ElectroQueer Interview MartinSolveig

Martin Solveig is one cool cat. His latest track "Hello" sees the famous French DJ team up with Dragonette on one of the catchiest dance jams of the year - seriously it get's the crowds moving. EQ caught up with Martin to talk about how he ended up collaborating with Dragonette, how he manages to maintain life as an international DJ, getting his grandmother to do promo for him and why the UK has always been a tricky area for him.

EQ: Hi Martin - how are you today?
Martin Solveig: Good, thanks, it’s a pleasure to be here with you. I’m in Italy, just performed “Hello” yesterday with Martina from Dragonette for a huge TV show here! And I’m also in Milano to play for the Fashion week.

So I love the whole idea of the tongue-in-cheek tennis story around your new releases like "Smash" and "Hello". Why did you decide to do webisodes for your new music videos?
Thanks! I’ve always been very interested by cinema and that’s how I decided to direct most of my music videos. But with the new SMASH project I wanted to take it to the next level as my ‘manageur’ Lafaille would say – it’s a very different approach from my previous albums, combining music and video at the same time, as I feel nowadays that you really have to give people more than just records. With SMASH I’m telling a whole story that would be a distortion of my reality with a mix of real characters, situations and absurd elements and figures. The episodes and the records all work together, the videos bringing people into my universe with at the end the release of the SMASH album.

As someone who is immersed and originates from the French music scene - how is it different than the UK music scene?
The UK has always been a tricky territory for me. I believe it works around the music you produce and some years ago I did experience a burst of interest when "Rocking Music" and "Everybody" did well. We’ll see what happens with "Hello", it’s doing well and it seems the UK is ready to welcome me back. Obviously I am excited to be doing things there again.

Read the full interview (this is a mere extract) on the fantastic EQ here!