Interview: Aïsha Devi / Danse Noire

15 Nov 2013 — Henning Lahmann

Tomorrow on Saturday, November 16, it's finally happening: together with our friends at Urban Mutations, we're proud to present and host a night at Kreuzberg's Chesters to showcase one of Europe's most exciting new underground dance labels, Geneva-based imprint Danse Noire. Featuring live performances by label founder Aïsha Devi and DN alumni Vaghe Stelle plus Lorenzo Senni aka Stargate as a very special guest, you may expect hours and hours of finest forward-thinking electronic exploration. 

To learn a bit more about Danse Noire and the ideas behind this amazing project, we talked to Aïsha Devi via email before she's arriving in town tomorrow. Read the interview after the break, and check out some tracks off of Devi's Aura 4 Everyone EP, released on DN earlier this year.

For more event details, check out Resident Advisor or Facebook.

 

When did you start Danse Noire?

I had fantasies about a collective platform for a while, I also wanted an other angle on music than my own solo production, a wider vision. So I started the label with my boyfriend and my best friend about a year and a half ago and some other friends joined us in the love circle. We found the name exactly a year ago, while driving back from a show in Turin. The whole trip was hazy and mystic, the name Danse Noire came to us. Things have been pretty intense ever since.

What did make you want to start a label in the first place?

Having a total autonomy and a subversive medium to feed.

What do you want to achieve with the label? What is the concept behind it? It feels like there’s a very distinct idea that characterises DN.

As the whole society is generated by materialistic capitalization, I think the revolution will be spiritual. The label is an experimental terrain for alternate languages, consciousness, activism and magic explorations. Music should return to its fundamental and ritual function. The music I'm appealed to put out is not a functional product but the result of an illumination. 

Aside from the releases, we've been running label showcases and parties. Clubs and raves are the new temples. There's an entertainment side to it, fun is fun but I like the gathering as a possibility to reach transcendence, collectively.

How do you find your artists, and where?

We're truffle pigs, yo. We do hours and hours of Soundcloud and Bandcamp subterranean digging and we also do have some magic friends-connections operating.

Is it easy to run a label from a rather small place like Geneva? How is the music scene in the city? Or is location irrelevant today?

In terms of livability of a label, location tends to have less and less impact. Our communication and audience is rather emerging out of Switzerland, but dealing with your direct environment is a nice challenge too. I feel Geneva is in a bit of a luxury era, avant-garde and non strictly danceable music is struggling out here, Danse Noire is also a reaction to this statism, we don't correspond to the local scene and we have that cool underdog position.

Exporting the label worldwide is awesome but i also like the reverse idea of bringing an alternative here, transforming Swiss media's prejudices about digital culture, curate events and build up a new scenery.

What is the reason behind the decision to abandon your moniker Kate Wax in favour of your given name?

Sometime you feel like what you've created has a story of its own and has reached some limits. I wanted to start the label and produce music as instinctively as I breathe, and I breathe as Aïsha Devi. I reunited with myself, I'm one. I feel like a virgin.

What’s up next, for your own music as well as for Danse Noire?

I'm working on my new album at the moment and we are readying three or four releases for early next year. I'm really excited about this, spectrum extension at its maximum, exploration 2.0.