Meeting on a Drum&BassArena production forum way back in 2007, the rise of Technimatic – previously known as Technicolour and Komatic – has been spectacular. With a knack for producing soulful liquid rollers, the duo’s forthcoming album on Shogun Audio looks set to be an essential addition to any discerning drum & bass fan’s collection.
On the back of their latest breathtaking release, and with an album well on the way, we thought it would be a good idea to catch up with the boys and ask them how each of their five UKF releases came to be, and if there’s any interesting back story behind each one.
“We never had any plans on getting where we are today,” reveals Pete, or Technicolour if you want to be formal. “We were just two guys who got together and made drum & bass for fun. The fact it’s got to this point now is constantly very humbling and incredible for us.”
We, along with many others, are certainly glad that they’ve made it to where they are today. To celebrate their rise to the forefront of the scene Technimatic have analysed and reflected on their many UKF appearances, shedding light on the realities of being committed to making music while working full time day jobs.
UKF Podcast #26
(Uploaded: September 2012)
UKF Music Podcast #26 – Technimatic in the mix by Ukf on Mixcloud
We got a fantastic response off that mix, which really surprised us. It got a lot of reach and gave us extra exposure. This mix is what we try to do in all of our mixes; give you a flavour of what we play out live, which is plenty of musical stuff but with enough weight for the dance floor as well – we always aim for a nice blend. It was a great privilege to do a mix for UKF.
Turner Road
(Uploaded: November 2012)
This was the first track we got on to the UKF channel, it’s actually one of the first tracks we ever produced together, but it took a while to come out for a number of various reasons. Eventually it got picked up for a compilation and that’s how it found its way on to UKF.
The title is actually a bottle of wine we were drinking at the time when we produced the track! We’re partial to a nice bottle of red or two when in production mode. As long as it isn’t Blue Nun… we do have some standards! We decided to have fun with this track, there’s a garage inspired soulful loop and vocal over the top of it which gives it a nice summery vibe, which is what we like to do with a lot of our tracks.
Not Far To Go
(Uploaded: March 2013)
This came out on an EP we did for Spearhead Recordings. The name alludes to the fact that neither of us do drum & bass for a living, we both have to hold down regular nine to five jobs too, which restricts our studio time quite heavily. We had to snatch every small opportunity we had to try and get the EP all done and dusted, so that’s where the name for this came from. We try to avoid standard song names and go for something that relates to the time. There’s no denying it’s difficult juggling two entirely separate worlds and at times it can be tricky, but we absolutely love it so there are no complaints whatsoever.
Intersection
(Uploaded: June 2013)
This was the title track for our EP on Shogun’s sister label SGN. It was the first EP SGN ever put out, so it was quite a good look for us. This track was us trying to do something a little more geared towards the dance floor, with a growlier bassline and repeated vocal. We feel like we’re at an intersection in our lives really; we’ve got our everyday jobs to bring the money in but we’ve also got the other lives of being drum & bass DJs, we’re at that point now where we’re wondering if we’ll ever be able to go full time as DJs – we’ll have to wait and see.
A funny story about this particular track: We were playing it at a Shogun event in Southampton last year and Friction was on after us. Komatic bent down to pick a drink up off the floor when a complete stranger gave him a wedgie! That caused his pants to completely come off! So of course, us being us, we picked them up and lobbed them at Friction’s head! Luckily it didn’t mess up his Mohican, that thing is rock hard…
Night Vision
(Uploaded: April 2014)
This is the first track from the new forthcoming album. It’s pretty much a straight up homage to a period of drum & bass that both of us are very passionate about; around the time of 2005 when the likes of High Contrast and a few others mastered that funky, soulful liquid sound which we absolutely love. We’ve been playing this in our sets for a few months now and even when people don’t know what it is, everyone seems to love it and vibe off it. It’s such a good feeling!
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