The following Skype conversation between Danny and zweikommasieben’s Mathis Neuhaus touches upon the topics of early beginnings and late fame, the appeal of collecting things and the difficulties of letting them go.

Mathis Neuhaus All good over in Rotterdam, Danny?

Danny Bosten All good, thank you. The weather is a bit stuffy though, very humid and cloudy.

MN I tuned into the video stream of a Rush Hour Instore Session before we started to talk; Sterac was playing, and it also looked stuffy there. Business as usual in the Netherlands, I guess.

DB Yes, Dutch summers.

MN I know that a friend of mine was at Rush Hour and it is funny to see you sitting in front of all these Synthesizers and Hardware now, because I know that he is also pretty involved with building his own machines or optimizing them as he wishes. His room actually looks similar to yours, they have a comparable vibe.

DB It is an epidemic and pretty addictive. These days, it is super cheap to build your own stuff, so it quickly gets out of hand. As you can see in my room, which is crammed.

MN It is always difficult to part ways with things that are dear to your heart.

DB There is definitely a lot of stuff here that does not really work, but I also do not want to throw it away, because I put so much effort in it. Maybe, I will take a look at it later, or maybe I won’t—who knows. And before you know it, you have a big box of stuff that needs to be looked at.

MN Your work is influenced by a lot of different thing, like science-fiction, early electronic music or philosophy. Did being based in the Netherlands shape the way you produce music, back when you started out?

DB Not really. It is influenced more by the things you mentioned. My artist name for example comes from the American film, The Thing From Another World and is inspired by Immanuel Kant’s philosophical ideas. In regards to the Netherlands, something that may have played a role is early Dutch design. Collectives like De Stijl or, connected to that, the Bauhaus. If you really want to, you could certainly build an argument for that.

MN You also have a background in design, right?

DB Yes, I went to an art school, but did not finish it. That was also the time when I started producing music.

MN Your first record came out in 1981. What was that time like for being a producer of electronic music?

DB It definitely was a time that led to the now-established term “bedroom producer”. Tinkering with machines on your own, figuring stuff out. All these machines were and still are toys for adults, I would say. And back then, it was just a fun hobby.

MN Besides doing music, I read that you were involved with the squatting scene, which has a big history in the Netherlands.

DB Indeed. We came to Amsterdam with some friends and became part of a squat, which was very strange. Basically, it was the tail end of the whole movement. The situation was comparable to the one in Berlin, where they gentrified big parts of the city by trying to buy out the people in the squats. In 1980 there were big riots in Amsterdam and this whole thing became kind of absurd. But it was also fun, there were always a lot of good initiatives. Squatter galleries, music spaces, rehearsal spaces. During those times, you had to build everything yourself, not like today where you just go and rent a set-up space. And there were a few bigger collectives we were a part of, close to bands like The Ex for example.

MN Do you think this kind of freedom is still possible in Amsterdam these days?

DB There are still good initiatives going on in Amsterdam, but compared to the 1980s it is way more regulated. In the squatter centers the people did all kind of things without real financial pressure. These days, all these hubs are gone, gentrified and transformed to regulated artist spaces. They call them “cultural breeding grounds” or something, which is ironic, because first they push the creative people out and then, they let them back in in a gentrified fashion. It is all very ironic.

MN Did you ever feel like being part of a musical scene, too?

DB Not really in regards to working together or collaborating. But what happened was that you would foster mail contacts to send and exchange tapes, because there was no internet yet. A lot of effort was put into mailing the stuff—mail art really was a thing. Fanzines, artzines, weird stuff. I still have a pretty big collection.

MN Do you think that your way of working, being around for so long and mostly tinkering with machines on your own, makes your work hype resistant and helped forming a unique artistic voice?

DB I think so. It is a fairly naïve approach that is not dependant on immediate feedback. These days, the internet provides an inherent feedback loop and sometimes, I put stuff online and it gets a few likes or comments or whatever. But really, waiting 30 years for feedback is a pretty long time.

MN But it feels like, 30 years later, it happens. You had re-issues on Minimal Wave, get booked at festivals like Dekmantel, etc. So you are finally coming around on being recognized on a broader scale.

DB It is a super strange and funny feeling. But I try not to think about it too much and I also try to produce music without thinking too much about the stuff I have done before, because then it is impossible to approach this whole apparatus and these machines with the naivety that I mentioned. I am getting the most productive feedback and inspiration from the machine itself, not other music that was made with it—by myself or others.

MN Do you approach your live set differently, when you know that you play at, for example, Dekmantel Festival for the club kid generation?

DB I do tailor it a bit. But if you play live and play a bunch of different songs from different periods you have to make a compromise with the stuff you use. You can’t bring everything. That would be nice, but it is impossible.

MN Do you listen to any contemporary electronic music?

DB I do. I was raised on folk music, but I listen to all kinds of music. The last records I bought were the soundtrack to Possession, a movie from 1981 by Andrzej Żuławski, the last release on L.I.E.S. by Tzusing and the new LP by Police Des Moeurs that came out on Mannequin Records. I tried to get the new Marie Davidson LP, but it was sold out at Clone. Veronica Vasicka is sending it to me, so that is taken care of.

MN Besides all the machines and the music, do you collect anything else?

DB I used to be a librarian, so I am a big print aficionado, but I try to get rid of stuff, because I just have too much. Too many books, too many records, too many machines. I have a recurring dream, probably from when I was evicted as a squatter once, in which I am on the street with all my possessions, and I have to travel by moving each and every item I posses one meter along one by one.