LOUD are a psytrance / electronica music group consisting of Israeli producers Kobi Toledano and Eitan Reiter. Over the years, they have become more influential with their unique take on psytrance music. Currently signed to Nano Records, the duo have released 4 full-length albums.
Hi Eitan and Kobi! To kick things off, tell me a bit about yourselves, how you two met and started Loud?
Eitan : We met for the first time on 2004 through a mutual friend who thought we might fit musically. In 2005, I returned from a long trip in South America and came back fully energized to take psytrance seriousy! I built a small studio and called up Kobi to see if he wanted to make a tune together. Kobi came, and the name of the track was No More X… the rest is history!
Kobi : We met in 2004 through a mutual friend and in 2005; Eitan and I met again at a local bar for a catch up. Eitan invited me to his studio, and that’s when we decided to work on a track together… in a way, that was the kick-start for the project Loud.
What was the best advice you received early on in your career?
Eitan : Always stick to what you believe in and no matter what happens along the way, try to enjoy every step of it because that’s how you learn what the most important things in life are! Still to this day I miss our first studio that was in a small neighborhood called Subinya, a time when no one really knew who we were and we had to work really hard to get a stage for our music; even that was a super fun time!
Kobi : Do what you feel!
What’s the key to a long-term successful relationship like Loud?
Eitan : I think that the more obstacles and hard times we overcame together, the stronger we got. We needed to fall many times together to rise back up, and every time it got a bit better. When making music together, we really believe that we bring passion to the music world.
Kobi : I do not think that there is a formula to that answer. In our situation, it is all about respect for your partner; keep an open mind and listen to his/her advice and always communicate. In many ways, that’s what makes any real relationship.
Psymedia : How has the sound and production methods of Loud progressed throughout the years?
Eitan : Sound and production has grown incredibly. It just comes naturally, but we also do experiment a lot! We enjoy playing live and jamming with others alike to absorb what they do and mix it into our music. We play on a lot of analog gear, do plenty of recordings, work with as many interesting musicians and producers as we can, and always go back to the studio, even with the same tracks, to improve them and bring their musical idea to where we are today. Plenty of people, such as Udi Psysex, Ido Ophir Domestic , Yaniv Shulman , Yuli Perfect Stranger, Union Jack and many, many more have helped us evolve our sound along the way.
Kobi : There has been a huge transformation from a production method point-of-view; mainly focusing on how the production should be, and incorporating the right sounds to resemble what we are about. Having a proper studio to record in is also crucial.
What’s it like having a drummer added to your live show?
Eitan : We are aiming to make our sets it as live as possible, making music on the spot! The difficulty here isn’t to record live, but to make it sound just as good as a well-produced track. It’s a very hard, yet fun process. We have already done plenty of ground work, pushing Ableton to the max and programming our own plugins, but there is still some work to be done.
Working with a drummer is really inspiring. Usually we focus on sounds, pads and melodies but drums are such a big and important part of electronic dance music and it always completes us! In fact, our first studio was one we shared with a famous drummer from Israel, named Denis who we also learned a lot from, so in general, drums are a big deal for us.
Do you feel like you’ve fully adapted and embraced the internet as a marketing tool?
Eitan : We do what we can, we try to do a lot of artwork, a lot of video editing and shooting, graphics, blogs, remix contests and whatever we can think of at the time. We can do much more of course but we need to focus on whats important – making music!
What are your thoughts on the South African psytrance scene?
Eitan : It’s amazing! There’s a beautiful and happy crowd, such a great feeling of culture, and a love for nature! You can feel Mother Earth there!
Kobi : Beautiful and happy people, a colorful nation. Everyone really seems to get into the music – all in all, I love the scene in South Africa .
Thanks for the interview! Anything to add?
Eitan : Thank you for having us!
Kobi : Looking forward to blasting your brain again soon!
