If you have not heard of Dairmount’s label ‘Room With A View’ then you have sadly been missing out on many many deep house cuts… Phil Darimont (as his parents named him) prepared an exclusive mix for us as well as gave us some time to delve into what keeps him going and what advice he can give to our readers about running a successful label.

What did you want to be growing up? Did you go to University or study something? Did you study music?

It has been a long time since somebody asked me this… LOL! The funny thing is that, back in the days, when I was at college, both my teachers & parents were convinced I should work as a journalist, a psychologist or a teacher… All these things were somehow interesting & making sense to me and I chose to have my try in psychology at university. But it was a huge disappointment to me to see that it is was not the “human science” I was expecting to be but more based on the “norm” and statistics. So I gave up & started to work. In parallel, I started to play with my first residencies and it made me very happy to be able to afford my vinyl addiction thanks to the job. I never studied music in any way but my kid dream was to be a drummer. It all started with the Muppet Show’s Animal drummer! LOL… I always considered that djing was the natural consequence of my drummer’s complex. And what is even more strange is that i somehow completed my teachers & parents wishes by combining them through my musical path : I’ve been a musical editor for years for a magazine called Plastiks in Belgium (a kind of Benelux version of the defunkt Straight No Chaser) and I think I combined the psychologist & teacher inspirations in diverse aspects of my musical work with people. To me, through music, I developed lots of “human science…

What’s the secret to RWAV’s success?

I answered the same question recently in another interview & mentioned that honesty is probably the only stepping stone I could identify myself. This is my way of seeing what can make that people are sensitive to an artist vision. There is really no formula anymore about anything and definitely no success formula. I truly believe that a strong personal vision combined with lots of lucky parameters & lots of work & dedication can lead somewhere. But more than anything, you have to be ready to put your “laurels” in question at every step & every release. I take this process very seriously and this is probably how you can manage to keep a certain standard of quality & a red line
in the artistic output…

Do you have any non-musical hobbies?  What do you do in your spare time?

I’m working a lot so spare time is limited. But I always enjoy to take some quiet moments that can be very simply to be at home and to not do much.

How do you balance running a label, working at Finetunes and your personal life?

It is a good question indeed. it took me a lot of time to find a better balance with that as everything is very demanding. Working at finetunes is my main job and is limited to normal office hours. Running the label is done besides it which means it takes over my personal time & on my private life too. But i organize these things pretty well after learning the hard way the last 2 years. It is all about organization at the end of the day

For the label, do you approach artists that you’d like to do something special for the label or do you rely on what people send you?

It has always been a strong policy for me to choose the people I wanted to work with. I did that already before the label didn’t even exist. The 6 first releases of the label have been signed like this. I knew with who i wanted to work and it never changed. It is a family business before anything, I only want to work with people I appreciate & respect. The only thing that changed is that I started to receive great stuff from solid producers in the middle of the mediocre wave of demos received very often. I’m extremely selective on any new addition to the core artist roster. I’m interested in artist development & not in handling releases like easy content. This is why Art Of Tones &
Marlow have really found a home with us, it is to grow together. This is also why we have done 2 releases with Lodemann already. We believed in him before anybody cared and contributed to let the world know about his enormous talent. At the same time, i stay totally open to newcomers and lucky discoveries. Paskal from Berlin & Nowakowski from Gotenburg are brilliant examples of that. Let’s say there is a natural selection operating too…

When producing do you use any analog equipment?  What’s your favourite/ dream piece of equipment?

In the context of our Dairmount & Berardi work with Marino, we decided to concentrate on a digital set-up apart from a few modules like the TG33. But we take great care to not give our stuff a “digital” sound. DJ Yellow told me one day that our sound is very organic & made for vinyl. Lots of people always ask us about what we use as we sound like we are using lots of vintage gear. We take it as a compliment. On the other hand, I’ve worked with lots of original synths & modules when collaborating with Ralf Petter on the Subakuatik Blues EP (VIEW002) and that was really an amazing experience too… My personal dream piece would be to have an SP1200 just for the sake of having the machine on which lots of my favorite hip hop & house records have been made. But that is just a little personal dream…

What’s the hardest part of running a label?  And how much of your day is spent on the label stuff?



Nothing is easy when you are handling everything on your own but it is also very satisfying as you learn so much by yourself. Everything takes time when you want to do it right. I’m kind of a control freak so I’m involved in all processes and making sure the quality control is present at every level. This is very demanding but very rewarding on the long run too… I work on the label every day for some hours to keep the things going in a smooth way.
Hard working people like Jimpster, Atjazz or Mazi always describe me as a big one too, so i suppose it is not just a legend… LOL

 

What are some of the rewards you get out of doing a label?

There are many rewarding aspects.. For me, working with amazing producers & developing high standard stuff with them is fantastic. I enjoy very much the deep work of A&R, being really involved. Having so much of my all time dj’s & production heroes being followers & fans of the label is something I was never expecting to this extend. See the music traveling all around the world is always amazing for me: to get people from Turkey, Egypt or South Africa reaching out is a big victory in my eyes. Of course to get a strong core of followers in US, UK, France, Germany or Japan is great too as these are the main music meccas of the planet. And of course traveling as a dj to meet crowds & people everywhere is a blessing too…

Any tips for any people wanting to start a label?

Make sure to have a strong vision of what you want to offer to people. Don’t put expectations too high before making sure you know everything you need to know to run a business. Embrace all sides of the bizz and learn as much as you can BEFORE starting it. Build strong plans well in advance. Choose the right partners even if it takes more time…

What do you have coming up?

In autumn, all core artists of the label will return with their second EP : Art Of Tones, Marlow and Dairmount & Berardi. Also coming this autumn are the next 3 parts of our vinyl only Midnight Circle Lullabies series containing my favorite tracks of the label, new tracks and some special surprises. I’m also working on forthcoming works by Matt Flores and hot new talents like Christo, Paskal and Nowakowski. In 3 weeks, we got also the third episode of the “My View Of The Room” series compiled by Berardi & myself. The principle is to highlight some forgotten gems of the catalogue, with some unreleased stuff and to mix them all together as a bonus mix. It is a great
opportunity for listeners to discover parts of our catalogue in a short cut mode.

 

Deep Absurdum Podcast 11: Dairmount by deepabsurdum

 

 

 

 

Tracklisting:

xXxXx – 808 state (Marlow raw 808 state) Be Bonkers
Jacob Korn – She – Uncanny Valley
Greymatter – Only To Fall – Wolf Music
Alfabet – Waus Music – Rush Hour
Deep Space Orchestra – Trust Skynet – Use Of Weapons
Matt Flores – Heading On Feat Meike Rath – CDR
Morning Factory – Diane’s Love – Royal Oak
D.T – Haze – South Circular
Arthur Russell – Go bang (Rob Mello’s No Ears Dub) – Not On Label
SGNY Feat Nu soul – King Of The Mountain – South Exit
Mogi – March For Everyone – Composite
Iron Curtis – you, On a Friday Night – Retreat
Matrix – Get Out (Kaoz 6:23 Again Vox) – Madhouse
Cazuma – Hayabusa Dub – Kurbits
Ahmet Sisman – Hi Tech Booty (Maetrik In London Remix) – Stock 5
Phonogenic – Bells Of Nuogram – Room With A View