New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Hot off the back of writing, producing and recording Loco Dice's Underground Sound Suicide LP,
Martin Buttrich launches his new label, Rhythm Assault.
This project is intended to be an outlet for impulsive releases of his own music, free from the constraints of rigorously organised and planned imprints.
The label's first project gives birth to Collaborator - A two volume project seeing
Martin release a continuous stream of brilliant collaborations with the likes of Carl Craig, Guti, DJ Tennis, Loco Dice, Timo Maas, The Martinez Brothers, Guy Gerber to name but a few. October 16th sees the first Collaboration titled Synchronicity, with Mathew Jonson.
There's a common misconception that Buttrich merely engineered the myriad tracks he's worked on over the last two decades. In reality, his long-running partnerships with the likes of
Timo Maas and Loco Dice were fully collaborative.
"I was never someone who would get told what to do in the studio" he says. "I like it more like a creative process. Really having hands on the song was most important. I haven't really ever just engineered other artists, apart from maybe here and there for one song. I would say it's co-writing, co-producing. I have requests where people would ask me, "can you mix my album?" and I'm absolutely not interested in that. Even for my own productions now, I'm thinking about getting a mixing engineer. For me, mixing is pretty much one of the worst jobs!"
Buttrich began producing at the age of 18 after being bitten by the dance music bug in parties in his hometown of Hannover and Berlin. A wealth of output under many different aliases ensued, but it was teaming up with Maas - whom he met when they both worked at legendary house label Peppermint Jam - in the late '90s that saw his career gain global significance. Their groundbreaking remix of Azzido Da Bass' Dooms Night helped spawn entire genres, crashed into the UK Top 10, and led to remixes for everyone from
Madonna to Muse, Kelis, Moby, Placebo,
Jamiroquai and to a Grammy-nominated rework of Tori Amos. Former hip-hop DJ Loco Dice made for his second key partnership in the early 2000s, Buttrich helping him to become one of underground house and techno's biggest stars and forming the acclaimed Desolate imprint with him.
His incredibly slick, highly musical yet intensely technical productions under his own name have been released on the likes of Cocoon Recordings, M_nus, Supplement Facts and Planet E, with his acclaimed debut album
Crash Test landing on Desolat in 2010. There is no now doubt that he is amongst the house and techno scene's finest artists in his own right - but rather than follow a path of self-aggrandisement, he's decided to focus his new album and tour around collaborations once again, yet this time
Martin will step from the shadows and into the light.
His 20 Years Of
Martin Buttrich Global Tour - dubbed #9414 - saw him take his live show to some of the world's finest clubs from
September 2014 to December 2014.
Martin teamed up with one of his favourite DJs for each date. "I was looking through old stuff, and I just thought - 'wow, 20 years'. It's just chance to give a little bit back to all the people who have supported me over the years, and it was also an opportunity to get together with the people I always wanted to play with." With the likes of The Martinez Brothers, Loco Dice, Carl Craig, Guti, tINI, Mathias Tanzmann and Mathew Jonson in tow, the tour reached from Berlin's Panoramabar to Chicago's Spy Bar and makes for a timely reminder of his enduring - and ongoing - contribution to the scene.
