Sifa

How are you, how has your year been?
Hey guys! I’m doing great. I’m in Brussels (Belgium) it’s freezing outside but the sun is shining. So what else?!

Tell us about the animations that inspired this new EP on your label Depth?


My EP is inspired by 2 of my favourite characters Cobra and Daisuke (Actarus in Fluke, Duke Fleed in English).

Cobra is a Space Pirate with a psycho-gun hidden in his left arm. At a certain point of his story he falls in love with Jane Flower a bounty huntress, who’s wanted by Lord Necron. So Cobra decides to help her and also to save her world.

Actarus is the main character of the anime UFO Robot Grendizer. His planet – Fleed – got attacked by King Vega. He was the only one able to escape by stealing the Grendizer. He then arrives on earth and decided to protect it against the enemy at all costs.

When did you first get into Japanese animation?
Cobra and Grenzider are anime’s from the late ’70s early ’80s. I’m from ’87 but my older sisters and brothers have been watching and I believe that is what got me into it. Later on it’s something that I still enjoyed watching. Besides all the fantasy and fiction there is always an important message in every animation that we watch.

Why do you like it?
I think I liked it because it did allow me to escape or see something different from the day to day reality. I mean it’s more peaceful to watch an anime then the news I guess.

Why did they inspire you so much, and how? Are these soundtracks for those animations?
When I produce music I always put a screen with a movie or something on it. In that case it was Cobra. From that point on my mindset, while working at it, was space and space adventures. I wish but both already have great soundtracks on their own.

Do you like working in this conceptual fashion? Does it help the music making process?
Yes and it’s the same things for my set. I always need the music to be around a kind of story. I have a huge imagination so it’s quite easy to come up with something while working on music.

There is a lot of melody in the music – are you formally trained?
I’m not trained at all. I just do everything by the ear until I feel it sounds good. There are also so many tutorials available so anyone could be able to do it with a little bit of dedication.

What’s next for you? What else are you working on?
Right now I just released Madela on Madorasindahouse which is part of a VA. This project is meant to help the people of Samburu in Kenya. Make sure to have a listen to it as there is a lot of good music on it!

January 25th I’ll start my night in Brussels EPISODE, the first guests are Jerome Sydenham and Kong. I just finished a remix for Boddhi Satva and Mehdi Nassouili (famous Gnaoua artists). It’s different from what I’ve done in the past so I hope it will please some people.

What plans, dreams and goals do you have for 2020?
For 2020 I plan to release more music then I did before. Slowly reducing all the label work to focus on myself. I still have so many goals that I would like to achieve and one year is not enough for all of them …. 🙂

How would you spend new years eve in a perfect world – where, with whom?
I would just spend New Years Eve around my family. At the end of the day, I don’t think it can get any better than that.

Sifa’s ‘Actarus’ EP is out now on his label Depth

Grab it here – https://www.beatport.com/release/actarus/2718456

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