Sonicanimation: Hey DJ.

Sonicanimation play the Great Northern Hotel in Byron Bay on Thursday, the Troccadero, Surfers Paradise on Friday and The Zoo on Saturday.

The hand that feeds must taste pretty good. With their last single, I’m A DJ, sonicanimation fired off a tongue in cheek broadside at uber DJ culture. Now the world of manufactured pop gets a hit with Super Showbiz Star, a heart-wrenching tale of a young hopefuls attempts to break into the biz, starting as a rapper before eventually becoming part of a boy band. Complete with five part harmonies.

“We’ve been putting I’m A DJ into the set, and people have been singing along to it. That’s kind of cool. We don’t have to sing it these days,” Adrian jokes. “We’re really into a bit of humour, and we’re really into taking the piss, because music is just way too serious. Too serious for it’s own good, it seems.”

“The whole superstar DJ thing is a bit out of control I think. People are just taking it way too serious. It never used to be like that. When I first started going to raves, it was very light-hearted and very fun and the music felt that way too. Now it feels like people are more concerned about how they look and how they act. When I first went to a rave no one cared how you looked. I asked a friend what to wear when I went to my first rave and he said ‘whatever you want, no one will care’. It’s not like that anymore.”

Do you see a difference in attitude between people who are producing as well as DJs?

“Not really, but having said all that I am guilty of not having been to a lot of raves recently. But I am still aware of the scene. One of the things that really made me laugh, but made me sad at the same time was when I looked at a DJ magazine photo shoot. You’ve got to have the white puffy jacket, the Kangol hat, and dark glasses. I can see the funny side of it.”

Do you see a way round it, or are we all destined to look like Ali G?

Adrian laughs. “I think eventually people are going to go we’re hear to have fun, it shouldn’t matter what you wear. There’s a bit of an underground movement happening again where you just go and enjoy the music and have a lot of fun. There’s a few DJs that play I’m A DJ, but we’ve had a few very nasty emails as well. One guy threatened to come to a show and throw bottles at us. Hey, if you’re prepared to pay for a ticket to come and do it… We’ll get you up on stage and humiliate you. Guilty by association.”

Heading back to the subject of breaking down a few musical barriers, the sonics lads are currently on the road with Melbourne hip -hop ensemble 1200 Techniques. An odd pairing it would seem, but musically Adrian explains it seems to make sense.

“It’s been going really well. A lot of people have been saying they weren’t sure how it was going to work with the too bands, but it’s been going really well. I think both bands try to transcend a lot of different styles, and people who are into that sort of thing are coming to see us. It was good fun putting this set together, we’ve thrown in a lot of pre Orchid stuff as well, things a lot of people wouldn’t have heard before.”

How different is the older stuff that you had been doing before Orchid was released?

“It was very much four on the floor dance stuff, right for the dance floor. I think now people are used to what we do they’re getting into the dance stuff as well as the more commercial stuff, for want of a better term, they’re ready to hear some of the older stuff now.”

“I think we’ve become more of a live band than anything else. We still have a lot of computerised stuff on stage with us, but we’ve made it as live as we can without having twenty people on stage, basically. They way we do stuff live means we can make things go for a minute of for twenty minutes or whatever. Completely mix up the whole set depending on what people are getting into.”

Is being able to mix things up on the fly something that comes from DJing?

“Yeah, definitely. You have to keep an eye on the crowd and what they’re getting into. Every state is into different stuff. It’s hard to work out beforehand. Queensland are more into things with a hip-hop sort of style, but in Melbourne, they want I really hard and fast. It makes it fun to put a set together, that’s for sure.”