MIXED BY/ Tee Mango

mixed by Tee mango


The term “Renaissance Man” is one that Tom Mangan must be familiar with by now.  By day, Tom juggles a popular clothing brand Millionhands and a thriving family life. By night,  Tom moonlights as Tee Mango, an artist and producer with a decades long career and acclaimed works to his name; illustrious mainstays such as Caribou, Leon Vynehall, Tim Sweeney, and the Studio Barnhus team have all shown Tom support, and it’s easy to see (or hear) why.

[soundcloud url=”https://soundcloud.com/boltingbits/mixed-by-tee-mango” /]
Tee Mango has every finger on the pulse of what makes a dancefloor shake, and his latest remix for Bill Brewster and Ray Mang’s latest Mang Dynasty release, Crash The Box, further confirms this. We now have the absolute pleasure and delight to chat a bit with Tom about the stepper, as well as his path up to now and where it may lead next.

INTERVIEW


Hey Tom, thanks so much for talking with us today! To help us ease in a bit, can you tell a bit about where in your world you’re at right now, and perhaps what you had for breakfast?
Hey BB, I’m in Somerset in the UK (about 20 mins from the gamours Glastonbury festival site). This morning i had x6 eggs scrambled, with some avacado.

The Bolting Bits crew is absolutely loving your revision for Bill and Ray’s project; can you tell us a bit about the concepts or ideas behind such a slippery groovy number?
Haha, conceptually, I was really just trying to turn in something interesting, that (rather selfishly) I’d enjoy playing out and about. Remixes sometimes take on a life of their own, this one came together pretty quickly i just tried to get out of my own way and record what came out.

Looking back a bit at some of musical output over the last 5 years, there’s an absolutely stunning catalog of disco and deep soulful house music that you’ve been responsible for. Can you share with us a bit about what’s drawn you to twisting these tried and true styles into your own shapes?
Thanks that’s very kind of you to say :) I’ve really just been trying to do stuff that excites me and I can honestly stand behind, and hopefully that’ll sound good in 5/ 10 years time.

From our end, balancing music production, a record/clothing label, and entertaining the whims of three beautiful children seems to be quite the handful. How do you manage your time and roles so effectively?Practice?
I don’t know. Ha. I’m quite disciplined on time that i spend doing different things. I work 3 days on business, 2 days on music and try not to work weekends, unless i have somewhere exciting to go and play records. i feel very lucky to be able to do all these things.

As a stalwart of the global dance music scene for nearly 20 years, can you share a bit of differences and similarities you’ve noticed between a lot of today’s output and what you recall from your early days?
This question makes me feel both honoured and slightly old :) Differences, less vinyl sales, more channels to look at: streaming, digi, direct to fan channels (like bandcamp and my store Millonhands.net)

Similarities, great music still stands the test of time, everybody wants to be a DJ, the tech is different but the desire is the same.

It seems that in the midst of our chat, you’ve already released yet another project—care to tell us anything about the complete 5 TRAX EP available as of this week?
Well I’ve just finished my 2nd album and while trying to figure out a plot I just wanted to get some things our there that i thought my bandcampers might dig. It’s a collection of different 5 trax from different times over the last 5 years, that for reasons of sample content or style may not make it onto the album, but that i love nonetheless and wanted to share really. I’m pushing for consistency over the next 12 months, so just consistently and relentlessly releasing music that I’m proud of.

What’s on the horizon for Tom, and what’s coming down the pipeline for Tee Mango?
Pipeline is the album project, which will incorporate vinyl, digi and some awesome pieces of clothing :) For Tom (my alter ego) more of the same, trying to learn, everyday, whether that’s my craft, (playing, singing or programming beats). Nurturing my beautiful babies.

This is the part where we try to come up big with some recommendations from you about peers and contemporaries you’d like to highlight or share with us….always looking for a TIP :)

L’Uomo D’Affari / Italove by Emmanuelle


On Soulwax’s label is brilliant wonky pop

Entire Studio Barnhus comp is golden and genuinely very well put together:

Mark Seven joint ‘The Call’ is awesome revivalist house.

Guava’ by Tunnel Visions is awesome chanty balearic house wickeness.

https://youtu.be/L77pTGsuZjs


Thanks again for chatting with us Tom, wishing you the best as your 2018 rolls on. As a final question to wraps things up, what’s a new favorite film of yours introduced to you by your kids? I’m sure you’ve had your fill of Frozen by now.
I watch more kids films these days than grown up films. Coco latest disney pixar film about day of the dead is pretty fucking amazing and an absolute tear-jerker. It gets ten haunty skulls out of ten from me.


Interview by Dan