Audio Therapy

Brit DJ/producer Dave Seaman was reinventing pop stars long before David Guetta's chart takeover. As Brothers In Rhythm with Steve Anderson he created Kylie Minogue's best – and most cred – song in 1994's post-SAW Confide In Me. “It all happened very quickly,” Seaman recalls. “I gave Steve a rough idea of a starting point and left the room for a few minutes to take a phone call. By the time I came back, he'd got the groove working together with the bassline. I think at that point we already knew we had something special. We immediately added the string hook. Then I grabbed my folder full of bits of lyrics I had written on hundreds of scraps of paper.

“One of the phrases I'd written down was 'Confide in me'. Steve said, 'That's your title'. I went home that night [and] wrote the rest of the lyrics. Kylie came in and did a demo vocal a couple of days later. We had the luxury of finishing it off in Trevor Horn's Sarm West Studios, adding a 32-piece orchestra, which was truly a goosebumps moment I will remember forever. It's still the thing I'm most proud to have been involved in.”

In 2012 a solo Seaman, returning to Australia for three club dates, is committed to underground dance music – and, like his contemporaries Sasha and John Digweed, identified with the progressive house movement. “I try not to get too bogged down with what's 'in' and what's 'out',” he says. “I've seen trends come and go and entire genres morph into something completely different. I know genres are a necessary evil, but I try to stay clear of them as much as possible. It's all still acid house to me.” And Seaman, who hosts the monthly Radio Therapy on friskyRadio, is inspired by today's music. He rattles off an extensive list of digable producers (Electric Rescue, Butch, Hot Since 82...) and labels (Kompakt, Systematic, Herzblut).

Seaman pioneered the mix compilation – and he's assembled over 25 for such brands as Renaissance, Global Underground (including a Melbourne edition), and Back To Mine. He's currently promoting a volume in the Toolroom Records Selector Series, raiding the UK house imprint's back catalogue. “I think it's a bit different to what people have come to expect from me. It's very housey – [and] a bit tribal in places, with quite a few techy electronic synths, too.” In late September Seaman will release Pixelated, a track he recorded with hard trance stalwart John “00” Fleming, through Dutchman Eelke Kleijn's Outside The Box. Seaman no longer has his own label in Audio Therapy, but is “in talks” to start afresh. “I laid Audio Therapy to rest last year – or put it out of its misery, depending on which way you look at it,” he quips. Audio Therapy had “run its course.”

Seaman would “love to” produce more (countercultural) pop. (His favourite single this year so far is Major Lazer's Get Free.) “It's more to do with time constraints that I haven't done so already, rather than a need to 'keep it real'. There's actually loads of great pop music being made at the moment, which is very inspiring.”

Dave Seaman will be playing the following shows:

Friday 31 August – Fluidlife Lunar at Onesixone, Melbourne VIC
Saturday 1 September – Musik Matters at Goldfish, Sydney NSW
Sunday 2 September – Lemon & Lime at Sky Room, Brisbane QLD