Tommy Trash is a name synonymous with good times. With his mass of curls and his penchant for dirty electro house, he’s an East Coast boy who knows how to kick it with the best, particularly if that best includes the kids over at Ministry of Sound (MoS).
As a producer slash DJ slash musician, Trash has taken Australia by storm with a thundercloud of thumping beats. Particularly with his new MoS release Sessions Seven which sees him sidle up alongside the Stafford Brothers and Steve Aoki.
So what to expect? More dirty electro house? Or has electro become a dirty word itself?
‘For some people electro is such a dirty word’ Trash confided on the phone from his Sydney pad. ‘I don’t seem to see anything wrong with it, even though a lot of the stuff I’m writing now is tech and prog.
‘But I think electro is going to be around for ages, especially the fun kind of electro, your party kind of stuff, I think it’s just going to keep growing. It’ll just morph into whatever’s going to be the next big thing.
If there is a shift, Trash pointed out, it’s more toward a heady disco mash of house music, stuff that’s a little more loopy, a little more out there.
‘The kind of stuff that Armand Van Helden is starting to put out, like his remix to Dance The Way I Feel, that kinda stuff,’ Trash said when asked if he thought there was a new genre emerging.
‘I guess it’s just not as in your face as the heavy electro stuff. But I don’t think anytime soon it is going to take over everything else.’
Tommy Trash originally kicked off his career as a piano player in Bundaberg, Queensland. He then went to the University of Queensland to study, of all things, trumpet. By his own admission he started ‘partying really hard’ and dropped out of uni… to make dance music. Shortly thereafter, he got signed to Ministry.
‘I still play trumpet and piano, but now it’s more about sitting down at the computer and making electronic stuff. For me it was always the obvious choice. Studying trumpet at uni was a bit depressing really because you’d spend hours sitting in an orchestra counting bars left in symphony orchestras.
‘And then I found out that orchestral musicians – and I don’t know if this is true – but orchestral musicians have one of the highest suicide rates in professions. I think dentists are the highest.’
So other than potentially putting him on watch, have there been any benefits of studying classical music?
‘I think it comes in really handy when I’m writing the progressive house tunes because I think there’s a lot of melodic content that goes in to that stuff. Being a classical musician means you can come up with the material a lot quicker.
One thing is sure: when it comes to dance music, Tommy Trash will make you move!
Sessions Seven, featuring Tommy Trash, is out now through Ministry of Sound. www.ministryofsound.com.au
Scott-Patrick Mitchell
