Meet Doktor Plekter: ‘A Disco / Funk enthusiast from Norway‘, source: bio SoundCloud, or as his Instagram bio displays: ‘Funk and Synth enthusiast from Norway‘. Introducing someone with a very healthy dose of not-taking-himself- too-seriously-all-the-time and thus showing the world his way of dealing with the every day life of a music producer. And uhm..I know you’re all smarter than I am, but just in case, find Doktor Plekter on Spotify 😉
My kind of Music, with Doktor Plekter.
STAY UP, it’s SHOWDOWN time.
Once again we’re going to Norway. If the third time Is In Fact a Charm, this one should blow you away. I know his music did me. I had some other names offered by previous Spotlights and Doktor Plekter was one of them. And it’s no hardship having him here! Click the pics 😉
I started following him some time ago, when his name came up in a conversation about a previous article. I hadn’t heard of him yet at that time, but hey, if people who clearly know what they’re talking about, start mentioning artists they themselves listen to…
He also came up in Spotlight on Tollef, because of the mix he was tasked to make, including a really funny PowerPoint with fun facts (well… Facts..) about the artists – remember this one:
A sense of humor will always appeal to me. I mean, we cannot survive without being able to laugh, first of all, at ourselves. Going through Dokter Plekter’s posts, it’s easy to see that he has great fun in what he is doing. He is also not afraid to show that new things are kind of intimidating sometimes, but he goes about it with a positive attitude. I love that. And I love Cheat Codes ☺️
Listening to his music was kind of a surprise in disguise. Next to the more obvious (nu)disco and funk sound, there are tracks that in my ears very much hinted at the jazz-rock / fushion, I grew up with and to name a band: Casiopea. This was a Japanese jazz / fushion band and their sound was so clean cut. With melodic but really funky bass lines, at times screaming guitar solo’s and synths bordering on frantic. Something like this:
Of course at that time in history (was it the 80s?), synths were already very well used within different genres, but I don’t think they were ‘chopping’ anything yet, though I can’t be sure about that lol. Intentional or not, I discovered Doktor Plekter’s sound, though covered under modern electronic funk, did quite trigger some music memories and good ones at that.
Maybe, after all the Spotlights, I picked up a tiny little bit of what’s going on in the music business, but I basically leave that up to the artists to talk about. I just love their music, other than that I am not gonna pretend, it’s not likely to end well…
On his Facebook page, it says: ‘Software Company’, this got me impressed and when I asked him about it, he explained he does sell some audio software he created. It is a hobby to him, but he is working on extending the line-up with better software. I can only respect the ambition and will to improve, setting goals will get you places right?
He also does some game-programming as a hobby and you can see a couple of examples on his YouTube site, if you’re into that. Everybody knows by now, this is not my thing, but being married to a gamer, I am confronted with that world almost daily. The developments there are traveling with the speed of light, so there should be enough of a challenge. And even I can see, it looks pretty cool.
Among his Instagram posts, there are a couple showing some weapons accompanied by some captions, to scare people of who dare to steal his samples. I would not keep myself from a dose of sarcasm now and then. But yeah, I had to ask about that of course. His answer: ‘I admit it is kinda tasteless to use weapon imagery like that, but I find the weapon-synth aesthetic strangely pleasing (like in my album-cover for “Showdown”, featuring an old Church-drum-machine next to boxes of ammunition & smoke)‘
It’s funny really, because in my previous job I worked with a lot of people from Norway and we always had fun about our languages and the similarities they contain. For those who didn’t know, I’m a Dutchie. Although we might spell words a little differently, we will get the meaning of a lot of them. Some of the above titles were recognizable, as well as this one:
When searching Spotify for Doktor Plekter’s music I was thrown off; how was it possible that he had only 3 followers and just one mix uploaded? Well, duh… obviously he has a lot more than that, but I apparently didn’t look very well and ended up at the wrong place. Luckily I asked him about it and just when he was explaining that there were a couple of accounts with his name incorrectly displayed I had this ‘Lightbulb’ moment… Yeah..🙄
I wasn’t deterred though, SoundCloud offers all in one place, which is why I love it so much. However, while talking about Spotify, Doktor Plekter did mention that though his label releases also get Spotify releases, he is thinking about gathering all his non-Spotify tracks and do a compilation album of them, though the plans have not taken shape just yet. And speaking about compilations, there are a couple of them with scraps of projects. Really interesting to listen to, it shows off the amount of creativity unleashed.
Dokter Plekter seems to pretty much have created his own sound, at least that’s what it feels like to me. Having fun while doing it, makes it only more appealing to watch and listen to. Fun is also the below remix. Though the sweetness level of the vocals is about to break your teeth, the music will sweep you into dance mode, thanks to a funky bassline. Fancy that.
The amount of music Doktor Plekter has already produced is impressive and way too much to properly display here. I hope the ones mentioned will get you to move and start following this amazing artist, who, I am sure, still has a lot more in store for us. All this is just to give you an impression.
It’s definitely time to let Doktor Plekter himself give you the answers I just know you are curious about – I was. But before we go there, first I want to give a Big Thank You to Doktor Plekter! It was certainly fun to meet you and talk with you about your music. If possible I believe your enthusiasm does half the work for you. I wish you all the blessings and (not sure if you need it) inspiration! I will keep following you, to update on the Spotlight page, where you will be permanently added to the rest of the Spotlights. And for you readers, pay attention now 🙂
Let’s start with the obvious: Can you please introduce yourself and tell us, who you are, and where you’re from?
‘I am Felix, a 23 year old music-producer from Grimstad, Norway, and I go by the artist-name Doktor Plekter. My electronic music-journey began around 2012 when I heard a remix from the Nu-Disco artist Robotaki (Popular Computer – Lointain [Robotaki Remix]). Robotaki was my gateway into the world of Nu-Disco French Electro music, and my first ever attempts at music production was back in 2015 crudely trying to recreate some of my favorite Robotaki tunes in FL Studio’.
When and how did you get started in the music business? Can you tell us about your first (official) project?
‘In 2015, I made my first ever music-project called “Blubrass”, and would frequently enter in big & small remix competitions, and upload the occasional funky track on SoundCloud. I didn’t really know any music producers at that time, and did it mostly as a fun hobby next to school-work.
In late 2017, I was introduced to the music label Montaime, where I met lots of like-minded artists. Up until this point I had felt kind of isolated in my “niche” nu-disco music-making, so it was very encouraging and fun to finally be able to talk to so many people with the same musical drives as me.
My first release with Montaime, was the Blubrass – Prog Disco Mix, and shortly after this release I changed my name to Doktor Plekter, which means “Doctor Guitar-pick” in Norwegian (I felt I needed a more Oslo-disco-ish name to compliment my music haha)’.
Where do you get your inspiration from – who are your biggest influences and what motivates you to keep going – and how would you describe your music?
‘I am extremely inspired by Blog-House-era Ed Banger sound from about 2007-2010. My musical roots are originally from prog-rock/metal bands like Muse & Dream Theater, so it was easy for me to fall in love with the the heavily distorted sample-riffs & basslines from artists like SebastiAn & Justice.
I am sometimes criticized for sounding too much like these Blog-House artists, but it doesn’t really bother me too much hearing that! Right now, it makes me very happy making this kind of music, especially since there is so little of this type of music being made today. Somebody has to do it, right?’ 🙂
Which track you consider your biggest accomplishment so far and why is that?
‘Earlier this year, the Finnish artist Lenno contacted me asking if I wanted to contribute with some synth-programming on one of his upcoming singles. I am absolutely MAD about Lenno’s music, and have been following his music for a very long time, so I consider this my biggest personal achievement in my music career. The song is called “Lenno – Us Kids” and was released this June, featuring some synth-work done by me(!!).
Other than that, I am quite pleased with what I have achieved through my music-production. It has brought lots of Audio-technical stuff to my resume, which has landed me a couple of nice jobs in the audio/music industry’.
Do you have a creative process that you follow and if so, can you tell us how that works for you?
‘I don’t really have a special creative process/solution I follow. Sometimes at random, I will hear a melody in my head, then type it into MIDI and let my musical intuition guide it from there. Other times I will go digging through HUNDREDS of YouTube playlists looking for interesting-sounding songs to use in my sample-based music’.
Looking back, is there anything you would have done differently – what would you advise new / upcoming music producers to start with?
‘One thing I would advice all producers, is take piano/guitar lessons! Whether it be at a music-school or through online-lessons: The music theory you learn through learning to play an instrument helps incredibly much in both the music-writing and music-production. Another tip, is to use the OTT compressor on all your audio-channels with the plugin-depth set to 800%’.
What would be your dream project / collab?
‘My dream collab would be with the Danish producer Eumig & Chinon. He is probably the artist I have listened to the most over the last few years. He is an extremely talented & mysterious producer who stopped making music 7 years ago to pursue a career in programming. His music is, in my opinion, a perfect blend between everything I love about the Blog-House era electro music, and I feel his musical intuition is quite close to mine! I would go as far as saying he is my favorite ever music-producer, and if you like Doktor Plekter, then you are going to LOVE Eumig & Chinon.
Other dream collabs would be: U-Tern, Robotaki, Siriusmo, Betablock3r, Lenno again, J.A.C.K, Bobby Tank & Shook! That’s all I can think of right now’.
What can we look forward to for the (near) future, any new projects in store? And is there anything you would like to add or share with the readers / your fans?
‘Right now, I am working on some cool music that I hope you’ll get to hear at the end of this year/start of next year on my label Montaime! In the meantime, I am also working on programming/designing some VST synth/effect-plugins that I hope show off before this year ends’.
Find Doktor Plekter on Spotify – SoundCloud – YouTube – Instagram – Facebook – Twitter
Again, Thank You Doktor Plekter! I hope this all helps people to find you and your music! For now I am just spreading the ❤
Enjoy the Weekend y’all, this class is dismissed 😉
For
Feedback
Questions
Suggestions
Colorful Expressions 