FACES Podcast 05 w/ Joel da graca
We’ve already surpassed the summer’s equator and we were feeling like some house music was very much needed in our platform. And we couldn’t think about any better house loco than our friend Joel. I’m pretty sure Kerry Chandler would be proud of our decision.
Rosario born, Amsterdam based, Joel is a dj / producer / live act, also part of Dagraca Brothers with (guess who?) his young brother Josu.
We met him taking part of some of the most funky parties we’ve been in Amsterdam, but has also been a nice host for some of those popular house parties that were filling your dad’s newspaper these days.
For this occasion Joel prepared a 90min vinyl set showcasing some gems and many vocal house anthems, so go inject Joel’s house groove through your nervous system and get to know a bit more about him in through this questionnaire.
When did your love for house music begin?
I still remember the exact moment, I was in London and a friend of mine ask me to get him a record, it was “Tears of Velva’s - The Way I Feel” Kerri Chandler mixes... Instead of buying just one for him, I bought 2 of them ;)
When did you started djing? Do you remember the first time you played in front of a crowd?
I was slowly getting into djing because I was first really into producing. I do remember my first live set in front of a crowd, it was amazing, an indescribable feeling.
How does Rosario treat the electronic music scene?
Well, to be honest I was only just starting getting into it when I moved to Europe, so I cannot say a lot.
There’s a small crew there that works and push the scene further, but that’s pretty much it.
There isn’t even one club that is just about electronic music, so you can paint the rest of the picture.
When did you move to Amsterdam and why? What differences do you see music wise?
I moved to A’dam almost 8 years ago just because I liked the city and I always wanted to live abroad. I find it very interesting and one-of-a-kind in the sense that it behaves as a big city and it has a lot to offer but it’s actually a small town and you can just go everywhere with your bike.
Music wise it’s ages away from my home town. Loads of records stores, lots of clubs and small bars into music, artist wherever you look... you can never get bored here.
How do you combine work with music?
What is work? xD
Through the years I always had a full time job to pay the bills and the when I’m back home I do something related with music, either playing piano, producing, listening to music, djing or record and gear shopping. Now that I have some time that I didn’t have to work I realised that whatever you don’t do it’s not because the lack of time.
What do you think is your biggest strength?
Is there such a thing? Idk, I think it would be the fact that even though I thought many time on selling all my records and gear and stop wasting my time trying to get somewhere with my music I always carry on because it’s impossible for me to stop doing what I love.
Best recent highlights.
Very recently we’ve recorded a set in video with my brother for House Nation Amsterdam and already a while ago we have released a track on a label I really like called Love&Loops.
What do you find most difficult at the moment?
At the moment with all these regulations is very hard to plan things, especially events. We’ve been able to find our way to still do something without compromising our heath and that’s of people around us, but it feels as the world is stuck in one point and there’s no way out.
Tell us about your music referents.
Well, there are soooo many, and so many genres as well...
Within house music I would say Kerry Chandler is my all times favourite. Dam Swindle are also another duo that I’ve been following for a very long time and I like how they are growing musically and in particular the label that the Swindler Lars has with Lorenz Rhode called Sound Support.
Also I’m following pretty closely the label Toy Tonics, they’re bringing so much musicality to dance music.
From other genres I could name Fito Paez, Charly Garcia, Luis Alberto Spinetta, The Beatles, David Bowie, The smiths, The Clash, Prince, Pink Floyd, Stan Getz.... And I could go on for hours
We’ve seen you playing the piano and the guitar multiple times on Instagram... did you have any formal music education?
Not at all, I’ve never taken lessons. I have learnt everything I know (which is not a lot) absolutely by myself with the help of the internet. I’m proud of it but it was not an efficient way of learning, especially in the beginning.
Could you explain a bit about your studio / live act / dj set up.
Well, the studio and live act is in constant development. At the moment I’m using the Toraiz Squid as my main sequencer and I have a master keyboard that I can use to play any of my synths and record sequencer into the squid. Drums are coming from a Roland TR-S and the Toraiz SP-16. Mostly acoustic pianos, Wurlitz and Rhodes are coming from the Nord electro 6, subs from the Roland sh-101 and main synth for either pads, stabs or leads is my beloved Juno-60.
In the studio I first work sketching the ideas as if I’m playing live and then record it into logic to work on the mix and the arrangement.
For DJing I tend to go only vinyl from my side. When I play with my brother (daGraca Brothers) he plays digital and I stay true to my roots. I tried digital many times but I find it boring. I’d rather dig records than be looking into a tiny screen seeing names of tracks, idk, I’m not trying to be a vinyl snob here but it really is what I personally enjoy the most.
What do you value the most in your scene? What is something you would change?
I don’t really like to call it the scene, you can find every kind of people within the so called the scene. I can tell you that I despite competition, I like when the people is up to collab even though they are not into the same genre. I also find it hard to work on projects with other people, it’s usually hard to find the right time and that everybody involved is excited about it, but I get it, because sometimes it’s me the one that is not “vibing”, you know what I mean.
How’s the summer going so far?
Summer in the Netherlands, you know exactly how it goes, one day really feels like summer and then you have a full month that you don’t really understand what’s going on xD
Music wise things are moving, slowly, but moving at the end which is great.
Do you have any recommendation of any kind of content that you’d like to share with us?
Yes, actually I’ve been lately watching some videos from this Youtube channel called Contrapoints. She is an ex-philosopher who talks about a quite wide range of different topics, but she makes them sound very interesting. Definitely worth checking.
Did you get COVID?
Haha of course. Funny fact: I’ve been meeting lots of people every week since the beginning of the pandemic, and we got it after the most quiet weekend we spent in the whole year.
Leave us a message
I really appreciate that you have myself in mind for 64CREW and I hope we can carry on working on some projects together in the near future.
Love, respect and admiration.
Joel da Graca.