Sometimes life moves in mysterious ways. Take, for instance, Barclay Crenshaw, aka super-producer and dirtybird/mothership boss Claude VonStroke. How could he, as a rap-obsessed 16 year old dreaming of an engineering job at Metroplex (Juan Atkins’ studio) in Detroit, expect that someday he’d end up headlining gigs alongside Atkins?
“Around 2001, I moved in with a high school buddy of mine to Oakland, and we started going to crazy raves. I was working on my third career then, editing commercials for a post-production TV house. They had all this great equipment at the edit house, so I had this idea. [Up to that point] I had created all this original music but nothing ever happened with it, because I didn’t really know what to do after the music was done. I never really learned when I was a kid because no one was there to mentor me. So I thought to myself, ‘When I was 16 and getting into music, what would’ve been the ultimate instructional video that I could’ve watched?’ I came up with the idea for this DVD, to interview the most famous DJs in the world: asking them how they became famous, how they make music technically, how they run their label, all of that. I ended up interviewing 50 people, from Paul Van Dyk to Derrick May to Orbital, everyone. After two years, I didn’t have enough money to license the music, and I needed to have a piece of music playing under each interview. So Justin Martin, Nigel Richards (from 611 Records), this trance guy from Sweden and I made all of the music for the whole DVD by imitating the sound and style of each interviewee. That’s how I learned to make house music.”
– Claude VonStroke
Cleveland-born, Detroit-raised, San Francisco-based Barclay Crenshaw has been fuelled by happy accidents and a contagious, happy-go-lucky attitude in general. He’s living proof that everything happens for a reason, even if everything might seemingly happen at the wrong time. Ask him about his novelty rap tapes as a teenager, or his time in Hollywood that ended with his song being pulled from a blockbuster movie, or his short-lived drum & bass career that ended in a disheartening electrical disaster. There were many reasons for Barclay to think that his musical fate was doomed, but it took a “surprise” production (and the meeting of a likeminded spirit, Justin Martin) to convince him otherwise.
“Justin Martin and Sammy D made the first track released on dirtybird. So just as a surprise, I did a remix of it. The response was great so then I made another surprise track, which was basically my first original house track ever, ‘Deep Throat.’ I’d been dying for my entire life to not have a real job, and to do something interesting that I enjoyed. My wife’s a little more sensible, and I’m a little dreamier, so she said: ‘I’m going to give you one year and I’m going to pay for everything – and if in that year, you can make this certain amount of money doing music, then you can do it forever. And if you don’t make it, then you have to get a job for the rest of your life.’ This was extremely motivating and that first year, everything went totally crazy, and I doubled the money, which surprised me even more than my wife, I think. I put out ‘Deep Throat,’ and followed it with ‘The Whistler’ and ‘Who’s Afraid of Detroit’ on the same record. And then somehow, it all came together and took off…that record was bananas.”
– Claude VonStroke
The three records ended up being the sound of 2006, the most recognisable and demanded tracks throughout scenes far and wide – ‘The Whistler’ even made its way onto worldwide TV screens via a T-Mobile advert. His debut album, ‘Beware of The Bird,’ pushed both Claude VonStroke and dirtybird to become house-household names, tuning the world’s ear to the vibrant new movement that was bouncing out of San Fran. These days, as he remains one of the most sought-after remixers across every genre imaginable (from Bmore club to drum & bass to hipster rock to mainstream pop), works busily through a globe-trotting DJ schedule, and manages two wonderfully quirky, impressively consistent record labels that forever raise the bar, Barclay Crenshaw undoubtedly holds his own in the electronic music hall of fame.
“Everything is really tailored; the tracks aren’t really the tracks, it is all cut up, chopped and twisted. It’s challenging to do a project that has to say everything in such a small time frame because I play a lot of genres. So I worked hard on getting all the different sounds that I really dig into one mix. It wasn’t made as a dancefloor mix, but if you listen to it and you don’t tap your feet, or move in some way, then it’s just a complete failure. I wanted to create a greasy, dirty vibe but also get melancholy and funky – a little hard here, a little soft there. I picked the best music I could find and put it together in a creative way that fully represents my sound and personality.”
- Claude VonStroke
Tracklist
- Ekkohaus Ft. R. Wurz – Cry Baby – Morris Audio
Ekkohaus Ft. Mensa – The Healer – Morris Audio - Claude VonStroke & Bootsy Collins – Yabadabadooza- dirtybird
- Rob Van Valen – Trampen – Frankie
- Holger Zilske – Mes Yeux – Playhouse
- Detroit Grand Puhbas Big Onion (Joakim Remix) – Pokerflat
Roman Salanger – Galaxius – Lucent - DJ Deeon – Shake It – Databass
Isomer Transitions – Downtime in the Hangar – Moongadget - Stimming – After Eight – Dynamic
- Peter Lauer – Free Entry for Girls (Robag Whrume’s Drikkibass Remix) – Punkt
- Voodeux – Just A Spoonful – mothership
- Italoboyz – Bla Bla Bla – mothership
- Varislove feat DOP. – Inside Ways (Boris Werner. Remix) – Supplemental Facts
- Kiki – Immortal (Instrumental Dub) – BPitch Control
- Xpansul & Daweed – Pilsnerd – True Type
Marc Houle – Dirty Dirty – M_nus - Dinamoe – Maceo – Alpaca
Clara Moto – Silently Ft. Mimu – Infine - James Braun – Symphonia – Tartelet
- Donk Boys – One Tooth Missing – Frankie
- Robag Whrume – Guppipepitsche – Freude Am Tanzen
- ICS – Espagnol – dirtybird
- Markus Schatz – Running – Highgrade
Catz ‘n Dogz – SF – mothership - Marc Miroir – Kraft – Paso Music
- Stimming – One Weekend – Dynamic
- Claude VonStroke – Aundy – dirtybird
