'We see banging music as a release from the shiteness of a capitalist society' - Oisin DSNT

In this interview MOTZ catches up with Oisin O'Brien, head honcho of DSNT and Guerrilla Shout. Oisin started throwing parties over five years ago and has cultivated Belfast with hard hitting techno.

Following the success of DSNT parties, they have now formed a prominent label with some of the finest techno artists around releasing with them. DSNT005 Is out on the 28th April to coincide with Lumen and the release of the AnD - Interferometer video also hitting our screens soon too.

In this interview, Oisin talks about the ethos behind DSNT, techno in Ireland, politics and upcoming talent coming out of Ireland. An intelligent and humorous read that honestly describes the current climate in world and how we use techno as an escape from the political injustices and how we have formed a self sustained community. A compelling read by the insightful Oisin O'Brien.

Coming from a design background, what made you want to start your own night?

Going to Bangface weekender and loving stupid, hard, fast electronic music and not having any in Belfast. Still love hard, fast electronic music and it's great to see much more of a scene now!

What's the ethos behind DSNT?

Our tagline is “We throw visually intense techno parties, release records & love doof” pretty concise and straight to the point - we see banging music as a release from the shiteness of a capitalist society that doesn’t give a fuck about people. If you have had a hard week in what ever shite call centre you work in, going out and getting binned listening to whopper kick-drums over a massive rig is the perfect escape from the mundane. We seek to create these experiences.

We also believe that there is a snobbery and complete detachment in establishment art that doesn’t have any immediate relevance to young people. The visual aspect of our production seeks to engage and create an experience where people are exposed to art, without it needing validated by traditional hierarchies.

The nature of the art world seeks to place meaning on reputation and ego, which ultimately only exists to place a monetary value on any kind of creativity. LUMEN & DSNT exist to empower people to be creative outside of the traditional boundaries.

At your last party someone threw a drink at Ansome’s gear but Defekt ended up stepping up and banged out an insane set. Do you have any preventative measures in place to make sure that doesn’t happen again?

This was an absolutely gutting experience for us, however Defekt definitely saved the day. It was positive to know that it didn’t effect his gig the following night. We don’t want to lose the intimacy of the artist being directly in the crowd, so to counter the drink risk we are installing a perspex screen over the gear. GEAR SHIELDS & BANGERS lol.

The next Lumen has some serious techno heavyweights on the line up. AnD are known to blast out BPM of 150 and over. So what is this ‘23 minute warning AV show world premiere’ and should people be prepared?

In their own words “GO HARD OR GO FUCKING HARDER“. The 23 minute warning show is part of a running narrative of a character that we made up that channels the collective experiences of Robert Anton Wilson, Timothy Leary and Alister Crowley through a series of meta-programming psychotherapy experiments on himself. This is a presentation of his research in a visual format before he was kicked out of Harvard and disgraced. Expect to unravel the mystery of the Bavarian Illuminati, expose the Sirius Connection, Operation Mindfuck, meet the queen of space and find out the secret of the Kennedy assassination and also lizards, there will also be loads of lizards.

The electronic music scene is constantly changing, with genres like EDM, tech house etc. attracting the masses and generating huge amounts money. Do you think techno will ever become a mainstream genre?

I think there is certainly a level of it that’s easy to understand and sounds like a vintage Nokia ringtone, DERP’d out. There are two different techno’s that we are talking about, on one level I think it comes and goes and it's the next phase that people feel they can exploit and make money from, whereas the other has a long history, legacy of integrity and isn’t going anywhere. As Dave Clarke's t-shirt says ‘DONT SUCK CORPORATE COCK’ LOL.

Why do you think the Techno scene in Ireland is more prominent than ever?

1. Loads of people that absolutely love it putting the hours in to build something they care about.

2. The world being mad.

3. Cus it's fucken class yeoooooooooooooooo.

I’ve heard from a few people involved in the scene that it’s more than a genre, it’s a movement. Would you agree?

I think when a creative community becomes self-sustaining from a demand for its art, it allows creators to make better work as they aren’t worrying about paying rent and can focus on making music or art.

I think there is a collective social conscience that we see with our core scene and family that is reflected in the political activities of those involved in our scene.

In short: yeah and it's great to see more and more artists coming through and smashing it.

In the past, music was used as a way of resisting against capitalism and political injustices. With Brexit and Trump, do you think we will see music as a form of resistance to the current political climate?

I think that autonomous art and culture is massively important in challenging state sponsored mediocrity. We see this with areas gentrified and street art being used as a distraction. Brexit is being used as a massive distraction and excuse for the absolutely brutal policies of the Tories, Trump’s vulgar, idiotic behaviour is a front for much more sinister policies. Techno music and outlying culture has always been a space for those that will be most immediately effected by this structural shift to the right (not that Blairite New-Labour or the Democrats are left-wing or present any kind of viable alternative, they were just slightly more subtle with their institutional oppression).

On that note, can I take a moment to say fuck the establishment media and the Blairite scum in the Labour party, and also with the Democrats. The first viable opportunities for positive change e.g Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn who were hung out to dry with complete media brutality like a corporate sacrificial lamb as a symbol to the working people of ‘FUCK YOU, YOU HAVE NO HOPE’.

It’s not a coincidence when everything breaks at once, it's a strategy. It's about grinding people down into submission to our corporate overlords, we don’t live in a democracy we live in a plutocracy. Socialism for the rich and wage-slavery for the poor.

Can you recommend any upcoming Irish talent that we should keep an eye on?

Myler absolutely fucken wrecked LUMEN005 and I rinse his Cider & Bonfires mix flat out, Fran Hartnett’s new AV show is looking absolutely sick. Casper Hastings - Bionic was sent to me as part of an EP on RVE, it's my favourite track on the record. Casper has been supporting us for ages and it's great to see him hitting with a strong release. Doug Cooney is doing great stuff with his Real Sound thing too and is definitely worth a mention. Nez has been smashing it with his Computer Controlled label as well if your feeling a bit electroey. There are the obvious ones like AnD, Defekt, Sunil, Tinfoil, that go without saying but no point in not mentioning how sick their tunes are. That kick drum video from LUMEN005 still makes me smile like fuck.

LUMEN006 tickets are on sale now and available to purchase here.

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