Name: Perrelli & Mankoff
Your location(country,city): Newcastle, UK
Dimitri: Can you mention your biggest music career achievements in 2017?
Perrelli & Mankoff: Gaining support on our tracks from Markus Schulz, Paul van Dyk, Aly & Fila, Sied van Riel, Giuseppe Ottaviani, Sean Tyas and many more. We're so grateful to these legends for giving our tracks their stamps of approval. Also, cementing our place as regulars on Rielism is something we're very proud about. Lastly, having a few of our tracks included on some great compilation albums. Dreams come true!
Dimitri: Can you mention your biggest personal life achievements in 2017 that make you extremely proud?
Perrelli & Mankoff: A combination of buying a first house, starting a family and achieving career goals between the 2 of us :)
1) Best Track from other artists:
Such a hard question, but here's a few of our favourites:
Linkin Park - In The End (Markus Schulz Tribute Remix)
XiJaro & Pitch feat. Artifi - Maple Valley
Bryan Kearney feat. Plumb - All Over Again
2) Your top 3 2017 personal productions
Also not easy to pick just 3, as they all mean a lot to us in different ways, but here goes:
Perrelli & Mankoff feat. Sara Houston - Lingering Mind
Sied van Riel feat. Nicole McKenna - Stealing Time (Perrelli & Mankoff Remix)
Bart Claessen - Playmo (Perrelli & Mankoff Rework)
3) Best Artist (Dj & producer):
We'd have to say Giuseppe Ottaviani. The amount of talent that this guy possesses is staggering. Stoneface & Terminal have also had a massive year, they have not had a single bad release.
4) Best Remix from other artist:
These questions are not getting any easier are they! Our pick would be:
The Space Brothers - Shine (Jorn van Deynhoven Remix)
5) Best Remix that you have produced?
We've remixed a few tracks this year, but this is the one that really showed us how much our production skills had improved from the previous years: Eryon Stocker - Skyscrapers (Perrelli & Mankoff Remix)
6) Best Remixer:
Not just in 2017 but over the course of the last few years, John O'Callaghan, Jorn van Deynhoven and Mark Sherry never fail with their remixes!
7) Best New Talent (Dj or producer):
Some of the guys breaking through at the moment have been really doing it for us. Sam Laxton, Eryon Stocker, Fred Mozz, Type 41, XiJaro & Pitch and James Kiedis to name a few.
8) Best Electronic Music Album:
Paul van Dyk - From Then On and Aly & Fila - Beyond The Lights both have some very nice tracks on them.
9) Best Electronic Music Compilation:
We might be biased but for us, hands down, it has to be Rielism Four. Every track on the 3 CDs are great!
10) Best artwork/cover of an Album or Compilation:
As above, the Rielism Four artwork takes the biscuit for this one. It's incredible. Honourable mention goes to Craig Connelly - One Second Closer which has a stunning cover.
11) Best Lyrics in an Electronic Music track (it can be your production or from other artists)
We love the lyrics in our track Lingering Mind with Sara Houston.
This is a snippet: "In darkness words just linger on, linger on.
Even in the darkest hour, darkest hour
I run, I run to you."
12) Best Vocalist/Singer featured on Electronic Music track:
She's had a quiet year but Susana is our favourite vocalist. Her voice is angelic.
13) Best Electronic Music Label:
Rielism gets our plaudits for delivering tune after tune for each release.
14) Best Electronic Music Video:
We haven't seen many electronic music videos this year to be completely honest. This one from last year by VocalTranceUK is amazing though!
15) Best Online Social media for communication with your fans:
It has got to be Facebook, but Twitter and Instagram are very useful too.
16) Best Twitter or Facebook message or Instagram message you received from a fan or friend or you have read on someone else’s account:
An excerpt from a review by The Crazy Dutchman's Blog regarding a mix we did earlier this year:
"So many great records smashed into this hour long mix. This is pure heaven, just the way I like my Trance music. Rielism, Sied van Riel, and now Perrelli & Mankoff… you are leaders in the Trance scene. You’ve gained a fan. I’m liking this mix, and even your own productions are ace. Is this the best mix of 2017? I reckon so. Still got a few months to go, but you’ve got to be so damn good to top this mix. I reckon nothing can beat this.
Perrelli & Mankoff. Your names have gone on my ‘favourite Trance DJs/duo’ list. Very high."
17) Best music composition software:
We use FL Studio 11 and we love it.
18) Best Club Event or Open Air Festival:
Dreamstate. Whilst we've never been, it looks incredible.
19) Best personal Dj Gig:
At the moment, we're focusing solely on our productions, and we haven't been looking for gigs, but once we reach the level where we're aiming to be, we plan to start thinking about playing gigs etc.
20) Best Dj set of the year from other fellow Dj:
There were some really great sets at Luminosity Beach Festival this year: Scot Project, Sied van Riel, Signum and Jonas Steur stood out for us.
21) Best country that you have played in 2017 and where did you met the best festival/event crowd:
We wish we could say "Argentina"... Hopefully one day!
22) Best Radio show or Artist Vlog?:
A State Of Trance has to get credit if only just for the sheer number of listeners it exposes beautiful trance music to.
23) Best Radio station:
1Mix Radio is a good station for trance... And BBC Radio 1 when Will Atkinson is on. It's always great to hear some trance on the mainstream FM radio in the UK!
24) Best Online Record shop that you purchase your music:
Beatport, whilst it isn't the cheapest, it's very simple and user-friendly, plus it has a lot of exclusives.
25) Best music related website that you visit frequently:
SoundCloud. We'd be lost without it!
26) Best Smart phone or smart phone application:
One of us is an Android man, whilst the other is an Apple man. It causes endless arguments between us (not really!)
27) Best Dj equipment (software or hardware):
We're yet to use any mixer that beats the Pioneer DJM-2000 Nexus. Hopefully one day we'll be able to afford one!
28) Best new sound or sample that has been used in Electronic Music this year perhaps introduced first by you?
Not sure about new sounds but we love recording our own sounds to use in our productions! Who could have known that the sound of you popping the inside of your cheek with your finger would sound so good?!
29) Best tip that you learnt this year for your Djing techniques or music composition:
Never have the "power saver" function turned on on your computer whilst producing. Latency galore!
30) Best piece of advice you got in relation to your career in 2017:
If you have 'haters', you're probably doing something right.
31) Best hobby or activity that you spent a lot of time in 2017:
Music production of course! We dedicate as much time to producing as possible, outside of our 'normal' jobs.
32) Best holiday destination for 2017 either to relax or to perform in a club or festival:
Portugal / USA
33) Best Electronic Music magazines in printed form not online:
We don't read printed magazines these days. You can say times have changed...
34) Best Movie of the year that may inspire you to compose a track:
There's no movie that springs to mind here unfortunately
35) Best online/PC/video game of the year that you have played this year?
We both enjoy Football Manager games
36) Best soundtrack for video game of the year:
No idea, sorry
37) Best electronic music related joke you heard this year and make you still laugh:
Can't think of one right now but almost everything that Wunderground publish is hilarious
38) The saddest electronic music news you heard this year and still makes u cry:
The tragic passing of Robert Miles. He truly was a pioneer of the scene.
Finally, please tell our readers your plans with your future releases, tracks, albums, collaborations, Dj gigs.
Perrelli & Mankoff: We can't reveal too much unfortunately but there is A LOT of music coming from us in the near future, music that we're very proud of and excited about, solo originals, collabs, remixes and reworks, so keep an eye out on our socials!
Many thanks to Sied van Riel for organising this interview.
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