Shonky's interview at Djoon, Paris

WTS. How did you meet the Real Tone crew?

Shonky: It’s a long story, I first met Lionel almost ten years ago. It was for some new year's eve and he was a friend of a friend. We all ended at my parents place for a huge afterparty. The kind of parties you totally lose control. He was there and I guess this is where everything start with him.

About Franck, I first heard a lot about him before we met. Lionel was talking a lot about him all the time and when we finally meet I already knew him pretty well. I remember when Lionel told me how he pictured himself Real Tone in the first place, his wish to unite both french and american house scene.

W. Real Tone is known as a  US deep house inspired label, you know them for a long time, in your opinion what this merger is it due?

S: I think we have a lot of common roots about electronic music but they have been always more concerned by the NY scene than I was. I've been more influenced by San Francisco and its psychedelic deep house. I guess they are known as a US deep house inspired label because Franck Roger who built Real Tone with Lionel has a strong US deep house background. They also had collaboration from a lot of american artists and they were promoting parties with guys like Kenny Dope, Alix Alvarez ,Frankie Feliciano, etc. They stay focus on this direction for a long time now.

W.Real Tone is trying to be as crossover as possible, is this workable because the scene becomes more housey?

S: Nowadays i think everything is going really fast: There are more and more producers, doing more and more tunes and the styles are moving quicker than before. I think Real Tone is more crossover because their definition of house can touch both scenes, house and techno with guys like Ricardo Villalobos or Loco Dice.

W.Why did you call this EP "Le Velour" (french word for velvet)?

S: When I think about velour I always think about something warm and cosy in which you want to let yourself go. The track is deep and drives me in a nice and warm feeling. In french sometimes we can categorize a vocal as a vocal velour. The artist Sade would be one of the best examples. It's the same with that track, I think the vocal is a vocal velour.

W. Why choosing Franck Roger to remix "Le Velour"?

S: First because i love his work, then because he enjoyed my work and wanted us to release something together. I also think he wanted to do a remix. It is also nice to work with friends who share the same passion than you do. I think our productions are increasingly close to each other, so it was pretty natural to choose him as a remixer, and even if I'm hardly excited about remixes, he did three great remixes. 

W. Any predictions about the future of the scene?

S: Hard to say because if we knew everything about the future, it wouldn't be exciting anymore. Music is changing all the time, everyday some newcomers extends the scene.