on why you think your Melodica series has been such as success?

I think it’s about direct communication with the audience. There are a lot of DJ mixes out there but not so many shows where the music explored is explained in simple terms. I hope it is also to do with the brilliant and consistent music selection!

The future of club music & online radio shows?

I would like to develop a collective on Mixcloud and other platforms so that people making interesting shows can promote each others work and maybe even start touring the shows / doing live shows in interesting locations. I haven’t seen this happening as a trend but maybe if a few of us work together we can make it into one?

Which online shows do you listen to?

I follow Mixmaster Morris for his diverse mixes; NTS Radio do a lot of good stuff; Groove Salad from San Francisco is pretty cool; Dub Lab in LA too. To be honest I don’t listen to loads of other shows, there’s too much new music to listen to and mixing to do, not sure if that’s a bad thing, I guess I should try harder.

What’s your view on Soundcloud’s recent move towards deleting mixes with copyright infringing content?

I think this is a simple one. Soundcloud’s agreement only covers uploading material you own to their platform. So if you upload mixes without permission that’s not covered. If you are also allowing other people to download the mixes you are effectively giving away other people’s music, which, in my opinion, is wrong.

I think Mixcloud works better for mixes because you can’t download stuff and they pay royalties.

What’s coming up, any new releases/gigs or new adventures?

Well, there’s the remixed version of Coco, Steel & Lovebomb – The Chillout Album, my experimental soundscape project with mixes from Seahawks, Mark Archer from Altern 8 and some other luminaries; and a new Nightbus album that I have curated with Ojan from Haraket featuring late night electronica from new London based artists.

Credits:

In collaboration with R.fm and Gustav Bagge.

Chris Coco, Melodica Recordings, Nightbus, Melodica Radio Show, Coco Soundcloud