Mid-tempo, percussive-driven rhythmics, dreamy house grooves and a couple unexpected curveball moments. Igor Tipura steps into our mix series, next to sharing the latest on Stuttgart’s music scene and his Kitjen record label and party series.
Our buddy Igor Tipura treats us to the next installment in our mix series. The Stuttgart-based party thrower, disc jockey and label head has been an avid contributor to the international circuit on multiple fronts for a number of years. His on-and-off record label Kitjen has a slowly but surely growing catalog, featuring some pretty spectacular music by the likes of Fantastic Man, Beesmunt Soundsystem, Chinaski, Hotel Lauer, Tambien, Suzanne Kraft, Gerd Janson, Shit Robot and Stijn Sadée
Recorded during his latest DJ gig at Zur Klappe, the mix on display today is an extract of his 3 hours opening set. Expect mid-tempo, percussive-driven rhythmics, dreamy house grooves and a couple unexpected curveball moments.
Hey Igor, what’s been happening? You told me you’re out and about traveling – where have you been and what have you been up to?
While I’m writing this I’m residing in Croatia and enjoying the great hospitality of my friends after playing two great nights at the Garden Brewery and Club Masters. Before this I’ve been to South East Asia and Berlin.
As someone who’s been running events in Stuttgart for a number of years, how’s the city’s scene developed over that period and how would you describe its current state?
It’s really tough at the moment I think. A lot of venues have been shut down in the last years and not enough places popped up since then. It’s very complicated and quite expensive to run a venue over here since the city is not really interested in providing space or help for people who are brave enough and take the big risk of opening a club or music venue.
Tell us about the idea behind the Kitjen nights and the guests you invite to play – I saw you’ve an event coming up with Tornado Wallace.
Well it started with the parties about almost 8 years ago. At some point I had the great idea of doing a label too. Since then a lot happened and I’m very happy with how everything turned out. Tornado Wallace is next end of March to play my regular Party at Rakete in Stuttgart. Which is a Bar with a dance floor in a Theatre. And I live just across the street, which is of course super comfortable for me 🙂
On the label side of things, you’ve released some great records via Kitjen since 2015. Operating with a somewhat irregular release schedule, what’s the ethos of the label?
There’s no major plan or anything behind the Label. I work with people who I like and of course the most important thing to me is to be convinced about the music and artist. So it happens that I do three releases a year and sometimes only one a year. Maybe there won’t be none this year…
Fantastic Man recently returned for his second EP outing for instance, next to Chinaski delivering the label’s first album release under his S-F-X alias – tell us a bit about those two records and the artists you collaborate with in general.
Chinaski has released te LP on Youtube and Soundcloud on his own before. I remember listening to it by accident while working on some stuff and was thinking “too bad he didn’t ask me before”. Then I got in touch with him, he deleted it from all the platforms, Michael Satter did the Artwork and it got released! It’s the second Fantastic Man release on Kitjen. The first one went really well and I liked it a lot. When he sent me the new demos I wanted to release pretty much all of them. I’m such a big fan of his music and super happy he trusts me with releasing his stuff.
Tell us about the mix you’ve shared with us today. How and where was it recorded, etc..
The mix was recorded at “Zur Klappe” in Berlin last January. This is how I tried to get people in the mood for a fun Night… of course it worked out amazingly well 🙂
What else is coming up for you and Kitjen?
Well…. there’s nothing confirmed by now but recently got some amazing stuff by two artists and I’m waiting for some other stuff too. So let’s see if I can make it this year or not.