RS: The Moscow CD you did for Global Underground seemed a little more aggressive and harder, while this new CD is a little more deeper and funkier. Is this like a transition with a Deep Dish sound?
Ali: No, it's pretty much where our heads are musically these days. Everybody goes through peaks and valleys with the music that they listen to. And for a while we were sort of playing a lot more upfront, banging, up-tempo sort of tracks and these days our style tends to be more laid back, more housey, more soulful. So it's just something that happened pretty naturally.
RS: Was it difficult for you to choose out the classic cuts for the bonus CDs?
Ali: Yes, because there's so many great classic cuts that sometimes you just get a flat-out no when you try to license. So it made our jobs difficult, because a lot of the classics that we wanted to use were originally on major labels, and they tend to say no right off the back whenever they get a license request for a compilation.
RS: Were there songs that both of you wanted to use?
Ali: No, it was pretty much a compromise because there were four CDs of music, so there was a lot of leeway as to what he wanted to use and what I wanted to use.
RS: What's the hardest part of being a traveling DJ?
Ali: The traveling.
RS: Different night, different cities?
Ali: The traveling's the job, the DJing is the perk.
RS: It's like the end justifies the means?
Ali: Yes.
RS: What are your favorite cities to spin in around the world, and why?
Ali: Tokyo, just because it's such a culture shock, and it's such an amazing place. Buenos Aires in Argentina because the crowd really give it up for the DJ and the club doesn't even open. There's a club called Poncho's, it doesn't even open till 2 a.m. Miami, it's like our second home, we've been playing there for years and going there for the annual Winter Breeze conference since like '95. And I'm sure I'm forgetting the other places. Shin Dig in Newcastle is fantastic.
RS: You have a truly international following - what aspect of your musicality do you think brings such recognition, on a national level?
Ali: What is it about us that brings recognition?
RS: You as DJs, what about your musicality? The music you play brings in such a bigger national audience for you.
Ali: I think it's because we're not purists, we're open to all kinds of music. We're not afraid to take chances and we work really hard, and we gig relentlessly, we've been very active in the studio, we're active with the record labels that we have. So I think it's like a full-on assault. We've stalled in many different directions and it kept us in the limelight for so many years.
