He has just completed a major US tour, and in September 2023 he can finally be seen again in Germany, namely at the Hockenheimring at the “Feelings of Happiness” festival: Mega DJ André “ATB” Tanneberger talks here about a childhood behind Freiberg , his new start in the west and the conquest of the rest of the world with his sought-after dance electronics
The DJ and producer André Tanneberger decisively shapes the international dance scene under his artist abbreviation ATB: As a producer in the 90s and noughties, the Erzgebirge native not only produced numerous genre world hits such as “Marrakesh” or “9 PM (Till I Come) ” landed, he is still one of the 20 most important DJs worldwide – mainly because he has always refused dance stereotypes. ATB has just released its eleventh album “Contact”. Tim Hofmann spoke to the 40-year-old.
Free Press: If you surf the internet, you can read a lot about your successes, but nothing about your childhood after your birth in Freiberg. Don’t you like talking about it?
André Tanneberger: Yes, I have no problem with that. It’s just that nobody ever asked for it (laughs). I lived in Brand-Erbisdorf until I was about 10. Then my parents applied for an exit visa to go to the West.
Free Press: So you went through the full GDR childhood?
André Tanneberger: Yes, I was still a pioneer. Should I be honest? For me it was a good time. I grew up mainly in the village, my grandmother lived in Obersaida. I played in stables and on heaps. For me, the west consisted only of the Intershop smell. Where I lived was the big world for me. My childhood was far more beautiful than my youth. It sounds stupid, but in the Ruhr area I was a bit malnourished as a child from the East, you could see the difference. That was perhaps due to the lack of fruit. And the dialect made me an outsider. I wasn’t completely bullied at school, but I was different. Ultimately, I think that helped me push through.
Free Press: Why are your parents over?
André Tanneberger: They wanted to travel and not be locked up. That wasn’t dissidentism, even though we had to move back to Auerbach in the Vogtland after applying to leave the country. You withdrew from the family so they wouldn’t have any problems – my parents were often picked up by the Stasi for talks. Still, I didn’t understand people who crossed over after the border was opened. You knew then that it would be one at some point, that would be good.
Free Press: Because you knew what it’s like to lose your homeland?
André Tanneberger: Yes! It was hard not being allowed to come back. When my grandma and grandpa died, they didn’t even let us go to the funeral. Well, you were aware of that – but it made the move pretty tough.
Free Press: Has that influenced your musical career?
André Tanneberger: I’ve always been musical. As a child I used egg cutters as a harp and later tormented my grandmother’s zither. When I was 14, I started taking guitar lessons. That’s when I realized that I was in the mood for music – but I wanted to make whole songs, complex music. With the guitar I would have always been just a band member or would have made campfire music. That wasn’t enough for me. When I was 16 I got a keyboard and a tape machine and started snipping things together.
Free Press: At that time, the conventional teenager already had to laboriously save himself an electric guitar. How hard was it to get hold of much more expensive studio and keyboard gear?
André Tanneberger: I was fortunate to meet Thomas Kukula from Project General Base. Electronic club music was still rare, there were few like me. He let me record something in his studio and organized a record deal for me with a good advance. At that time I was still doing an apprenticeship as a skilled construction worker. I invested the money in the first small studio.
Free Press: With ATB you immediately have the typical trance sound, but not necessarily a formative hit in your ear. Isn’t that a disadvantage?
André Tanneberger: I recently asked ATB’s favorite song on Facebook and thought it was nice that 1000 people immediately gave around 800 different answers. (laughs) That shows how wide the choice is for me. That’s exactly what keeps the project interesting over the years, that I hit a nerve here and there. I started out with hard techno, but the most important thing to me has always been the melody and the song. I immediately sat between the chairs and was too heavy for the mainstream but too melodic for the underground. In principle, I write quite conventional songs, which could also be developed into pop or rock songs. I just turn it into dance because I love it. And that’s exactly why I have a huge audience worldwide, I don’t need a one-off number 1 hit like Aviici.
Free Press: Is your music underrated?
André Tanneberger: Dance is perhaps the most influential music of the last 20 years. Many of the great musicians sound very dance-like right now, whether it’s Rihanna or Lady Gaga. But the media has this image in their heads that a guy with a guitar deserves more artistic respect than someone behind a keyboard. They always say it’s handmade. Hey, that’s my music too, I record every instrument on my record myself. Conversely, rock musicians cannot get along in the studio without the possibilities of the computer. And on the other hand, on “ATB in Concert” we play almost everything live.
Free Press: But it often seems as if the computer tempts you to hit the ball quickly. So can’t the countless technical possibilities also be a problem?
André Tanneberger: Not for me. It doesn’t change my approach to music – just the sound, and for the better. It’s good when creative people have the opportunity to achieve better and better results with fewer resources. But of course there is the problem that many people who have nothing to do with music quickly try to make music with software. It’s just easier to tinker a four-quarter boom on the computer than to practice the guitar in the band basement. That’s why too much electronic music ends up littering the market.
Free Press: Was it logical that Eurodance disappeared from the scene after its huge success in the late 90s and mid-noughties?
André Tanneberger: It’s actually only in Germany. Here my stuff at Viva ran up and down, at times I had five records in the charts at the same time – and from one day to the next people came and asked me if I was still making music at all. At the time it hurt, I have to admit. Then I always said: “Oh, I’ll make ends meet” – although I was starting to take off internationally at that time, especially in the USA. I’m almost a kind of cult figure there today, we tossed around in country clubs for years and made dance palatable to people. Now I’m headlining a lot of festivals and in Las Vegas to 100,000 people, I play in Australia and Thailand to 10,000 people.
Free Press: Isn’t it annoying when, as a global star, you’re not really respected at home?
André Tanneberger: Oh, I like the word “star” as little as I like the term “fan”. Stars are people who rise above things – and fans simply adore them uncritically. The vast majority of people just like listening to the music without getting too excited. I’m happy about everyone who just likes my stuff. I prefer that to people who adore every note, no matter what you do. Fans are often somehow militant, there is no critical exchange anymore. I find it more honest when someone tells me they don’t like a track. Then it has much more value if he likes someone else even more. Also: The musicians who go crazy the most are also gone the quickest. Someone once said: “As soon as you believe that the audience means you as a person, if they cheer you, you’ve already lost.” That’s right, I’m very realistic about it.
Free Press: With the attitude you are right in the Ore Mountains. How often are you in the area privately?
André Tanneberger: Not as often as I would like. But I like being there and then walking down a few paths that remind me of my childhood. In the meantime, I am also very firmly rooted in the Ruhr area, because I have ultimately lived there for most of my life and live here with my family. But I’m always drawn to Saxony, also because I find it interesting how Freiberg and Brand-Erbisdorf have developed.
The interview was published in the “Freie Presse” in 2014
Of Eurodance and Trance
By the mid-1990s at the latest, the triumph of techno meant that what had been underground electronic music with the distinctive boom-boom beats was split up into a multitude of styles that even experts find difficult to tell apart: It stated At the extreme ends, tricky artistic approaches like abstract ambient, dull party bang like happy hardcore or brutal gabber.
In between, however, techno offshoots with high pop appeal, which are summarized as “Eurodance”, were found above all in the hit parades. Groups like Culture Beat, DJ Bobo, Eiffel 65, Snap!, Dune or Dr. Alban mixed the typical techno beats with soul and pop elements to create very creamy, energetic dance music that sold like hot cakes.
Trance, on the other hand, can be described as a kind of “dreamy” brother of Eurodance thanks to representatives such as Robert Miles, Kai Tracid or Paul Van Dyk – here the techno beat is expanded with soft vocals, floating piano melodies and epic pads in an often almost esoteric direction .
ATB has its roots in this trance – in a calmer and slower variant. However, Tanneberger works less with typical stylistic elements and uses a lot
idiosyncratic “deviations”. (Tim)