Armand Van Helden Interview

Armand Van Helden Interview image

We catch up with the man who’s discography stretches no less than 40 pages long, this is the-man they call Armand Van Helden. We chat about his latest debut UK mix album ‘New York : A Mix Odyssey’ on Southern Fried, about threesomes after his DJ sets and people chatting shit on 4 Es & 8 lines of coke. As if that’s not enough, he also clears up that vicious rumour about him clearing the dance-floor at Space with a hip-hop set…

How did your latest compilation; New York : A Mix Odyssey come about?
"Basically it’s like a reflection of who I am when I’m out I guess, I live in New York, when I go out I go out to like the downtown scene, which is kind of like this mix of Hip-Hop, Rock, R&B, House, basically everything, 70’s/80’s, it’s all over the place. I was trying to reflect it - you can’t really capture it, you have to experience it… I’m just trying to bring some of that home on that CD."

"It was always something I had in my thoughts as a mix CD, it’s a very difficult thing to capture so I knew better to do it exactly how it would be done downtown, cause it’s almost impossible to do. When Southern Fried cam in they were like ‘we want to put this mix, don’t what it to be like’, saying the same thing I was saying in a way, the whole Southern Fried and me coming together was in the fun side, it’s not for like serious clubbing (that’s more for the drug crowd), this is more for people that drink their beer or smoke their weed, or just go out and look for hot girls or something like that, it’s not really built for anything else but that."

What have you been up to over the last couple of years?
"I work pretty hard when I work, you know - when I play, I can play pretty hard too. I know how to balance the two I guess, I’m not just this type of person as Madonna said to ‘take over the world’. I’m more concerned about my happiness than anything, so to me if I feel like I’m working too hard, I’ll be the first one be like to say "OK I’m done!" before anybody. I just tell my manager whatever comes in I’m not doing it, and I’m off. I’m privileged and fortunate to be there. I do that and I’ll continue to do that, why waste my life working?"

You're quoted as saying 'I love to make music in my studio. That is the number one thing in my life. Everything else is secondary" .. does this cause you any difficulties in your relationships with people?
"I have a nick name by my manager, he calls me fog-bank, or the fog’er or anything to do with fog, because basically when I get in to the studio I’m not really there mentally, it’s like a creation type of trance like state, it doesn’t matter cause if I wanted to have a deeper relationship with somebody, even from early on they’re gonna see that’s part of who I am, anybody that’s close to me knows that’s me. I can’t break from that trait, it’s an artist thing, like a painter, architect… They zone in to their zone and get creative, it’s just what they do…"

You've recently teamed up with Felix Da Housecat and Lenny Bertoldo to remix 'Toxic' for Britney Spears, how did that come about and did you actually meet the lady herself?
"I never really meet the artists at all, it kinda comes through my management and it just ends up at my house. It’s weird mainly American artists and I guess in the UK, most artists that are signed to a major label (as a pop artist where everybody knows them) don’t really have any say in the matter it’s built in to their contract, we’re gonna remix these records for a specific markets, and that’s what I do - I’d say 80% of the artists don’t even know these things exist!"

I’ve developed this theory about facial hair and I was wondering if you shared my view on it - do you attribute any of your success to your beard?
"I hate to say it but I wish I didn’t have one, if I didn’t have any on my face that grew, but guess what - my shit just grows, it’s like genetic! I don’t really have a choice, it’s either do something with it or just become like Santa Claus. The clean shaven thing isn’t necessarily something that I would have the maintenance for, I’m too low maintenance. Just to even do when I had the pencil beard thing, that was a headache - now I just kinda have a beard - it’s still maintenance but it’s not as bad as the pencil beard I guess… I guess it’s just whatever their preferences, I cleaned shaved myself a few times and I wasn’t happy with the look."

What's New York clubland really like?
"For me it’s always, always been like never-ending and amazing, obviously for the media think they can grasp it but I live in New York and I’ve lived there for 10 years so I know better. I know that even in my circle of fun, there’s plenty of others I’m not involved in, and that’s the type of city that New York is. It’s not really easy to sit there and go oh New York’s about this or New York’s about that, cause it’s actually only about what you place yourself in. I try as much as I can, maybe like once or twice a month to go to things that wouldn’t be in my click, I’ll end up going on an adventure, going to something that maybe isn’t you, has nothing to do with who you are, New York offers you that element. I can just go from one club to the other from where everybody knows you to where no-body knows you. It’s wonderful."

Out of the cities you've visited, can you tell us your top 3 and why?
"I like South Beach, Miami, I think if I didn’t live in New York that would be my number two. I couldn’t do London, I couldn’t do Paris, I couldn’t do Amsterdam, I can’t do LA, I can’t do much else in the states, I would do Rio - that would be way off for me."

Out of all the remixes you’ve done, which would say are your favourite and why?
"For me I think the biggest ones would be all the remixes I got a lot of DJ’s to play that they wouldn’t of played normally cause they’re all about that independent record label shit. For them to be spinning something from Arista, Atlantic, Warner Brothers, that cracks me up. They’re all about being underground and they’re forced to play some major label release is pretty funny… if I were to think and look back at myself - it would be like Tori Amos (obviously), CJ Bolland and Sneaker Pimps."

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