The group viral a couple of years back when they started performing outside in the park and on the street, always close their audience and community. Their new album EMPOR is out now and the band is making a stop in Luxembourg on 8 June at Francofolies.
For this interview, RTL Today’s Josh Oudendijk chatted to Thomas Burhorn, founder and leader of MEUTE, via Zoom back in March. Thomas shared his thoughts on the band’s development, the new album, as well as standing up against right-wing extremism and hate.
Hear the interview as audio:
Josh Oudendijk speaks with Thomas Burhorn ahead of their upcoming show at Francofolies
RTL Today: Thomas, since the founding of MEUTE, what has changed, and what has stayed the same?
Thomas Burhorn: The core of what we do, obviously, didn’t change, we still play techno with a marching band and still go onto the streets and search for the real close contact with our audience. Well, I think we just developed in our professionality. I always say it’s like a frame: We set a frame, maybe it seems to be a bit narrow, but we just play techno with these 11 instruments. And the good thing is when you have this frame, it makes it easy to take decisions. That’s the first thing.
The second thing is you get better at what you do in this frame, and then you need to dig deeper. So this frame gets more three dimensional and interesting. Then you get to work on the details. I think when you listen to our first album compared to now then you can really hear the difference, there is so much more love for the detail, and maybe, much more awareness from us for the detail. We’ve always had this love for detail.
RTL Today: Tell me more about the effects you use. With programmed music you can add delay, reverb to make things sound bigger...do you do the same, or do you use arrangements to imitate these sounds?
Thomas Burhorn: Hmm, yeah, it’s both. Sometimes there are some studio effects on our live instruments, but everything you hear is a live instrument. And we did many experiments with our instruments and with the way of blowing through the instrument. And I think what helped us was the fact that we started our career doing cover versions, so that we listened to a track which was created with a synthesiser. And then we tried to figure out how we can translate it to live instruments. And still we do the cover versions. And this really helped us a lot.
RTL Today: It sounds a bit like a singer-songwriter who’s starting out playing their first concerts and they are playing cover songs by some of their favorite artists and then at some point slowly start to transition into finding their own voice, finding their own sound.
Thomas Burhorn: And I think that’s what every artist does in a way. In music and also in painting or so. I think Beethoven and Mozart and Bach or Miles Davis started to follow their idols and started to do what the idols did. And then you can’t do anything against your own personality, which will influence that.
RTL Today: So what does the new album EMPOR actually stand for? Is it a German word?
Thomas Burhorn: Yeah, it’s a very old German word. We always try to play with some old-fashioned German words which aren’t used very often. The word EMPOR is an old, fine word which you use when something rises up like a phoenix from the ashes, full of grace and dignity.
RTL Today: How has the audience been connecting to your new songs?
Thomas Burhorn: Yeah, pretty, pretty good. So, I think this EMPOR album is pretty deep. It’s not just party bangers. But still you have this four on the floor raving vibe. And when we played it live people reacted really positively. They were raving, but also listening. So it’s music you also actually want to listen to.
RTL Today: I remember being at a festival in Hamburg a couple of years ago, and I spotted some of the MEUTE members in other acts. So they’re super busy and have to juggle a lot of projects, but does this have a very interesting influence as well on the sound and the diversity of the band?
Thomas Burhorn: We have a principal band, but yeah, most of them play in several different projects, which makes it very interesting for us, because we get many influences from many other bands and styles. It’s from jazz and classical music and hard rock and electronic music. Everything influences our band and that’s also what we listen to when we drive through the countries on the bus. And then, due to the fact that people have different projects, we also have substitutes for them. There is a lot of circulation.
RTL Today: The band has always taken a very clear stance against right wing extremism and against hate, and you recently and currently are joining several protests in the country. You went out on the street and performed music, and used music as a form of protest against hate. And this can sometimes be a difficult issue for artists, because they seem to believe they should probably best remain nonpolitical. But how does MEUTE think about this? How do you see the interconnectedness of politics and art?
Thomas Burhorn: Yes it is very clear for everyone. Some 10-15 years ago, one may have thought it wouldn’t be as necessary because it’s not such a big movement on the right, a movement of hate, however you want to describe it. But now we realise it’s super important for artists to raise their voice. We have the possibility to change the world in a positive way, and we have to be aware and make the people aware we can go voting and make a change, and choose love, not hate.
RTL Today: Are you still a big raver?
Thomas Burhorn: I’m a person of balance. So raving but also taking breaks.
MEUTE play Francofolies in Esch-sur-Alzette on 8 June. Tickets here.
