| DJ Sets ::Infected Mushroom
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Infected Mushroom - Erez Eisen and Amit
Duvdevani (aka Duvdev) - has been the leading group within
the global psy-trance scene for nearly a decade. Incorporating
pumping, bad-ass grooves and infectious melodies and live
instruments and vocals into their songs, they've performed
live - a feat that many of their DJ peers aspire to accomplish
- for well over a million people around the globe.
The band's energetic live show has triumphed at some of the
world's biggest and most important music festivals (OMIX Festival
in Mexico, Miami's Ultra Festival, Tribe in Sao Paulo, among
countless others), and they continue to regularly sell-out
top clubs such as the Brixton Academy in London, Toronto's
Koolhaus at the Government, and Avalon in New York and Los
Angeles. Their success as an electronic music band on the
global concert circuit has translated into record sales in
excess of 150,000 albums over the course of six acclaimed
independent albums. Not bad for two guys from Haifa who started
producing music mostly to escape boredom.
"We met in 1996 through a DJ friend," recalls
Erez. "Duvdev was in Goa at the time, and I was working
on another project with a German guy. We met and tried to
do one track together, and we've continued on since then."
A year later, Erez and Duvdev started buying equipment and
began to take Infected Mushroom - a name they stole from a
disbanded local punk band - seriously. Finding little influence
in Israel's music scene, they drew inspiration from bands
like Metallica and The Prodigy. Early productions led to club
dates and gigs at local parties. Before long, the twosome
had developed quite a loyal following. While the headlines
were filled with news about violence and bloodshed, Infected
Mushroom's music touched the hearts of the burgeoning Israeli
trance scene, and clubbers began looking to the band's music
for a respite from the tumultuous political situation.
"People were dying and the government saw that dealing
with that as more important than abolishing trance parties,"
says Erez. "And now the government is supporting trance
parties. They want people to party, instead of staying home.
There are places in the United States that you cannot go to
because it is too dangerous because there are crazy people
living there. It's the same thing in Israel."
Brandishing a multi-influenced trance sound that hadn't been
heard before, Erez and Duvdev were turned down by nearly every
record label in Israel when they attempted to get a deal.
"Nobody wanted to sign us," recalls Erez. "We
went to the biggest and smallest labels in Israel, and nobody
was interested. At the time, we really believed in our music
and continued looking for people to sign us. Fortunately,
there was this A&R guy from BNE named Avi Youssef [and
BNE's owner, Avi Brand] who gave us a chance."
In 1998, BNE released Infected Mushroom's debut album, The
Gathering. Inspired by the surreal ambient styles of Simon
Posford, X-Dream and Transwave, it took a few months for the
forward-thinking album to catch on. But once it did, the buzz
within the global psy-trance scene became deafening.
The group's second album, Classical Mushroom, was released
in 2000. "This album was totally different that the first
album," says Duvdev, who, like Erez, is a classically
trained musician. "Not only did we expand our style,
but the album was big in Europe and Japan. It sounded totally
different that the other trance music that was happening at
the time."
"The trance scene at the time was really monotonic
as opposed to melodic with chords," adds Erez. "We
put a lot of classical elements into that album; it sounded
different, and that's why it stood out. At the beginning,
nobody believed in that one as well."
Infected Mushroom's third album, B.P. Empire, followed in
2001. The combination of their live show and diverse electronic
palette eventually won them the support of critics and a new
legion of hardcore fans in North and South America. In 2003,
Infected Mushroom issued their sprawling double-disc album,
Converting Vegetarians. Perhaps one of their most ambitious
recordings to date, Converting Vegetarians was a sonic departure
away from trance. Leading the listener through trance, freestyle
and ambient sounds, the album paved the way for 2004's I'm
The Supervisor.
"After we made the chilled-out non-danceable side to
Converting Vegetarians, we wanted to make something for the
trance fans that was danceable and full-on," says Duvdev
of I'm The Supervisor. "This album is trance, except
for the last track. There's more singing, and it's the most
difficult thing we've done. Using the voice as an instrument
is tough to do. We're like every band in that we're trying
to search for something new with every album."
Always one step of their audience, Infected Mushroom are
constantly pushing themselves. With fame and success in their
homeland and in the global electronic music community, Infected
Mushroom threw caution to the wind and relocated to Los Angeles
in January 2005. The purpose was to take themselves out of
their comfort zone in order to take their music to the next
level.
"The weather is a lot like Israel's," says Erez,
"and we still don't know the city very well. But we're
here and we're looking to push ourselves and do the sort of
things that we couldn't do in Israel."
As they work in their adopted surroundings and continue to
tour the world, Erez and Duvdev have added famed Israeli guitarist
Erez Netz and Brazilian percussionist Rogerio Jardim to select
live shows. They're also busy finishing material for their
seventh album, Vicious Delicious, which contains a myriad
of new musical explorations, from Flamenco guitar, to hip
hop, to thrash-metal undertones. They have even been commissioned
to remix recordings of rock legends, The Doors. But today
they are especially proud to be recognized by their fans -
Infected Mushroom was named #12 in DJ Magazine's Top 100 DJ
list, a 14 place jump from their debut on the list last year.
While they see themselves more as an electronic band rather
than a psy-trance outfit these days, their track record of
producing everything from trance to downtempo makes them feel
that they can realize all of their musical aspirations.
"Being in the studio is like playing a PlayStation
game, where you have to pass a level each time," says
Duvdev. "That's our goal every time we do a session.
The energy that you get at the parties makes you want to go
right back into the studio and create new tracks. You need
to be in the studio and do the shows; they're both connected
to each other. Our mission now is the same as when we started
out, and that's to get Infected Mushroom's music out to more
people."
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