Born in Hungary, Gergely Szilveszter Horvath, better known as Route 8, is a multi-genre artist/producer who wears many hats. Whether it be house, disco or techno, Gergely always manages to maintain his authentic sound, which has made him one of the most interesting acts of recent years. Since joining Lobster Theremin in 2013, Route 8 has been met with much success. With crucial releases including Dry Thoughts and my personal favorite This Raw Feeling, he is constantly pushing the envelope to create interesting and inventive music.
Much like his studio productions, Route 8’s mixes are an amalgamation of different genres and influences, and those defining characteristics are clearly evident in our MIXED BY feature. As criminal as it is to try and box Route 8 into a genre, ill go ahead and try: Visceral—dark—summertime—warehouse—breeze—house. It does kind of have a ring to it. Montrealers, be sure to catch Route 8 at the Lobster theremin 5 Year reunion next month at Artgang !
INTERVIEW
First and foremost you are touring a lot these days. How has life on the road treated you?
It’s pretty amazing that I’m able to travel all around the world and meet a bunch of amazing people just because of my music. It’s pretty rough sometimes, having 3hours of sleep after a gig and then worrying if my synths gonna survive the flight or not, but in the end it’s totally worth it.
It’s been a long time since a you released an EP (as Route 8), can you tell us if there’s anything in the works?
Yep my new Route 8 EP on Lobster Theremin just got released today + I got a new DJ Ciderman EP lined up on my label for the summer.
How do you differentiate both aliases when releasing music?
Well I like all kinds of music, and you can hear this in my live & DJ sets too so that’s why I started my Q3A project, so I can release techno/electro tracks or disco edits with my DJ Ciderman alias too if I want. Route 8 is for house but sometime it will dip into one of my aliases. So yeah when I start to make a track I will instantly know what alias I will use for it.
Can you explain what is the main idea behind the mix you are offering us?
I’m a big discogs digger so I tried to fit in some recent records I bought for the summer. Getting ready for those hot beach parties. ;)
In the studio, you seem to use more compact gear such as groove boxes and desktop synths (like the Nord Rack 3). Is this a preference or a necessity?
I like synths which I can use for more than one thing and also I have this law that if I buy a new gear and I can’t fit it on my table, than I have to sell something in order to do so. With this I won’t go broke haha.
Speaking of your work in the studio, do you make a lot of music which does not see the light of day?
Yeah a lot. I make music almost every day, but I’m only able to record 2 or 3 trax/month and it’s mostly because 80% of the time I’m not satisfied with the track I work on. So when this happens I just delete everything and start a whole new song.
In 2016 you started your own label, This Is Our Time, can you tell us a bit more about what your vision is regarding the music you’ve released so far?
I started this label because I wanted to showcase quality Hungarian dance music. I knew a few people who got the talent here in Budapest to make great stuff but unfortunately we were not able to collect enough tracks so we only did one EP (Gorongosa – Be Nice To Animals) which is not from me. Hopefully this will change this year.
You are part of the group of producers that helped kickstart Lobster Theremin in the very beginning. What are your views on how the label has since changed and evolved?
Lobster Theremin helped a lot to showcase a bunch of amazing talents, (and thanks to it’s distribution service) record labels all over the world. They released so much music which in my opinion sometimes also lead to questionable releases but this year they will take it back a little I think. Quality over quantity!
Going back to your touring experience, what is the club you had the most fun playing in? The best atmosphere?
Bassiani in Tbilisi is the best club in my opinion. I played in there Horoom room on NYE for 8 hours haha, it was so much fun. No matter what record I put on the crowd followed me through this magical journey even when I played some slow “let’s hug each other” trax because I thought the club will close but nope, when I left the party went on for another 6hours.
It seems there’s a scene with like-minded producers (like S. Olbricht or Imre Kiss) in Hungary right now. Can you elaborate on how the scene came together and what it’s like to party there?
We all came together because of Farbwechsel. That was the starting point for this scene. We all did our first tape releases there and it helped a lot to bring some international light on Hungary. Also when this label started the club scene had a big boom here and it’s mostly thanks to Larm. Without this little black box, underground music wouldn’t have spread this fast here.
Many artists talk about the lack of support they receive at home, despite international acclaim. How did your relationship with the scene in your home county change after your production career started to take off?
It changed in a positive way, especially after I played in the first Hungarian Boiler Room last year. Still I only play at my friend’s parties and even then I just do a warmup set for somebody else… which sucks sometimes, because with this I won’t able to show properly how I play outside of Hungary.
If you could collaborate on a record with any artist who is alive today, who would it be?
I really wanna make some music with my friends who are close to me, so with Nthng, TRP, Asquith, Soundbank (who I ran my label with) etc, which will happen eventually.
Last but not least: What album or EP are you obsessed with right now?
I’m currently really enjoying Traumprinz’ new album under his Prime Minister of Doom alias. I like his take on hypnotic tribal techno tracks.
Interview by Elias / Andrew
