RS: In your radio shows how much is your original production?
Matt Darey: Maybe play one a week, sometimes my own stuff or remix, maybe every other week. I don’t know. Anytime I have a new release, but I’ve been putting out quite a lot of records. Five last year, and they all have remixes. I only play the appropriate remix because there are two shows, Nocturnal Sunshine I’ll play anything; I even played a Dub- Step record by Dead Mouse. I think it was called the One Trick Pony, the only one that I’ve heard that I thought was sort of cool, but I’ll play anything, any Genre, no limits. Nocturnal has to be mixed. It’s a mixed show; where as Nocturnal Sunshine is edited together. They have to blend in.
RS: With your DJ sets are you on CD or Laptop?
Matt Darey: CD, just because…I use Ableton to mix my radio shows because I do it when I got down time, on a flight or whatever, but I had an experience in Russia. In fact, I bumped into Paul Harris from Dirty Vegas, we were playing the same gig in Russia, and his laptop got trashed. I was like no way, I was just about to make the switch, and it was like some beer or whatever spilled on it. CD’s are bulletproof and it gives you something to do. I do my own editing, most of my tracks that I play I edit. Even if I just extend the beginning and the end or whatever. I put them into Ableton and rendered them again. I have seen some DJ’s on laptops and it looks like they are typing emails to their moms or something. I like to get the CD, something physical, and its bomb proof, which is pretty important.
RS: Where do you get most of your music from? Mostly from other producers, or do you go on Beatport?
Matt Darey: Some on Beatport and quite a large percentage of promos that we get sent in. The Nocturnal shows been running since mid 2004, something like that. We are nearly at 300, so, almost 6 years now, and over that time we have built relationships with all of the labels that send us their stuff.
RS: Let’s step over to the controversial side. On the DJ list, where are you right now?
Matt Darey: Oh, DJ List, I don’t even know. Do you know? You mean DJ MAG? I don’t know. I wouldn’t like to say; I don’t know how real Internet polls are. Somebody told me that, I don’t know who it was, they made up a DJ called DJ Billy Big Balls and he went straight up to No 1 and it was somebody just trying to prove a point. That you can make up a DJ if you’re like a computer whiz, like a computer programmer or something. I don’t know how they weed them out. I don’t know.
RS: There's such a prevalence of Trance DJs at the top of that infamous list (DJ Magazine), but is that really accurate on the global scene?
Matt Darey: I think that DJ MAG thing is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If a DJ goes in really high in the DJ MAG then they get the big gigs. Once they get those big gigs for a year, then it’s self-fulfilling because then they are exposed to millions more people than a DJ outside the top 100. I don’t think there is any other way of doing it though, is there? People like polls. People like the ratings, the rankings, whatever it is. We were just in a radio conference and it was about ratings and how many holes there are in rating surveys. I think the intelligent promoter will take it with a pinch of salt. There are some promoters around the world who just look at the DJ MAG Top 100 and don’t even listen to the music and they just make the bookings; I’ve experienced that. They don’t even listen to your sound. Then there are the wiser promoters who actually listen to the music and they think,” does this fit where I’m at, with my crowd?”
RS: What are you working on now? Do you have new singles coming out, a new album, a new mixed CD?
Matt Darey: Yeah, there is a single on Nervous Records at the moment. They are great, really good label. It’s called Chasing the Sun, that’s out now. A second remix package is coming out with some cool up-and-coming talent. I spot the new talent on my show before they blow up because you get their first big production. I’ll jump in there and say, “hey, will you do me a remix?” I work with them from beginning to end. It’s like a two-way street. We’ve got four new remixes of that. I am working on an album as well in between stops on tour. I do a lot of work on my laptop. When I get back to London I’ll do it in my studio so I can finish stuff up. I am hoping that we finish by the end of April, or the beginning of May.
RS: So I am guessing that these up-and-coming DJs find you and send you music, and with what you like, you contact them back and you work with them?
Matt Darey: Yeah, because pretty much a lot of my stuff is all vocals. I like vocals and I can write vocals, so why not? I usually write it, put down a guide vocal myself and then ship it out, or just put it out for a top line. It just depends. So, I always start off with a song.
RS: Have you ever released a record with your own vocal on it?
Matt Darey: No. I was on the verge of doing it, but I just don’t know. I used to be a singer in a band and that’s how I started out.