In Conversation With: Luca Cazal Aka LVCA
We engaged in an in-depth conversation with Luca CAzal regarding his upcoming ‘6ix Tales’ EP and his return to his underground roots with the project LVCA
If you’ve been clubbing in the past decade it’s likely that you catched Luca Cazal’s name on some line-up around the world. Luca performed in some of the most iconic venues from Panorama Bar and Club Der Visionaere in Berlin to Fabric or Glastonbury Festival in the UK, other than holding a residency for DC-10 at Circoloco Ibiza for over 10 years now. And this came together with a wide-spread success of his imprint ‘See Double’ as well as a number of releases on different top labels - over the last decade Luca’s role in worldwide dancefloor electronic music was pivotal however you want to put it. However, at the same time, Luca cultivated a more underground output (mostly with his LVCA pseudonim), staying true to his roots and exploring different influences within the underground electronic music scene.
This summer Luca striked a new dynamic release on UK based label, Superlux Records, moving his LVCA sound even further into underground dance-floor realms. The ‘6ix Tales’ EP delivers four sharp underground house tracks - from the tight groove and psychedelic bleepy textures of ‘TEEP’, to the hard-hitting ‘Dean’s Groove’, the hypnotic acid sub-texts of ‘Northerplan’ and the far-our percussive trip of ‘Heavy Duty Sound’, we fell in love with the mix of styles and analogue sound of this release. We liked the EP so much and felt that it was a perfect timing to catch up with Luca on this point of his career - going in-depth into the production techniques and gear used for this EP as well as the differences between his Luca Cazal and LVCA monikers, and his thoughts on this unique moment for electronic music and club spaces. Enjoy the read!
Listen to the premiere of ‘Dean’s Groove’ from the EP as you read:
“Toronto (and Canada in general) have a very rich history when it comes to electronic music, starting from the late 70's, early 80’s with their unique brand of electronic disco and synth music all the way to the 90’s with some great underground house and techno labels, it’s also very close to Detroit so there’s a lot of ‘musical contamination’ between the two cities. I personally found the whole thing very inspiring. “
Hi Luca! Thank you so much for the availability, lovely to host you for this interview on Guerrilla Bizarre. We’d like to start with some questions regarding your upcoming '6ix Tales' EP and then move onto some more general ones regarding your approach to production and this moment in your career. '6ix Tales’ was fully produced in (and in a way, we guess from the name, dedicated to) Toronto, Canada. What’s your relationship with the city? For your experience, what’s special about it?
Yes it is definitely a tribute to this city that I love...I started going to Toronto around 2012/13 for gigs, I didn’t really have a chance to spend much time there at first but I felt a certain affinity to the people and the city straight away.
Then in 2017 I met my current partner and she is from Toronto, so I ended up spending a lot more time there. I'd go there every year for a couple of months, usually in winter, and that's when I started to really get a feel for the city and the people. Soon I started to connect with the local music scene and to collaborate with a few local producers.
What was special to me at the time was the way I was made to feel at home by everyone and the connection with the local music community. The passion that people have over there for analogue gear, vinyl and music in general is also a key reason why I decided to keep going back every year to dig for records and make music, that’s where my LVCA project started taking shape.
Toronto (and Canada in general) have a very rich history when it comes to electronic music, starting from the late 70's, early 80’s with their unique brand of electronic disco and synth music all the way to the 90’s with some great underground house and techno labels, it’s also very close to Detroit so there’s a lot of ‘musical contamination’ between the two cities. I personally found the whole thing very inspiring.
Can you tell us a bit about the secret studio where it was produced?
It’s not really ‘secret’, it’s my friend’s home studio and he’s been collecting analogue gear since the late 80’s. We connected through music in Ibiza and when I went there he kindly let me use his space to record. He also taught me a great deal about the gear he owns and how to use it. It would take years to properly learn how to work some of those machines but he liked what I was doing and helped me on the engineering side of it.
I was very lucky to be given the chance to explore the many possibilities that a 70’s Moog modular system can offer, and to further my knowledge on many classic synths that I had briefly used before in other studios over the years (miniMoog, memory Moog, Prophet 5 etc) but never had enough time to properly work on.
We also experimented with analogue sequencers such as the original Genoqs Octopus which is such an unpredictable and unique piece of gear. As well as all the main 80’s Roland synths and drum machines which I also have in my studio there were a few rare pieces I had never worked on before such as the PPG Wave and the Rhodes Chroma which I loved and used a lot on this EP.
Let’s talk some more about studio production - what's your studio workflow like? Do you usually keep things very structured or prefer to give improvisation a lot of space?
It depends on which project I’m working on, for the “6ix Tales” EP and my previous one on Partisan (War Is Over EP) it was more an improvisational workflow, both EP’s were recorded in the above mentioned studio in Toronto and there was a lot of live playing going on as well as a strong element of randomness from the digital and analogue sequencers we used. All the tracks started as long live takes which I then edited and shaped into their final form.
For the more recent stuff such as my collaborations with Marlon on ’Sock It To Me 02’ (Ba Dum Tish) it was all a bit more structured, we used the MPC2000 for most of the rhythm parts and musical loops, programmed the basslines in Ableton Live then sent the midi to various synths such as the sH101 or my modded TB303 and from there we started building the tracks. I think the main difference between the two workflows was how much we relied on Live and its features during the writing process.
If you would have to pick one key piece of gear for the creative process of this EP, which one would it be?
I think the synths I used the most in the “6ix Tales” EP are the Moog Modular System and the Rhodes Chroma, I’d pick the Chroma because it’s the one I did the most ‘live playing’ on, it's an early 80's synth and it was mainly used to play live by musicians rather than programmed, it’s literally on every track on the EP.
We feel that your sound has been shifting a bit in recent years (specifically in productions). We were always fans of your work, but in a way what you are delivering now feels more raw and underground. From your point of view, did you perceive this change? What are you looking for in terms of sound these days?
I think one of the main reasons why my sound has changed is the fact that I´ve been gradually moving away from the kind of ´scene´ I was associating with, what I was producing at the time, although it was always slightly different, was still relevant in the clubs and the parties I was getting booked to play at and as that whole scene became more mainstream and moved onto a more ´modern main room´ sound It felt natural to go back to my underground roots both as a dj and as a producer.
With the LVCA project, the sound I'm looking for (in terms of production) is simply music made now that I can comfortably play alongside the records I play in my sets which are mainly made in the 90’s.
“I think one of the main reasons why my sound has changed is the fact that I´ve been gradually moving away from the kind of ´scene´ I was associating with. With the LVCA project, the sound I'm looking for is simply music made now that I can comfortably play alongside the records I play in my sets which are mainly made in the 90’s.”
Would you say that’s the key difference between the music you release as LVCA and Luca Cazal?
I started the LVCA project to focus on some of the sounds I grew up with and I’ve always played out but never given myself the chance to produce.
I started clubbing in Italy in the mid to late 90’s, going to see dj’s like Francesco Farfa and Miki in Tuscany were my earliest experiences as a raver. These guys played a wide range of styles, mixing progressive sounds with Techno, Acid, House etc., their style could be quite tough at times but with a strong melodic/psychedelic element. I’m trying to apply a similar ethos for the LVCA sound. The Luca Cazal project is more focused on classic house music.
Depending on one’s location, right now you could be living a great dance-floor renaissance after the COVID times. At the same time recent re-closures of clubs & dance spaces in countries like Netherlands and certain areas in Spain make it hard to forget the biggest issue that clubs ever faced in history. In all this mess, what’s your view of the state of things and specifically of its outcome? Do you think any aspect of the dance scene’s will benefit from this “break” at all?
It's great to see that in places such as the UK and the States things are happening again and I hope that this will set an example for other countries to follow, at the same time the way some countries such as Spain and Italy have dealt with this situation shows us how unimportant our industry is to their governments.
In Ibiza, where I’m based at the moment, it's pretty clear that the government has taken this opportunity to make fundamental long term changes that will affect us for years to come, favouring a VIP and family based type of tourism rather than a mixed one as it was for years.
It also saddens me to see how the music scene in a country like Italy, that's so rich in clubbing history, has been suffering so much since the beginning of the Pandemic with clubs still closed and zero government help to the music industry workers.
I really don't know what the outcome will be, I think a lot of it depends on how effective the vaccines are and whether people will choose to use them or not.
There have been many positive things that have come out of this situation, a lot of people have taken this opportunity to make positive lifestyle changes and to connect or reconnect with spirituality, relationships between people have improved and having lived the same collective nightmare has brought people together.
On a musical level some incredible music has been released and some very important changes have happened making our industry more equal and balanced.
Thanks for your time Luca. One last question - what else is next for you, into the rest of the year and 2022?
A collaborative album with Marlon as we return to ‘Sock It To Me’, I have an EP on Kepler´s label ‘Perspective’ from the UK and the launch of my new label “Ibiza Sound Machine” distributed by ‘Ba Dum Tish´.
