Nadisko formed during the Myspace glory days of mid-2008; an era when MGMT’s debut album was being blasted all over the radio and ultimate-cringe head-to-toe flouro attire was widespread. They quickly cemented themselves as premier resident DJs in Sydney, and from there they gained airplay on BBC Radio One for their debut EP, they supported Steve Aoki, Tiga, Uffie and heaps more massive names, remixed Peking Duk’s first EP, and played shows all across Australia, Europe and Mexico. It’s been a wild ride, and the guys are super excited to be back with their new single Take Me Away, as Wood enthuses, “After a four year hiatus, we have developed a more mature sound, using the knowledge that one gains after 50 releases and a love of dance music. We are super keen to release new music and share it with everyone!”
Alex Hopkins and Blake Wood of Nadisko share with us their top 5 Australian electronic artists of all time.
For us there is too many good artists to mention out of Australia, but here are a few that stand out to us.
RÜFÜS DU SOL:
What can we say, we first met one of the boys in what almost felt like a previous life. They are all the nicest guys you could imagine. Now about 8 years into their journey, back at the time of ‘We Left’ and ‘This Summer’ they were making something special. Something fresh nobody was doing at the time. They are what it means to be true taste makers that are backed by such a inspirational dreamy sound coming out of them. It’s not often a group like Rufus comes along but for us they have really changed our perspectives to electronic music.
GROOVE TERMINATOR:
Groove Terminator has been around for as long as we can remember. Starting as a hip-hop dj you can hear his roots come out in songs like ‘You Can’t See Ft. Kool Keith’ Which is one of our favourite big beat tracks of all time. But what caught our ear was when his tracks like ‘One More time’ & ‘Brand New Day’ came out – which we still have on vinyl! These were such hits back in the early 2000’s that shaped the ‘dance’ scene for what we knew in Australia at the time. We were lucky enough to meet and have dinner with him while we were playing Adelaide a few years back. On top of his music he was such a nice guy, much kudos to him!
GERLING:
Gerling struck a massive chord growing up in the mid 2000’s in Sydney, synonymous with the Purple Sneakers party scene, they engineered a gritty party sound, particularly their Bad Blood album that was incredible. ‘Smash The Emergency Glass’, ‘In The City’ and ‘Newwave Machine’ were perfect for the time and place, being at the forefront of indie-dance locally. Who can go past the epic hook of ‘I’m coming back to you.’ of ‘Dust Me Selecta’? They are completely underrated!
MIDNIGHT JUGGERNAUTS:
One word, ‘Dystopia’. These guys were so influential at the time for us. Dystopia was declared album of the year from ‘Pedro Winter’ who lead the way with the French scene and been involved with so many influential artists at the time. They were one of the groups who had the golden ‘French Touch’ outside France and for us really drove a new way for the Australian scene. ‘Shadows’ left an imprint on us like no other record could with the dreamy synth line and the way the song drives along left too many good memories for us to forget in and out of the clubs.
PENDULUM:
Mixing rock with electronica? Yes. Remixing the ‘ABC news theme’? I don’t think we had ever been so ready for the news in our life. These guys could honestly do it all, rock, down tempo, drum ‘n’ bass, electronica. They had a unique sound which I think is why we love this project so much. Their remix of ‘The Prodigy – ‘Voodoo People’ was something that stuck out to us, they really made this remix their own and is still stuck in our playlists today. If we were to make a movie, they are what we would want our soundtrack should be!