Victor Calderone is immensely talented and quite amazing. He never fails to come up with fresh ideas. I love his work and I love working with him.”
- Madonna

One of the hottest Producers / DJ’s on the scene right now, Victor Calderone has not only spun famously at clubs around the world, but he comes with some pretty heady references having worked with everyone from Madonna to Sting.

If creativity could be bottled and sold, Victor Calderone would be wealthy beyond comprehension. The multi-talented master of musical manipulation has helped redefine the role of the American DJ in recent years, and, in the process, has amassed an impressive array of artistic accomplishments. Equally adept both in the studio and in front of live audiences, a typical night with Calderone on the decks is a journey of rhythmic explorations, where moods are traversed and expectations teased and fulfilled. At home in the United States, Victor spins monthly at Crobar in Miami’s South Beach & at Stereo in Montreal whilst holding down an unrelentless schedule of international gigs and studio sessions.

I managed to catch up with Victor to chat briefly about his life & career to date and his Djing / production plans for 2003.

All respects & thanks to Mitch Clark at Sanctuary Music, for making this interview possible!

MC: Many thanks for your time today Victor, it’s much appreciated!

MC: Can you tell us start by telling us how are you feeling right now?

VC: Hi Myles, well I’m feeling very inspired right now, I’m in such a good place, musically & mentally. I’m going through a transition period right now. I’ve been doing these big music events in the states & my music was a reflection of that – but I myself have darker routes … so I feel that I’m making this whole transition back to what is true to me.

MC: Where are you from originally and where are you based now?

VC: Well I’m from Brooklyn originally and I’m still there now. I grew up in a section called Bensonhurst … I moved not too far from that, I now live in an area called Brooklyn Heights; it’s right by the water, right by the Brooklyn Bridge. I must say that it’s a beautiful day here; it’s sunny out but nice and cool.

MC: Can you tell us how you become involved with the scene and where it all began for you?

VC: Well it began when I first got into Djing … my older brother was a DJ before me, so there was always gear set up in the house; a massive record collection, so I was always mixing records and that’s how I got into it. It became a passion for me, I would just stay at home in our bedroom and just mix all day! I became very addicted to it [and shopping for records!]. My brother took me to my first clubbing experience at the Funhouse; at the time there was a great DJ there. I was 15 years old but my brother knew the door people and so he got me in - and that was it – I was hooked! It was Church for me, I was there every Saturday, religiously, right in front of the DJ booth just waiting for the next new thing to go on. At the time, people like Arthur Baker would walk into his booth and play tracks like “Reel To Real”, “Planet Rock” & New Order … classic records now but at the time that sound was so fresh.

MC: Is there any particular music from that period that sticks in your mind?

VC: Yeah, a lot of great music that inspired me … like Kraftwerk & Georgio Moroder … I would just play their albums from beginning to end. They were so ahead of their time; it really inspired & influenced me in terms of production.

VC: Officially, the early 90’s when I was in a techno group called ‘Program 2’, I was doing some techno tracks for a label out in Belgium called R&S Records. At the time, my partner & I were collaborating with Joey Beltram on a couple of projects. We worked on a couple of projects, “The Omen” & the “Human Resource – Dominator” remix. This was really the time when I put out my first official production. I met Joey through the “Energy Flash” track because he was from my neighbourhood; we just wound up agreeing to do some collaborating.

MC: What would you say was your first break into the industry?

VC: My first break … it came a lot later. After a lot of bad deals my partner & I had to put up with, I took a break from the industry, a little hiatus. I took off for about 5 years. I came back into the industry in late ’96 when I produced “Give It up”, my first solo production. I had just gone back into the studio after not having been there for so long, I was just having some fun and I’d say that’s when I got noticed by the people who’s attention I had really wanted.

MC: Looking back, what do you think of your first production now?

VC: Well, it’s still in my record box now and every time I play it, it just destroys the dance floor! I often say that I would love to be able to capture what I was thinking then, now! When I listen to that production, I realise that I have learned so much … but I don’t know … there is something that I captured in that record and it was just special at that moment. It was a certain ‘sound’. I don’t want to compare it to “Energy Flash” but you know … it’s that type of record. To me, “Give It Up” has a sound that you could play today and it would still work.

MC: How would you say your musical style has evolved over the years?

VC: I was always a big ‘tribal-head’, always into drums. I’m learning a lot in the studio every day, learning more about arrangement, writing & programming. So my sound is maturing. In terms of how my sound is evolving, I look at my stuff now and look at the productions that I’ve done in the past and I hear myself evolving; I’m just learning a lot more everyday, more complicated arrangements with vocals. I was always a big ‘track’ guy, I would just go in there working without a vocal. Now I’m working on tracks, which I would say are a lot more musical.