artists

• Where: Argonaughty boat
• When: Sunday 11.07. at 16:30-20:00
• Where: Tiki Bar and Beach Terrace
• When: Saturday 10.07. at 22:00-02:00

Kristian Beyer and Frank Wiedemann (collectively known as Âme) were born in Karlsruhe, South Germany. Kristian grew up in Mannheim whilst Frank remained in Karlsruhe. Even now despite the electronic music world’s current migration to Berlin, they both agree Karlsruhe is still the city for them to continue their musical journey.

Frank spent his early days exploring the vast worlds of jazz and contemporary classical music, immersed in piano lessons with very encouraging and open-minded music teachers. While he tinkered away in Karlsruhe, Kristian meanwhile in Mannheim was too busy shirking his guitar lessons in order to play football and collect records. The latter hobby paid off when, at 25 whilst taking a civil engineering degree, Kristian had the opportunity to open a record shop with a friend. Having moved back to Karlsruhe to study, it was only a matter of time before Frank, the like-minded electronically inclined record collector began frequenting Kristian’s shop.

Frank: I went into the shop and was buying some nu jazz records, lots of drum’n’bass, all sorts. Kristian showed me some Moodymann stuff, and some music that he thought could fit into my jazzy mind. I had some club experiences after that. Kristian brought me to see Robert Johnson, and that finally helped me understand house music. I’m not sure I even understand it right these days! (laughs) At the time, I was already working on a small electronic music project, but it was more nu jazz. I always say that Kristian asked me to start working together...
Kristian: No, he asked me! (laughs) I was playing parties, he was playing parties, and sometimes we’d play together. It wasn’t like we had a club night or anything like that; there’s not a huge scene in Karlsruhe. It’s funny because these days the clubs are getting bigger, but it actually feels exactly the same. We’re still just playing music we like and having fun. It’s been over seven years now.

Having already dabbled in the party scene as up-and-coming DJs, Frank and Kristian had acquainted themselves with the likes of Jazzanova, Henrik Schwarz and Dixon. Their first signing was incidental and unexpected, as they’d only modestly asked Dixon for his opinion of their productions. Dixon had been A&R’ing for Jazzanova’s Sonar Kollektiv imprint and he immediately snapped up and signed what would become their debut ‘Safari/Hydrolic Dog’ EP. From there, their rhythmic, fluid releases poured out, perhaps their most notable being the chart-topping, endlessly remixed, omnipresent hit of summer ’05, ‘ Rej.’ While they still can’t seem to get through a DJ set without a ‘Rej’ request, their wide-reaching productions have grown from strength to strength, spun from genre to genre and jumped from label to label. Ame alongside Dixon have worked on their own independent label “Innervisions”. Through this label, they’ve spent the last 2 ½ years A&R’ing and working with like minded artists.

Kristian: Frank is the musician so when it comes to producing, I’m more like the movie director sometimes.
Frank: I think he’s more like the producer, and I’m more like the musician throwing in all the material; he’s got the vision to put it all together. The problem is if you work on something for a few hours, you can’t even hear it anymore. I don’t know where he gets it from, but he’s always able to see the whole thing, as a full picture. We’re counterparts. Good, bad...
Kristian: Ying, yang. During the course of production, our sound changes so much, depending on what music we are listening to, what mood we’re in, what the others are doing. I own a record shop so I can see what’s going on at the moment in the electronic music scene. Going through all of these influences brings us always to some point. I hope it will still always sound like us, but maybe it’s different to records we did before. It’s a constant evolving process.

On ‘fabric 42,’ Âme twist in and out of shades, shapes and chromatics to create a kaleidoscopic blend of electronics and infectious grooves. Here Ame have created their own soundscape with a diamond-studded cast, which breathes a magical soundtrack to the last days of summer and beyond.

Visit the artist’s webpage for more info