Pole Interview

STEFAN BETKE AKA POLE TOOK SOME TIME BEFORE HIS BLEEP43 LIVE SHOW TO TALK TO DAN BEAN ABOUT HIP HOP, ARCHITECTURE AND ADRIAN SHERWOOD

You’ve mentioned that you used to be involved with hip hop, how did you get into it and has it influenced your music?

Well, I was listening mainly to hip hop when I was still living in Düsseldorf in the late 80s early 90s, and we had a band there too playing mostly jazz influenced hip hop and so it took quite a while before I came more involved in techno and dub etc… I really liked the beat programming and the simplicity in just beat on sound and vox.

Are there any artists that have inspired you to use the mixing desk as an instrument (e.g. Lee Perry)?

Of course. a lot of Jamaican musicians inspired me using a mixer as an instrument. but as well I was lucky to know a guy in Düsseldorf back in the days who was really into dubbing on the board, and of course Adrian Sherwood’s work influenced me a lot beside quite a few others…

What experience are you aiming to create for the audience during a Pole performance?

This is difficult. I try to be funky and groovy. It would be great if I could make them dance a bit, to show that there is dance music even without a 4/4 minimal techno beat, if you know what I mean? But anyways I will try to be diverse and bassy.

What do you think Pole would sound like if you were based in another city such as London, or even the countryside, instead of Berlin?

I think it would sound the same so long as I would have lived in a big city. Maybe a bit more British or more techno if I would have developed Pole in Detroit instead of Cologne and Berlin. Countryside I don´t know. I guess I could work part time in the countryside, but I need architecture and big cities close to me to get new ideas.