In the world of Drum and Bass, Halogenix has fast become a household name, boasting plenty of big releases on a variety of labels such as Dispatch, Critical, Horizons and Invisible and recently forming The Ivy Lab with Sabre and Stray. We’ve managed to hook up with him to get an insight into the world of Halogenix, past and future.
Welcome Halogenix 🙂
In-Reach: Firstly we were wondering if there’s a story behind the name Halogenix, how did it come about?
Halogenix: I used to sit in school back in the day drawing tags all over my text books, I remember I used to love drawing the word ‘Halogen’ all over my chemistry text book, so when it came time to make a name for my beats I just though of a way to extend upon Halogen, and thus Halogenix came to be.
In-Reach: Everyone is different when it comes to music. Aside from drum n bass do any other genres influence your productions and do you ever experiment with making much non dnb?
Halogenix: Yeah i’d say i’m pretty heavily influenced by music that falls outside of dnb. I listen to a lot of ambient music and techno, these both come through quite heavily in my productions I think.
Yeah I don’t just stick to making music at 170, I play around with lots of different tempos.
Dispatch Recordings – Halogenix – Raya
In-Reach: We heard in your fabric live promo that your dad inspired you to make music, would you ever get your dad involved in any of your coming productions?
Halogenix: Ha. – I used to have this fantasy of playing a pendulum style set on stage at a massive festival and having my dad come out and play the horn. I think if I ever made music with my dad, it’d change keys every 7 & 3/4 bars and would be in some crazy time signature. He’s a classically trained musician and I don’t think he understands dance music all that well!
In-Reach: We know that you’ve recently got together with Sabre and Stray to form Ivy Lab, will your solo work be taking a back seat?
Halogenix: Quite the opposite. The success that the Ivy Lab has had in the past few months has driven me to pick up the pace with my solo endeavours. I’ve got a couple projects in the pipeline so keep your eyes peeled.
In-Reach: Is there a particular process when making tunes with Sabre& Stray? Does one of you work a specific area or is it all together?
Halogenix: Not really – When we’re actually all in the same place we just end up either going through samples or going through old projects, when something snags, we end up just running with an idea until we can’t go any further and then move on. We all have our strengths in the studio, J’s got a wicked sense of melody and loves to mess around with synths. Gove has a very vast knowledge of some very weird and wonderful samples and I sit happily in the middle. We’re all very hands on with the production process as well so it’s a constant “move over” kind of situation.
In-Reach: Aside from that who would you most like to do a co-lab with?
Halogenix: Amerie.
In-Reach: We’ve all got our favorites old and new, is there any track in particular you would love to remix?
Halogenix: I’d love to remix Inner city life by Goldie. I remember when I first started going clubbing when I was a kid, hearing Goldie play that tune at Herbal blew me away. I didn’t realise who he was or what that tune was for a very long time. Even now i’ll hear it and go straight back to being 15.
In-Reach: Also I see your playing at Outlook this summer, I personally can’t wait to get out there! Do u have much else planned?
Halogenix: Yeah I can’t wait for that. It’s my first time playing at a festival so i’m pretty excited.
I’ll be gigging a lot over the UK and Europe this summer with Halogenix and Ivy Lab. I’m actually playing a double show on may 24th which is my birthday, first at Hospitality in Brixton, and then off to Bristol to play Critical @ Motion, so pretty excited about that. I’m sure it’ll be a wicked party 🙂
Now a couple of quick fires for the producers out there.
In-Reach: Do you use any sample packs or do you sample your own drums and hits etc?
Halogenix: Depends what i’m going for really. I’ll use hits to reinforce particular sounds, most of which come from old breaks.
In-Reach: What’s your favorite plugin?
Halogenix: There are so many! A few that spring to mind are the FabFilter Pro Q. URS Phat C, Ohmicide.
In-Reach: Favorite external hardware?
Halogenix: Virus.
In-Reach: Finally… Whats next in the pipeline? Any events or releases our readers should know about?
Halogenix: I’ve got my debut Solo 12″ forthcoming on Dispatch in the next few months which is a 4 track EP, 2 on vinyl, 2 digital, as well as some other projects which are still being sorted out.
With Ivy Lab, we’re working on our first EP for Critical which’ll be coming out hopefully by the end of the Summer time. You can catch Ivy Lab in Brighton on the 20th of April, in Cologne on the 8th of may, Cable on the 18th of May and then we’re doing the Brixton/Bristol night on the 24th… You can catch Halogenix in London on the 6th of June at Fire for the Genesis 3rd birthday party.
In-Reach: Yeah the night at Cable in May is on my list, will definitely catch you there.
RinseFM // Critical Music – Halogenix // Ivy Lab – 10 April 2013
For more; check out Halogenix’s Soundcloud / Facebook / Twitter
