Dual Shaman

“Heavy, distorted, dystopian, melodic, neo-acid…” The Transylvanian techno brothers introduce themselves.

Who are you?

Vio: We’re brothers Dacian and Vio from central Transylvania, Romania. We do a lot of sound design work for sample library developers and synth manufacturers and we also play live using Elektron drum machines and grooveboxes plus effect pedals and various MIDI controllers.

What do you sound like?

Dacian: Heavy, distorted, dystopian, melodic, neo-acid techno hybrid – that’s the kind of sound you can expect from our live shows. But you can also find more tempered, easy-listening type stuff in our back catalogue as well.

Why should we listen to you?

D: I’m extremely tempted to say something witty and edgy but honestly, we’ve been dedicated to the craft for more than 10 years now and we’re always pushing ourselves and improving our skills just to be able to put out good records and make people go nuts at our shows.

What have you released so far? What else have you got coming out in the near future?

V: We have a lot of melodic techno releases from our early years out on Wolfskuil, Manual Music and Wide Angle Recordings. Also a number of more electronica/experimental remixes for Origami Sound and Soun Records and now we’re pushing our more recent analogue techno endeavours on Liar’s Tessier-Ashpool Recordings. Our recently released Akathist EP is stirring quite a buzz and we will have a remix on TAR coming out this year, plus a track on a various artists vinyl on Trick Track Records, a remix for the Touched – Music for Macmillan Cancer Support charity compilation out late June, and after the summer festival season is over we’ll be dusting off some toys for a new EP.

What song sums you up? Why?

D: We’ve always done stuff which was hard to label but probably Jon Hopkins – ‘Collider’ shares the same characteristics as our output: throbbing rhythm, abrasive analogue bassline, powerful melody, ethereal pads and brooding vocal snippets.

What or who is your biggest influence and why?

D: Without a doubt Eduard Artemyev, and Vio will agree with me on this one. The train sequence in Tarkovsky’s Stalker, scored by Artemyev, left my brother and I speechless.

Where can we hear your music?

V: Our more relevant works are up on our SoundCloud page. You can also visit our boutique label for samples and loops here. As for gigs, we’re playing Electric Castle this year, which is Romania’s number one electronic music festival, and we’ve scored a number of gigs locally and abroad for late summer to mid autumn.

Where will you be in five years’ time?

V: Hopefully still doing our thing, designing sounds, playing shows, travelling, meeting like-minded people and keeping ourselves healthy and sane.

Tell us an interesting fact about yourself

D: I always burst into laughter when I see someone riding a unicycle.

V: I almost drowned twice in the same summer, when I was 14.

D: Probably had a hard time breathing, ’cause you broke your nose a year before.

V: Don’t remind me, man. Fell from 10 feet high face down.

D: That’s why I’m the good looking one.

V: Sure you are.

Find Dual Shaman on SoundCloud, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.