Clubbing Magazine


Above & Beyond (Tony, Jono and Paavo) are one of the UK’s most exciting dance music talents, known for their peerless solo productions and remixes for the likes of Madonna and Dido, as well as for their award-winning Radio 1 Essential Mix. The trio are set to release ‘Tri-State’ on March 6th 2006.
Tri-State feels like an album that will make your core fans very happy but which should also appeal to all fans of electronic music and beyond. Was it always your intention to create an album with such broad appeal? TONY: We wanted to make an album that would appeal to us first and foremost and the thing is we have quite broad tastes but for things that are really good. So that’s always the aim, make something that’s good at what it is rather than aim it at someone. And the start point for the album was primarily the songs. For the most part the songs are about doubt, that core human feeling of constant indecision that most people recognize, is this the right person for me, is this the right direction for me and so on, and that is where the connection will come from hopefully.
Among other things you’re known for making music that rocks the dance floor, so how does the process of making an album differ from making club tracks? JONO: Working on an album is very liberating, as you don't have to think about keeping a dance floor moving, you can concentrate on the music. I'm sure people who like our music in clubs will love it, and of course there will be club mixes of many of the tracks. I'm hoping we'll be one of the first acts to pull off an album in this genre with real quality and sincerity, just as bands like Underworld did years ago. It's not a token album that's there to serve a purpose, it's raw and real - what you're getting is just the three of us with our vocalists.”
The album seems to have an almost filmic quality to it, much like your Radio 1 Essential Mix. Do you draw inspiration from movie soundtracks? PAAVO: All of us obviously end up watching lots of films on airplanes so I suppose it comes naturally :) But yes, we all really like music in films and I feel that it’s great how “pure” the music in soundtracks is: it’s written specifically to be effective.
You write all your own songs and they seem to have a lot of depth and emotion, do you see that as something that differentiates Above & Beyond from other dance acts? TONY: Most of the people in our scene are DJ’s and/or producers, rather than musicians or songwriters. And so the only way for these guys to get vocals into their material is to ask a singer to write something over a backing track that’s already been written and that’s great if they really nail it first time, but that’s very rare. We start from the opposite position – we write a song and then build a track around it that suits the lyrics. And this is the same whether we’re doing the whole thing ourselves, like Far From In Love or Alone Tonight for example, or writing with a singer like Ash (from Luminary who sings Can’t Sleep) or Hannah (who sang Home). We finish the song first, make sure it hangs together lyrically and melodically and then build a track around it. In that way we’re more like a band than a dance act per se.
	Why is the album called ‘Tri-State”? TONY: “It’s a title that seems to fit a lot of things. On one level there are three of us in Above & Beyond, with three different unique personalities and different nationalities (Jono is British, Paavo is Finish and I’m Irish). On another level we have three different aspects that are involved in this album – we are producers, we are DJ’s and we are musicians/songwriters. And then there are the Three Realms of Existence, the three states of matter and the three dimensions. Three is the magic number!”
	Back to the album then, what are the tracks on there that people will recognise, and any new ones they should look out for? JONO: The album has Air For Life and Alone Tonight in there, but all of the other tracks are new to the public. One of my personal favourites is Stealing Time, which captures the feeling of writing the album - a lot of over-time! Liquid Love is perhaps the most emotional moment of the album, but I'll let you be the judge of that!
The album preview podcast you created made into iTunes top 10 music podcasts. Have you been surprised by how well the album has been received so far? PAAVO: Podcasts were a new, interesting world for me when we first thought of making one: I didn’t even know they have charts etc. We were amazed to see how popular the podcast became, and how quickly: it entered the charts after just 24hours of being available! If you are online, podcasts are definitely something to check out: they’re free and easy to listen to, and ours can be found there by doing a search for “tri-state”.
Interview by: John Doe @ Anjunabeats / Bonnier