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They both appear online under a pseudonym, and "LostInTheRush" did not actually know "FTAH" when they both started as students on electronic music line at Performers House. But "LostInTheRush" aka Niels Hesse quickly found out that he and Sebastian Graugaard had been in contact online without really meeting in their shared hometown Silkeborg.
"There is not really an electronic music environment in Silkeborg," explains Niels Hesse, who always lived in the town.
"It's a little niche, what I do. The environment exists on the web. A small music community created entirely on the Internet, and it is just no matter where people come from. It is composed largely of people around Denmark and I have repeatedly been doing gigs based on writing with people on the internet - particularly in Esbjerg and Århus."
Niels Hesse mostly worked by himself. He has "been nerding in my room" as he puts it. But he has made a lot of connections through the electronic music, and many of my friends hear it too.
"I have never really received money for playing. I have had an experience and possible some beers - but it's always a good thing to get out and promote your name as a DJ. Okay, I actually sold some hip-hop beats to some rappers online. As I said, I've always worked best by myself."
Inspired by funk, jazz - and German techno
Hip hop is not really his genre, although he has listened much to it. The musical interest began with funk and jazz. But when he really got started with the electronic sound machine and started making beats, they could be used for hip hop.
"Actually that was what I started doing when it became more serious - that is when I was about 14 to 15 years and I've made much hip hop. There is a lot of borrowing of each others stuff, and it is agreed that this is OK - but you can not cut a piece out of a Michael Jackson song and then use it . The reason why hip hop is known for sampling is because in the beginning the musicians did not have the technique to produce the sound themselves."
Originally it was some obscure German techno music of the 90s that caught his interest, and already by the age of 10, Niels Hesse acquired a simple program, "Dance Ejay" which was the first step towards working seriously with music on a computer.
"Later I got hold of something a little more advanced, where I could make sounds, composition and arrangement. The first program was really just pre-programmed sounds and melodies that you could combine. The first real music program was an early version of "FL Studio" which does not look very sophisticated today, but still could do far more than the one I used first. It is a question of how many parameters you have to fiddle with."
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 Disc jockey without vinyls
While his work with electronic music took place behind a closed door, Niels Hesse started going out to perform as a DJ, formerly known as "disc jockey" and having to do with flipping records and saying something clever in between.
"There are some who claim that you are not a real DJ if you do not have vinyls and a couple of Technics turntables. I am a digital DJ - I have everything in my computer. When I perform, it is with my computer, my controllers and headphones. I play all possible numbers and put my own stuff in between. The trick is to get the numbers gliding into each other, so that it sounds as if it has been supposed. In parallel with each other or as a transition from one track to the next. On the way, new music emerges out of existing tracks."
"My live setup consists of compositions I have made and cut into pieces - which I then combine again live. It can be anything from small percussion parts or strings or individual sounds that I put together in a new way. I have these 16 buttons that I can put different things on and then set off in different ways. Actually, there are eight times 16. When you have spent a long time making a composition, you have heard it so many times that you know where each element is located. It is actually not as difficult as it sounds."
A live performance can last a half or eight hours or something else entirely, says Niels Hesse. He often plays locally as "background DJ" where the task is to lay the base for a good party .
"At Escobar I’m usually told that I can go on at 11 and continue until I get weary ..."
Heavy reggae rhythms and bass mania
The music he really wants to play is akin to reggae, explains Niels Hesse.
"The music genre I have focused on, called "dubstep ", comes from Britain. It origins in early "garage music" mixed with dub elements and a lot of bass. Dub is a kinmd of digital reggae. Technically dubstep is tempo 140 beats per minute with half tempo drums and a lot of focus on bass. At first dubstep was minimalist, heavy, deep and dub-like, but that has changed. Today it is more cumbersome and noisy, "in your face "-like - more club-oriented, where it initially was "four people standing in a dark room looking into the ground”. More of a listening experience. It has been about experiencing the sound of some giant speakers - with so much bass. The bass-element derived from reggae - in Jamaica they have developed a culture from reggae, where they meet with some great sound systems and play this bass stuff. It is almost a kind of bass mania."
Reggea-inspiration is also characteristic of the band Bionic Disco, who appeared at the recent No. 9-festival that took place at Performers House. Niels Hesse knows the "colleagues" from Silkeborg very well.
"Bionic Disco is a sound system in the best reggae tradition. They go out as DJs and play mainly reggae. There is not so much mix-element in it as in DJ'ing, but the music they play is very lively and they can respond to audience reactions. They do it as a hobby. There is hardly a career in it, because it is very much a niche. They have this contact with people and really understand how to build up a mood. If you want to make money as a DJ, you have to play popular music. Pop and house."
Building network
Bionic Disco has a huge network within their own subculture and they are thus addressing a niche audience. If people come to hear Bionic Disco, they know what it is about, says Niels Hesse. He's even started to expand its contacts.
"If you talk about "compositions" - "numbers" I have fairly many listeners out there - the web breaks some boundaries. But it is not so remarcable - yet - as to make tour with it. I have no idea what the perspectives of my work with music can be, but I will have to work with producing music - the future probably lies in producing for others.
The evolution in sound and dance
Niels Hesse tells of a current collaboration between the line of electronic music and the dance line. The theme is the evolution from big bang to the end of the world, which will be translated into sound and choreography. Collaboration between the lines is going really well, the musicians working individually with compositions for the different time periods.
"I do the "big bang" piece and the final: "The machines take over the world." It's great to have a framework and to have a fixed assignment. One easily gets lost in all the possibilities when working with electronic music. But here, in a way you have handed over the over all responsibility. The framework is laid out."
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