Concussion 004 – An interview with Kantyze

Fast on the approach to Christmas, we have around a month left for the labels to get out their end of year goodies and by goodies we mean, belting drum and bass! Amongst those labels is hard tech-based, Concussion Records. Now the name itself should give an idea to the kind of music they are putting out… The kind that’s likely to cause concussion, or at least dizzy the listener with tunes that pack a punch!

Celebrating their 3^rd year of releasing top notch tunes from the likes of Nickbee, Kantyze, and Bowsar, Concussion Records is already making a name for itself amongst the ranks of the heavier-minded labels. Their latest offering is from French tech monsters, Kantyze with CNCSN004 – ‘Get Over Here/Gipsy Curse’. The multi-genre specialists have of course opted for a hard-hitting drum and bass roll out with this release really showcasing their knack to being able to craft something special whatever the tempo.

If you haven’t heard of Kantyze id really urge you to get listening, definitely more underground than some of their scenes counterparts but not lacking any of the talent. They are more known for the ‘heavy’ influence in their tracks whether that’s drum and bass, dubstep or breaks.

We thought it best to have a chat with the guys and get a little insight into them and their workings!

Easy, Kantyze! Thanks for taking the time to chat to us here at In-Reach!

Ezeeeeee!

You guys are no strangers to the electronic music scene with releases spanning back over 11 years and covering many different styles and genres… Do you have a favourite genre/tempo to produce?

Our favourite tempo remains between 170-175 :). Although we have released 2 deep dubstep LP’s in the last 2 years, so we’d be lying if we said we didn’t like producing at 140.
As for genre, it’s difficult to say just one, as we have released many tracks, covering a lot of the spectrum of bass music, from hip hop to DNB.

You hail from Tours, France. What is the ‘bass music’ scene like over there? Do you find that because you produce an eclectic array of sounds you get different bookings or do you get predominantly booked for a certain genre?

Tours has a big musical scene for it’s size (roughly 300k), unfortunately electronic wise, it’s not the case. It’s predominantly a rock / punk / pop city. There are a few dj’s and younger ones emerging, however we still feel as if we are at the back end of the scene. There are some crews doing a few events, but nothing huge. We have a big venue that opened recently which hosted Prolix, Dose, Killawatt + Biome but it was an exception. It’s a shame because we have 2 huge festivals (Aucard & Terres du Son), that bring in around 20k people over 3 days each, and generally there’s only 1 or 2 electronic artists booked.
We do get bookings here and there locally, but overall we play more gigs in Belgium + eastern Europe over the years. Generally we get more bookings for DNB than dubstep, as it’s been our main music style over the years, but we have had more dubstep bookings since we released those 2 LP’s over the past 2 years. In some rare shows, we’ve even been booked for both!

What is a typical day in the Kantyze studio, do you guys have any rituals at all?

Well it has definitely evolved over the years! Especially since both myself and Fred have 2 kids each. We’ve never had a “ritual” in itself, except maybe getting our ears ready with some quality tunes that we liked before jumping into Cubase.
Now we tend to work a lot faster than before, and we have stopped spending days or weeks on a project we started but doesn’t really get anywhere. If we don’t have something rolling within the hour, we drop it, export what we feel is worth keeping and move on.
We often work separately now (unfortunately), the time that we do get together is usually spent on the mixdowns and finalising tracks. These days Fred works more on the 140 tunes, while I work mostly on the DNB tracks.

So you guys have done the latest release for Concussion Records, which we are loving by the way! And see that you’ve gone for a more rolling tech DNB style, do you approach your drum and bass productions differently than other genres or is it a similar process?

It’s a similar approach I guess, over the years we have compiled a long list of samples, unfinished bits and cuts etc. So generally we try to start something new every time, even if in the end it sounds like a Kantyze tune, as we have our dynamic and rolling trademark. (We hope!)
The Concussion tracks were finished quite quickly as we had the hooks made in a short space of time. ‘Get Over Here’ has a bouncy, groovy bass hook, especially in the second part of the track. ‘Gipsy Curse’ came out a bit differently, and we tried to produce it with an old school atmosphere. Straight forward, not as clean, nor as many elements, but still carrying that dark touch.

How long has the release been in the works?

I can’t remember, but well over a year. We signed these tracks with Adam just as he was rebranding the label to put out vinyl releases.

We notice a certain ‘heaviness’ through a lot of your back catalogue, be it DNB, Dubstep etc. What are your influences, any Metal, Rock?

Yep! We are both huge metal fans first of all. Especially New York hardcore bands, ‘Sick of it All’, ‘Madball’, ‘Battery’ and ‘Judge’ etc. I listen to a lot of deathcore, grindcore and black metal, classical music and soundtracks also. So most of the time i’m responsible for the epic intro’s in our tunes lol ;). Fred likes emo-metal and a lot of hip-hop too.

You are part of an ever-growing scene now with more artists coming about month after month, who else are you feeling at the moment?

Yeah there are some really talented producers up and coming, and of course the established ones that still kick ass and probably always will do. For newcomers, we’re feeling; Monty, Signal, Dauntless and Gydra in DNB. We also really like the material that Plasma Records are putting out.
As for the established names, The Upbeats, Rido, Break, State of Mind, Telekinesis and Fierce. So as you may have guessed, a lot of Blackout and Dispatch.
For dubstep we really like the stuff by J:Kenzo, Distance, Ipman & Thelem.

If you could have a dream collab, who would that be with?

I guess any of the above mentioned! But to narrow it down to a couple, Black Sun Empire, Break or Noisia.

Any final words, upcoming releases, shows, radio etc?

Please help to support us by buying our latest releases! Slap anyone who leaks them! 🙂
We have some forthcoming material on the Triplevision labels, more on Concussion, a release on a french label named ‘Kosen Prod’, and a tune on Renegade Hardware. We have some gigs coming up in France at the end of the month, also Amsterdam! We have a big event in Paris around January/February, which we also have to do a mix for!

Again, thanks for chatting to us here at In-Reach, big up!