The Boston boys absolutely blowing up in 2012
It came up at dinner one night while our friend Neil was making fun of the fact we have no money. “You guys are like J Paul Getty, except the part about having money, you are J Paul Getto.” Obviously it stuck from that point. Aside from laughing for fifteen minutes, we loved the name right away.”
Brilliant! Did either of you come from musical backgrounds – was music filling your houses as you both grew up?
Tony: “I did not come from a family of musicians but there was always music around me. I got into djing at 13, a friend of mine introduced me to somebody at a small radio station when I lived in Sicily who taught me the basics.”
Maurice: “I came from a family that listened to Assyrian folk music. I was always around it. My idea always was to take whatever I heard and make it new.”
Tony, you are from Palermo in Italy and Maurice from California but you are now based in Boston. How did this relocation happen?
Tony: “I moved back and forth between Palermo and Boston for many years but ultimately have been living in the US for over 10 years. I met Maurice online around 2004-2005, he emailed me because I put out a record at time with my old group Lost Daze. He’s a huge Armand fan and so am I so we clicked right away. We’ve been friends ever since and in the last couple of years we finally started working on music together. Maurice still lives in Cali but comes to Boston for months at a time to work on projects.”
Your ‘likes’ on Facebook include “staring at your girl’s tits, doing the Truffle Shuffle, Saying NO to waking up for a fishing trip and picking turntables up and throwing them into the crowd.” Care to elaborate on all this?
“Hahaha, we didn’t think anybody looked at that.”
I check everything!
“Well, most of those things are inside jokes. The first two things are from our friend Gary, he is a character to say the least. One of our next projects is making a reality show on his life. Our friend Neil has this huge boat and always wants us to go fishing with him in the summer…we always make an excuse not to go. We love to sleep in. The turntables into the crowd is a crazy story we heard about a certain DJ, apparently the club owner didn’t like the music he was playing, so he decided to unplug the turntable and throw it over the booth!”
What was your first break in the music industry?
Tony: “My first break was co-production on Felix Da Housecat’s remix of Sinnerman which ended up being a huge success for him. It opened up some doors to do other projects/remixes. I still hear that thing in TV adverts!”
Maurice: “I still don’t have a break. LOL.”
Tony: “Neil’s office is fairly close to where I live plus he is Armand and Sneak’s manager. What better person to send demos to? We met around 2003 just from giving him a bootleg and I’ve been doing work for him off and on since then. At that time, I was obviously still new to production so I needed to get more experience. After many years of doing co-production and remixes, here we are. Maurice came in later and met Neil when we decided to get our group together.”
A beautiful chunk of dirty funk with a dirty vibe you have brought us with Todd Terry with ‘Go Bitch’ – how did this come about?
“Todd had a gig in Boston and he stayed and visited Neil. From there the studio just came naturally.”
We have just interviewed Todd for DMCWORLD, a true pioneer. What do you think are his best qualities?
“The presence of The God was overwhelming. He is a true pioneer, he showed us what’s up in the studio. I mean he can rudely play the keys. We can’t sum up qualities of Todd. He is the definition of House. But, the qualities run so deep, we’d say his personality in the studio. He is very objective. During his stay for two days we made seven tracks. We learned so much from him. To sit in his presence was truly an honor. We basically lived out one of our dreams.”
What is the current top 10 you are spinning?
Luca Agnelli – Desire
Oliver Twizt – Love Trip
Ghosts Of Venice – Disco Love Affair (Ridney Remix)
Niki & The Dove – The Drummer (Fake Blood Remix)
Junior Sanchez – Feel It (At The Warehouse)
Jay Vegas – All About House
Gary Beck – Diva
Robot Man – Ready For This (Marco Lys Remix)
DJ Dan – Whore’s Play
DJ Mes – Love Affair
So we come back to yours after the club, what is the J Paul Getto Back To Mine Top 10 you spin us to chill…?
Donald Byrd – Think Twice
J Dilla – Donuts
Slum Village – Climax
Masters At Work – I Can’t Go No Sleep (Ken Lou Mix)
Thomas Bangalter – Club Soda
Louis La Roche – Love
Alec Carlsson – Your Soul
Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes – Bad Luck
Felix Da Housecat – Sequel2Sub
Armand Van Helden – Summertime
What is the finest record you have ever played to a dancefloor?
“Alan Braxe & Fred Falke – ‘Intro’…the best dance record ever created…”
It’s your birthday – what 3 DJs do you invite to play for you?
Tony: “Ian Pooley / Riva Starr / Jazzy Jeff”
Maurice: “Gary Cannavo, Neil Petricone, Johnny Karaguez”
What is your Guilty Pleasure tune?
“Modjo – ‘What I Mean’ (Aloud Mix).”
“There’s never a set process. Sometimes one of us will work on most of the track and the other will put their ideas or tweaks in it and vice versa. Sometimes we just take turns. Maurice is good at diggin for samples. Tony is good at cutting stuff up in weird ways…we called it “the swivel”.”
What is your favourite J Paul Getto production or remix and why?
“The Alec Carlsson remix. Mostly because it came out of nowhere and we flipped it pretty quickly. We got the parts on a Thursday, the track was released on the following monday and went to #1 on Traxsource in less than a week. The reaction we’re getting from it is bigger than anything else we’ve done at this point.”
Best club you have ever played at?
“The best club we played at so far was this past Halloween at Station 4 in Dallas. We were supposed to be on for just an hour but ended up doing a 4-hour set. The vibe was crazy and they let us stay on and close the night.”
What is your biggest vice?
Tony: “Hennessy.”
Maurice: “My insensitive humor/Killing Zombies on PS3.”