Solomun's White Isle Journals no. 4: How Mladen Got His Groove

Welcome to my White Isle Journals, where you'll get an inside look at my life in Ibiza during my Solomun +1 residency this summer at Pacha.

Every week, I'll bring you deep inside Ibiza life, up-close and personal and behind the scenes. Then, I'll pick my own +1 from the island to show you the beating heart of the White Isle––The people. Lastly, I'll pick the track that took over the airwaves for me that week. There's so much going on, and on this party Island, you tend to forget fast. That's why I wanted to write it all down, so I can remember it all and share with you.

This Sunday, I welcomed my Diynamic-buddy, Holger aka H.O.S.H, as my +1 in the booth at Pacha. Not only were we roommates back in the early days in Hamburg, H.O.S.H has been with Diynamic since day one. And…not only is he a very attractive guy, but also a great DJ!

The night before, we had our big Diynamic party in Barcelona at Off-Sonar week. With 6000 people on 2 stages, it was more like a festival in a park. There was an amazing atmosphere and a great vibe.

So we arrived at Pacha the next night with not so much sleep, but when the party started we were full of energy again, so much so that we ended up, again, in a basement club for an afterparty. Old friends, old habits. What can I say?

I have known Jan-Peter for more than 10 years. He was friend of friend in Hamburg, and, besides the fact that he used to be and still is a great DJ who does not make a living as a DJ, he is one of the most fun people I know.

I was very glad to hear that he was going to visit us on the Island. He joined us at Pacha and the next day we went to the beach together, and went to some beach bars afterwards. Once again, he told one of the best stories of my DJ career, but I will let him tell the tale, since he is such a good storyteller…

What's your name?
Jan-Peter AKA Peter DieOhr Gucci

Where do you come from?
Bad Neuenahr, but I live in Munich now.

Why are you in Ibiza?
I was invited to a wedding of a very good friend

Why a Solomun party?
I've know Mladen for 15 years, so I wanted to see him in Ibiza of course!

What will you do after finishing this interview?
I will go with him to the beach.

It was in February, 2003, and we drove together to Kassel, a small town in the middle of Germany with a nice small Techno Club called ARM to play back-to-back there. Daniel, who is Solomun's manager today, made the booking and joined us, since he is actually from Kassel.

Since Daniel left his hometown, though, the crowd had changed a little bit: people with safety vests, ankle warmers in cow-fur design, and statue-of-liberty-haircuts had taken over and were looking at us with question marks in their eyes when we started around 11.30 pm.

I wanted to bring the people in with a smooth, deep mood and an original Bakerman tune…but this went terribly wrong. One thing was for sure: Solomun, whose DJ name was not yet Solomun at that time, had to save us. And he started with his first record.

How can I explain what happened next? It was like on the Titanic, when the ship hits the iceberg and it's sinking and the owner asks the master engineer when the ship can continue sailing and he says he has 2, maximum 3 more hours until the ship sinks. This is exactly what happened to us in Kassel.

After I screwed up with Bakerman, Mladen took over and yes, he did well! The first statue-of-liberty-haircuts were starting to move a little bit to the rhythm. But at the very moment I was slowly starting to relax, Mladen leant towards me and said "Ey, Jan-Peter, to continue playing this hard, I have 2, maximum 3 more records."

This was at 11.45 pm! Daniel desperately grabbed a microphone and started to imitate machinegun-sounds with his mouth, which was only a small comfort to everybody. However: the staff seemed to like us, also our sound. Maybe only because they knew they could go home already at 4 o' clock. Anyway, we all went home and slept at Daniels parents in his old children's room. This is how superstar DJs are made!

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