Matthias Tanzmann: “House is always so self-referential"

“House has always been interesting, and it’s always so self-referential,” says DJ/producer Mathias Tanzmann. In his chat with Gray Area, the Moon Harbour Recordings label head mused on the ebb and flow of house music’s sounds over the past few years.

“It sounds like the ’80s again, then it sounds like a 909 rave sound, and now with the very melodic stuff, it’s really difficult to say… I don’t even know where house is right now,” Tanzmann ponders—not that being undefinable is a bad thing.

“There’s all these different scenes in house music; it’s not like there’s one form, and there’s not like one main tendency where house music is headed to—which is okay, which is good,” says Tanzmann.

“It just underlines how big house is—or has become. I mean, this is something a lot of people can agree on, and it also is kind of mainstream now; you can listen to house (or what they call deep house) now on mainstream radio, so it’s really difficult to say house is going this or that direction, but it doesn’t have to for me, it’s fine,” he says. “I find my niche in house, what I like, and I always find new, interesting tracks.”

Tanzmann admits there was a period during the Coronavirus lockdown when he didn’t want to listen to any tracks, house music, or any electronic music genre. “When there was no clubbing because of corona, at some point … after a few weeks without being able to listen or play that music in a club/party/social environment, [one] kind of loses inspiration to make club music.”

Thankfully Tanzmann is back to making fresh house tunes, plus he even created an exclusive Spotify Mix for Gray Area. You can also check out his latest releases at https://www.matthiastanzmann.com/.