Bring On The Dog

Come Stereosonic time, Alexander Ridha is appearing as Boys Noize and was billed to perform as part of Dog Blood with Skrillex, before the latter's cancellation. Ridha was enthused about the project; “It's a really wild DJ set – we just play back-to-back, really quick mixes, and we go all over the place.” That a German techno rebel should introduce a vehicle with the US dubstepper is wild in itself. The friends premiered with 2012's Next Order/Middle Finger and have since remixed A$AP Rocky's (Skrillex-helmed) Wild For The Night and DJed at Miami's Ultra Music Festival, Coachella and Glastonbury. “Both of our sounds are different – and I think that's what makes it exciting, creating something new.” The ravers just issued the Middle Finger Pt 2 EP – and Ridha references Dog Blood on this month's Fabriclive 72. Yet he stresses that Dog Blood is about spontaneity with no grand designs. “It's a new project, so we wanna take it slow and let it grow naturally – but also we've still got our own shit going on. So it's good to have it now on the side. Every time we get together in the studio, we make something new. But there's no real plan now.”

The Hamburg native, entering the biz as a teen in the dance-pop guise Kid Alex before shunning major labels and reinventing himself as the EDM anarchist Boys Noize, signing to DJ Hell's International DeeJay Gigolo Records.

Ridha has long been equated with punky electro-house or 'noise', but in recent years he's snuck back into popdom. He produced music for Kelis' future-disco Flesh Tone. Ultimately, he just enjoys messing with sounds.

Late last year Ridha presented a third Boys Noize album, Out Of The Black. Though committed to the LP format, he admits it's “tough” selling them. “I can't really say if I'm gonna work on a new album or not because I make music all the time. If it feels like an album, then it probably is. I have a lotta time at the beginning of next year, so I will definitely work on some new music.” This year the banger specialist has unleashed the Go Hard EP and remixed Donna Summer's Bad Girls (not on the official compilation Love To Love You Donna).

Incredibly, Out... boasted a collab with Snoop Dogg (yup, Dogg) in Got It. “It took a long time to really get together with him,” Ridha admits. “He always liked my stuff, but then it was really tough because he was signed to a major label and they have ways of getting the music together and so it never really worked out before.” Ridha is amused by the gangsta rapper's metamorphosis into the peace-loving reggae artist Snoop Lion, if unconvinced. “I don't think he's gonna be 'Snoop Lion' forever – even though they said it when the record [Reincarnated] came out (laughs). But he's already making new rap tracks as well. I think it's kinda funny to see him being this [Snoop Lion], and it's a cool project, but it's definitely funny because it's talk in the end.”