With aggressive electro tracks like "Physical Fraction" and "Rykketid," Trentemoller established himself as the preeminent Danish electronic musician on the global dance music scene. His debut artist album, "The Last Resort," surprised many with its lush melodic instrumentals forming an almost soundtrack of ambience and dub. Currently touring with a hybrid live/electronic band, Trentemoller is also busy working on movie soundtracks, remixes, and a new artist album. For a good introduction to his vast catalog of music, check out "The Trentemoller Chronicles," a 2CD set combining his rarest releases and biggest remixes (Royksopp, The Knife, Moby).
DJ Ron Slomowicz: I have had the Trentemoller Chronicles in my CD player all
week and love the way you put it together – a cd of original tracks
and a CD of remixes. What was the idea behind it?
Trentemoller: The idea actually came up because so many people,
especially on MySpace and when I was out playing live as a DJ, asked
for a CD with some of my more rare tracks. Some of these tracks have
only been released on vinyl in very limited runs of three or four
hundred copies. A lot of people also asked to have some of my best
remixes together on one CD so people don't have to find one remix on
one CD and find the other on some other compilations. It was natural
to make two CDs, one with my more rare tracks and one with the remixes
also to give people a chance to hear some of the work that had not
been released on CD yet.
RS: Was it difficult to get clearance from the artists and
labels to put the remixes on there?
Trentemoller: Yes. There was actually quite a lot of work for my
record label to clear, especially having the rights to put the remixes
into iTunes and other web stores. The tracks by Royksopp and Moby were
not able to be cleared for online because the labels didn't want them
to be on iTunes. I don't know why, but that was quite a lot of work
done on clearing all those remixes.
RS: I noticed that your Pet Shop Boys Mix isn't on the CD, I'm
sort of guessing that was the same thing.
Trentemoller: Yes, because it was very difficult to get the
permission to use that remix. To be honest, it was very fun for me to
remix the Pet Shop Boys because they're one of my biggest heroes.
RS: That must have been a real honor to be approached by Pet
Shop Boys to remix one of their tracks.
Trentemoller: Yes. It was really weird because one day in my
hotmail, their manager wrote me that the Pet Shop Boys wanted me to
mix their next single because they liked my last album. The Pet Shop
Boys are some of the great pop composers of the 80s and 90s, so that
was really a big honor for me.
RS: I'm sort of guessing you had the same reaction when Moby
approached you?
Trentemoller: That was also weird because he was actually asking me
at first to remix his new single that was called "New York, New York."
To be honest, I wasn't so much into the track so I told him that I was
very happy he asked me but maybe there was another track that you
might like me to remix. He answered back that I could actually pick
out any track he has done and just pick out my personal favorite track
to work on. I chose Go because that is one of his best tracks and
actually one of the biggest underground club hits of all time.
RS: Your current tour features lots of live musicians. How is
translating your music, which is very electronic, to a live music
setup working out?
Trentemoller: It is quite natural, because even if my music is electronic there are also a lot of real instruments, and you can hear that on the album, The Last Resort. There's acoustic guitars, drums, and all kinds of real instruments. So for me it was just a natural next step to bring those acoustic instruments on the road, so to speak. The guys in the touring band also played on the album, so it's the next step for me to try to play that music live. I have done special live edits and versions of all the tracks so they're similar to the tracks on the album yet more live-oriented. Some of the tracks have been more uptempo and one of the tracks was quite slow and mellow on the album and it is now a very hyper drum and bass version.