A bit of Therapy with Dave Seaman...

After only a few sentences chatting with Dave Seaman on the phone from his home in London...he has returned after a month or so of touring America (with Phil K) on the back of the first release of his new Therapy Sessions series... I get the distinct impression that he's very happy with his lot at the moment. He sounds relaxed, comfortable, and genuinely excited about his new project...not to mention his future as a married man as well. Yes you read correctly, so you can cross Dave Seaman off that list of eligible bachelor DJ's. Apparently it happened last year whilst he was in Sydney, "I was actually proposed to!' he tells me.

Therapy Sessions, Dave's newest offering, features one disc mixed by the man himself and the other by arguably the hottest property going around at the moment, Melbourne's Phil K. After recently coming out of his contracts with both Renaissance and Global Underground, Dave decided that it was time to start a mix series of his own, anchored around the label that he started a few years back. "The idea is pretty much for me to do one disc, whilst the second will come from some of the amazing up and coming talent we have around, such as Phil, Lexicon Avenue or Infusion for example.' Those of us who are lucky enough to reside in Melbourne have been singing Phil K's praises for many years, and so, it would seem, has Dave Seaman. "The first time I met Phil was back in 1993 when I first came out to Melbourne. We've been great friends ever since and a few years ago Phil said to me that he thought he was ready to take his wares to the rest of the world, so of course I wanted to help him if I could. The same thing happened with Pappa actually, I'm more than happy to help support people who are as talented as they are.'

The Therapy Sessions formula does seem to be a strong one, exposing a few artists who've been knocking at the door for some time now to a wider audience, whilst giving Dave the opportunity to continue to push his own sounds but perhaps this time completely on his own terms. With this release, Dave has turned in a solid, albeit a little deeper sounding than usual mix, whilst Phil has put together one of his trademark mixes of eclectic and twisted breaks and beats. When pushed on what his ideas and aspirations for this mix were, it seems that it comes down to keeping the balance. "With Phil putting together a more eclectic mix I really wanted to keep things balanced by providing a more 4/4 club type one. But in the future, if someone else mixes that type of disc then it might give me the opportunity to do something different, even a chill out disc, or whatever.'

So what about Audio Therapy then- The label had its beginnings a few years back, however whilst enjoying some rather large success with Infusion's Legacy, it seemed to stall for a while. Famously, the label signed Highland's massive 'No Way Out' late in 2001 but with all the delays they seemed to be experiencing it never saw the light of day on AT, finally getting a full release late in 2003 back through Vapour Recordings (even with the cheekily titled 'In and Out of Therapy Remix' on one of the two discs). According to Dave, it all came down to staffing problems in the end, meaning that he was forced to work on the label between everything else...obviously not enough time to run things properly. With new label manager Scott Davison in charge of it now, Audio Therapy definitely looks like a label worth watching. Their release schedule looks very hot indeed with Habersham's recent AT debut (Transparent Sound/Follow the White Rabbit which are both incidentally included on the first Therapy Sessions
release) starting the ball rolling for releases by Stel & Good Nez along possibly with the long awaited release of Infusion's take on Jase from Outer Space's 'Do What You Want'. Line all of those records up together and one thing that stands out is their diversity...twisted brea Tags

• Seaman
• Phil K
• Audio
• Therapy