Michael Mayer has done many things over the past four decades. He made a name for himself internationally as a DJ, co-founded the label Kompakt Records (which defined a whole genre) and produced a constant flow of singles and albums, both as a solo artist and in collaboration with electronic music greats from around the globe. Mayer was born in the Black Forest in 1971 and grew up there but he’s been working in Cologne since 1993. You can still find him there today, behind the counter of Kompakt’s record store, where we caught up with him for a chat.
Michael, is there a go-to story you always tell people about Kompakt Records?
MAYER: There certainly is and it starts with the opening of the Delirium record store in Cologne in 1993. Back then, I was living on a diet of US underground house – not the rave sound that was so big in the early 90s. I was more into intimate club music. When the store opened, I was the first customer. And I was bitterly disappointed. I went straight up to them and complained that they only had four boxes of records that were of any interest to me.
That’s how customers make themselves popular…
Exactly. The four guys behind the counter were pretty taken aback and we got chatting. And that’s how they ended up giving me a job as their record buyer. Six months later, I invested the money I’d inherited from my gran and bought a stake in a record store! After that, everything happened quite quickly. Our production and music publication work played an increasingly important role. In 1998 we decided to pool everything under one new name and Kompakt was born.
Did you ever think the idea might not make much business sense?
I knew I wanted to be a DJ at the age of 12. The world of disco had a magical appeal to me. I didn’t realise you could make a living from it though. But when the 90s came along, it was clear nothing was more important than what was happening right then. A musical movement, a revolution. And either you were part of it or you didn’t have a clue and completely missed out. In 1995, I decided to drop out of university – partly to force myself to start building something, start working and not just party all the time.
Was the business a success from the outset?
Yes! Kids went to a club or a rave at the weekend and then they came straight to the store and wanted “that track that goes dum, dum dum, dee”! We sold tonnes of that sort of music. And we grew, following the demands of the market. We always wanted to maintain complete control of what we did as artists.
How did that work? Through self-exploitation?
Yes, I think I’d say so. In the past 30 years, I’ve worked extreeeeeeemely hard and put a lot into the business. It’s not something I’d sell at the drop of a hat.
And the others agree?
Yes, Kompakt Records is our life’s work. We’ve created something unique that only works with us at the helm. If a consortium were to get involved, the business would fall apart. We’ve had offers. Perhaps in ten years’ time, who knows? But not at the moment.
Your “minimal” style created a whole new genre of electronic music. Was that your greatest achievement?
We need to be clear on the facts here. The great creative achievement in terms of minimal techno was definitely down to Wolfgang Voigt. By 1998, Kompakt was actually “post-minimal”. The music was starting to sound fuller, more entertaining, brighter. The idea was always that we’d come up with this skeleton, minimal, at some point and now we were adding the skin and dressing it up in clothes. We wanted to do our own thing. We were intent on not sounding like people from London, Detroit, Chicago, New York or Paris.
Or Berlin?
Not Berlin, that’s for sure! (Laughs). And we managed to create our own sound with some really bold records in the early years of Kompakt Records. Incorporating German vocals was one of our pioneering achievements too. Before we did it, it was an absolute taboo. We showed people it was possible. The journalist Philip Sherburne from Pitchfork put it best when he said Kompakt had lent techno a friendly face. And it helped us stand out from Berlin techno, with its persistently anonymous and dark air.
You knew the cleaner would arrive at 6am and the lights would go on. So we didn’t play hardcore techno right up until the last moment. We tried to gradually ramp things back down and send people home singing a nice song.
Michael Mayer
Is that something to do with the city you call home?
Definitely. The cheerful nature of the locals is part of it. The Karneval festivities and the fact that the venues where this style of music was played were completely different to the ones in Berlin, where people partied in squats. In Cologne, we had small clubs for 200 to 300 people and established discos. That has an influence on the music.
How? There was lots of freedom in Berlin. Economically speaking too.
And in Cologne there was a closing time. You knew the cleaner would arrive at 6am and the lights would go on. So we didn’t play hardcore techno right up until the last moment. We tried to gradually ramp things back down and send people home singing a nice song. It’s a very Cologne-style way of partying. And it became an art form – writing music that works really well in those situations. For those moments when the skin between the dancers begins to melt away.
Were you only thinking about the Cologne clubs when you were producing tracks? Kompakt had had a global audience for quite some time, after all.
The global attention was more of a by-product. Tobias Thomas and I organised the Total Confusion parties at Studio 672 (now Jaki) at Stadtgarten every Friday for nine years. They were the beating heart of our business. Everything we’d done during the week was tested and celebrated there. There was tremendous synergy between the parties and the label. We always invited musicians to the parties too and that led to an increasingly international network of like-minded people.
But Berlin was perhaps more of an equal to other major cities. Cologne never really was, was it?
No, but I do feel I should stand up for Cologne on this point. The city’s really blossomed in recent years – especially in terms of clubs. A great one opened in May – Fi on Widdersdorfer Straße in the Ehrenfeld district. Gewölbe and Bootshaus are fantastic clubs. But Fi is really the club the city still needed.
In a new building on a piece of land that belongs to the people who run it. A club that can’t be forced to move?
Yes, that’s right. Gentrification has caused considerable damage but the city currently has a better opinion of itself than at the beginning of the noughties. There’s a feeling that “Cologne is cool” that sets the city’s soul aglow. Despite the fact they have a Second League football club. I don’t think it used to be that way. Back then, the local patriotism focused on BAP and Die Höhner – that local brand of old-style rock. Today’s local patriotism has a much younger, cooler feel to it. But perhaps that’s just my impression.
Is there such a thing as a “sound of Cologne”? Perhaps a sort of legacy left behind by Stockhausen, the WDR Studio for Electronic Music and that approach to electronic music?
Film-makers, journalists and writers are always trying to draw a direct line from Stockhausen or Can to Kompakt but there isn’t one. Our music stems from acid house, not krautrock. People often used to ask us and we always thought it was a bit weird. It was quite strange to see Holger Czukay [the bassist of krautrock band “Can”] suddenly appear at one of our parties too. Now, of course, I think it’s great such an amazing artist was there. But back then, I thought, “What are those old fogies doing here? (Laughs). This is a youth movement.”
Are you actually seen as an economic player in the city?
Because we’re part of a subculture, we never cared whether people were aware of us. We realised the whole scene had become an economic factor at some point in the noughties. The music output – and not just ours – was incredible. But it was peanuts compared to the economic importance of local businesses such as Rimowa or Ford. At one point, there were posters hanging up to promote an event being held by the city council and they had a picture on them of a record player with a Kompakt slipmat on it featuring the eagle.
The one from your logo?
Yes. But it’s important to know that the eagle was actually originally Cologne’s official logo until it was redesigned in 2000. Then Wolfgang [Voigt] came up with the idea that we could use it. And that’s how we ended up with it.
Perhaps one last question to finish off. What other question would you have liked to answer?
I’m not sure. Have we talked enough about my love of Cologne?
Yes, you did mention that. You like living here, right?
Yes. As you know, I wasn’t born in Cologne. I’ve been here since 1992. But it feels like the city has adopted me fully. My children were born here, they have the local accent and they love the city’s carnival festivities and its football club. My roots here are deep. The city gave me all of those things. And I would never dream of moving somewhere else. Cologne is a great place to be based for gigs in Paris, London or Berlin but it’s also just a gorgeous city.
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