PUBLISHED December 15th, 2015 04:00 pm | UPDATED August 19th, 2024 02:40 am
A sound designer by day and DJ by night, Ramesh Krishnan is a familiar face in Singapore’s music industry. To date, he’s spread his gospel in clubs around the world including Dagmarkt in Holland, Heavyweight in Montreal, Double Six in Bali; and locally in influential venues and music festivals such as Lola, Ce La Vi and Gilles Peterson’s Worldwide Festival, just to name a few.
With his knowledge and experience, Ramesh has collaborated with Marseilles-based artist Mathieu Briand’s Derrière Le Monde Flottant at the Musée d’art Contemporain as a sound designer and played an influential role as a music consultant for several lifestyle organizations in Singapore include Vertu and the Garibaldi group of restaurants.
On top of this, Ramesh started MeshRadio with ‘tech wizard’, Ernie; a Singapore based non-profit internet radio station, consisting of an independent group of musical minds – a network of DJs, bands, producers and music lovers.
And for this edition of City Nomads Radio, we chat with Ramesh on his latest happenings, time machine and what his ideal set is like.
City Nomads Radio #06: Ramesh Krishnan by Citynomadsradio on Mixcloud
Hi Ramesh! We haven’t seen you around lately, what have you been up to?
Besides being a busy dad, I completed two major sound design projects earlier this year, and am currently consulting for various hospitality establishments. And to top it off, I am DJ-ing actively, with Ce La Vi being my home base and a couple of amazing invitational guest spots. So yeah, no complaints! Made a couple more friends, had promising opportunities, musically it’s been a great year. All inspiring!
You play across all genres, but honestly, what’s your ideal set like?
Ha! Your answer is in the question, my ideal set is to play across all genres! I tend to get quite bored listening to the same shit over an hour. I always try to put all the stuff I like listening to in to my sets. There are no boundaries; it’s always about the groove and a hook. And of course, I usually prefer black music.
And who are your musical influences?
Man, it runs wide and deep. I would listen to archival recordings to present electronic stuff. I enjoy listening back to the field recordings I made during my projects too. Lately I’ve been diving into some selected Turkish psychedelic 70s funk stuff. I strongly feel my influences comes from my surroundings, places I been to, people I hung out with, and listening to my Dj friends perform. There’s been heaps of interesting stuff happening in this city, we just had our first Felabration festival in Singapore! and we had a propa Drum n Bass rinse out recently with Subcity!
So other than DJing, what do you do outside of the dance music scene?
I own and operate a small music design business, Meshtrax, mainly for museum exhibitions. It gives me great chance to work with sound in space. I manage and curate music playlists for various restaurants, hotels, and retail brands in Singapore and the region. It has been ten years, and I am constantly learning and solving new challenges.
What do you think a good party should entail?
First and foremost, a seriously good sound system. From a performer and punter’s point of view, that’s key for me!
If you had a time machine, what year would you go back to and why?
The Fifties and Sixties for sure, as it’s been said, it was a time of radical protest, flower power, polarization, experimentation, upheaval and alien abduction.
Any shout outs?
A big thank you to all the like-minded people and collectives I met throughout the year. Your values and determination will always be an inspiring part of my exploration. As for 2016, look out for a series of parties coming your way from the HPL Building. Boom!!!
About City Nomads Radio
City Nomads Radio features mixtapes curated by regionally-based DJs, a community that deserves a whole lot more love from us.