MY MUSIC MOMENT - Erol Alkan

If Erol Alkan had an electronic music bakery, there would be a pie in there to suit every taste. Known as one of the founding fathers of the electroclash movement, this DJ/producer has become a veritable London institution, channeling the music-for-dancing zeitgeist admirably. After his hipster party Trash retired after 10 years, Alkan stepped back into the ring with his psychedelic "Beyond the Wizard's Sleeve" reanimations, then put his au courant production stamp on albums for UK rockers the Long Blondes and the Mystery Jets. Alkan recently reminisced with us about the songs that made him the notorious DJ he is today.

When I was about ten and my uncle played me "Blue Monday" for the first time, but as well as just playing it on his stereo he told me to watch the LED lights on the graphic equaliser on which there was this pair of red lights that ran from left to right. The introduction with the base kick made the LED lights kind of flicker with a trail from left to right in a really kind of rhythmical way and I was gripped by the first bar. The visual aid that the EQ bought reminded me of something like Knight Rider, it was such an iconic thing having a red light pulsating back in 1986. It was very exciting and by the time the song had finished, I had just gone through one of the most important musical experiences of my life.

When "Blue Monday" came out, it was in key with the musical climate of the time. There are so many fantastic records from that era, but there is something about that track that gives it a strange life, it still sounds exciting and fresh 25 years later. It’s one of those records that aren’t quite right in a way. It wasn’t designed for the charts, it was just purely made for a moment and it defines the moment so well that it is still very relevant even today. You play it in club now and it would be the biggest track of the night, it’s just amazing and I will never grow bored of it.

Another pivotal moment was hearing "Smells Like Teen Spirit" for the first time. It was at The Dome nightclub and I must have been about seventeen. It felt like I had always known the record and it felt so effortless it was like “Oh God! Here it is! Bang!” I think it had something to do with the fact that the whole room was just so excited, it created this atmosphere and made it feel totally natural. It is something about when you experience a record with your own generation, it’s fresh to everybody and it feels like there is this major change coming and I think that only happens once every six or seven years.

Getting older, your musical tastes change and you may not be acutely aware of something that is revolutionary for a generation beneath you. People could say the Artic Monkeys but I possibly didn’t experience it the same way as the generation beneath me. Like the same as Blur were for us, perhaps – but that’s how it should be anyway. I hope that I will hear something in the same vein again, but I don’t think it would be music for the popular culture, it would be a lot more niche. I still have amazing moments with records that I discover, but maybe not quite as epic. When you experience something when you are young, it moulds your tastes so much more: you can be quite militant in your tastes, and yet on one day you could be really into one type of music and the next day you completely change everything including your hairstyle. That is the beauty of youth and I think that people should be able to do that. Young people have a go at you for completely changing your tastes overnight but that’s what it is about!