A Conversation With MR.BLACK – Working With Hardwell’s Revealed, And Touring Asia
Hey MR.BLACK, welcome to Dance Rebels! How are you? Also, where are you from, and how long have you been working in the music industry for? I’m great! Currently on the road, doing a major tour in China as part of Revealed Recordings. I’m from Tel Aviv and I’ve been producing for 10 years.
Who or what inspired you to pursue a career in the music industry? What sacrifices have you had to make to enable you to be a DJ/producer full-time? One of my biggest inspirations and definitely acts that helped shaping my career as an aspiring producer are Infected Mushroom, Tiesto, David Guetta, Prodigy. The main sacrifice was certainly to put all my focus on producing in the studio rather to have a ‘regular’ day job in parallel, therefore doing it for free with all your heart and passion damaged the finances until it got stabled. Also I’m known as a workaholic so this affected my social life aswell haha.
You’ve had a busy start to the year, 3 releases already including ‘Turning Back’ and Outer Space’ via Revealed and ‘Ravin’ via Dharma, what’s been your most favourite release, why too? If to be completely honest I love all of them in a different way, firstly it’s been a great run of releases so far and this couldn’t happen without the ongoing support I receive from KSHMR and Hardwell and their labels, particularly Revealed Recordings which has been my main home for my releases. ‘Turning Back’ was something that I’ve been working with my hometown friends TripL which is more progressive and a bit different than what I usually release, but it felt right releasing it at the beginning of this year, ‘Ravin’ shown a different side and mixture of different sounds and style with my signature sound but I wanted to gear up a little bit on the second release, ‘Outer Space’ takes the energy to the climax and has been an essential weapon in all my sets recently, been really pleasure working with my Aussie friend Dimatik.
You’ve released a lot of records via Hardwell’s ‘Revealed’ imprint, how influential has his music been in regards to developing Mr Black’s sound? Is it important an artist has a distinctive sound too? Firstly, it’s very important that an artist will have his own signature sound and story, he has to take the listeners on his own musical journey and not someone else’s. Hardwell is known for his energetic sets and performances, so whenever I send something to Revealed, Robbert is the one who’s eventually approving it, so whenever I produce something that in my vision goes to Revealed Recordings, I try to make sure it’ll fit the type of music that Hardwell embraces in his sets, with ofcourse my own signature sound.
What other releases do you have scheduled for 2019 set in stone? When you produce tunes, do you prefer to use a big studio, or content with a laptop and plugins etc? Here’s a scoop! I’m going to release a big collaboration on Revealed in May, make sure to keep an eye ;) regarding the production, I love working in my studio, although it’s not too big it, it’s cozy and comfortable to what I need. Whenever I’m on the road, I’m taking my laptop and projects with me so I can work and be efficient with the spare time I have in the Hotel.
You’ve had support from popular names including Afrojack, R3HAB, Blasterjaxx and many more, what advice would you give to a young artists wanting to achieve such support? I feel very lucky to have such a great amount of support from these big artists. And it might sound like a cliché but you have to believe and work hard, if you set yourself a goal/target, and you put all your effort to reach it – you’ll make it, it’s really up to you.
You’re about to start a major tour of Asia, why should fans see Mr.Black live? What makes your set such a unique experience? The amount of effort I put in my show is huge, I make sure that every single track in my show will fit the crowd, I’m creating special edits and versions before every show, of my own records but also from other tracks that I want to play. I love to touch in several genres during my show and to take the crowd on a musical journey, I really put my heart and soul in each show to give the best performance I can for the people came to see me. It’s always flattering and motivating to see all the heart-warming feedback and love from the people.
