Interview: A² AKA Alpha Twins

Posted by Moe on Jan 10, 2010 in Uncategorized | 3 comments

A^²: Hardstyle brothers from hell

Having earned their merits at the legendary Qlubtempo parties in the early 00s, slowly conquering the world from there on, Arjen and Anco Timmerman can be considered one of the most constant factors in the hardstyle scene ever since it was born. With performances all over Europe and, recently, even in Australia, their dark sound slowly conquers more and more souls worldwide: this is the story of the Alpha Twins.

Making their Q-Dance entry at the very first Qlimax event held in the Heineken Music Hall, these brothers have seen a small promoter evolve into the Netherlands’ biggest hardstyle event organizer. Playing almost every first edition of what are now world-famous festivals, they have always buffeted crowds with dark melodies and evil themes. “It’s a matter of taste,” Arjen says. “We both happen to like dark, raw hardstyle. It’s always been like that, really – there’s no particular philosophy to it, although it is a way of setting ourselves apart, in a sense. Of course, this doesn’t mean we don’t play the more accessible stuff; there’s really good tracks in that department too, and it can often be very useful during a 2 hour set.”

The twins, who aren’t actually twins at all, often team up with others for their releases. “Of course, solo releases are very important, but we do like to collaborate with other artists. Besides the social aspect, which is always a lot of fun, we also learn a lot from it. Other artists always tend to have a different approach to things. For instance, we recently did a new collab with Wildstylez, producing a new track we named ‘Atrocious’. A collaboration with Zatox is also in the pipeline.”

Gaining a steady crowd of followers over the years, Anco & Arjen never really had a home base. After releasing various records on labels such as Mythica and Sys-X, and even the Qlimax 2006 anthem on Q-Dance Records, they finally decided to set up their own label. With the April 2008 release of ‘Nowhere to Hide’, A² Records was born. “It’s something we had been planning to do for quite a while. Of course, it’s cool to have your own label as an artist, but we mainly see it as something that completes the picture,” Arjen comments. “The good thing about having your own label is that you can plan your own release schedule: no more waiting for those other two releases before it’s your turn. We’ve known the other artists on our label for a long time. 2-Sidez already were somewhat popular but didn’t have a home label yet, and we thought their sound fit ours. The same goes for Ran-D, although maybe he wasn’t as well known at the time.”

Even though the boys are running a label, producing, and performing every weekend, they still have time for other activities. “We both like to play tennis and you may find us at the golf course from time to time.” Whereas Anco lives off the music business, Arjen works from 9 to 1 four times a week. “Because I enjoy doing it, and because it helps me keep a healthy day/night rhythm.” He also confesses to be guilty of producers’ sin #1: “I regularly meet with friends at Friday night to play some games.”

Earlier this year, the guys decided to join up with what is probably the world’s famous hardstyle label: A² Records became a sublabel of Scantraxx. “They already had a bunch of sublabels, but none of those represented the harder sound. Of course, we did and Scantraxx asked us to team up with them. Things went rather fast and we quickly agreed on everything. The only thing really important for us was that we could keep our own identity, separate from the main label. Of course, joining Scantraxx has certain benefits. We’ve been getting quite a few extra bookings abroad lately.”

According to the Timmerman brothers, the future of hardstyle is looking bright. “At big events, you still see loaded hardstyle areas every time. And they’re often the biggest areas, too! We also notice hardstyle is on the rise abroad. As we said, we get quite a lot of bookings and so do our colleagues. The great thing about these booking is that in other countries, an event is still a ‘special’ experience.” Personally, they have achieved pretty much everything there is to achieve: bookings all around the globe, a Qlimax anthem, mainstage at all big events. Still, their work is not complete: “One of our goals was to play in Australia. We’ve recently accomplished that, and with great success: Defqon.1 Australia was unbelievable! Of course, an X-Qlusive Alpha² would also be great. It’s simply a party that’s all about you as an artist: you get to decide what the night looks like, you decide who gets to play. Besides that, we’d like to continue crossing the globe. We’ve already played in quite a lot of countries, but there’s a lot of other ones where we would like to go, to see if we can spread the hardstyle virus over there, too.”

Arjen also has some plans outside of the hardstyle world. “It’s nothing concrete yet, but recently I have been working on minimal, techno and tech-house and even performed with these style at the Q-BASE freestyle area,” he says. Don’t worry that he might leave the dark side, though: “I’m not sure yet if I’m actually going to do anything with this. Of course, Alpha Twins will always be more important.”

Of course, the British enthusiasm hasn’t go unnoticed with the brothers. “We’ve had the privilege to perform in England numerous times, and it has always been a blast. The crowd goes on and on and they’re extremely enthusiastic.”

As a parting message, they have one more thing to say:
Check alphatwins.nl , myspace.com/alphatwinsnl , facebook.com/alpha2 , twitter.com/alphatwins to follow the latest news!

And with that, these busy brothers return to their work: delivering some of the darkest sounds in the scene to us!