Exploring the world, playing and making music is surely one of the best jobs around. The jet setting DJ or producer lives a life of free drinks in Miami, Berlin and London, endless parties among beautiful people, only bisected by tedious travelling and waiting around in airport lounges. On one hand, Lopazz, real name Stefan Eichinger, could fit nicely into that category. He mainly releases his music on the German mega label Get Physical, DJs around the globe and has had a gaggle of bona fide club hits to his name. On the other, this thoughtful young musician could not be further away from the clichéd stereotype of international DJ/producer. For one thing, he makes it very clear that he ‘hates ethno house’.
A dislike of ethno house aside, the main thing that sets Lopazz apart from the pack is his musical involvement with Unesco. For several years now, Unesco have worked with the German public TV station, SWR to create documentaries highlighting important sites around the globe that are under threat from either man or nature. “UNESCO chooses sites that should be protected, and some of them are perfect for a documentary. The films are done in 35mm format - typical Hollywood format, and the films will be archived to show how the sites looked like, because some of them are really changing due to climate problems, money and other issues in those countries”. And working for public television seems to fit into his way of thinking too “it’s a real old school, well-educated, non-commercial workflow”
Providing the music for documentaries is something that Lopazz has been doing for over ten years now, but that doesn’t mean just sitting in edit suite providing music for images. For Lopazz it means getting on plane, boat, truck or camel to accompany the film crew and record the sounds he needs; “first of all I try to capture the atmosphere of the sites. It must fit to the idea of the film-script as it is a documentary, so nothing should be faked like in Hollywood films where everything is faked more or less. For example, if it is a windy place, I must have good wind sounds. I recorded singers and monks, but also different winds and various animals”.
Travelling to far flung corners of the globe such as Mongolia, Brazil and China is not something that I can imagine many other people in the music business doing for such worthy reasons, though maybe Lopazz may have found the time to grab some local samples along the way to give his club productions a certain edge “flute and strings samples…. I can also use these for my house tracks, sure!” But travelling to places such as Mongolia must have given some perspective to his ‘other’ life in clubs. I wonder how it made him feel. “Blessed”, he answers, “as for example in Mongolia where I had the chance to work with ‘pure’ people, like monks and native singers so different to the standard commercialized and industrialized techno and music-industry thing. To be surrounded by nature and old buildings with a certain past like the Dschinghis Khan temple.”
Having experienced some of the worlds most amazing and beautiful sites, and experienced first hand the effects of man on the environment, it is perhaps unsurprising that Lopazz has little time for the majority of what happens in dance music’s mainstream: “Sometimes I really think techno and house is just a never ending carnival or kindergarten.” So what would make things better I wonder, “Well, that’s a tough question”, says Stefan, “but I think most of the people involved want to be famous, well-known, rich, mighty and use silly, sometimes ridiculous samples and methods to make people think that its hot shit. I miss the depth, the naive feeling of music that hasn’t been produced with the thought of making a hit.”
Making a hit was probably the last thing on the minds of the people he has met and performed music with on his travels. He is one of only a very small number of artists to have been allowed to perform on Brazil’s Pelorinhou Plaza, and alongside his Tenori, he has performed several shows on his travels – as he says, “of course you have to be prepared to sing or do a little show when you are invited to a Mongolian or Asian or African family.”
Ambient Film Scores Volume One is out now on Get Physical.
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