Clubbing Magazine

The Thrillseekers - One of the best trance producers in the world.

The Thrillseekers aka Steve Helstrip has been at the very forefront of the trance scene for over 5 years now. From his 2003 Hydra project and recent Ferry Corsten collaboration 'Sublime', back to the legendary - The Thrillseekers 'Synaesthesia', he has produced a powerhouse of hugely emotive music. Steve started out making trance music while working for the computer games developer, Manic Media. Whilst living in Chipping Norton, on the Oxfordshire border, with a relatively basic home studio he constructed the milestone that is The Thrillseekers - 'Synaesthesia'. Signed and released by Neo Records at the height of the 1998 trance boom, it went on to sell over 12,000 copies on its initial UK release. With its vibe on the subtler side of the genre it took more than a year to fully realise its own potential however and its path to eventual chart-success was assisted, in no small part, by Paul van Dyk. He took the record and gave it a six month long, gig in, gig out battering. The next year saw PVD sign it to his own Vandit label, remix it and with the inclusion of a vocal from Sheryl Dean it entered UK charts at number 27. As a standalone track it has rocked a million clubber's hearts across a hundred countries. It still appears in a huge cross-section of DJ's all-time top tens today. Whilst still closeted in Chipping Norton, Steve took it upon himself to learn the art if DJ'ing. It was initially born out of a desire to see how his records worked in the mix with other tracks, and as a tool with which to improve their DJ properties. This quickly turned into a desire to see them, first hand, fire up a floor. Over the last four years Steve has played guest slots right across the globe, taking in some of the finest venues in each continent. Steve was always one for quality over quantity and whilst his production peers belted out one sound-a-like track after another, he focused on creating a catalogue he would still be happy with in 20 years time. Following 'Synaesthesia' came 'Dreaming of You' which was released on the Ministry of Sound's Data label and in the UK alone, featured on 14 compilations last year. In the intervening period Steve went on to launch a new moniker for MOS subsidiary, Incentive. En-Motion was born and with it came 'Truth' in 2000 and 'Getting Away With It' in 2002. In the adjoining years he also pushed forward with collaborations with Andy 'Pulser' Perring as Insigma ('Open Our Eyes'/'Avalon') and with ATCR owner Tim Stark under the name Rapid Eye ('Circa-Forever'/'Stealing Beauty'). Steve's remix career started pretty much the same day as 'Synaesthesia' was promo'ed. Since then he has revamped, remapped and reshaped in excess of thirty other artist's tracks. From Sonique to Sholan, from Tiesto to Timo Maas (twice!) and from Chicane to Cequenza, he has lent them all his awesomely melodic, electronic touch. DJ'ing under the moniker "The Thrillseekers", Steve has played the globe over Germany, Finland, Denmark, America, Australia, and Japan in addition to securing high profile slot in the UK at the likes of Ministry Of Sound, Passion and Golden. In the process developing his ever-growing reputation as a DJ towards the level he is looked upon as a producer…arguably amongst the best in the world.
Audio part You can listen to the interview with Steve Helstrip here, It was done on the 18th of december 2003 in Copenhagen. Length: 13.19 min, mono 32kbps Size: 3123Kb Format: MP3
Interview by: Christian Almind