RS: When you DJ, are you DJing on laptop or do you DJ with CDs?
Armin Van Buuren: CDs and earplugs.
RS: You use earplug monitors?
Armin Van Buuren: No, just to protect my hearing.
RS: On your laptop, what do you use to record your music?
Armin Van Buuren: Ableton.
RS: And what do you use for production?
Armin Van Buuren: Logic and Ableton.
RS: You use both. Have you thought about going the laptop route for DJing?
Armin Van Buuren: No, because I don't find it convincing. I could be
eMailing my mom from the computer. And laptops aren't made for DJing.
I don't know about your laptop, but my laptop says for home and office
use only. It doesn't say for use in a smoking environment where people
tend to spill drinks on your brand new Apple laptop.
RS: So of fifty-two weeks of the year, how many weeks do you
think you're on the road?
Armin Van Buuren: Thirty.
RS: Thirty, wow. What new city have you played this year that
surprised you with the reaction?
Armin Van Buuren: Tunisia, the country of Tunisia, near where they
recorded the first Star Wars
RS: How's the radio show going?
Armin Van Buuren: The radio show's doing really well, thank you very
much. We're reaching over six million listeners a week on forty FM
stations globally, so I'm really happy about that and the response has
been amazing. We closed the year with a special set of trance year mix
– eighty-five records in two hours, and we've never had so many votes
for a mix, it's unbelievable.
RS: Very cool. You're on XM Radio in the U.S. Do you do a lot of
promotion with XM Radio?
Armin Van Buuren: No, actually, I don't. I've done some interviews
with them, I've done some IDs, but it's just a show that goes on every
week and that's basically it.
