When and how did you form Monaque?

Serge - We met at Club XIII in Moscow during a party I was doing with King Unique.  I used to play some of Alexs tracks but never met him in person and here we were introduced by a mutual friend. At the time I had some remix offers on the table from Vapour and Ultra, and we decided to try and do them together. Both were rather well received so we started taking on more work.
Alex – Yeah, it worked out rather well. First we found out that we live only a block from each other and after working together on some projects we realized that we had more or less the same vision for the sound we would like to achieve. And even though most of our stuff is done in different styles, you can still hear that it’s us.

You are already counting 20 years of presence in music. Others would have moved on by now, what made you keep up with your work and stay at the forefront of the electonic music scene? Have you confronted any difficulties throughout these years?

Serge – For me it’s the fact that my body clock keeps me up at night. I’m completely comfortable with staying up ‘til 10am and then sleeping all day ‘til 8pm. At first it was a problem, but after a while I stopped trying to fight it and just thought, “hey I could use this”, it makes sense to be in a business where you don’t have to fight your own body. But the main thing is that I truly love electronic music. Everything from D’n’B to House, to Ambient, it’s just a part of me since I was like 10 years old, and I really can’t see my life without it in some form or other.  And the DJing started way earlier, around 6 years old I destroyed many of my moms tapes trying to start them at the same time and have them go together simultaneously. So me becoming a DJ was a natural progression I guess.
Alex – Ive been producing for over 12 years and for me every moment in this business is something new. I think its one of the very small amount of industries where you learn something new every day. And I only started DJing 5 years ago, so there is quite a lot that I still haven’t seen or experienced. I cant imagine going to an office and sitting behind a desk all day, so this is a really good way out.

Which are the factors that stimulated you in order to occupy yourselves with electronic music?

I think we just didn’t want to do anything else.  The feeling of having someone you admire play your tune, or when you play to a crowd of tens of thousands of people can’t be compared to anything. In a way you feel like God. That might be a strong statement, but in the end you’re controlling thousands of people, and through radio you have millions listen to you. Its partly enjoyment and partly power trip 
Do you have certain and separate roles concerning music production as well as live performances?
Serge - Well, Alex is what you would call a studio geek, he’s always upgrading, putting in new plugins, new synths, etc etc. I’m more in to using what I know and trying to get old software to do new things. I also like to do mixes more than tracks, I mostly see other peoples tracks a bit differently so I re-edit the hell out of them and I’ve even seem some re-edits cut out and posted on torrents. Kind of funny but makes you feel that you’re doing something right if other people go through the trouble of cutting those out.

Alex – I really like more sitting in the studio rather than performing, it’s a lot more calm, relaxing, I can take my time doing what I need to make a track sounding the way I want it. Designing new sounds, figuring out new ways to achieve different things in the mixes and tracks, and looking for new ways to do our live sets. We’ve been DJing together for a bit now, and Serge got more used to this over the years, while it really takes a lot of energy out of me. 
Which is the one thing that you pay more attention at the procedure of music production? Is it just a moment of inspiration or do you have in mind exactly what you want to create?
We usually start with some basic elements, but almost never have anything in mind prior to production. It kind of just flows, sometimes we redo a track a bunch of times. The Denis A remix that we did for Ocean, it was done over and over for weeks, and in the end we wrote a brand new version from scratch in a few hours. We don’t even think there’s any original parts in there other than a snippet of a midi part of the bassline, but it’s a project and you still have to deliver the way you see it.

I am going to ask you a question that put to any artist. Do you believe that technology plays an important role in music production and if it expands the inspiration of the artists.

Oh absolutely, I think its what drives most producers. It makes things easier, faster, better. It also inspires, sometimes you get a new program or plugin and BAM you do a bunch of new tracks in a matter of a few days, just because something that used to take you hours and hours now just took a few seconds and you can concentrate more on writing rather than warping, converting, and getting things to sound right together.  Technology is also playing a major role in more talented producers who couldn’t afford a studio now doing things on a laptop and giving the pros a run for their money, its not only inspirational but its also leveling the playing field for producers. We still cant understand why some oldschool producers use old equipment or methods when there is so much more quality equipment and software now. Even as the case with the infamous Yamaha NS10, they are horrible sounding monitors but due to the fact that most producers are so used to that sound they are not switching to better and newer stuff like Genelec or DynAudio.

Would you categorize your music into a specific genre?

Absolutely not, actually we get a lot of crap from our management and quite a few labels since almost everything we do sounds different to what we’ve done before that. It’s becoming quite a problem since its hard just sticking to one style but lately we’ve been consciously trying to at least keep things similar to each other.  But it really is hard, when inspiration hits or you see a remix or a track a certain way it’s really hard to change your view of it. But we’re trying our best.

Would you like to share with us any experiences you have gained concerning electronic music from your journeys around the world?

Serge - Well I think I’ll answer this as I’m the lucky one who gets to travel 99% of the time, although Alex has been touring with me more recently on the Renaissance – Russia tour. I’ve noticed that clubbers are different everywhere and its quite hard fitting in with your sound in some places. A lot of times you get booked just because someone heard your name or you came out on a certain label, and they expect certain things from you. You cant really play 100% what you want. It’s a lot easier for guys like John Digweed and Nick Warren, there is a sense of awe in the crowd, they are kind of like kings of their own sound, and even an average set from them will be accepted far better than an amazing set from you. That comes with the territory. But I have to say that you have to get as much info on the place your playing in advance, so when you do show up you can at least in some way bend your sound to suit the audience who came to hear you but is still a bit more inclined to the local sound. Also, sound systems make a HUGE difference on your performance and crowd response. Usually the better the sound the more you can experiment with music. It’s just a weird coincidence.

In which ways do you keep in touch with your audience? In fact you seem to be very friendly with facebook users, answering questions, something that is not so common among artists of your level.

Well, we don’t think that were at any special level at this time. We consider ourselves up and coming producers. But regardless of status, you still need to make people feel like they are on the same level as you. We think that an artist is no one without fans, friends, and fellow artists who support them, and we really want to get that point across. If you look at the biggest artists in any industry, the ones that keep in touch with everyone, they are the most grounded and the most followed. We really don’t want to and up being isolated from the rest of the world through our managers. It’s always a negative feeling when you try to connect with someone and all you get in response is an email of their manager.

Please name some of your favorite djs and producers.

Serge – Well for DJs I’d have to say Anthony Pappa, Hernan Cattaneo, John Digweed, James Zabiela,  Sasha can be so- so and can be the best on the planet. A person I really was amazed by was DJ Three, I never heard him before this year but was really surprised, I couldn’t stop dancing during his set and thought technically he was flawless. As for production, Guy J has been a favorite of mine for the past few years, and he keeps getting better and better.  Henry Saiz is doing some amazing stuff as well as Oxia, Robert Babicz, Nicolas Masseyeff, and of course Charlie May and Ripperton. There really are waaaay too many good DJs and producers to name them all. It all comes down to quality music and we’re in a good place right now with so much coming out, so much quality stuff to choose from, from really great producers.
Alex – For a long time my favorite DJs were Sasha and Digweed. But recently I opened a new name for myself, which isn’t really new but it’s the first time I heard him spin live, it’s James Holden, I also really like Platikman, Guy Gerber, and Minilogue. Out of producers I really like Deadbeat and Petar Dundov. But I try not to influence myself too much as it causes problems with finding your own sound.
In which gig did you have the chance to play with a dj that you admire? How did you feel about it?
WAAAAY too many. From Sasha on New Years Night at Arma17 to John Digweed in St.Petersburg, and the amazing gig with James Zabiela at Kazantip, Hernan Cattaneo at Gaudi Arena, more or less we’ve played with almost every dj we ever wanted to play with.  Tenaglia has been eluding us for the past few years, but time will definitely come  

How do you feel about the fact that many super star djs such as Sasha and Hernan Cattaneo choose to play your tracks?

Its amazing really… Me and Alex had only two goals at one point, to get Sasha to play our tune and to be signed to Renaissance. Both of them came true, and at one point we were sitting there and just going, “what now?” but truly the big guys like Hernan, Pappa, John, Sasha and many many others have been of tremendous help in getting us noticed. And we are extremely greatful for the opportunity they present to us. Its actually rather scary sending them our stuff, because you never know what the response will be. But so far so good.

Productions, members of the Audio Therapy Agency, 25 days on tour in Eastern Europe, a monthly show on Frisky radio and a cd compilation on Renaissanse, what else should we expect from you in the future?

An artist album hopefully, if we can get our heads around finishing up all of our remix and production duties, the tour has been really cool so far but its been a nightmare getting productions done. Never enough sleep, always on the road. But we guess we asked for it, so now we just have to adjust and work.
After the Renaissance compilation should we expect the release of any singles with them or any other labels?
Yes we already have an EP signed to Renaissance that will be out soon, also quite a few things on Microcastle, singles and a remix. Hopefully Butterfly will get a digital release as it’s been in vinyl limbo for over a year. Its got two amazing remixes from Jim Rivers and Sei A but only a vinyl version is available right now.  Some stuff on Vapour is going to come out soon. And a few surprises, so all you guys have to do is just wait a bit.  Just check our sites for updates.

Would we have the pleasure to have you in Greece in the near future?

We don’t know, we really don’t have any idea where we’ll be in a few months. Guess if Greece calls we’ll gladly come.

Submit a TOP 10 Chart Please!
1 Monaque – Resolutions
2 Nude Lowkey – Easter (Jamie Stevens Tech Dub)
3 Triangle – Four
4 Monaque – Dos3000 (Quivver Remix)
5 Pappa & Quivver – Sofastar DJs
6 Spooky – Little Bullet
7 Kirk Degiorgio – Membrane (C2 Mix)
8 Fink D’Void – Italoca
9 Metrika – Paradox
10 Sam Paganini - Shibuya