Ryan Dickinson and Ollie Bowler are the bad boys behind the meteoric rise of Bitrok. A mere four years after their first meeting, the lads from Brisbane have become bigger than Ben-Hur. David Minutillo caught up with the duo to find out how big their grins are before they head to Ambar for the not-to-be-missed night, Force Majeure...

After your chance meeting do you believe there is anything more to serendipity than chance luck?
Sure, I mean we wouldn’t have even started chatting to each other if we weren’t both throwing our CD’s onstage to the DJ’s playing, and we wouldn’t have both been watching the same DJ’s if our music tastes weren’t very similar so it was definitely more than chance luck, but of course it’s a big surprise to still be making music together after that random meeting all those years ago. I don’t think either of us went to that festival expecting to meet our future production partner!

What was the moment that you thought to yourselves, “this partnership is really going to be special?”
Pretty much from the get-go, the first track we made together turned out great and I think was the best thing that either of us had separately produced previous to that. Everything just kind of clicked and we were in the exact same headspace musically, plus we both got along really well and felt comfortable bringing any ideas to the table for tracks.

What has been your proudest moment as Bitrok?
There’s been a lot so far, when a producer/DJ that you really respect tells you they like your music that’s always a proud feeling, or playing gigs interstate/overseas and having people request a specific song that you’ve made is always a great feeling, but I think when we attended the ARIA’s and had a hand in helping Gotye win one was probably one of the standout ‘proud’ memories, the ARIA’s was something we’d always watched growing up and to actually be there firstly was mind blowing but to be a part of it in some way was just crazy.

Have there been any low points during your meteoric rise to success?
Probably the times that we’ve been living in separate states have been the low points, we’ve done it once before and are currently in the situation due to work commitments. Its mainly a low point because it means that our productivity slows down quite a bit and we are both so driven with our music, that any small step backwards towards our goals feels like something huge for us. Every cloud has a silver lining though and once the album is finished I’m sure we will be glad we’ve had a little time away from each other because if things happen the way we’re hoping they will we’ll probably be sick of the sight of each other in a year’s time haha

What changes come when you receive praise from the likes of MixMag and DJMag?
We got a big article featured on us in DJMag very early on for us, just after our first release so that helped a lot to show people that we were serious and also a lot of promoters to look at us in a different light. It seems when people overseas are liking what you’re doing, people locally want to get on board as well so it helped out a lot in the early days to get us gigs.

Which is your favourite of the big summer festivals that you have played at?
I think the most memorable for us was last year’s Parklife because it was the first time we’ve been given a night time slot at a festival. We always knew that if we had a decent festival timeslot to play in we would smash it, and that time we played after an interstate act which didn’t seem to be doing much for the Brisbane audiences, consequently we started with about 10 people watching us but by about halfway through our set the crowd had grown to at least 400-500 people and they were all really getting into it, was really satisfying to see a pumping dance floor and know that we built it up from a small group of people!

What has been your craziest dance floor moment?
Hmm I think that would have been the gig we played in Dundee, Scotland. Was a strange enough gig as it was, Dundee is a small town about an hours drive from Edinburgh, you had to take an elevator downstairs to this room which looked like an oversized lounge room and held about 200 people. The place was totally packed with sweat dripping from the roof and for about half the set I had this crazy Scottish guy yelling things at me that for the life of me I could not understand. I find the Scottish accent hard enough to pick up let alone being in a loud nightclub, whatever the guy was saying, he was very passionate about it haha

How has your classical instrumental backgrounds effected your style of music?
Well neither of us exactly have a classical background but we both have a musical background and that has helped us out so much with DJing and producing. I can’t imagine how someone could produce music without having a basic understanding of chords, melodies and rhythms. Having an understanding of song structures and key matching helps out tonnes for DJing as well,  I don’t think we could possible do the Dex N FX set without our musical backgrounds because it relies on a lot of the natural live music instincts you get from having played in live bands before and understanding what will work with what.

Who do you think you have been most heavily influenced by? Who are you listening to at the moment?
I think our Rock backgrounds come through a lot in the melodies we use and the type of energy we like to have in a lot of our songs but our most direct influences would have to be the Chemical Brothers, they are the reason both Ollie and I wanted to produce electronic music in the first place. I listen to a lot of different styles of music when I’m not in the studio and generally not straight up dance music, The Mars Volta are always getting a spin, as well as Fat Freddys Drop, and I’ve just discovered the Grand National album which is a few years old now but is the first thing that’s really grabbed me in a while as an all round quality album.

What was it like working with Wally DeBacker of Gotye?
I was a big fan of his music before we worked with him so I was honoured when he gave us the opportunity to be involved with his remix album. We didn’t actually work in the studio with him in person but have met up with him a few times since the album and he’s one of the nicest people you’re ever likely to meet in your life. The guys always got time for a chat even with a schedule as busy as his, we’ve been trying to get him to do vocals for one of our album tracks but unfortunately he’s had too much on his plate to dedicate a few days to writing for us, will keep our fingers crossed for a small miracle though!

What can we expect from your upcoming debut album?
It’s really a new approach to song writing for us, we’ve thrown out the rulebook of certain genres or structures we felt we had to stick to in the past and the music, in our opinion, is head and shoulders above anything else we’ve done previously because of it. We’re trying to get in as many of our influences as possible on there while still not letting the album sound like a disjointed collage of genres. There’s gonna be hip hop, rock, electro, chill out and maybe even a breaks track haha! It will also be a very vocal driven album, so far we’ve got people like NFA (formerly of 1200 techniques) Rupert RSK (formerly of Sonic Animation) and Johnny (from Children Collide) on there and are still working on a bunch more.

What else is on the schedule for ’09?
Still locked away in the studios trying to finish this album up as soon as we can, we’ll be taking it fairly easy on the remix and gig-front until it’s done as that’s our priority right now. We’re really hopeful of getting the project done this year and being able to get out there and tour it in 2010 with a whole new live show. Really just looking forward to holding over two years of hard work in our hands in the form of a finished album!

What are your impressions of the Perth music scene? And the Australian music scene?
Well every single time we’ve played over in Perth it has been one of our best gigs, the crowds there are always so up for it and are really passionate about their music, it feels like Perth clubbers are there to hear the music rather than to be seen. The Destination boys have done a great job of building their music label up to a respected international brand after the successful Perth club night, I don’t know where they find the time on top of working and producing as well! The Australian music scene is going from strength to strength as well, it seems like Triple J is a real institution these days and Aussie groups that are being supported by them are selling out tours across the country which is great to see, these days a totally local line up can draw bigger crowds than international acts.

Ambar draws quite a passionate dance crowd, how are you looking forward to playing there?
We’ve been excited about the gig since we found out we were coming back over to Perth, it’s been around a year since we were there last time and we were pretty much ready to get back on a plane to Perth after we got back home, your crowds are mental! Our DJ sets have grown heaps since last time we played over there and the Ambar crowds are pretty open minded musically which is good because there’s quite a few different things we have worked into the Dex N FX set now which I think the crowd will enjoy!

What kind of sounds can we expect at “Force Majeure” in Perth?
We’ll be testing out a few of the new album tracks which we’re looking forward to seeing the crowd reactions for, as well as our usual mash up madness. You can expect anything from Hip Hop to Rock to Electro to Breaks to Techno and everything in between, with lots of different vocal and instrumental mash ups. We’re really trying to push some new boundaries and also incorporate some songs into the sets that traditional DJ’s just can’t do smoothly without the help of the Dex N FX setup.

Keep an eye out for their up and coming debut album or catch a glimpse of the lads smashing the decks and dance floor at Ambar for Force Majeure, Friday 29th May.