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Go with the Flow ...

Joao Pena is one of the old players in psytrance biz.
The Labelmanager of Flow Records based in Lisbon / Portugal is well known for his High Class Releases on Flow Records and just founded " Open Up Records ", a label dedicated to the more progressive side of trance music.

With a bunch of all time favourite releases he represents Portugals Trancescene worldwide, organizes Events and so on ...

We had the Chance to do an interview with him and hope to give you some interessting infos and updates on one of the oldskool Labels.Portugals Trance Scene and Partys and what ever you´ll read in the next minutes.

1. Who are you and where are you from exactly ?

Born 1971, im a portuguese lisbon´s based citizen ...label manager and main dj of flow recs.

2. Tell us a bit about your normal day life ?

nowadays, have plenty of work, doing all the label office issues, all day in front of the computer and listening to music and normally take 2 til 3h per day to go to the beach and surf

 

3. What do you think of the today's scene generally ? What direction is it taking, what moments you like or dislike?

The scene has been changing, altough the gap between psytrance and progressive trance is still on, i´ve been noticing that the promoters and main scene is much more open now to both styles and the progressive is moving up, so the good things is that you can have the best of both worlds at a party or festival

4.What do you think of the growing number of the labels, artists and the quality of the music released nowadays ?

Each day there´s a new label appearing, its normal on all the scenes, with the good and bad things conected, its nice to see the scene growing but at the same time there´s plenty of labels who just release music without a minimum of quality or professionalism which makes the listerner/buyer/scene dazed and confused..

4a. After all those Years in the Trance Scene and successful work at Flow Rec. you´ve opened " Open Up Records ". What direction will this Label take ? What kind of Artists and Styles can we expect to hear ?

Open Up records is a colaboration with a portuguese dj(dj seph), our main focus is progressive, techy breaks house and sometimes trancy elements, we have 5 releases(vinil 12") ready to go and more beeing cooked but you can expect as first release a rhythm code ep, mike hiratzka with chris micali rmx, loppis with rhytm code rmx, descent with piece process rmx, descent ep to name a few, we are quite opened and we will release only high quality dancefloor top rated tracks, and we will work together with critical rhytmn management to give us a solid based distribution(amato and intergroove)

4b. Beckers is also signed to your Label, how do you see his evolution ?

No, actually Beckers will be on an Open Up release aswell, but maybe your thinking on my next Flow ep, its a Space Safari Ep(Frank Beckers more trancier side), this track is a top notch and for sure will be a hit for the progressive house and trance crowd, feedback has been amazing(and its features a Chris Micali rmx on the bside)

4c. On Flow Records you released Echoes lately ... what are the upcoming releases ? Any Albums planned for 2005 !?

For now, the Yotopia debut album, this guys from Israel can rock a dancefloor with their progressive morning trance with some psy elements, and the albumwill be a blast(will be out in the end of April) and the Space Safari Ep for beg of May.

5.Whats your opinion about the straight melting of Styles at the moment ? Producers and Djs from totally diffrent mayor styles get closer together e.g. André Absolut´s Rmx of Sub 6 !?

I think its great, this just shows that good music is good music and that we need to be open for all the styles and only this way the music scene evolves...

6.What are your origins how did you come to electronic music ???

i´ve been listening to electronica and industrial music since the 80´s and at the same time mixed that with alternative rock, disco acid house movement, so i hear bands like einturzende neubauten, front242, skinny puppy to sonic youth, spacemen3 and basement jaxx, madonna..etc...

 

7.Why did you decide to become djs ?

In 96 went to a goodmood/boomfestival party and all the world changed for me, i slowly left my lawyer career to become a dj and since then i started Flow in 2000 i left the the law world totally(altough i still use my knowlege due to label demands)...and im quite happy to be and live like this...

8.Which DJs and Acts/ Musicians have influenced your style?

Since im quite open i get plenty of influences but mostly in the begining where labels like Dragonfly, Tip, Twisted, Flying Rhino, Matsuri , Spiral trax, Phonokol, at that time all music and djs were an experience and i enjoyed all that energy and nowadays James Monro, Tristan, the Iboga dudes, etc etc etc etc so manyy

9.What was the best or funniest experience in your career???

good question...i loved to be in the eclipse festival in australia and all the country experience, also love to see japanese partying, and loveeedd Boom festival atmosphere this year

10.What was the worst, unluckiest or strangest experience in your career???

one time, i think, 5 years ago, went to a festival in france, they forget me at the airport and after waiting like 8 hours, me and friend decided to go by train etc...took us like one more day to get there...and then 1 more day to get our payment back...

11.What is your TOP OF THE POPS at the moment !?

mr Beckers is becoming a top popster indeed but of course i wanna mention Yotopia act, they are excelent musicians with plenty of inner musicallity and making some monster tracks

12.What are your plans, any upcoming releases or events you wanna mention ???

releases i have mentioned before, but would like to anounce the Flow Online Direct Shop with all our catalog and our new T-Shirt Collection(all up in a couple of weeks maximum), event wise our flow parties in copenhagen on 16april and lisbon on 13may.Check www.flow-records.com for all the info

13.Regarding Portugal, what´s up there actually !? Where are the ppl going to ?

Psytrance is quite comercial and big, specially in the center north of Portugal, some good parties are being held but plenty of bad ones aswell(typical everywhere)and the progressive house/trance in Lisbon is also getting bigger but only concentrated in clubs...all is flowing

 

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Interview by Frederik Flanger for Frederikflanger.com

for more infos visit :

FLOW RECORDS HOMEPAGE