Omid Nourizadeh is a bonafide house and techno legend with a genre-pushing career that includes remixing the likes of Lana del Rey, The Cure, Todd Terry and Gus Gus, releasing on seminal labels like Bedrock, Tsuba and Yoshitoshi, not to mention curating mix comps such as Balance (13 – SOS), Sounds Like Alola and Ministry of Sound (Club series – SOS). Whether as a producer or as a DJ, Omid has purveyed a wide ranging scope of dance music since day one and he has continued to do so with his ‘B4LP’ series, with the first two releases reflecting his wealthy experience as a producer of various different forms of house and techno. However, in his next outing the Alola founder goes even further, assembling four genre-spanning tracks pre-empting the broad aesthetic of his forthcoming album. In we go…
Hi Omid, thanks for speaking to us! How is 2018 shaping up for you?
Hi. You can imagine it’s not easy with an album deadline but every year seems to be getting faster and faster, time is speeding up!
Lately you seem to be making numerous appearances in Ecuador – what’s it like DJing over there? How does it compare to the rest of the world?
It’s different for sure, one of my best mates is like a mayor out there, he owns his own club so it’s as much of a personal visit as it is to play. It’s a beautiful country with beautiful people, but with a corrupt government like most places.
We all know you’re an extremely accomplished DJ having played some of the best clubs, festivals and held residencies since the early ‘90s. If you were to give any advice to young DJs what words of wisdom would you pass on?
Stay underground in the true sense as long as possible. Try to do as much of it yourself or with your friends, don’t rely on the industry as much as you should rely on yourself. If your noise is loud enough and you’ve organized your output well then at some point you’ll be making profit and that’s when they’ll come looking for you! Don’t be too concerned about anyone else you only get one chance at it!
You’ve also played alongside Carl Craig, Vince Watson, Craig Richards, Mr C, Steve Bug and Francois K. Who are some of the DJs you most admire and why?
All the above for sure due to their individuality, none of them sound like any other or copy anyone else’s sound! That’s what makes them admirable and innovative.
What are three of your favourite tracks to play in the club at the moment? What makes them so special?
I’ve resurrected three records lately but they’ve never really left my box.
– Vince Watson – Mystical Rhythm (Original Mix) [aLOLa Records]
Still to this day nothing sounds like it and nothing will
– Anthony Teasdale – Sensual Emotions [aLOLa Records]
I was there when this was made so I’ve got more personal with it through the years. It’s a perfect end of night close track. It’s like a smell, when I hear it it takes me back to 1998 in my bedroom at home with my parents, with Anthony trying to press keys on my Jupiter popping silly jokes with his scouse accent!
– 92% – Parts In One (Original Mix) [Disclosure UK]
This is a record I did with my brother Navid in 1996. It recently got noticed again with a whole new generation of vinyl sluts raising the price of any existing copies.
Many of the most experienced DJs say they continue to get nervous before gigs. Does this still happen to you? Do you have any pre gig rituals?
Rituals – Get as intoxicated before and after the show!!!
Nerves – Yes, but only if I’m not 100% with myself, I need to have more time to avoid it.
If everything goes smoothly it’s easy but if there’s cock ups or technical issues you hear about before the gig it can set you on a more paranoid mindset! If you tell yourself you got to do your best no matter what, that will usually get your attitude back up to scratch and you’ll deal with anything thrown at you with the least amount of hassle and you’ll glide through it!
You used to make music under various different aliases such as The Sixteen Million Dollar Man, Pre 4, O.R.N and Changing Shape. Do you plan on launching any new monikers? Or reviving any of the old ones?
I started doing that last year, a few ‘changing shape’ releases and a few ‘16 million dollar man’ releases have been active and I’ve added a couple of new ones like Jujuloo & NEW5 to the list of aliases.
We’ve been listening to your latest releases ahead of your debut album – each release has been very interesting with a lot of variation between each track. What can we expect from the album itself? When can we look forward to the release of it?
It’s complicated, romantic, edgy, extremely dark, lovely at times, nostalgic, futuristic, retro, classical, dreamy and due for a full release end of this summer. I’ve never said that before!
Have you got any other gigs or releases in the pipeline you’d like to shout about?
B4LP (part 3) just came out a few days ago, it’s the last release before the album comes out. Although saying that, we’ve finally got our heads ready with the vinyl side of things. We’ve set up a shop via discogs for some of our older stock, putting out a few vinyl only releases and starting a new label mainly for that, expect that very soon! Once I’ve got finished copies of my new album in my hand in early August I’ll concentrate on gigs to promote the record. I’m not interested in DJing just to keep up appearances any more, I’m way too selfish to miss out on my daughter’s early years growing but understand I do need to do gigs just not as much as I once did! Ideally I’d like to do a London / LA / TOKYO residency next year as they’re my three favourite cities but I’ve got to tour my album first and that could be longer if we decide to start at the end end of this year, let’s see!
16B ‘B4LP (Part 3) is out now on Alola Records
