When DT Found Shonky

Oliver Ducreux, aka Shonky is today best known as 1/3rd of Apollonia, the French triumvirate of Shonky, Dyed Soundorum and Dan Ghenacia that have morphed from label to label party to production trio over the last year and a half: snapping up a DC10 residency, a Fabriclive mix and a string of international appearances in the process. DT caught Shonky playing a solo set at Found festival, we chatted to the Frenchman about Apollonia, his own career and French music.

There’s been a huge amount of positive press regarding Apollonia, and its shift from label to actual artist collective – do you feel your own personality as an individual artist has changed?

I see it as only positive. When I work with Dyed Soundorom & Dan, I feel like I’m realising another side of my personality. I don’t see it as changing the side I already work with as Shonky. At the moment my focus is on Apollonia, playing back to back with the boys, because when I work with them it feeds back: I get more inspiration for my own projects too. RIght now, the work I’m doing with Apollonia is giving me enough fresh ideas to release some new material of my own soon.

You mentioned you started out really in ’98 – that’s when you began really going out and that’s when you linked up with Dyed and Dan. How did that formation occur? Were you all at similar levels?

I first became friends with Dyed in 98.  He was working in a club called Le Vingt: it was a combination between really stylish people and people just  coming straight in from work in their suits: a nice mixture, and then from there I also met Dan. But I really got to know Dan when he was playing at Batofar at an  after party called Cold Quality every two weeks. It was on a boat only for 200 people but the sound was unique:  a kind of deep house from the US West Coast – and it was that that changed my way of hearing beats in music. My first reaction was I wanted to get that music that I was hearing in clubs – I wanted to hear it in my own house and the only way was to buy vinyl – at that point the only stuff available on CD was very mainstream, this brand on of deep house was only available on vinyl. That was my motivation to start Djing – I bought decks the same year.

At this point, apart from Dan who I’d only met, I didn’t know any DJs. Dyed was not a DJ at this time either. We started together and Dan was impressed by what he heard so he asked us a few times to play at Batofar and it all went from there. When we started this Apollonia project a while back we’d already known each other for 15 years, playing in Ibiza, in after parties, going back to back unofficially, so when we started this up, it felt natural.

People talk about you, and Apollonia, as one of the real front runners of the Parisian party community – how does that differ to Berlin or the rest of Europe?

In Paris, the community is more like a microcosm, it’s always really complicated to throw parties because of the authorities. If you compare it to the UK, or to Italy, Spain, Germany, the general French public in some ways are less forward looking. That is changing, they are becoming more and more like this but when I moved to Berlin, it was one of those cities living a more advanced mindset. I’m not gonna say Berlin’s better, but for our music community – it’s way bigger. 

Do you think your production is ‘French’ sounding then – particularly if you were influenced by these unusual boat parties?

Nah, when I started to produce, I always produced because I was influenced by Batofar yes, but they were pushing German, American and English sounds. When I started to make a name, it was really because I was releasing off of  labels like Substatic and Crosstown Rebels. I initially got followings in the UK and Germany, then only after that I got a following in France. As they say in France, you are never a prophet in your own country. I became more supported in my own country once I’d made a name elsewhere so I guess I wasn’t a proponent of a ‘French sound’. 

Dan Ghenacia, Shonky & Dyed Soundorom / Apollonia @ DC10 Radio Show / 8.08.2012 / Ibiza Sonica by Ibiza Sonica on Mixcloud