The Hertfordshire-based producers’ Ken Petalcorin and Andy Bowden, known as TIBASKO, are laying the groundwork for an exciting year of electronic music.
The pair was designated Future Star of 2021 by BBC Radio 1’s Pete Tong, as well as a Billboard Dance Emerging Artists 2021 by DJ Mag in January 2019. This electrifying duo will be the year’s main attraction.
To end 2021 on a positive keynote, TIBASKO hosted their very own show at Cafe 1001 on Brick Lane alongside other up-and-coming DJs such as Meg Ward, Bklava and more. The evening saw TIBASKO perform twice and each time had the crowd spellbound into the wobbly techy beats.
TIBASKO has successfully established themselves as providers of an epic, extremely melodic electronica style that veers between breaks, melodic house, trance, and techno. In an interview with the duo below, we find out their journey, and the multitude of festival lineups they have secured.
How are you both finding the music scene here in London? Is it what you guys expected?
Both having grown up so close to the capital, London was our main source of underground music when we were first coming onto the scene. Clubs like Egg LDN, Fabric, Village Underground and Lightbox were our original stomping grounds. The sounds we were listening to around 8 years ago, first experiencing underground electronic music, were soundscaped by the likes of Dusky, Shadowchild and countless others.
Tell me about the journey you have both gone through, can you highlight some of the most important moments so far?
From our first self released music gaining a mass of Spotify attention to playing abroad for the first time, we’ve had numerous highlights over the time we’ve been making music. Alma, our debut single to be released on our own imprint ‘Omusare Records’ was completely produced, mixed, mastered, artwork, and distributed by us. This is such a huge achievement for us and to this day is our number one played track on Spotify amassing over 1.3 Million streams.
Another huge highlight for us – being named of one Pete Tong’s Future Stars 2021 on BBC Radio 1 early last year. Things started to kick off for us from that moment 12 months ago, from joining WME’s global talent roster, playing on some incredible stages, to signing a deal with Three Six Zero Recordings stateside. It’s set us up in a great spot to get our music heard internationally and it felt amazing to get that recognition from someone as legendary and amazing as Pete Tong.
You are constantly performing shows across the UK, do you guys prefer performing live? If so, how come?
Playing out live is definitely such a huge part of our musical journey, when creating music we always made in our mind what it would sound like on a dance floor and how it would translate to your average party goer. The ability for a DJ to hold tension in a crowd always fascinates us, knowing when to play certain tracks and how seamlessly we can make our transitions will always be at the forefront of our minds when playing live.
Can you tell me about some of the shows you have lined up for 2022 and what people should expect?
Our festival season is looking pretty exciting at the moment, we can’t tell you everything just yet, but we do have Snowbombing, Hideout Festival in Croatia, NASS Festival announced so far. There are a couple of months until then, where we have some quality clubs and rooms to play – and expect to see more of TIBASKO’s Melting Point within the capital.
How do you want people to feel when experiencing your talent live? I attended your show in Shoreditch recently and you had the crowd movinggggg, can you elaborate on this power you have?
It all depends on your location, crowd and time. As artists, we want to give the club goers the best possible experience. When coming to a TIBASKO gig you should expect high energy, emotive music and a wide range of styles/genres. I think being able to read a crowd and play exactly what you need to play is crucial to DJ sets. You have to adapt, switch it up and select what gets the crowd at their best.
How would you like your music to develop even more over the next couple of years?
Who knows what our music may sound like in years to come, we make music that we love making at the time and always will do. One thing that is true though is the production quality of our music will always continue to develop and evolve, and the introduction of more hardware kits and live performance aspects will propel our productions to new heights.
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